ramsies11 Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 so recently, i came across an old rr track that goes thru my place, (only bout a halfa mile) and i have a surplus of rr spikes, and i see all thee sites of people making their own steel tongs and such, but right now i cant hope to do that without a welder and drill press present. so a thought occured to me, "why not cast them?"ive casted small aluminum iingot (ignots?) before, and i was wondering how if i did decide to cast this, how to make a mould for brass, ive got atleast 3thousand .22 lr shells laying around in mason jars and such. my only issue is how to make a mould (id buy an actual foundry setup but i have tight money at the moment) i have my makeshift crucible from a 4in. diamiter rd stock steel that i lathed out, my only question to you gents now is: 1. is it even possible to do this with old .22 shells? 2. how do i go about making the mould? 3. would this even be a usable set of tongs? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marksnagel Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 Your best bet would be to make the tongs out of the old RR spikes. Do you have a forge? Brass would be too soft. Mark <>< Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maillemaker Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 If you have a forge, rail road spikes would be good material, but a lot of work to draw out. Also, a drill press is not necessary; you could hot punch the holes for the joint, or slit the hole and drift it out. Not quite sure why you'd need the welder. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timothy Miller Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 Even if you could pull this off. The tongs would be very soft and prone to melt when handling hot metal. Most of the time tongs are forged from steel rarely other materials are used. You dont need a welder or a drill press to make tongs you nees a forge, hammer, anvil and hand punch. I suggest doing some aditional reading before you do anything. It sounds like you don't even grasp the basic concepts of blacksmithing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MattBower Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 You could probably make RR spikes work for this, but you'd be forcing a square peg into a round hole. You'd save yourself a lot of pain and suffering by spending a few dollars on mild steel stock that's close to the dimensions you need. (I am envisioning a set of lifting tongs with reins of 3 feet or more. If that's not what you have in mind, then this comment may not apply.) That said, I agree with Tim's assessment. This strikes me as one of those, "if you have to ask, you're not quite ready" questions. I also agree that casting the tongs out of brass would not be a great idea. Brass isn't really an ideal material for this purpose, and casting them would be a whole lot more trouble than the minimal forging you'd need to do if you started with appropriately sized steel stock. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 The problem is NOT that the tongs would melt in use. FAR FAR worse is that the tongs would conduct heat into your hands so using copper or Al alloy tongs would be much like using no tongs at all and grabbing the hot section of the piece! You quickly learn how short a piece of steel you can use and still hold it with your bare hands. I have never been able to find a length of copper that I could do the same with. It seems that when it's long enough to cool down before it gets to my hands I am a fathom away from the anvil and so can't swing a hammer to hit it! And as mentioned this reads to me as "Hi I want to do a much more complex and *expensive* method to make a much less usable product..." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John B Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 Scrap the brass shells if you really have that many, and buy some tongs with the money. Casting brass is not really a basic blacksmith skill, melting railroad spikes is, (unintentionally) especially as a newcomer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rich Hale Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 I just did a quick google check. Price for scrap brass runs about a buck and a half a pound..Weigh wot you have and see if you can just get a pair or two of new tongs and learn how nice they workl/That will give you a feel for wot tongs do and when you do make some it will help you as you will have a model to work from. And keep shooting in your spare time/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Randy Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 Brass tongs would do just the opposite of what steel tongs are used for. Brass would not give a strong grip of the metal you're holding, it's too soft, If it gets hot it would melt, steel won't. And heat transmitts up brass which would eventually burn your hand and steel doesn't do that. Not a good choice of material for tooling for this craft. You could have several pairs of steel tongs forged out before you got your molds set up and metal hot enough to pour. Plus the material is a lot more expensive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramsies11 Posted January 23, 2012 Author Share Posted January 23, 2012 okay gents. thanks. i didnt think i could. i just thought id try. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pkrankow Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 They would be "pretty" at least. Actually, if you do a brass melt, use a ceramic vessel and cast an ingot or plate at least 1/2 inch thick and a few inches across. This is a handy tool if you need a plate to wick heat out of material, or any of a number of things. Cartridge brass melts nicely, but there may be retained unburned material in the casings so use a cover and PPE when melting. It might get "exciting". Melting a fixed charge of material instead of adding to a started charge is probably safer as the retained materials will burn off before the brass melts. For a protective cutting plate on your anvil, use a piece of mild steel, works very well. Phil Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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