Die Cast Mold

[IdeaMakers]

After milling the mold more to open the bottom to let hot metal pool and the top to make it easier to pour, try 3 resulted in only two beads. The ones on the right of the photo are the newest, better alignment of the mold and a little better shape.

   

For try 3 I placed the mold upside down on the furnace trying to heat the mold top to bottom. So for try 4 I placed it right side up trying to get heat into where the metal would pool. Cracking open the mold to peak in I could see there were still only two beads formed. Under the heading of "It seemed like a good idea" I clamped up the mold with C clamps and placed the entire mold into the furnace hoping to melt the copper and let it flow through the mold. The result, a couple of ruined C clamps and two pieces of steel welded together with cooper.

   

The C clamps couldn't hold up to the heat and thus the mold split apart and copper ran out. Back into the furnace with it all to try and melt the copper again and get the pieces apart. I'll pretty much have to remill to flatten the pieces and then back over everything to clean out the remaining copper.

   

So time to rethink the whole idea, begin with something smaller and less complex to see what happens.