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Birmingham Brass Founder

W

Wendy

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This painting was in a magazine given to me. The magazine entitled This England is dated 1982. I thought the painting was so poinient as many of us have Brass Casters and Founders in our families.:)

(Unfortunately the picture is lost, but the thread contains interesting information)
 
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Merry Xmas Wendy,what a cracking photo I can smell the fumes having worked with my father in his foundry it looks like one of two things the caster is doing . the crucible could have just been lifted from the pit furnace and he is clearing the slag from the top of the crucible prior to pouring into the mould shown on the left of the coke pile the short bar in his right hand is used for controlling the flow of metal into the mould the crucible is levered up onto the mould and is tilted towards the caster.
Or he is scrapping the sides other pot prior to lowering it into the furnace and refilling with 20 lbs ingots and faulty castings and the pouring stems from the moulds.
The pictures captures the heat smoke and fumes of the trade .A relative was having trouble with shrinkage with some very large Aluminium metal casting my father asked him to bring some metal across from his Coventry firm, my university trained metallurgist cousin couldn't get over the fact that when my father said the metal was ready for pouring without using the high tec thermometers he had been even more amazed at when they went to Duke st Police st to get some of the used straw from the stables . it was the way early Monks controlled the heat loss whilst cooling down the BELLS and thus controlling the shrinkage that only they could cast at that time in history thank again for picture Wendy cheers Tom
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What a fascinating and informative reply Tom. Your father obviously knew his craft. I thought the picture was very thought provoking and you have proved it was. I am so pleased I posted it now. Have a lovely Christmas Tom and thanks again!
 
Thank you for posting the photo Wendy - I have a lot of Brass Founders/Blacksmiths in my families so it was interesting to see how they worked.
Happy Christmas to everyone and all good wishes for the New Year.
Sheri
 
Hi Wendy my father and the other casters used to protect their legs from the heat by wrapping hessian sacks around their trouser leg quite often the sack would just burst into flame and my dad would just beat it out with his bare hands , that was another problem with the trade your hands hardened so much the older members will remember coal fires at home sometimes the coal fell out of the fire place onto the hearth my dad would get up out of his chair and just pick it up with his bare hand even though it was glowing red hot,I do recall that he was nearly always cold at home and we nearly always had a fire even in the summer cheers Tom
 
hi.all i have posted some imput on this thread before,but it has gone.my dad was a caster,he to had hands like asbestos.plus he had no finger prints due to pushing sand through a riddle all his working life.very bad burns due to a crusible breaking. he died coughing his lungs up.due to the smoke and fumes etc.
 
Hi Pete that is sad to hear. My husbands family were casters and had short lives. I though the picture showed the true reality of the job.
 
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