Got a general basic question here. I have built my own powered, draw bench and basically wanting to know if I should draw my wire through each hole twice on the draw plate or just once. Trying to cut down on processing time.
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I only draw once, but do it slowly with some sort of lubrication. The wire on the input side can get to shaking or vibrating if I pull it too fast. This is something that your powered draw bench might do. At least for me, this shaking or vibrating leaves small waves in the wire on the output side. Just my $.02ā¦Rob
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drawing once is enough per hole. parafin wax makes a good lubricant. as soon as the wire shows any sign of stiffening, anneal, anneal oftenā¦ annealing is essential to prevent cracking, surface blemishes and internal cracks or weak points. clean the residual carbon off the wire between annealing and drawing, then reapply lubricant. I used parafin wax because it could be pushed into the holes of the drawplate.
If the wire is vibrating it could be too stiff. If your draw is powered, al the more power to you!!! ā¦ slow pull gentler than fast though, adjust the speed.
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Thank you, gave it a try on yesterday and drawing through 1 hole 1 time is plenty. Cut my time at the draw bench in half. Thanks for the info
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I would love to know how to make my own!
Kimberlyā¦Making wire is fairly easy. As long as you can cast and roll out ingots to a smaller square shape, all you need is a draw plate and some sort of draw bench. There has been a lot of discussion about draw benches that you can access in the archives. You can buy draw plates in many different shapes that progress through various size ranges. Donāt buy inexpensive draw plates. Itās another one of those ājust do itā exercises after which you will wonder why you waited so long. just remember to anneal often. Good luckā¦Rob
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You mentioned basics in another postā¦ some basics that will save you money: make your own sheet and wireā¦ you will have to invest in a rolling mill that does rods as well as sheets. Rolling mills are pricey but well worth the investment. You also will need to invest in an ingot mold. I have a steel adjustable mold that will take a pour for a sheet ingot and for rodsā¦ Pouring molds requires some practiceā¦ the mold has to be well heated for molten metal to fully fill the spaceā¦ first attempts can be failures, even second or thirdā¦ but the metal can be remelted and reused so thereās no lossā¦ just be mindful that pouring molten metal is very dangerousā¦ any spills will burn anything that is combustible.
I did all of my pouring outside on a homemade table top with a ceramic tile inset with left over tiles from a bathroom remodling project. Having the top inset helps catch spills and saves metal, as well as preventing molten metal from falling on anything combustible and setting it on fireā¦
The final thing to invest in is a draw plate. These are not very expensiveā¦ steel draw plates have graded holes going from 1 gauge down to 22g or even smallerā¦ One youāve poured a rod ingot, pass it thru the rolling mill to the smallest size that the mill hasā¦ rolling is the same as pulling wireā¦ the rod has to be repeatedly annealed and cleanedā¦if you pickle between rollings make sure that the rod is well cleaned and free or acid. also well driedā¦ you donāt want acid or water to get on the mill and ruin the finishā¦once you have a rod with a small enough diameter, sharpen the end with a file so that the tip will stick thru the drawplate and pull it throughā¦ some people use draw tongs to pull, but Iāve found that a set of heavy duty pliers works just as wellā¦ with each pull you will need to sharpen the end to a tip for it to fit into the next smaller holeā¦ just repeat the process until your wire is at the gauge that you wantā¦itās repetitious, but pretty amazing how long a wire of small gauge can be pulled from a small rodā¦ten feet or moreā¦ you will need to cut the wire in half when it getās too longā¦ too hard to evenly pull a 6 foot long wireā¦you can make enough wire in one session to last a long timeā¦ I did it before the internet was in full swingā¦ looked it up in booksā¦ now all of the information on how to make wire is onlineā¦
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Draw benches donāt need to be expensive or fancyā¦ I made a stand for my rolling mill out of scrap 2X 6 lumber. The boards were doubled up for stabiity, strength and weightā¦ no rocking of the stand when usedā¦ I used the same stand with a large jawed clamp bolted inā¦ clamped the draw plate, and started pullingā¦no need for draw tongs or other expensive accessoriesā¦ heavy duty pliers did the job for pulling. pulling one rod makes a very long length of wireā¦
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I forgot to mention that rolling out the rod has to be done carefully alsoā¦ as soon as the metal feels a bit stiff, annealā¦ anneal oftenā¦ work hardening of the metal will lead to surface flaking, internal cracks and other defects. Any defects in the rod will carry over into the wireā¦same goes for rolling out sheetā¦ err on the side of NOT thinning out the metal quicklyā¦ Donāt try to squeeze something down too quickly as it will lead to defectsā¦
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Ate you wanting to make your own powered draw bench?
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Yes
Practice make perfect. I second the ājust do itā.
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Donāt bother with a powered draw benchā¦ start with just doing it!.. pour the rod, roll it and pull only need a heavy duty pair of locking pliersā¦ took me several pours to get it rightā¦ some of my rods crackedā¦ not getting the perfect result the first time is not abnormalā¦ next time goes easier and the next time easierā¦ pulling didnāt present a problem once you do it in a steady and interrupted motionā¦once you get the hang of it, itās fineā¦ just remember that you can make many feet of wire from a single rod pourā¦ donāt need to to it very often if you are doing home studio workā¦
Also refer to the discussion of ingot embrittlementā¦ āhelp needed with cracking sterling silverāā¦this discussion is about one of the problems you can run across and happens quite frequentlyā¦ what is happening with the silver cracking in this particular case still is unsolved, but the common causes have been discussedā¦avoiding the common ones will save you some time and frustrationā¦ this specific case is still somewhat of a mystery as the common problems have been excludedā¦ the last post on the topic mentioned testing the metal with XRFā¦ looking now at trace element contaminationā¦way beyond what most people would have a problem withā¦
my apologies, I misdirected my post to you instead of to KimberlyJā¦ sorry
Sorry for misdirecting my post to CletisSā¦ It was suposed to be directed to youā¦ you can see it on this threadā¦didnāt catch it until now when the discussion is oldā¦ hope you have tried something in the intervalā¦ just do it was my bottom line contribution, seconded by MichealS. Let us know where you are in your endeavorā¦ best of luckā¦and sorry for to CletisS and you for the misdirect.