Making a keg foundry furnace.
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- čas přidán 5. 09. 2021
- For those thinking of making their first furnace, I actually would not recommend using a keg.
It’s bigger than you really need. But if you plan on doing bigger melts this is an option for you. This furnace will fit a #6 or #8 crucible.
That’s after I sized it down. I cut 3 1/2” out of the middle to size it down. Do that right away unlike what I did.
I prefer the furnace I made out of a propane tank. It’s smaller so it heats up faster, hotter and uses far less fuel. And is plenty big enough for most of my melts. I use a #4 crucible in the propane tank furnace. You can find that video here:
How to build a foundry out of a propane tank in under 5 minutes: back yard Foundry
• How to build a foundry...
Cost of build and material used.
I bought most of the material from local fire brick stores in Minneapolis so prices will vary.
Keg-$25
Mizzou refractory cement, 55lb- $50
2”x 2’x6’ of ceramic insulation- $90
1/2”x2’ x2’ ceramic insulation- $20
Sairset mortar, 1 gallon- $20
Greenpatch 421 mortar, 1 gallon- $30
Note: Some of these things I had left over from other builds and it’s not necessary to get each one of these products. For example I used a very small amount of the refractory cement. I’ve seen people but metal inserts around the rim to strengthen them instead of using cement. That would be a cheaper option.
Chamber size. It’s 10”wide by 11” tall. Remember the bigger the chamber the more it takes to heat all that space up. And the more mortar and cement you have in there the longer it will take to heat up and the more fuel you will use. - Zábava
I really appreciate your willingness to share your work process. A lot of the content makers have tons of money and all the tools ever made and can easily do any task. But you're a real man like most of us and have limited access to expensive materials and you show us how you manage. Thanks again.
It's awesome that you show any mistakes or failures. There's much more depth to the information when you do. Thank you sir!
Lundgren studos does an EXCELLENT job explanng the craft and foundry processes! Not only the"how" but more importantly the "why"...thank you man..youre "spot on"!
Failing isn't the same as failure. Keep learning, and keep up the good work
I appreciate that you showed us the problems that you encountered and how you worked your way through them. There are so many ways to build a furnace. I am now inspired to finish my first one! Thank you!
stainless will work harden when drilling. the key to drilling stainless is slower rpm on the drill. I finding pulsing the trigger works well. drill a second, stop a second, drill a second. Nice build
You beat me to it. A brand new drill bit, coolant, ...and ...slow ....slow ...slow
if a material hardens upon drilling, you need to feed the drill rather than in one go yes but you also should use a coolant (1 part oil, 20 parts water should be fine). The reason it hardens is due to the heat making the carbon in the alloy connect and your drill head kinda softens. Using a coolant and feeding in bits is the solution.
I did not know that, thanks.
Used to have to drill hundreds of holes on site with a few hand sharpened 6mm drill bits I’d bring along. Lots of little tricks to do it, slightly slower speed is one, but the major one is constant pressure. As soon as you back off pressure slightly it’ll work harden and dull your bit. Couldn’t use any coolant on site
Also used to drill hundreds of holes in stainless. Some of my coworkers were going through drill bits like water. I'd try to explain it to them to just pulse them, but I was just a kid. What did I know? I think one guy thought I had a magic bit until he burned that one up, too. I just resharpened it and went back to using it.
You can lead the horse to water, but can't make 'em drink.
Good work mate, just as a tip to stop cracking, I line mine between the fibre and cement with aluminium foil, it will stop the moisture from escaping into the fibre so quickly and stop cracks.
My cement is 1 inch thick minimum, 2 inch is better for extended use as it holds the heat better. But will increase the weight significantly, 1 inch is ample.
As the bottom gets burnt and bits and pieces build up you can, pour a thin new floor and repair sides as required.
So better to have a little cavity within so you can repair the floor a few times before the crucible is to close to the top.
For example:- a crucible fractures and you lose the contents to the furnace, and yes that happened to me🤣
Using chicken wire will also stop the walls cracking if you make a cage and secure the ends together properly.
Pour a pancake type thickness mixture and pour it in and have a 1 inch step at the top ( also wired ) and separated by aluminium foil.
I must remind you that this is tedious work and requires patience and skill, small tears are tolerable, but ideally you want no holes.
Your cracking should be eliminated.
I use an 80,000 btu burner and a 3 inch hole is a good size I’ve found, I have tried a few different sizes, 3 inch for and 80,000btu burner creates a small pressure within and will help force out loose debris during operation.
I also never let the refractory touch the burner, you may want to take it out from time to time to inspect the nozzle or even replace the tip.
I also repeat this process for the lid.
I’ve only ever built 1 furnace for myself it is years old and has never been relined or even repaired.
Once hot it will melt 2.5 kgs of brass in 7-9 mins.
Copper in 1/2 an hour from cold and about 15-20 mins melts for 2.5-3.5 kgs there after at about 25 deg C ambient temperature.
I run mine at .2 Mpa with a full crucible to start for about 15 mins till everything has a dull glow.
To melt brass once heated I’m usually at .3-.4 MPA and 1.0-1.2 MPA for copper.
It is very well insulated.
Separation of the rock wool and the cement is critical for long jeopardy and good heat retention.
I’m usually melting 15-20 kgs each time I fire her up, this will save you plenty in gas and I would do all that melting on less than 1 bottle in about 2 hours.
You done a good job with the available tools you have.👏👏
Enjoy the copper melting and well done👍👏👏🇦🇺
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Perfect advice I’m a 5 th generation brick mason and my uncles built most of the furnace’s at Bethlehem steel here in Baltimore Maryland they were great brick layers my uncle Felix Santoro and his brother Phil Santoro both died from asbestos and it came from the furnaces and boilers they built back then those hard working Italians and Irish and polish ect didn’t have any one who gave a shit about their safety or health the immigrants of the late 1800s and the early 1900’s were taken advantage of in many ways that would never happen now a day RIP UNCLE FELIX-UNCLE PHIL AND UNCLE MIKE I miss everyone of you and at 51 years old I am as good as the 3 of you I hope your proud love ya
What do you mean regarding separation of rock wool and masonry? At the floor? A air gap?
Did anyone else tear up a little bit watching all that perfectly good beer get poured out? No? Just me? Well, ok then. From now on, I need to "inspect" all kegs before use.
I had to immediately get up and go look at the beer in my fridge for a while, just to rein in the anxiety. Just looked at them. Not like I talked to them. I'm OK now, though. Thanks for listening.
My keg and the beer inside is about ten years old so the beer is no loss. otherwise i feel your pain!
😥 The Beer ....
I cried
I'm broke for a few hours and I'm dying for a beer
Watching that was heartbreaking
In fact I immediately commented that it broke my heart.
So many steps to the project ... very impressed and proud of you!
Thanks for the content, I really appreciate that you make realistic and simple tutorials, that tapered swivel is a very neat trick!
Nice job ...thanks for sharing your experience with us ...particularly the adjustments ....👍👍👍
Very nicely done. Thank you for the time and effort to make and post this video. As I'm planning a build and happen to have a keg, thank God, this was very helpful, especially the boo-boos and changes.
as a bloke looking to make himself a forge this video came along at just the right time, after watching it I'm glad it did, you got yourself another subscriber today , thanks mate
This is not knocking you at all, but I am glad I bought a premade furnace. I would be so frustrated by this point. You did awesome work and thank you so much showing what went wrong and why. This will be super helpful when I want to step up my game and make a bigger furnace.
Looking forward to your coming projects!
Love the lid swivel idea, waiting on my ceramic blanket, pretty sure I’m gunna steal your idea
Been a while. Glad you're back posting videos.
Like the message “how I did it”. Sizing the burn chamber to the crucible is good stuff. Glad you were able to save your build.
watched a lot of Diy furnace making videos. Your´s seem to be the best one.... Well done. and thank you
Awesome video. I have a keg and plan to use it to make my own forge and it was brilliant seeing how you made it. I don’t have a welder but my friend Noel does. Will be a great project, you sir are a legend
Your awesome for sharing. My boyfriend is the type that needs to go to extremes when making, fixing, creating things. (Tim the Tool Man Taylor is the best way to describe him.) He needs to see how a smaller chamber is better like you've shown here. Thank you for sharing.
Great video!! Look forward to seeing more of your videos.
I really like your How I did it approach when I am making my plans, I see what I might be able to do better and what i don't want to do. Then I go learn more about the materials and why it didn't work like we expected.
That’s the goal. I don’t want people to follow what I do. I want people to improve on what I do.
Great video! Glad to see you back. Hope you post again soon.
Fantastic content. Short, to the point, but enough details to understand it.
very informative, thanks. Cover the hole on top till you need in it.
I like it, I made mine out of a 1/4 barrel keg instead of starting with a half barrel as you did. I used refractory bricks and cement. I have it setup with both a PID controlled electric element and I also drilled a hole in the side where I put in a gas venturi. I have not had a chance to fire it up yet but looking forwards to it.
Hi Gary from the UK I'm an old heating engineer and I think if you lay the thing you are welding on it's side so it's flat it will be better as opposed to welding vertically, you will get a better run.
Great video very interesting and informative keep them coming
Thank you for making a honest video you inspired me to make this and saved me allot of time
Can't believe after 2yrs and 267 comments, nobody has called you out on your tig weld. Specifically, the carbon filler rod on the stainless steel keg. But, my hat goes off to you, for documenting and sharing your knowledge !!
It’s holds together all the same. Haha.
must be something about welders that they always shit can someone who isnt a welder but still has a go
The best method is always the one that works for you. So, nice job and thanks for telling us about the problems you had. An honest man!
I would have built the whole thing out of fire cement and reduced the chamber diameter even further but that's just me.
That would be one way to do it but all that cement is a heat sink and takes a lot longer to get up to temperature. That’s why I chose to do it the hard way.
Thus genius work❤ I like the fact that there where cracks and you had to solve the brakes splendid work
thank you for making this, it was really clear to follow and prevented me from making a massive heat sink garbage can furnace for my 6kg crucible 😂
Good luck with your build.
That lid is awesome!
Great post ! I made mine following your build but used a propane bottle for mine. I can just get a 1.5 kilo crucible in to it. Just a tad small and can do in a graphite crucible in no time so I went back to a good old ceramic piece that is doing great and a bunch / cheaper than the graphite ones by a LOT ! and can get hundreds of pours through them. Unlike the graphite ones.
Good post bud. Take care and pour on my friend.
Good job overcoming the design and build challenges. If you're still wanting to build more of these, ceramic supply shops have all of the things you need to dial in the cements. Grog, in particular, will turn your shrinking mortar into a nice surface treatment. Anywhere from 5 to 10 parts grog to mortar will do the trick. Throw in some fine saw dust, maybe 2 or 3 parts by volume, as well, and it'll burn out, leaving behind some air spaces which will resist heat transfer. As you saw with the Greenpatch, you can also add in simple fiberglass, kaowool, or rockwool to improve the green strength and resist shrinkage (I swear, this is the first time it shrunk!) You can play around with all of these variables to create an incredibly efficient and protective chamber wall! I made all of these same mistakes the first time I made a foundry furnace. The only "mistake" (because the rest is just learning) is leaving out a hole in the bottom. A big enough melt and cracked crucible becomes a rebuild job rather than just a clean up job.
Finally, when you get around to building another burner, you can use the various cements and ceramic material to make a burner flare which will last a long time and fit the application perfectly!
I converted my foundry to a ribbon burner and that made a significant difference in the amount of heat output for my setup. I really recommend a ribbon burner over any kind of single pipe jet type.
Yeah I do think I need to upgrade my burner.
My furnace doesn't run well. Never even thought about making the inside smaller (at this point I only own tiny crucibles). Thank you for the good work!
Great video. Very interesting hobby you have here.
good job! thanks for showing all the process
Great Video man. I would suggest having a couple of sleeves, one smaller than the other so you can insert one them inside the main furnace with a cutout for the burner. A thin layer of refractory cement with some fibre gauze over the blanket to stop the cracking
That lid lifting hinge was genius. Thanks!
You could use a rising butt hinge too.
Love your videos! Thank you sir
Good work pal, videos feels so natural. I’ve subscribed for more
Wonderful!
If you sharpen masonary bits, they can be used to drill stainless steel with minimal burning. Great channel. 😃
Awsome build. Been dragging out my own bild for years now. Got all I need to make waterglass, hope vinegar and bakingsoda will do for co2 making? Very inspirational channel You got going.👍
CO2 from the air will work it just takes a long time. Vinegar and baking soda will be a lot faster.
Great video, I think a lid of some sort may keep the heat in and help get it to melting point quicker
Good video! Appreciate you showing what went not as well to save your viewers the same mistakes!
I wish I could say I did it on purpose but I just screw up a lot. Haha.
Thanks heaps, I’m starting on my furnace build and your video was absolutely brilliant. I’ve just been stacking fire bricks when required up to now😂. I certainly didn’t realise that having a bigger furnace would make melting so much harder so now I will follow your advice and make mine to suit the crucibles I use. If you’re interested there is channel called Mark Presling and he is changing his burner over to diesel as diesel has about 60% more energy than propane so the furnace will burn much hotter, and of course, diesel is much safer. I’m glad I found your channel as it’s very informative and I really like your style. Thanks for saving me so much waisted time and effort and I would like to give your channel a shoutout when I make my furnace. Cheers mate, Stuart 🇦🇺
I’ve been thinking up upgrading to to diesel burner as well.
@@lundgrenbronzestudios I think it maybe the way to go so ill see how Mark gets on. 👍👍
So I found the furnace video I thought I was suggesting. Noob, I know! It's a good channel mr. I'm pleased to have subbed to your effort. Try two bottles and two burners for the bigger furnace. My friend makes his melt with charcoal and a blower. It's slow and uses a heap of fuel. the fire is a serious flame though. Thanks for showing your keg furnace 👍
Hey brother, watched a few of your videos now and you have a good channel going. I love the idea of getting in to foundry work. Am in the process of getting items together to make a furnace/ forge, it’ll really be for heat treating metal but I want to be able to melt metals as well so am gonna build it with that in mind, anyway thought I’d drop you a message, I’ve subbed, so all the best and keep the coming, I liked your animal castings they are something special very good.
Looks good, I wish I had made mine a bit shorter too, think I have to much head space about the crucible, I can melt about 40lbs of copper in about an hour, but it takes about 3/4 of a 20lb propane tank of gas to do it. I like the greenpatch too, but I dont like the way it cracks, I think I need to get some refractory and fix my lid with that, I keep having issues with the GP421 coming off after I use it. Cool Build, looks great.
A forced air burner will stretch the propane.. it's crazy efficient!
He he just the idea I had. Good stuff man.
I did mine inverted, refractory cement for outside walls and then lined the inside with wool and then used a plasticizer to harden the inside layer of the wool. That way the wool insulates and the cement sinks any of the heat that escapes, the wool is easily replaceable and I’d rather use that as a consumable than to have to redo any refractory in the long run. Only ever re lined the Kaowool once and it was because it got left outside the shop to cool off and got rained on because I forgot to check the weather forecast lol, so it got soggy and fell apart, other than that the wool itself, when plasticized holds up well, probably done 20-30 burns and it still seems fine
Plasticiser? Like what is used in mixing/reading water in cement?
Looks good. Smart choice to coat the insulation with a thin coat of refractory mortar instead of casting a thicker hot face. The benefits of greater thermal mass on efficiency don't kick in until you are doing back to back to back melts all day in more of a production setting and it becomes more about keeping the furnace hot as opposed to heating it up initially. 👍
Reminded me of the first keg I bought when I was in high school. (Drinking age was 18) I remember looking down at that ball in the tap with out the slightest thought given. I reached down and pushed it with my thumb. Instantly I was wearing at least a gallon of beer. Super soaker. Good times! GOOD TIMES!
😆
Thank you this is very informative
There is a spray-on kind that you can buy for your ceramic blanket.
Thank you for this very sincere, staightforward presentation. I was watching to see if you were going to place a drain hole in the bottom. Some do. Mine is not as precise as yours, but i am hoping it will melt ok. I need to fill in the airspace, as you did
I decided not to put a drain hole. Maybe in the future I’ll regret that but we’ll see. So far it hasn’t been an issue.
@@lundgrenbronzestudios Thank you
Very nice and very well explained video , I'm inspired to start making my sculptures in my workshop now . Congratulations , you have a natural and very good way on teaching , also linking DIY foundry and art .
It would be better for me to build a bronze furnace out of LPG cask as it's found everywhere in Brasil.
It's about 13" high ( without foot and handle) x 14" in diameter .
Could you give the dimensions of that furnace , also of the crucible please ?
Thanks 🎉
Thanks for the video!
More on the burner would be nice.
I wish I knew more about burners as well.
Definitely need more BTU's
Welds were pretty sad but nice build! 🙂👍
Haha. Would you believe I’m a self taught welder 😆 I’ve got a lot to learn in the art of metal surgery.
Lots of good info. I used to make them 1998ish but forgot. Mine had A frame each side 3/4 hight of furnace and the furnace about 25cm off the ground {cruicable was CNG tank and outer shell 44 gal drum or 12 gal cant remember which had the K_O wool} the furnace was hinged at top of A frames with pins welded to crucible, it had a pipe welded on the back - and i had a platform for castings in front, when metal hot enough off comes the lid - put a long rod used for handle into welded pipe top back of furnace and pull towardyou / basically tip the furnace and pour. I was making big castings - Aluminium lathe heads almost meter high - but never completed it. I have a habbit of doing something - get ambitious / greedy and want bigger better / start again and so on so nothing to little gets completed. I used to run two LPG bottles together or they would freeze and slow - run through old single barrel carborator buterfly with old vacum cleaner on blow shoved in.
For those new to Al who dont know - if you get lots of little bubbles in the metal when you machine it its called hydrogen bubbles from moisture {hindsite now I should have had lid on crucible inside furnace to keep LPG mosture out} but before pour Id run a car steel brakehose pipe hooked up to Argon bottle and buble it and stir made the metal very clean. If you heat with metal only melting AL pour as soon as melted if you leave it tryingto do things better like I did - then you end up with lumpy metal.
great video
At 11:13 nice work, good idea :-)
Anyways steel keg will last much longer (or even forever) than the propane crate. Thanks for the video, is very interesting and the fact that you showed the "don´ts" make it much more genuine than the video where everything goes perfect with rainbows and flowers, every process have a bunch of fails in order to succeed, and now I learned than short keg may be more proper than tall ones.
The propane tank is also stainless steel.
@@lundgrenbronzestudios But more thin, less resistant, right?, at least is what I think, may I be wrong?
@@javo_roma no. The propane tank is actually thicker if it’s insulated properly the metal of the tank won’t even get much over a few hundred degrees.
if you use furnace cement and mix water in till its a paste and paint it on with paint brush it wont crack its a trick boiler workers use and i used it on my furnace but it does have little bubbles when fired.
I built my foundry about the same size. The burner I built uses oil and diesel which I can get the temperature high enough to melt cast iron.
I want to update my burner to diesel. I would like to play with molten iron.
Thanks for sharing
My thoughts on the cracking. Maybe the ceramic insulation is drawing the most out of the cement and making it dry to fast.
I mean, it’s ceramic. Would it wick water out?
great vid, tks, couple things. maybe bolt some metal casters on the bottom to make it easy to roll around. also, I have seen some guys make a chimney for the top to get it up to temp faster then remove when at working temp. have you ever heard of this?
Seeing beer wasted was heartbreaking
😆
Nice hinge ideal
Fyi. Can't tell in the vidio how fast the drill was going ,but when drilling stainless slow the bit down and use a bit more pressure. Avoid overheating the bit , wounce you blue it that's it for stainless. And of course start with a sharp bit . Nice work mate. 🤔😎🇦🇺👌
Awesome!
Nice forge never seen how it could be made
Should have used chicken wire mesh to stop the sairset from cracking. It’s thin and has pockets
I saw a video where the guy painted his zircon cloth with water-glass. Water glass is lye and silica gel from gel packs. I think its sodium silicate. It seemed to work well. There are videos on how to make water glass. Or try fireclay in some mixture with magnesium oxide, but difficult to keep it from crumbling under heat. I think gypsum drywall cut in 8 sides can be used because when it burns it gets rock hard. Or wet it and get it to bend in place. On the cheap, I am saying these to try.
Tells friend he wants a Beer keg, friend buys him a keg full of beer, he then proceeds to drill holes in the top of said keg and pours the beer down his driveway?
I used a thin layer of Satenite over the Kaowool insulation blanket, it's a dry powder that you mix with water and apply like cement over a wire mesh secured over the Kaowool, just like he secured the top insulation to the lid, I did not use wire mesh on the sides and bottom and it's still in one piece, but the Satenite did come loose from the insulation on the lid for a lack of wire mesh to hold it in place.
Satenite does not shrink and fully cures the first time you fire the furnace.
I also use a firebrick for a plinth inside and outside.
That was a great build.. I assume you were following Brian oltrogges build... which was great, but I like your simpler approach...
I’m not familiar with Brian Oltrogge but I studied a lot of designs and tried to combine the ideas I thought would be best.
Hole saw and oscillating saw may fit well in your arsenal.
Sprey with water every few hours while curing won't Crack. If it's to big add anther layer of insulation on inside to lower diameter.
If I put another layer of insulation in there wouldn’t be enough space for the crucible. The issue was too much empty space above the crucible.
Noooooo! There was tasty beer in there!🍻
A picture is worth a thousand words 🤔
Hi , I build a furnace very similar to your keg furnace using propane as well , but I found it was too slow and expensive to run so I changed the burner to diesel and was amazed at the difference
The time to temperature was nearly half and the cost of diesel used was a fraction of the cost . I think it is safer as well . I highly recommend switching . Regards Stu
Thanks for the tip. Do you have any suggestions for the burner you built/bought?
@@lundgrenbronzestudios hes talking about a forced air drip feed waste oil burner, theres great youtube vids on how to make a forced air waste oil foundry, they run on diesel aswell as waste oil, and hes not wrong they deffinantly heat up and melt copper in a quarter of the time at a fraction of the cost, i got waste oil free from my local dump and when it gets low i just replaced it with diesel because it was way easier and less messy than oil... i think one good channel making it is called 'oil burner' thats his youtube channel hes an australian guy who uses his to melt entire engine blocks.
The work was really excellent Please, I want to know the name of the music that accompanied the video
11:07 I like that swivel
You can put a towl over the opening of the keg but still it was very entertaining lol 😂
stainless is ok just shit for drilling as you have to go really slow and push hard if you go fast heats up and hardend :) nice work man
I have a small enough furnace, with a ring made of refractory concrete that i can use to add 3" of height, so that i can (just about) fit a larger crucible.
Good to see you leave your fuck-ups in the video and not edit them out.
Most of us watching stuff like this aren’t professionals we all learn from our mistakes. Great job. 👌
Sweden here: I know when thery are building houses, and add cement, sometimes they add plastic on top, or water it carefully to avoid cracks. Should be the same here.
A propane furnace diy that lists the materials needed? Impossible!
i am by no means an expert... you are more experienced than me... but... Titanium mesh is not very pricy.. Titanium has a very high melting point...it may be worth considering using titanium mesh as a kind of rebar for your refactory that your lid will rest on.... it should make it a lot stronger and more durable very affordably....... love your videos.. keep being you..
an old trick you can use... when you dont have a hole saw or a band saw or the right tool for the job..... is to use a drill... drill a bunch of holes around the parameter of the shape you need.. then use your dremel or a hack saw to basically connect the dots... and finish out the shape.
If you vibrate as you go it will pull up any air bubbles trapped and pull them to the surface…less cracking
Nooooo, not the beer.....😂😎🇦🇺👌
😆
That is how I drink my beer blasted right into my face I am drunk in seconds =)
😆
Awesome
This is cool and I like your videos. Where do you get beer kegs and what size is it?
Paul
People sometimes sell them on Facebook marketplace.
I run a gas line to s pipe and hook it up to bouncy hosir blower I use way less propane and it’s so much hotter but brwewsre u have to use thr Bret material because I’ve melted my lid with refractory and thr fire blanket behind it melted lol