[Captions by Mary V. at Y Translator]
We've got a really fun experiment today
brought to us by
YouTube user Daniel Burton
who wants to know if we can
use kinetic sand to cast molten metal.
[Music]
We've done a few different
experiments in the past
using sand to try and cast metal.
And so I think this is
an interesting progression.
Kinetic sand is this
weird polymer covered sand
that does a pretty good job
of sticking to itself
just a little bit.
So, the sand really bonds
and it doesn't pour
like individual grains of sand.
It almost pours more
like a sort of a liquid,
like a clumpy liquid.
It's weird.
There's a good chance that
one of the reasons Daniel
wanted to see us try
casting molten metal in this
is that it does a good job
of taking mold shapes.
In fact this sand comes
with a few different molds.
Let's look at what happens
when we pack the sand into those.
[Music]
Boom!
The grains of sand that make
this stuff up are really small
so you can pick up some
pretty good details here.
You can see the
inlaid brick texture.
That's a part of this cast.
[Music]
Similarly, let's try taking this piece,
and pressing it down into the sand.
[Music]
Once again you can see it
picked up quite a bit of detail.
Here's the basic idea.
We've got about 4 pounds
of this kinetic play sand.
We're gonna try a
couple different methods
for making molds in the sand,
and then see if we can
cast melted metal into it.
First up.
I think we're gonna
try some aluminum,
and because this sand
comes in a plastic container,
we're gonna try transferring
some of it into this frying pan.
And as a first experiment,
I want to try casting a handprint.
So I'm going to take this sand,
throw it down into the pan,
and try and press my hand in, maybe
press all of the sand down around it.
So it really does a good job
of keeping its shape
then we'll melt some aluminum
see if we can pour it in.
Okay, I think I've probably got
a pretty good hand print going on here.
That's a handprint.
Pretty good detail.
Not like fingerprint level of detail,
but it's pretty good detail still.
I have another test I wanna do.
I also want to just do
a test for how well
the sand takes molds
that we make ourselves.
So I've got here this
little King of Random logo
that I just made
out of some MDF board.
We're going to see if we can
get this pick up all the details,
and really give a good impression down
into that sand for the metal to grab onto.
That's packed, but not 
super strong packed.
I'm most concerned about
the dot inside the R
and little lines inside the O,
so I think I'm just gonna
take a little bit of the sand,
and try and just drop it
down into those spots.
So we know that there's
already sand in them,
and hopefully, it comes
out in the way we want.
Little bit of uncompressed sand on top.
Right here it goes.
[Music]
Hmm...
Didn't really stick very well
to the parts in the little gaps and spaces,
so we have an okay outline,
but we lost a lot of the detail.
This time I'm trying
to not compress it quite as much
because it might be that
when it gets pushed
too far into the mold,
it can't really release.
So this is pressed but
a little more gently.
That one there turned out pretty well,
and it does have some
tiny little cracks in the sands
just from not being compressed too much.
I think we've got a
little bit of a trade-off.
But we would rather have the sand
with some little cracks in it?
Or would we rather lose
a lot of the detail
from all the nooks
and crannies of our mold.
We've got some aluminum,
and hey, we've got our updated
foundry with the fire bricks
as the insulation,
and at the bottom with our nicer top.
It's time to give this thing a real test.
See what we can do with it,
and we're gonna start
by melting some aluminum down.
[Music]
We've got a nice crucible full of
molten aluminum inside our foundry.
We're gonna pull that out, set it down.
I'll grab the pouring tongs,
grab it and then I'm first,
gonna pour it into the
King Of Random symbol
and then everything else that's left over,
I'm just gonna pour into the handprint.
We're gonna see how they go.
[Music]
Flow.
[Music]
The middle fingerless hand.
It may be kind of hard to see
'cause it is really bright out here
but that might be on fire.
Yeah there's definitely
flames coming off of that.
Smells interesting.
Probably not too good to be
breathing in much of those fumes.
So I'm just gonna stop
trying to smell that for now.
Now this is aluminum,
which means it needs to cool off
for quite a while
before it stops being liquid.
Can see this is still very runny.
Just pass the tongs right through it.
This one's thinner.
So it was able to cool down
more and it's not solid yet.
It's sort of almost a
a wet sand consistency.
I can stab into it if I try...
Poke it, dent it very easily.
We need to give those
some time to cool off.
The comment request was to see
if we could cast molten metal
in this kinetic sand.
And we're trying that with aluminum.
We've got our aluminum that we poured,
and those are cooling off outside
because aluminum takes a while to cool down.
But in the meantime,
there's something else I wanted to try.
The comment did not
specify what type of metal.
So we've got a different
type that we're gonna try.
First, let's make the mold
then let's grab the metal.
Running a little low on
these two sand colors.
So I'm just gonna mix them together.
Now for the mold on this version,
I have a tiny plastic replica
of Grant's Head and Shoulders.
This was made by 3D scanning Grant
while he sat in a rotating chair
and then printing it out on a 3D printer.
Pretty cool little thing.
So we can just have mini-Grant
sitting in the studio all the time,
and we're gonna see
if we can't make a mold of this,
and then cast it in metal.
What do you say mini Grant,
you ready to get face-planted
into some kinetic sand?
Oh no, I don't want to.
Ha ha! Too bad.
Suish squish squish squish
squish squish squish.
All right.
Moment of truth.
Do we have a mini Grant
imprint in the sand?
Oh his hair sticking up.
Think we do.
We got Grant's face smooshed
down into the sand here.
Lovely.
Obviously, this 3D print isn't
the highest resolution in the world.
So we'll see how much of it gets
transferred from the 3D print
into the sand into the metal.
You may have noticed that
our mini Grant mold in the sand
is still in the plastic
container that I was using before.
And I didn't use that
because I didn't want
to melt it with molten aluminum.
So this time I'm using gallium.
I have here a couple
of pounds of gallium.
Now if you're unfamiliar with gallium,
gallium is a metal with a melting point
of about 85.6 degrees fahrenheit,
which means that this metal right here
is about as warm as a bathtub.
At any rate,
it's easily cool enough
to put your hands in.
It's really kind of neat to play
with because it's pretty dense.
It is metal after all,
and it doesn't have nearly the danger
or destructive power of mercury
even though it looks pretty much
just the same when it's melted.
So here we go.
Let's see if we can pour some
of our gallium down into our mold,
and cast a little mini Grant.
[Music]
Not too bad.
There we go.
I had a barrier kind
of low on this one spot,
and as you can see, of course,
it has spilled over the edge.
But that's all right.
We're just gonna let this cool down,
and then take it out
and see what kind of result we've got.
[Music]
Our aluminum has partially cool down,
at least enough that I feel
safe bringing it inside,
and setting these pans on a table,
at least with a cloth underneath it.
So now to cool these down the rest
of the way let's try taking them out,
dropping them into this bowl of water,
which should both cool them off,
and help rinse off any sand stuck to them.
Missing a middle finger and
the other fingers are puddles.
[inaudible] that.
I mean obviously, other than the
missing finger and the puddle fingers
going around,
but the detail that that picked up
is actually not too bad,
can see like the creases
in my fingers a little bit.
Definitely got the finger shape.
Interestingly, the heat seems to
burn out the color from the sand.
There is still some sand stuck
to this but it's not purple.
It's just kind of sand colored.
As I said it definitely
discolors the sand,
and then I would say it
just straight up burns it
and it absolutely does
something to the polymer.
You can see, if I just poked
a little bit of this,
and scoop it with the
screwdriver here,
it sort of sticks together
very much clumped up.
Doesn't like to separate,
and then I can squish it
back down to pack.
If I do the same thing to
the sand here in the middle,
this just very powdery,
falls to pieces, does not clump,
does not seem to pack back
together well at all.
So it's completely
dried up and burned up.
Let's see how deep I could
dig before I get back
to some purple and sticking the sand.
So the color is still under there.
It didn't burn all the way through.
We've just got maybe, I don't know,
an eighth of an inch sort of thing
of this just absolute powder.
No binding at all.
Kind of wonder if we can
get rid of all that,
and still use the sand underneath it.
This is actually pretty interesting too.
You can kind of see the change
at it radiates out.
Here's the burned portion
where all the color is gone,
and then fairly abruptly
the color returns
and that's acting
like the normal sand.
It's got the springiness, the stickiness.
See how our King of Random symbol did.
Not too shabby.
It's not perfect.
But it's decent.
You can see what it looks like.
Obviously, it ruined some of the sand,
but the sand does do a pretty
good job of holding its shape
and containing the aluminum
even if some of it does get burned up.
The aluminum looks all right.
Let's see how the gallium did.
Oooh, boy that is sticking quite a bit.
Might be because I had to put it
in the freezer for 40 minutes.
[Music]
Over all, that is not
too shabby of a casting
like it picked up
some pretty crazy detail.
You can see the print
lines in the gallium.
It did seem to get a little bit
of the sand stuck in embedded
into the metal in a couple of spots.
That's in there a little bit.
So I'm not sure what exactly
about that particular spot
and these other tiny little spots
that was different from the rest of it.
But overall, I'd say we did
get a pretty good casting,
and while it's not exactly
a photo realistic sculpture of Grant,
it looks about as much
like him as this 3D print did
so I'm pretty impressed.
Well Daniel Burton, you wanted us
to try using kinetic sand to cast metal,
and I would say we got
some decent results
with both the aluminum and the gallium.
Daniel Burton, thank you for your idea.
We're sending you $25.
Remember, if you've got any cool ideas,
let us know down in the comments,
and if we use your idea to make a video,
we're gonna send you 25 bucks.
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