When [Turbo Conquering Mega Eagle] tried lost wax casting, he ended up with a fireball and a galvanizing sense of disappointment. There wasn’t enough heat to get all the wax out, and the paraffin ignited. Though a bit burned by the experience, it didn’t extinguish his desire to do lost wax casting. In a textbook case of project-spawns-project, this eagle decided to wing it and made his own high-temperature oven.
This is true, seat-of-your-pants DIY. For this project, [TCME] treated himself to a virgin sheet of mild steel, a metallic delicacy for a guy who seems used to using whatever is available. The oven consists of a welded-together box inside a larger box, with insulation between the two. The door is a shallower box filled with insulation, with hinges on the right and a sturdy-looking gravity catch on the left. [TCME] welded together a nice little box for the 12-volt, 1000 °C temp controller module, and tacked some tabs to the outside to help wrangle the wires. Lower your visor and click past the break to watch this hot box come together.
We hope [TCME] answers the burning questions of how well the thing loses wax, and how fast it bakes a pizza. Meantime, here’s a clay oven that’s built to pizza.