Mixng Casting Wax to Harden it up
FMM
parifin & beeswax & other 'things' that one mixed to get Blue wax or
Red wax or casting wax ... ect...
I have a lot of light blue injection wax but would like to 'toughen it
up' so it would have the consistancy of green or blue carving wax.
Can anyone help me with the recipe I need for mixing wax ???
Does anyone know a site that would definately have the answer or some
very smart wax person I could contact????
Any help is gratefully appreciated
Thanks Frank
Peter W. Rowe
Frank,
injection waxes and carving waxes are wildly different formulations. The main thing you
need is additional plasticizers, but I doubt you find anything you can add to an injection
wax that will make it equal to any of the actual carving waxes. The basic starting point
for the carving waxes is different from that of the injection waxes... You CAN find an
injection wax called "tuffy", which is very high in plasticizers. This is intended to be
added to injection waxes to increase hardness and toughness and memory, etc. But the
result is still an injection type wax, considerably softer and gummier than the almost
plastic like carving waxes. It will still gum up a file, for example, and will be softer.
Even adding softening agents to carving waxes (which is easier to do) will seldom give you
an injection wax type of formula...
Some suggestions: I'd forgo trying to turn the injection wax into a good carving wax.
Not likely to work well. Instead, go though industrial suppliers who carry Do-All
products (machine tools). You can get what amounts to blue carving wax at prices far
below what it sells for in jewelry supply, intended for checking tool paths on CNC
machines without risk to cutters, etc. That gets you your carving wax.
Then, if you don't need the injection wax... Well, most of us still need sprue wax or wax
wires, and the like. If you can find, again through industrial suppliers, (check the
Thomas Register web site) microcrystaline wax, you can mix this, 50:50 with the injection
wax, to get a softer, flexible, and extrudable wax similar to the red sprue wax rods you
can buy. With more or less of the microcrystaline, you can get somewhat stiffer if you
wish. This mix can then be nicely forced through an extruder. That, you make from some
old plumbing pipe with angle iron brackets welded to the front to support it in a vise,
pipe caps drilled to the size rod you want to make, and a plunger made from steel rod
(capped with a poured lead plug to match the pipe's inside diameter, doesn't need to be a
really tight fit though) To use, you fill the pipe with the wax (melt it to pour it in,
the let it cool enough to be just solid, but still soft. A vise or shop hydraulic press
(the big cheap H frame presses like what harbor frieght sells work wonderfully) can be
used to force the plunger into the pipe, extruding the wax wire. You can quickly turn
pounds of unwanted or reclaimed (from your steam dewaxer or trays under the burnout, if
extracted from the flasks at low enough temp) injection wax into pounds of useable wax
sprue rod or finer wax wire (don't use use/reclaimed wax with impurities for actual
models, though. Fine for sprues, where precise surfaces aren't required)
Microcrystaline wax is a pure petrolium based wax, slightly off white in color, a little
like parafin in consistency, but stronger/more deformable. A bit like "sculputure" wax.
Mixed with injection wax, it gets tougher and more flexible yet. Nice result. Not,
though, by any stretch of the imagination, a carving wax.
Hope this helps.
Peter Rowe
doitnow
I have tried this in the past and I can assure you...it will pay you
to use what is required ...THE FIRST TIME! Dan.
johnjeweler
together with the wax. I haved mixed some ziploc bags
with wax and got a medium hardness.
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