Will

Aluminum parts can certainly be melted using a propane kiln. Kilns are designed to produce firing temps much higher than the melting point of aluminum. The big question IMO, is how rapidly the kiln in question can bring your aluminum to melting temp. Most kilns are designed to produce a long, slow temperature rise, though a fast firing kiln (like a raku kiln) would be nearly ideal.

Your Toyota manifolds are probably OK for cast> I have a kiln which will apparently be hot enough to melt aluminum. I

You can try melting them and see what happens. If you take a whiff of the vapors and a few minutes later feel like you're going to die from the flu, you have zinc alloy in your castings. Old carburetors were mostly zinc.

Be careful.

-- Ed Huntress

What do you want to do with the "cylinder" you are casting? This is an important question.

If you want to make artwork or sculpture, most any aluminum alloy will do. And you can't goof it up too badly - Have fun.

Though carburetors might be a bad choice for raw material, they are likely to be a high percentage of Zinc in the aluminum alloy, trade name ZAMAC [a contraction of Zinc Aluminum Magnesium and Copper] often referred to as "Pot Metal".

ZAMAC works best on injection die casting of finished small parts like that carb with the complex chambers. The zinc boils off readily in the melt, and it is NOT good for you to breathe zinc fumes...

But if this "cylinder" you want to cast is something that will be machined, drilled, turned into an actual operating engine cylinder sleeve, etc. I'd stop right here and go look for a chunk of new raw aluminum bar or tube stock.

The wheel has already been invented and perfected once, no sense in going through those steps again... ;-)

Or go find a commercial aluminum castings foundry that can make the castings for you on the first shot, out of the right alloy, no contaminants or inclusions in the material, the right final size because they allowed for shrinkage in the patterns and molds - there are *way* too many ways for a homemade casting effort to go bad.

Do you want to spend your time making something useful out of that 'cylinder' and enjoying it, or just in making the casting for the cylinder in the first place?

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