sort, cleanup and experment day today.

after I sorted and cleaned up my little yard today I tried a couple of experments, sadly neither came out as I had hoped.



1. I read on the forum that you can seperate HD magnets with heat, so I fired up the torch, too much heat I guess, the metals seperated but lost all magnetism. but at least I know hot to seperate them if I ever find a buyer for the metal.

2. tried to make a flower pot forge using the torch for a heat source. again too much heat I guess broke the pot, and the alu came out all dirty looking. ok so back to the books.

3. tried to use the torch to seperate copper from smaller armatures, no luck there either just burned up the copper. back to the drawing board. and yes gus I know a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing . promise ill keep reading and get it right.

I think the reason the copper burned instead of melted was the amount of free oxygen present when you used your torch. I believe the reason a furnace is used instead of open air is that in a furnace, any available oxygen is consumed by the flame, leaving little free oxygen to oxidize (burn) the copper.

ya I though that would happen just looking for a quick way. but they never seem to work I have the brick. a 15 gal water heater and an old b b q just havent had the time to put it all together yet.

Good luck to you OD. Let me know if I can help.

thanks

I wanna build a furnace too. I have way to many projects nopw though.

I had some leftover charcoal and a cheap BBQ grill. I mounded up the charcoal over the top of several small armatures, lit it and closed the top of the BBQ. Well, a little vent on top of the BBQ was left open. Went back after it had cooled down and found the varnish had burned off. It was easy to pull the copper wire out. So would reccomend a low heat rather than trying to meld the copper, Mike.

Keep in mind aluminum furnaces put off dioxins and furons. Both of which are regulated particulates by the EPA. The last thing you want is the EPA showing up and doing air and ground sampling at your house. Yes I have a story of being caught by the EPA doing the exact same thing back in day all we got was a warning twice then they mentioned if they came back a third time and caught us someone was going to jail. I was 14 or 15 at the time. We made a homemade furnace for cooking irony aluminum it worked great until we got shut down. We were also cleaning electric motors.