Heating hooks and molds

[JayC37jigs]

Totally going to come off sounding like a Noob. But always wanting to learn and make things work better or more efficient. I’m looking for all the different options of heating or pre heating molds and hooks. I’ve seen guys pour empty molds a couple times, put their mold on their lead pot for awhile, and even heard one guy mention boiling. I’m curious as people who have done this a ton what creative ways or better ways to get the hooks and molds warm before you start pouring. Forgive me if there is a topic on this already, I searched and didn’t see anything in depth. Thanks very much for the info.

[smalljaw]

I do it the same way since 2005 and it works well. I put the mold on top of the pot and then turn the pot on. After the lead is melted I run 5 blank pours without hooks and I have an ingot mold under the mold as lead will come out on some molds. The only time I warm hooks is in the winter when it gets cold. I have a small stainless steel dog bowl that I put the hooks in. I heat the bowl with a torch for about 8 to 10 seconds and my hooks will stay warm for 20 minutes or so until I have to heat the bowl again. Remember, I only warm my hooks so they stay a little warmer than the room temp. The bowl is hot but the hooks on top only get warm, maybe 75 degrees. You don't need hot hooks, just warm and I only do that when it is really cold. 

[Jig Man]

I do pretty much the same as smalljaw.  I rarely heat the hooks as I pour in my garage.  When I built the house I had the garage super insulated and it rarely gets below 54° in there.  
More important to me is having a good coating of Frankfort Arsenal dropout on the mold.

[cadman]

I as well do something similar to smalljaw. Only thing different is always make sure each mold is covered with "Drop out" and I use a 100 watt bulb with the clamp on reflector shield aimed at my hooks in a black old teflon frying pan. The 100 watt bulb keeps the hooks very warm depending on how high you adjust the bulb from the hooks.

[JayC37jigs]

The topic came to me because I went to pour the other day when it was cold out  and had some issues till I got everything good and warm. I am also always willing to learn something new if it helps.
    I did also take Cadman’s advice from the last topic and ordered some drop out to try for my next pour. Awesome information guys. Thank you very much.

[m.t.pockets]

I heat my molds on a single burner electric hot plate. Mold gets hotter a lot quicker than placing it on top of the melting pot. As for hooks I really don't worry about heating  them as I live in Florida, but when I lived up north I would place the hooks on an old heating pad and then fold it in half over the hooks

[Bentrod425]

For my Do-it mold I put it on my melting pot, but for some of my smaller custom molds I picked up a used toaster oven off of my local Buy Nothing FB group.  I use that to heat my molds and keep them hot.  It also doubles as a curing oven for after powder coating jigs.  

 

[Kasilofchrisn]

For me it depends on the pot and the mold.

For instance if I'm using a do-it mold and one of my bottom pour pots I'll usually just stick the mold on top of the pot while the lead heats up.

But if I'm using my large 50 lb lead pot on my turkey fryer burner to do some rather large jigs such as my saltwater jigs/sinkers that could weigh up to a few pounds each here's what I do.

My turkey fryer burner has extra space around the outside of the lead pot.

So I can place three molds around the pot preheating.

That way if I'm switching molds and only making a few of each jig I always have one that's preheated.

For keeping the hooks warm I have a 20 lb cast iron lead pot and I use my plumbers torch to heat it up and I just stick the hooks in there. The cast iron holds the heat for a bit.

I do have a heated garage but sometimes the hooks are a little cool so after sticking them in the pot I'll wave the torch over them for a few seconds just to get them warmed up a bit.

I do use dropout in all of my lead molds and that helps pouring as well.