Making a Cast Iron Skillet Using Recycled Brake Rotors | Cast Iron Gypsy at the Windy Hill Foundry

you [Music] a few months ago Rob and I got invited to go to the Windy Hill foundries first iron Invitational I decided I was gonna do something a little bit different than my normal style so I brought this medium sized cast-iron skillet just your kind of run-of-the-mill find them at the flea market find them with antique malls and I just yeah I just wanted something simple all right so the plan was to use these sign board letters so they do have little tabs on the backs of them because they're supposed to be put into sign boards so all I needed to do was figure out what letters I was gonna use and then I took the little tabs will actually Rob to this because I was due I was helping make molds for the other participants but with an exacto blade just cut off all the tabs of the letters and numbers that we needed to use then used Elmer's glue and just glued them right on the cast iron skillet Clark and the Windy Hill foundry use a clay bonded green sand that is activated when water is added to it if you've been watching my videos you know that my specialty is the resin bonded sand I have done Petro bonds sand molds before at the metal Museum in Memphis and there were a lot of similarities to the Petra bond sand and this green sand but there definitely are still some nuances that Clark had to help me with thankfully he's a great and kind teacher he's all set up to Mull his own sand and rehydrate it his sand already has all the additives and bonding agents in it the first step was just assisting him in mulling the sand and getting it ready to Ram two sites how to make a cast iron skillet no you better help me oh my goodness no I mean like he's gotta help me tell me what's it okay you'll come to okay all right so today I'm gonna cast this cast iron skillet with my and Rob's name on it and our wedding date step number one find out where your gating and venting is gonna be step number two get a bigger flask with the handle here we're not worried that she'll I'm gonna have a runner it is round here I would put a gate here a wide one here in four places so you're ready to go yeah [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] don't waste it it's cool coming out we got a leaker Mawile need to put more weights on this one [Music] [Music] I like to open my molds that the day after the iron pour just so that it gets gives it a chance to cool down a little bit so at this point when I'm opening I really didn't expect that the the skillet would have cast because of how much iron ran out of the side of the mold this is the pattern that we made the mold of and I'm holding it up next to what actually was cast in the mold I'm brushing it with these little steel brushes just to kind of get the extra sand off so is this the channel basically came in here and then this is like the kind of catch riser that catches and then it just went boom and then maybe that's why it rose up is because there was just so much pressure all the way around and then fill this and then was just like we got to go somewhere out so where did it actually fill the cast iron skillet at so it filled it in before these boys like one two okay okay cast iron actually is really brittle if you know where to hit it in the right place you can get a really controlled break yeah so just a big shout out to Clark Easterling and Windy Hill foundry for having this event and also for his wonderful wife Josie Easterling who fed us all and took care of us all looked after us so they really did a great job once I was back at home clamped it up in this vise I used rubber as a barrier in between the vise jaws and my cast iron the steps that I typically follow for finishing my iron castings are to use a cut-off wheel and score any of the gating or venting and then I'll hit it with a hammer and it comes right off and then I switch to a grinding wheel on the angle grinder and the in the angle grinder will take off the bulk of the extra material and I also kind of use the grinding wheel to sculpt a little bit and and really smooth out the transitions and the parting lines then I'll switch the angle grinder to have a sanding wheel and the sanding wheel will typically be 100 grit sandpaper disc you know it's like made with all the little flaps and then I'll use them for a while so it I just actually end up giving me a finer finish than a fresh under grit wheel I just keep a stock of all different kind of grits and use the appropriate ones so this one I just did the 100 grit or maybe it was 120 whatever and then switched to my palm sander and this is a hundred grit sandpaper on the palm sander to you know it'll get pretty fine but it's not gonna be a mirror finish and I don't really care I mean this this is just gonna be a wall piece any so it's just really to make sure that I feel good about it because you're not gonna really be able to see the final finish when it's up on the wall so after I'm done with the palm sander I switched to this wire wheel and it was really nice at getting the extra little sand particles off of the cast iron and bringing out that cast iron sand texture that is my favorite here you can see I hung the cast iron skillet on a steel rod in between these two tall saw horses and we're just heating it with a little hand torch and then get the boil linseed oil on a cotton rag and just kind of coated it heat it and then oil it and then heat it some more and oil it some more the color got darker with each course that we did and this is the final color it really just came out so nice alright so here's the before and after I guess anybody could really do this with any cast iron skillet and you're just these letters on those these ones you know just come right off you just come right off with just a little bit of pressure but this one you know this date may not be set in stone but it is casting iron all of us who have participated in the event Oh Clarkie sterling the Windy Hill foundry and his wife Josie Easterling a huge thank you for their hospitality and generosity throughout the whole event definitely go over to Clarks channel which is Windy Hill foundry on YouTube and show your support let them know if you want to see more events like this one in the future and check out his videos on iron casting if you thought this video was entertaining give it a like to help it get seen by more people and check out the other videos that I have on my channel if you want to see more videos of me casting iron or metal working or traveling around the country please show your support by subscribing to the cast iron gypsy channel as always I love you and I'll see you at the next pour [Music] [Applause] busy in the shop barely you can't stay there see his eyes yeah Roley [Music]

Channel: Cast Iron Gypsy

Views: 410,140

Rating: 4.8762479 out of 5

Keywords: breaking iron, camo hat, cast iron gypsy, cast iron, cast, casting, casting iron, casting metal, fe, foundry, foundry work, gypsy, iron, iron casting, metal, metal art, pink camo, pink camo hat, resin bonded sand, resin sand molds, roam, roam or rust, smashing radiators, iron art, sculpture, metal sculpture, backyard foundry, how to build a furnace, how to melt metal, how to melt iron, how to make cast iron, cast iron art, metal foundry, iron foundry, iron gypsy, welding

Id: K_qyoxX8fXc

Length: 16min 10sec (970 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 13 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/Aziz603]

Perfect to cook Brakefast

[u/vapidamerica]

I may be mistaken but it looked like there was an Adam Booth (Abom79 on YouTube) cameo in the dinner shot. Pretty cool.

[u/ReverseMoses]

Idk, asbestos from the brake pads = safe?

EDIT: I want one regardless 👍🏼

[u/bigboyg]

/r/easeofftheslomo

[u/-Badger2-]

She sounds like Mila Kunis

[u/sineofthetimes]

What is the purpose of running the comb/pick over the sand mold?

[u/zyzzogeton]

Wear safety glasses when you are grinding!

[u/Gespuis]

She’s living in December already, nice!