How to Cast Small Metal and Rubber Parts 2nd Edition

How to Cast Small Metal and Rubber Parts
2nd Edition

Using this excellent sourcebook as a guide, you can easily make high quality, defect-free castings for almost any purpose... at amazingly low cost! Just some of the countless uses you'll find for this potentially profitable skill... making obsolete or vintage car parts, hood ornaments, garden and fireplace tools, kitchen utensils, automotive parts, replacing broken antique parts, reproducing sculpture, plaques, and other art... all kinds of decorative and useful objects for your own use or to sell!

Writing in nontechnical language, author William Cannon, provides all the instruction you need to cast any part... putting an end to those long and often unfruitful scavenger hunts through shops, flea markets, and swap meets. This all-new, time- and money-saving second edition of the "bible" on casting small metal and rubber parts guides you through all the basics of foundry work.

You'll learn how to reproduce or create new items of brass, bronze, or other metals... or almost anything made of rubber. Cannon shows you how to organize your own home workshop—the equipment you'll need, how much it costs, and how to set it all up! You can even open your own full- or part-time business.

You'll discover which metal is better for certain jobs and why, how to choose molding sands, how to design and produce molds, and how to repair castings. Plus all new information is included on coremaking, casting problems and their causes, finishing castings and correcting defects... even new chapters on grinding, polishing, and buffing. Plus the completely updated and revised information on casting rubber parts will bring you up-to-date on all the recent developments in polyurethane rubber.

Table of Contents

Part 1 — Casting Metal Parts
Survey of casting methods | Casting your own hood ornament | Alloys you can cast | Foundry equipment: Make it yourself | Molding sands, fluxes, degassers, and flasks | How to make and pour molds | Core making | Casting problems and their causes | Finishing castings and correcting defects | Do's and don'ts for safety | Foundry terms

Part 2 — Casting Rubber Parts
Rubber and a space-age substitute | Making a top bow rest pad | Making a four-hole grommet | Making door bumpers and check straps | Making a fender lamp pad | Metal molds for more precision | Ingenuity replaces original part | Molding from defective patterns | Molding with a metal insert | Making a weatherstripping mold | How to estimate amounts needed | Be careful, clean, dry, and accurate! | Tips on cutting and shaping rubber

Appendix
Where to buy supplies and equipment

About the Author

William A. Cannon is Technical Editor of Skinned Knuckles Magazine, a monthly magazine for automobile collectors and restorers. He has spent over 30 years as a materials engineer and scientist in the chemical, automotive, and aerospace industries.