Hot plate use...

[CWLONGSHOT]

Way back I was taught just to warm molds atop the heating pot. Its served me well for over thirty years now. About two months back... a mold plopped right into the pot! Yesterday... that 311284 jumped in for a bath...Well its one thing for a solid mold to become encased. Its ENTIRELY different when a Lyman HP mold does it!!!

So Rogers voice is loud in my ear... I TOLD YA!! Get a hot plate!! So later today Im headed to Walmart for a cheap hot plate!!

Do you guys use them? Or are ya like
Me and just use the top a the pot?



CW

 

[Spindrift]

I got a hot plate a couple of years ago, and never looked back. I start heating the moulds when I turn on the melting pot, medium heat. Usually, the mould is just hot enough, I can cut the sprue with my gloved hand from the first pour. Very effective and convenient, and the mould is less exposed to force.

 

[Rick H]

I use one but need to make a "roof" for mine, a mini kiln if you were. I was casting with a plumbers pot on an old gas range....no place to balance a mold.

 

[Winelover]

Been using a hot plate for the last ten years or so. The thirty years, before that was, a propane torch. I still keep a propane torch handy, when casting.

 

[Joshua]

I really like my Panini press. It heats top and bottom.

I also keep a propane torch handy. Mostly for igniting wax so that it doesn’t smoke so much.

 

[Winelover]

Maybe I should steal Cindy's Panini Press. Hasn't used it in ages.

 

[L Ross]

Lyman hot plate with a 5"x5" plate of flat 1/4" steel on the coil, and I take care leveling the mould handles to get the blocks in full contact with the plate. Typically in the time it takes for my RCBS pot to get to temp my mould is hot when the dial is set to half way.

 

[Cadillac Jeff]

I know I could do better with a hot plate, but I have a 3/8 in chunk of aluminum that set's on top of my rcbs bottom pore,I just cast away ---& sort out the ugly one's after.
I guess I have more time than anything else.
Jeff

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

Im gonna do the "cinder block" tower. I have a piece of 1/4" plate 7-8" wide and 38-40" long. Ill cut it to length and put pots on top and tools and hot plate beneath.
Thanks guys!
CW

 

[RBHarter]

I use an open coil hot plate with a kettle plate/cast iron hot pad with a #10 can cut out to take the tallest mould on hand .

 

[462]

Hot plate and a mould oven made of a metal 4-gang electrical box and its cover (will accept a Lee six-cavity). Turn the pot on, plug in the oven, confirm the mould bottom sits evenly, turn the setting just a wee bit past medium, when the alloy temperature is attained, retrieve the mould, first cast keepers almost always.

 

[waco]

Hot plate with cover.

 

[JonB]

Be sure to check out the thrift stores before you by a new one.
about 8 yrs ago, I got this one at Goodwill, it was marked $1.00 and I had a 50% coupon

 

[Ian]

Mould oven made from an electical work box on a hot plate with bbq grill thermometer affixed through the top for big moulds, smaller ones just get the front edge dunked in the alloy for 20-30 second until the alloy doesn't stick anymore, then the tip of the sprue plate goes in for about ten seconds, then I start casting with it.

 

[Winelover]

I do all my casting outdoors, in temps between the 50's and 60's. Never found the need for a cover for the hot plate. Mould goes on hotplate the same time the pot gets turned on. By the time the alloy is up to casting temp, so is the mould.

 

[462]

Yeah, forgot the thermometer hole in the oven's cover that was used for a while till I became a pretty good judge of what setting equalled a 400-degree mould.

 

[fiver]

I have a hot plate, but I've never used it for casting.
one caution, mine has a cord exactly like my casting pot, it isn't cool to plug in the hot plate under the casting bench.

 

[Rockydoc]

I use a solid top hot plate from Walmart. Cheap but effective. No “oven cover” needed.
I like that panini cooker idea. If you can find one of those at a thrift store it shouldn’t cost any more than that Walmart hot plate.
Good luck.

 

[Joshua]

I use a solid top hot plate from Walmart. Cheap but effective. No “oven cover” needed.
I like that panini cooker idea. If you can find one of those at a thrift store it shouldn’t cost any more than that Walmart hot plate.
Good luck.

I paid maybe $7.00 for that one at a thrift store.

 

[Rockydoc]

There you go! That’s less than my WallyWorld hot plate.