guys welcome back i’m nate with the king
of random and today we are going to try
casting molten metal in clay in the past
we have tried casting molten aluminum in
a few different things we’ve used muffin
tins we’ve used plaster and we’ve tried
using sand we’ve had mixed results with
the sand sometimes it would work alright
and sometimes the weight and pressure of
the metal would cause the sand to break
up so we wanted to try using something a
little more dense and cohesive clay
holds itself together really well and we
wanted to try three different varieties
of it we’re going to try casting metal
in wet clay dry clay and some of the
clay that we fired in a previous video
before I start pouring molten metal into
these I’m gonna make some predictions
about what I think is gonna happen and
you should write down your predictions
to tell me in the comments how you think
this is gonna go I think our fired clay
has the best chance of working well it’s
already been fairly heat tempered and at
this point I don’t think too much is
gonna happen to it if it gets exposed to
hot metal however it is by far the least
convenient if you have to fire the clay
every time before you pour metal into it
that’s quite a big time commitment just
to cast something in aluminum the dried
clay has a decent chance of working as
well but since it hasn’t been fired when
the metal starts heating the clay up
there’s a chance it could crack apart
the wet clay is the one I’m gonna have
to be the most careful with I think when
I pour the hot metal in it’s gonna start
forming steam inside the clay which
could cause the molten metal to bubble
or possibly even splash out so I’m gonna
have to be very careful with it for the
aluminum today instead of using soda
cans like we have in the past I went to
the hardware store and I got some
housing conduit this is several thick
strands of aluminum braided together and
once you remove the outer plastic tubes
you have some fairly high-grade aluminum
that you can quickly melt down
[Music]
all right there’s one big chunk of
aluminum
[Music]
all right I’ve taking two of the
aluminum cables out of their plastic
tubing I think this is going to be
plenty of metal for our experiments
today at this point if you have some
large shears you can cut the aluminum
cable up into chunks or you can just
grab single strands and start untwisting
it from the rest of the bunch
[Music]
we of course have to make our pieces of
aluminum small enough that they can fit
into our crucible
[Applause]
[Music]
all right we have our aluminum we have
our three types of clay let’s go fire up
the foundry and start melting some metal
alright we’ve got our backyard foundry
and our crucible for the aluminum let’s
light it up
[Music]
holy heat Batman toasted my finger right
through the glove
our founder is going in at this point
the crucible is bright orange so let’s
start adding aluminum
there you go you can see it’s starting
to melt already
who lost a little bit to the outside
there lilia that stuff just melts into a
puddle looking nice and liquid
[Music]
our aluminum is nice and hot and first
we’re gonna try pouring it into the
fired clay
I hear a lot of crackling noises going
on from that clay now that I’ve poured
in the aluminum now there were already a
few little cracks in the clay looking at
it I think I see a few more they may
have started to expand the heat from the
metal is going to make the clay expand
I’m not exactly sure what’s going to
happen to it as it does there is a
little bit of water gathering around the
bottom I don’t know if that’s water that
was somehow in the fired clay or if it’s
water that was in cement pad beneath it
or both that’s really cool shiny look I
love the reflection of the sky and
clouds in that there are lots of tiny
little points appearing on the surface
of the aluminum and they almost look
like they could be bubbles rising up I
wonder if that’s an effect of using the
clay or if that’s just something that
happens from the aluminum you can see
that the dome on top is no longer quite
as smooth and I think that’s because the
cooling metal is starting to contract oh
there we go it still feels a little bit
soft but it is no longer liquid you can
see as I poke it it doesn’t sink in or
anything like that and it’s losing some
of its shine as it starts to oxidize a
little as well
[Applause]
[Music]
all right second batch is done let’s
pour this into the dry clay
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
whoa look at those bubbles holy cow I’ve
never seen aluminum do that that is
super weird and I don’t want to get very
close to it because I’m kind of afraid
it’s gonna explode look ahead it looks
alive oh man and now it’s oozing off
this side that’s just poured down off of
the side I guess it exploded okay so
that was maybe a little bit too exciting
after boiling for a couple seconds in
the end fired clay the clay exploded and
kind of shot molten aluminum into the
air
I had already backed off a little bit
because I was afraid of that I think
Marc our camera guy took a little bit of
a the brunt of it he got a tiny bit of
it on his glasses even so we’re
definitely gonna figure out what we can
do to improve the safety of this before
we try pouring it into the wet clay
which I’m pretty apprehensive about I’m
pretty much positive it’s gonna explode
so we’re gonna take some safety
precautions on that one that looked
really cool though all right our final
batch is ready to go and this one’s
gonna be poured into the wet clay but
because I’m pretty much positive it’s
going to explode I’ve taken a couple
extra safety measures not only do I have
the gloves but about its sleeves a hood
and I’m gonna be putting the welding
mask down I’m also just going to pour it
and back away immediately and my
cameraman is also not going to be
standing so close to it this time
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
oh yeah lots of good bubbling action
like last time
I don’t think the clay is going to
explode but I would be surprised if the
aluminum doesn’t do anything hey maybe
it’s settling down look at that you can
see that the clay is actually drying out
where it’s touching the aluminum a lot
of cracking the top of this thing is
starting to look like a volcano check it
out the clay is still steaming the the
aluminum is obviously still very hot and
I’m not going to touch it for a while
but it’s got a cool effect I think this
might be a bubble in the aluminum so I’m
gonna see if I can poke it pop it maybe
it’s collapsing in so I think I’m right
it’s just oh there we go I’ll look at
that the inside like crater of the clay
it’s picked up some of the clay any
wound yeah you can see that is a bubble
there’s all Hollow in there you can look
down into it see if this one will come
out oh no
well our fired clay has become even more
fragile and I think it already was Oh
yep yep that is just all falling apart
it did cast fairly well it looks like
there’s a little indentation that might
have been a bit of an air bubble because
there’s no little mound in the clay so
I’m not sure where exactly that came
from but there it is
although the casting did it did come out
fairly well I don’t know if it has
enough detail that you would want to use
fired clay for cast aluminum parts and I
am quite sure that you don’t want to use
dry clay for casting aluminum parts
that’s just doesn’t work at all
obviously that’s a neat looking thing
but it doesn’t look like cast aluminum
that’s still very warm if I hold this
piece still in my hands for too long it
will start to get uncomfortably hot but
as long as I keep it moving it’s really
not a problem at this point see that the
aluminum so hot that it actually dried
the clay out all the way through in the
middle the purpose of today’s video is
to see if we could cast molten aluminum
in clay and we tried three different
varieties we tried normal wet clay we
tried some clay that had dried out what
hadn’t been fired and then we also tried
a piece of clay that had been fired what
we found was that clay is probably not
the best material to cast in our fired
clay did hold its shape for the most
part but it did crack apart when we
tried taking the aluminum ingot out it
mostly fell to pieces when we tried
pouring our aluminum into the dry clay
it seemed to be working for a second but
then it started boiling it poured over
the edge and then the whole thing
exploded which was actually really cool
looking but pretty dangerous as our
cameraman did get splashed on just a
tiny bit we then tried pouring it into
wet clay which I thought was gonna just
explode immediately I thought there
would be violent amounts of steam and
molten aluminum would go flying into the
air but I was wrong it did bubble and
boil which also looked really good but
it didn’t really go anywhere
it was pretty safe in the end the heat
from the molten aluminum did start
drying out the wet clay which I thought
looked really cool it almost like a
volcano especially while it was still
steaming that was a really neat effect
but I don’t think it’s a great tool for
casting molten metal in because the
final pieces of aluminum had a lot of
air bubbles in it and wasn’t really the
shape of the container it was poured
into overall I think that sand works
better for casting molten metal ding
clay does although there might be
another material that we can still use
that will give even better and cleaner
results there you have a casting molten
metal in clay it’s a fun experiment
although it’s a little bit dangerous and
we didn’t get very clean results so I
can’t say I really recommend it overall
I’m very glad that we did this I learned
something new that I’ve never even seen
anyone try before it and although the
result is not what I thought would
happen and not something I was hoping
for it was still a good experiment to
try thank you for joining us for this
video and we look forward to the next
one talk to you then
see my face that was a little scary dude
you all right yeah you got a little bit
on your glasses lens holy cow
and on your camera lens very front
that’s crazy
hey my friends thanks for watching and
supporting our videos and thanks for
welcoming Nate on to the channel it’s
his first experience working on camera
and he’ll soak up any validation you’re
willing to give so do your best to make
him feel at home and we’ll see in the
next video
of random and today we are going to try
casting molten metal in clay in the past
we have tried casting molten aluminum in
a few different things we’ve used muffin
tins we’ve used plaster and we’ve tried
using sand we’ve had mixed results with
the sand sometimes it would work alright
and sometimes the weight and pressure of
the metal would cause the sand to break
up so we wanted to try using something a
little more dense and cohesive clay
holds itself together really well and we
wanted to try three different varieties
of it we’re going to try casting metal
in wet clay dry clay and some of the
clay that we fired in a previous video
before I start pouring molten metal into
these I’m gonna make some predictions
about what I think is gonna happen and
you should write down your predictions
to tell me in the comments how you think
this is gonna go I think our fired clay
has the best chance of working well it’s
already been fairly heat tempered and at
this point I don’t think too much is
gonna happen to it if it gets exposed to
hot metal however it is by far the least
convenient if you have to fire the clay
every time before you pour metal into it
that’s quite a big time commitment just
to cast something in aluminum the dried
clay has a decent chance of working as
well but since it hasn’t been fired when
the metal starts heating the clay up
there’s a chance it could crack apart
the wet clay is the one I’m gonna have
to be the most careful with I think when
I pour the hot metal in it’s gonna start
forming steam inside the clay which
could cause the molten metal to bubble
or possibly even splash out so I’m gonna
have to be very careful with it for the
aluminum today instead of using soda
cans like we have in the past I went to
the hardware store and I got some
housing conduit this is several thick
strands of aluminum braided together and
once you remove the outer plastic tubes
you have some fairly high-grade aluminum
that you can quickly melt down
[Music]
all right there’s one big chunk of
aluminum
[Music]
all right I’ve taking two of the
aluminum cables out of their plastic
tubing I think this is going to be
plenty of metal for our experiments
today at this point if you have some
large shears you can cut the aluminum
cable up into chunks or you can just
grab single strands and start untwisting
it from the rest of the bunch
[Music]
we of course have to make our pieces of
aluminum small enough that they can fit
into our crucible
[Applause]
[Music]
all right we have our aluminum we have
our three types of clay let’s go fire up
the foundry and start melting some metal
alright we’ve got our backyard foundry
and our crucible for the aluminum let’s
light it up
[Music]
holy heat Batman toasted my finger right
through the glove
our founder is going in at this point
the crucible is bright orange so let’s
start adding aluminum
there you go you can see it’s starting
to melt already
who lost a little bit to the outside
there lilia that stuff just melts into a
puddle looking nice and liquid
[Music]
our aluminum is nice and hot and first
we’re gonna try pouring it into the
fired clay
I hear a lot of crackling noises going
on from that clay now that I’ve poured
in the aluminum now there were already a
few little cracks in the clay looking at
it I think I see a few more they may
have started to expand the heat from the
metal is going to make the clay expand
I’m not exactly sure what’s going to
happen to it as it does there is a
little bit of water gathering around the
bottom I don’t know if that’s water that
was somehow in the fired clay or if it’s
water that was in cement pad beneath it
or both that’s really cool shiny look I
love the reflection of the sky and
clouds in that there are lots of tiny
little points appearing on the surface
of the aluminum and they almost look
like they could be bubbles rising up I
wonder if that’s an effect of using the
clay or if that’s just something that
happens from the aluminum you can see
that the dome on top is no longer quite
as smooth and I think that’s because the
cooling metal is starting to contract oh
there we go it still feels a little bit
soft but it is no longer liquid you can
see as I poke it it doesn’t sink in or
anything like that and it’s losing some
of its shine as it starts to oxidize a
little as well
[Applause]
[Music]
all right second batch is done let’s
pour this into the dry clay
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
whoa look at those bubbles holy cow I’ve
never seen aluminum do that that is
super weird and I don’t want to get very
close to it because I’m kind of afraid
it’s gonna explode look ahead it looks
alive oh man and now it’s oozing off
this side that’s just poured down off of
the side I guess it exploded okay so
that was maybe a little bit too exciting
after boiling for a couple seconds in
the end fired clay the clay exploded and
kind of shot molten aluminum into the
air
I had already backed off a little bit
because I was afraid of that I think
Marc our camera guy took a little bit of
a the brunt of it he got a tiny bit of
it on his glasses even so we’re
definitely gonna figure out what we can
do to improve the safety of this before
we try pouring it into the wet clay
which I’m pretty apprehensive about I’m
pretty much positive it’s gonna explode
so we’re gonna take some safety
precautions on that one that looked
really cool though all right our final
batch is ready to go and this one’s
gonna be poured into the wet clay but
because I’m pretty much positive it’s
going to explode I’ve taken a couple
extra safety measures not only do I have
the gloves but about its sleeves a hood
and I’m gonna be putting the welding
mask down I’m also just going to pour it
and back away immediately and my
cameraman is also not going to be
standing so close to it this time
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
oh yeah lots of good bubbling action
like last time
I don’t think the clay is going to
explode but I would be surprised if the
aluminum doesn’t do anything hey maybe
it’s settling down look at that you can
see that the clay is actually drying out
where it’s touching the aluminum a lot
of cracking the top of this thing is
starting to look like a volcano check it
out the clay is still steaming the the
aluminum is obviously still very hot and
I’m not going to touch it for a while
but it’s got a cool effect I think this
might be a bubble in the aluminum so I’m
gonna see if I can poke it pop it maybe
it’s collapsing in so I think I’m right
it’s just oh there we go I’ll look at
that the inside like crater of the clay
it’s picked up some of the clay any
wound yeah you can see that is a bubble
there’s all Hollow in there you can look
down into it see if this one will come
out oh no
well our fired clay has become even more
fragile and I think it already was Oh
yep yep that is just all falling apart
it did cast fairly well it looks like
there’s a little indentation that might
have been a bit of an air bubble because
there’s no little mound in the clay so
I’m not sure where exactly that came
from but there it is
although the casting did it did come out
fairly well I don’t know if it has
enough detail that you would want to use
fired clay for cast aluminum parts and I
am quite sure that you don’t want to use
dry clay for casting aluminum parts
that’s just doesn’t work at all
obviously that’s a neat looking thing
but it doesn’t look like cast aluminum
that’s still very warm if I hold this
piece still in my hands for too long it
will start to get uncomfortably hot but
as long as I keep it moving it’s really
not a problem at this point see that the
aluminum so hot that it actually dried
the clay out all the way through in the
middle the purpose of today’s video is
to see if we could cast molten aluminum
in clay and we tried three different
varieties we tried normal wet clay we
tried some clay that had dried out what
hadn’t been fired and then we also tried
a piece of clay that had been fired what
we found was that clay is probably not
the best material to cast in our fired
clay did hold its shape for the most
part but it did crack apart when we
tried taking the aluminum ingot out it
mostly fell to pieces when we tried
pouring our aluminum into the dry clay
it seemed to be working for a second but
then it started boiling it poured over
the edge and then the whole thing
exploded which was actually really cool
looking but pretty dangerous as our
cameraman did get splashed on just a
tiny bit we then tried pouring it into
wet clay which I thought was gonna just
explode immediately I thought there
would be violent amounts of steam and
molten aluminum would go flying into the
air but I was wrong it did bubble and
boil which also looked really good but
it didn’t really go anywhere
it was pretty safe in the end the heat
from the molten aluminum did start
drying out the wet clay which I thought
looked really cool it almost like a
volcano especially while it was still
steaming that was a really neat effect
but I don’t think it’s a great tool for
casting molten metal in because the
final pieces of aluminum had a lot of
air bubbles in it and wasn’t really the
shape of the container it was poured
into overall I think that sand works
better for casting molten metal ding
clay does although there might be
another material that we can still use
that will give even better and cleaner
results there you have a casting molten
metal in clay it’s a fun experiment
although it’s a little bit dangerous and
we didn’t get very clean results so I
can’t say I really recommend it overall
I’m very glad that we did this I learned
something new that I’ve never even seen
anyone try before it and although the
result is not what I thought would
happen and not something I was hoping
for it was still a good experiment to
try thank you for joining us for this
video and we look forward to the next
one talk to you then
see my face that was a little scary dude
you all right yeah you got a little bit
on your glasses lens holy cow
and on your camera lens very front
that’s crazy
hey my friends thanks for watching and
supporting our videos and thanks for
welcoming Nate on to the channel it’s
his first experience working on camera
and he’ll soak up any validation you’re
willing to give so do your best to make
him feel at home and we’ll see in the
next video
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