George, I appreciate the feedback. I have the knifemaking version that's rated to 2200°F, so that was a consideration but not a heavy concern for me. I just cooked a rasp file at 1800°F yesterday, and regularly run in the 1650-1700 for O1. I have zero experience with casting or molten metals, but my thought was cook the whole "build" around 350 with the door open to remove any and all moisture, kick it up to 1850 to melt the brass and soften the copper, let it stay there for about 30 mins, and then kill the power and let it cool on its own so I'm not sloshing around and metal. Mostly because I have a cheap set of tongs that came with a small crucible I ordered from Amazon for some silver casting I'm planning on doing. The only other items I have are blacksmithing tongs, and I'd be way to concerned about the slipping on the graphite.
Thomas, I appreciate the info, and I'm aware true Mokume Gane is made in a process similar to Damascus. However, I don't have a clean enough or hot enough (reliably) forge to do that. I realize it's not *true* Mokume Gane, but it would hopefully look similar and look good. Or it might be a waste of some scrap I have laying in my shop that would be dumpster fodder anyhow.