Given the price of silver right now I am hoping to reuse scraps for students in my classes. I have one larger ingot mild, but what is the suggestion for ones that will be better for wite and small sheet? Looking on Amazon at the moment in hopes of also saving some money, but what constitutes a “bad” ingot mold to purchase?
You can buy an ingot mold that will cast both wire and sheet. You get what you pay for applies to them in terms of alignment and the amount of flashing that they create. I just bought the Durston version because it would do larger rod (up to 10mm), than my older mold. I can get at least 12” of 8 gauge from the 8mm groove. It will also do sheet. I have made molds out of hard charcoal blocks . You just carve the shape that you want with a burr and then open cast into it. I have also poured melted silver into a depression ground into the charcoal and then quickly covered it with another piece of hard charcoal. This allows you to get a uniform thickness. When I need an odd shaped ingot, I arrange pieces of square steel rod on my anvil and hold them in place with small magnets and pour into the opening that the rods create. I am sure that others will have more ideas. Good luck…Rob
I forgot about using delft clay or petrobond to cast odd shaped ingots or even rods…Rob
I’ve never heard of using an anvil, square steel rod, and magnets to pour an ingot. That is thinking outside the box Rob!
Jeff
You should also look at Hans Meevis’ adjustable ingot mold…Rob
I ditto Rob. Contact Hans Meevis. You won’t be disappointed.
Kind regards,
Lois
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I am in the road or I’d post a photo of my combination mold by I suspect it is the same tool most of us already have. Four different rod sizes and after turning the mold around you have a sheet mold that will give you a variety of sizes that max out at about business card size, 8ga. thick. My most used method is the Delft Clay method Rob described to me years ago. (Great for triangular wire) And I have square rods and magnets too.
I use a lot of discs so I puddle up scrap on a hard fire brick. Since it wants to be round anyway I can hammer it flat and then chase it through the rolling mill to get 20-22ga disc. Then I leave the edges ragged or I finish them up in the disc cutter. Which ever fits the project……
Don Meixner
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