Name: The Charcoal Foundry
ISBN: 9781878087003

The Charcoal Foundry

This is the first book in Gingery's series showing you how to build a complete metal working shop from scrap for almost nothing. You must have the foundry setup in order to build the lathe, milling machine and other tools described in each of the other books. Castings make strong and precise machine tool components. You'd go broke buying the castings, if they were available, but you can make them for almost nothing in your own foundry. Building machine tools takes hours and hours, but building the charcoal foundry is far simpler, and loads of fun. You can make castings for any purpose. Almost anyone can build a furnace, and you will become "hooked" on melting metal once you try it. The Charcoal Foundry is a small book worth every penny of its price and then some. Every page is loaded with practical how-to and useful advice. You get many, many drawings and excellent photographs that will show you step-by-step how to build a foundry.

What Hacker News says

kd5bjoFeb 2020

There’s the Gingery book series that starts by describing how to build a charcoal foundry and goes all the way to a complete machine shop.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_J._Gingery

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SquibblesReduxNov 2023

"Complete Metal Working Shop From Scrap Series Set (7 INDIVIDUAL BOOKS)"

Here is the description of the series:

ISBN 1-878087-00-2 The Charcoal Foundry

ISBN 1-878087-01-0 The Metal Lathe

ISBN 1-878087-02-9 The Metal Shaper

ISBN 1-878087-03-7 The Milling Machine

ISBN 1-878087-04-5 The Drill Press

ISBN 1-878087-05-3 The Dividing Head & Deluxe Accessories

ISBN 1-878087-06-1 The Sheet Metal Brake

Quote from the site:

Build Your Own Metal Working Shop From Scrap is a progressive series of seven projects including, The Charcoal Foundry, The Metal Lathe, The Metal Shaper, The Milling Machine, The Drill Press, The Dividing Head and The Sheet Metal Brake. Beginning with a simple charcoal fired foundry, you produce the castings for building the machine tools to equip your shop. Initially the castings are finished by simple hand methods, but it isn’t long before the developing machines are doing much of the work to produce their own parts. It does not take long to learn the simple craft of pattern-making and sand molding. Each phase of the projects increase your knowledge and skill. There is no need to look for outside help. You can do it all in your own shop. No complicated math----No exotic equipment required----No large cash outlay. Lots of work to be sure, and some of it can be downright tedious, but the reward will be a practical small scale machine shop that you might never give yourself permission to buy, assuming you could afford it.

https://gingerybookstore.com/MetalWorkingShopFromScrapSeries...

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jstanleyAug 2023

I presume it's the Gingery series.

1. Foundry: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Charcoal-Foundry-Build-Metal-Workin...

2. Lathe: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Metal-Lathe-Build-Working-Scrap/dp/...

There are a few examples on YouTube of people who have successfully made this lathe, here's an example timelapse: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBuUOO3qn30

It's a cool project, but in the end you get an aluminium lathe made of home castings. If you just want a lathe, I'd suggest starting with a secondhand mini lathe instead and modding it to your taste, they're not very expensive. It's a lot less work than making a Gingery lathe, and not all that much more expensive. But the Gingery lathe is still a cool project!

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