On Sept 14th, 2019, Mike Kamin of the WI chapter of American Foundry Society brought their traveling educational setup for kids to use/learn metal casting/pouring for our monthly Inventor's Skillz (2nd Saturday's 9-11AM).
Here is an 8 sec clip that shows the metal actually pouring! Some of the forms that were brought were smiley faces, star wars emblems or a shark bottle opener.
We had a very large group that wanted to see this process. Like all events we request that for each child present that an adult chaperone also is there to help us moderate a safe learning environment for everybody. This was the most dangerous one we probably did, but with gloves and eye protection we were well prepared to make this fun and safe!
Here are the electric crucibles that melted the tin pellets. Surprisingly after they were up to temperature you could melt new pellets in a minute or two.
Each participant had an opportunity to sift sand on the form and then pack more into each form box. Two halves were made, one with the shape and another with a cone spire that could be removed so that there was a hole to pour the metal.
Here is the video clip again.
The final parts after cooling and breaking out of the sand castings. The metal was still fairly soft after cooling and thus could easily be removed from the joining H with only a pair of side cutters.
Thanks again to Mike and Taylor who made this a very popular edition of Inventor's Skillz.
