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Author Topic: This is dedication to your hobby.  (Read 2913 times)

Brian60

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This is dedication to your hobby.
« on: March 09, 2016, 06:05:29 pm »

First up make a timber plug of the ventilator. Then make a RTV mold from the plug. Pour in low melting point metal, then this is the clever bit.....

Use the metal ventilator you have cast as an anode in a electro plating bath to coat the cast ventilator in copper. Once it has built up enough thickness, reheat the entire piece and pour out the low melting point metal, leaving a lovely thin wall ventilator that is hollow!

I love this blokes work but it is definitely ott unless you are a professional model maker.

Crossie

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Re: This is dedication to your hobby.
« Reply #1 on: March 09, 2016, 07:16:18 pm »

 
   As you say Brian, dedication , but that certainly is a most elegant way of forming a thin wall component in metal, though given UK domestic electricity prices, quite an expensive process I would think!

                                      Trevor
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essex2visuvesi

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Re: This is dedication to your hobby.
« Reply #2 on: March 09, 2016, 08:00:45 pm »

though given UK domestic electricity prices, quite an expensive process I would think!

                                      Trevor


http://www.magnificentrevolution.org/diy/single-bike-generator/


Electro plating for the cost of a few bacon sarnies
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Crossie

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Re: This is dedication to your hobby.
« Reply #3 on: March 09, 2016, 08:18:40 pm »


 Ha-ha! I'll pass up your diy power station suggestion on the grounds that I've built enough one-off bike and pedal car devices in the past and secondly I certainly don't need the exercise, so I'll just eat the bacon butties while doing something constructive in the workshop!

                                                 Trevor.
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ballastanksian

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Re: This is dedication to your hobby.
« Reply #4 on: March 09, 2016, 10:02:58 pm »

This was demonstrated in an edition of Model engineer from the mid forties! My old engineer club in Chichester has a collection of the magazine dating from 1944 to this day plus another set especially for photocopying from.

I think it is a bloomin excellent way to get around complicated sheet metal forming and very attractive.
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Brian60

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Re: This is dedication to your hobby.
« Reply #5 on: March 10, 2016, 07:17:32 am »

Electro plating can actually be done with a 12v car battery albeit it's a slow process compared to the 'dip it in take it out' of commercial operations.

jaymac

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Re: This is dedication to your hobby.
« Reply #6 on: March 10, 2016, 08:51:50 am »

wasn't exactly dip it in and take out in my day depended on the base metal eg Bright chrome finish had to be /polished /degreased/  caustic dip   electrically done/acid dip /copper plated then bright nickel then flash chrome   / Things like bumper bars  the same up to the copper plating which was put on  thicker  then hand scoured     then dull nickled  which then had to go back to the polishing shop to be polished up  prior to its chrome finish. It was easy to accidentally weld the the bumper  to the side of the vat  in the caustic dip not to mention the bang if you sparked it  pulling it out through the foam .needless to say the polishers who were on piece work were no that pleased if it had to go back cause of  a weld mark. American bumpers were  made of zinc another  variation in the process
silver and cadmium were done in the shop gold and Rhodium in the lab
Hard chrome plating was a science you plated  to thousands of an inch  as required
Jay
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Brian60

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Re: This is dedication to your hobby.
« Reply #7 on: March 10, 2016, 10:01:50 am »

Jay forget all the polishing and other prep work etc. I was talking of time in the commercial tank to plate a piece, I've seen a motorcycle part connected up dipped in the chrome tank and out, all under a minute. I do know the whole process is longer than this, but it was just the dipping I was talking about.  Doing similar with a car battery and copper sulphate at home means the part could be in there a couple of days not minutes  to build up enough thickness.

tonyH

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Re: This is dedication to your hobby.
« Reply #8 on: March 11, 2016, 05:06:33 pm »

The only difficult part is getting the copper sulphate/sulphuric acid bath. I tried it with a pair of very strange ventilators and luckily I had a pal who taught chemistry at the local high school. Anode was a plumbing fitting and the power was from a variable transformer at 9volts - long and slow was better.
Wooden master then latex female mould. I split the mould into 2 halves and then painted them on the inside with conductive paint from Maplins having punched a bit of wire through the mould. Soft solder the 2 halves together and job done. Does take a bit of time but was an interesting little job.

There are a couple of pics on here in 2006.

Tony
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ballastanksian

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Re: This is dedication to your hobby.
« Reply #9 on: March 11, 2016, 08:57:27 pm »

Copper sulphate is readily available as a gardening product 9Fungicide) though I cannot quote on its strength. I see Amazon also have it available in various sized packs.

Sulphuric acid is also available from the above company though you may be able to buy it from the suppliers direct. Model Engineers use it for pickling silver soldered items such as boilers though the trend is towards using Citric acid as it is less nasty to dispose of.

I like the idea of using conductive paint as it saves that part of the process involving casting lead blanks.
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tonyH

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Re: This is dedication to your hobby.
« Reply #10 on: March 12, 2016, 06:22:35 pm »

Copper sulphate is available on Amazon and the drain cleaner One-Shot is Sulphuric Acid. Most of the fungicides that had CuSO4 as an active ingredient have been withdrawn. The amount of Sulphuric Acid required is quite low and there are recipes on line.

The left hand item is the half shell forming and the others are the latex mould halves with the remaining paint and the wire tail.

Tony
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