Mary Jo and I took a tour of “The Melt” escorted by retired Kohler employee Daryl, who is the “go-to guy” around the factory. I’m told that Daryl really knows the ins and outs of the cast iron foundry. The atmosphere in the melt is simply unbelievable; it is the picture of industrial America. Smoke, heat, hot molten iron, men in hardhats driving forklifts holding molten iron ready to pour. The process is essentially the same as it has been throughout history, but the scale is truly immense. The space is five-stories tall with towers of melting iron waiting to be amended and parsed out to different parts of the factory for different products. Kevin, from the office, gave us a comprehensive tour and spent a lot of time generously answering all of our questions. We also got to see the Herman machine in action. This is a huge, self-contained behemoth that combines all of the processes in one room and makes large patterns into finished casts.
Today I did my first pour and it turned out pretty well. MJ and I pushed our cart of molds over to the Osborne machine in order to get a hand-ladled pour -- kindly done for us by Carl. Gregory helped us break apart our sand molds and I got just what I was looking for: an initial casting experience and a better idea on how to proceed on making my type patterns.
