I have been casting for a little over a year off and on and I'm still trying to perfect it. I have heard that hard candle wax makes a good flux. Does it, and if not, what would make a good cheap fluz.

Lots of casters use candle stubs for flux. I don't have a supply myself and use canning parrafin. It does burn off a bit too fast, but doesn't stink as much as most other fluxes. Sawdust or bacon grease work fine outdoors. Check out this article.
http://www.sixguns.com/crew/simplefluxing.htm

Bye
Jack

thank you verry much

thank you verry much
try bees wax works real good Forest

gmgearhead22

A simple glob of common pine-pitch, about the size of a marble will do a 20lb pot of alloy quite nicely as well. If you live in an area where pine pitch can easily be procured, it doesn't take much, and it's a first rate fluxing agent. Be advised though, that it smokes like the dickens.... better have either a good exhaust hood over your pot, or do it outdoors.

God Bless,

when smelting wheelweights i just use car oil. Just about anything will flux lead. Ive used sawdust potato peals a chunck of wood will even work. Only problem is you dont want a lot of crap in your casting pot so when i use the bottom pour i use wax. I dont see alot of difference between parifin and bees wax and parafin is alot cheaper i save my bees wax for bullet lube.

I use candle wax, canning parafin, and wood ash from the stove. I generally will leave the wood ash in a layer on top of the melt after mixing, as it works good to prevent oxidation. sundog

I flux with candle wax or left over canning wax. As I prefer to cast indoors a vented hood with plexi-glass walls surrounding 3 sides all the way down bench and a partial wall of plexi-glass on the front keeps the fumes going out the vent pipe. This also helps protect a caster from some of the splaters. I prefer a bottom pour pot, so after a good fluxing I add Boric acid from a salt shaker to give a good protective oxide barrier. This technique of using Boric acid is explained in the Lyman Cast Hand book. Hope this might help .

Leon

when smelting wheelweights i just use car oil. Just about anything will flux lead. Ive used sawdust potato peals a chunck of wood will even work. Only problem is you dont want a lot of crap in your casting pot so when i use the bottom pour i use wax. I dont see alot of difference between parifin and bees wax and parafin is alot cheaper i save my bees wax for bullet lube.

Potato peels in molten lead? Careful, you're giving out McDonald's secret french fry recipe!!!!!

Ok, you're trying to mix a liquid wax or oil of specific gravity of about 0.8, that's boiling off as fast as it can, into a mass of lead with a specific gravity of >13. If you've ever melted wheelweights, you see the steel tabs pop out of the melt. If you can't get an object of sg 5.0 down into the melt, why do you think you can get that wax or oil to mix in? It can't be done.

However, you stir like mad to try to get that "flux" in, and that's what gets the crud to float out. I've found that the crud is not in the lead, but squeezed between the lead and the pot's wall. Just scraping the wall with a long spoon will dislodge a lot of it.

There are some fluxes, e.g. marvelux, that do not boil off, and you have a chance of mixing them into the melt.

If you read the Lyman Cast Bullet handbook, you'll find they also say fluxing with wax etc is hopeless & unfounded.

Also, when melted, tin dissolves completely in lead, and it's casting folklore that flux is required to make the tin stay mixed. However, flux that doesn't boil off can help to agglomerate and float off the tin oxide that forms.

As for using potato peels, be very careful never ever to put anything with water into your pot! The water can boil very rapidly, generating steam which can splash molten lead all over. Ouch!

The reason you use a flux like wax and burn it off is to reduce the oxides, tin especially, back to pure metal. Read this again.
http://www.sixguns.com/crew/simplefluxing.htm

Bye
Jack

Jack,
I'm trying to figure this casting stuff out before jumping into it come the warmer days of spring. If I recall you use a ladel for some of your casting, which is my plan at the moment.

How does fluxing affect dippering clean lead out of your pot? Does the flux form a scum at he top of your pot that you move aside to get clean material to ladel out? Do you flux and then scrape the gunk off the top before you put the ladel into the pot?

I guess it probably becomes clear once you do it some.

Thanks.

Eric

There's always a thin film left on top of the metal. If I use lots of paraffin wax, it seems to be that last little bit of oxidized metal. Beeswax and bacon grease leave a thin black scum. You'll probably have a bit of dirt too if you're using wheelweights. I skim this off with a spoon and start casting. The dross builds up, but it isn't that much of a problem with a Lowell bottom-pour ladle. I understand the RCBS ladle has a sort of scraper on it so you can skim the dross to one side and scoop up clean metal on the backstroke. The dross does stick to the ladle but a tap on the edge of the pot drops it off.

After an hour of casting my back needs a rest so I dump the sprues back into the pot and flux and scape when it gets back to temperature.

Sawdust burns down to ash and a bit of ash gets into the occasional bullet if I don't scape it off. It seems that I get caught short of one type of bullet before spring and I end up casting a batch indoors. Then I don't flux and just save the dross. Come spring I toss it back in the pot and flux with an inch of sawdust. What I scape off after it burns down is very much lighter than the dross I started with, proof that the dross was reduced back to unoxidized metal.

You may wonder why ash can get into a bullet when it's so light. The theory is that the lead is dense enough that it traps light particles. The first time you stir hot lead it feels like molasses, but it pours like water. That's because it's eleven times heavier than water, and it's hard to stir because you're moving so much weight around. Just because a Coleman or turkey fryer can boil X gallons of water doesn't mean it can support anywhere near the same volume of lead.

Be sure to preheat your ladle by floating it on top of the melt before you dip it in. Cast iron can absorb a lot of water and a cold ladle can give you a steam explosion.

Bye
Jack