Turkey Fryer for melting?

[Monty]

here is what i am talking about,

here is the link,

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000B41I3S/qid=1140793717/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/002-3980330-4595260?_encoding=UTF8&v=glance&n=228013

and for the mixer, wouldn't,t a old hand held mixer beater work? just my $.02

Monty

[Delw]

Being a new bee' date=' I do not want to pour a qt or more of plastic at one sitting especially one color

Is it ok to heat a qt of plastic in the presto pot and take say 4 oz out and then mix my colors, will probably have to re-heat in a micro, main question is the remains in the pot, is it ok if you do not use all of it and let it cool to re heat later without dis colering ?

Does this sound resonable or does someone have a better idea ?

I will have to do some searching but if you know the link, or does anyone have listed the ratio for color to a qt of plastic ?[/quote']

Yes you can do that, on floresant colors the coloring wont work as well if you add the color after the plastic is all ready heated.

As far as reheating make sure you cut the plastics into small chunks and heat it slower stiring it all the time or it will turn color.

theres a color chart about thats a sticky with lots of colors in it.

[Delw]

here is what i am talking about' date='

here is the link,

[url']http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000B41I3S/qid=1140793717/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/002-3980330-4595260?_encoding=UTF8&v=glance&n=228013[/url]

and for the mixer, wouldn't,t a old hand held mixer beater work? just my $.02

Monty

Monty a hand held would work fine if you could mount some how and keep it on all the time.

if your pot wasnt big enough for both mixer attachments you could use just one.

You need to keep it on the slowest speed

[Monty]

no, i meant just mount the beater in the drill press

sorry for any confusion

Monty

[Delw]

Thats not a bad idea at all

I never even thought about that and I have used both.

Another way to make a cheap stirrrer is to take a 3/16-3/8 rod cut a slit in it with a hacksaw and stick an electrical box cover in the slit.

Pop some holes in the cover about 1/2 -3/4 dia. and put it in the pot it will mix stuff extreamy well.

On a lee pot cut the box cover so its about 1/2" clearance on each end of the pot and stagger the holes. this will keep everything mixed perfectly.

[jm]

Temp control is a matter of a thermostat turning the heat on and off.

If you just limit the power, you limit the rate of temp climb. That is a very inefficient way to control temperature. A thermostat allows the pot to heat quickly, and turn off when the temp is reached.

You can get a thermocouple temp controller with a thermocouple on eBay for about $35.00 for a Chinese rip-off that works well. Catch is that if you get a book, it is in Chinese. I think I have a copy of it though, and I've used a couple of them. If you work at it a little, you can get a decent Watlow or Partlow controller used for about the same. You should fasten the thermocouple to the bottom, or near the bottom of the pot. It could be inside the pot in the plastic. It wouldn't hurt the thermocouple or change it's operation.

Some controllers will take almost any thermocouple, and some will only take one kind. Be sure you can match it up.

There are many kinds of thermocouples. An RTD device is actually a platinum resistance element, very expensive. A type K thermocouple is a pair of alloy wires that you can weld, clamp, or silver solder together at the end to form the junction. It's cheap and can sense the temp of a very small sample spot, like an 1/8 in hole in a piece of metal. It works well between 0* and about 2000*.

Among other things, I design and build electronic circuits for specific purposes, and thermal control is one of them. If there's enough interest, I could design a pc board controller that could be incorporated into many of these kinds of projects. It could be as simple as a screwdriver adjustment of temperature, measure it yourself, to a digital design with readouts and buttons. I'd lean toward the simpler one.

The designs I've been doing so far have used a precision thermocouple amplifier. The chip alone is 20 bucks or so. that'll read to fractions of a degree, much closer than needed here. I could come up with an op-amp circuit that would have a couple of degrees of slop in it and be much cheaper.

hope it helps.

jm

[millsryno]

Temp control is a matter of a thermostat turning the heat on and off.

If you just limit the power' date=' you limit the rate of temp climb. That is a very inefficient way to control temperature. A thermostat allows the pot to heat quickly, and turn off when the temp is reached.

jm[/quote']

I think you are right jm. I posted this on a DIY Electrical forum and they were pretty much telling me the same thing. The good news is that they helped me learn that the thermostat is adjustable. The screw was covered in a glue (bunch of white crud) so I did not notice it. I scraped away the glue and there is a screw to adjust it. It will probably take some trial and error to get it adjusted right.

Monty, I am sure a hand held would work fine, just more work, though. The drill press only cost $99 brand new and works absolutely perfectly. With this setup it is absolutely a hands free operation other than filling the molds. No need to worry about mixing, it is all automatic. The drill press also elevates the pot enough to slide your molds under the spigot, even two peice molds.

The way this is looking, I am going to be spending under $150 for everything. This includes a mixer. If you go buy something already made, you are looking over $1000 with a mixer. I'd much rather have 7 of these than 1 of those :-) From what I can tell, this will work perfectly, I cannot imagine any other pot working better unless it was pressurized. I was skeptical at first because it only has a bottom heating element. That is where the drill press really makes a difference though. By keeping it uniformly mixed, this is not a problem. Keep in mind, it's still a little work in progress, so I won't know for sure until I get it right.

[LedHed]

Ryan

If you need a temperature standard to calibrate your thermostat let me know. Also I have a watlow controller you can have ? use it for a digital temperature display. I wouldn't use this particular model for temperature control ? does not have a SCR (solid state relay). The other TCU's (temperature control units) I told you about would be perfect - but way cost prohibitive ? guaranteed that you would not burn your plastic though?.

[jm]

I'd like to see a picture of this setup.

jm

[Travis]

http://www.gopresto.com/downloads/instructions/06000.pdf?PHPSESSID=69e8eeb1687612968466f3809c14407d

This is the one I was looking at last year. Not for sure about heating element location however when it comes to drilling. Anyone used htis one yet. Around 30 dollars and temperature control. Appears to be similar or same one from the ebay link.

[millsryno]

Travis, that is the exact one you can get on eBay. It is also referred to as a Presto Pot. They use them alot to melt wax for candle makers. The only problem is that it has a 1.5 gallon capacity. This FryDaddy has only a half gallon capacity.

jm, I'll post a pic tonight. I adjusted the thermostat and will be experimenting with it. Just got back from Lowe's with the perfect mixer.

LedHed, how does that temperature standard work?? If it is something easy to use, I may want to give it a whirl.

[Monty]

Travis, i saw that one you linked to at wally world for $24.00 its got a big pot

millsryno, can ya show a pic of where that screw is as well?

thanks, Monty

[millsryno]

Welp, poured about 250 stickbaits this evening with the new pot! There is a little bit of a learning curve but it should definately speed things up.

I need to get a mixer attachment. I bought a paint mixer, but it pushes all the salt to the side. I need to get something that mixes it all better. As soon as I get this all figured out, I'll post a how to or something. For under $150 you can't go wrong!

Monty, the screw is real easy to find. There is a plate on the bottom of the unit. There are two visible screws. Unscrew the middle screw, this will take off the plate. Inside the unit you will see the thermostat in the middle. You can't miss it. It is held to the frydaddy with one screw. You should see some white junk on the thermostat. Scrape it off and the screw you need to adjust the thermostat is right there. It is very tempermental. Turn it clockwise to reduce the temperature setting. I have one of those lazer sensor temperature guns. I'd highly recommend getting one. I plugged the unit in with nothing in it and tested several settings with the temperature gun. You will get different temperature ratings in different spot in the frydaddy. The key is to point the temperature gun directly in the center of it. Let the frydaddy run a couple cycles as you watch the temperature on your gun. Ideally, you want the high temperature to be 300 degrees. Your plastic will stay right around this temperature when you cook it. I'd recommend only turning the screw 1/4 turn at a time until you get it where you want it. Like I said, it's very tempermental.

[CrawChuck]

That's good news your pot is working. Would an updraft prop type mixer blade do any better? Angle the blade like a fan so it's pushing material to the top?

[millsryno]

craw, do you have a link to one of those?

[LedHed]

Ryan

Sounds like you have calibrated your thermostat using the temp gun as your standard. An immersion probe (RTD, TC, thermometer, etc.) would probably give you more accurate temperature readings ? if you still want to tweak the temperature.

One drawback to using thermostatic control (temperamental) is that you have on/off control. If you picture this on a graph - the low temperature (off), after reaching set point, and high temperature (on) would be represented in up and down sharp spikes.

A I/P controller or a PLC smoothes out the spikes, more like a wave and minimizes the temperature swing (delta). Also I/P control reduces the initial overshoot in temperature (integral) and reduces the modulation (proportion).

You can take temperature control as far as you want.

Congratulations on your trial run and all for under $150.

[millsryno]

Ideally, you want the high temperature to be 300 degrees. Your plastic will stay right around this temperature when you cook it.

I made a mistake. You want your LOW temp to be at 300 degrees. The plastic will stay right around the low temp setting.

[millsryno]

Here's the pics:

Here is a front view. You can get a size comparison vs. the Del-Mart mold in the pic. I filled 'er up this evening and got 200+ sticks out of it.

There are a couple side views.

Here you can see the mixer I was using. I think I need a different one, though. This one does not do a good enough job. After about 20 sticks or so I have to manually mix it up a little because the salt gets shoved to teh bottom side of the pot. I used a hacksaw to shorten the shaft on the mixer.

Here's a couple shots of the spigot. One open and one closed. I was a bit sceptical of the ease of use with this style valve. It works great though. I just tested a bunch of the valves at Home Depot and got the loosest one I could. I poured half the bucket with the 90 degree nozel and it would get a little clogged. When I removed the 90 degree nozel it flowed out really well. Like I said, it's still a work in progress. I may just need to adjust the thermostat a little higher to keep it all meltined in the spigot better. It works fine without the nozzle though. A lot better than I thought.

That is JB weld around the pipe going into the pot. I scortched it on accident and probably will have to redo it. I did this when messing with the thermostat (I accidently tuned it the wrong way). you probably won't have this problem.

Honestly, I don't see why anybody would want to buy one for $600+ (without mixer) or $1000+ (with mixer). This entire thing cost me under $150 including the drill press and was REALLY easy to build. If I can do it, you can too!

[smallheadz]

Ryan,

I don't know if this will help but you may want to try a flare fitting with copper tube instead of a 90 that way you could put your own bend in it and it won't be as sharp. Then you could just change tube sizes for different pours. It may work and it may not but it's an idea. I don't know how long you could make it due to cooling but I would probably keep it as short as possible.

On the thermostat screw, Is it left to lower temp?

later

[smallheadz]

I misread above where you informed about the thermostat so ignore the question.

[smallheadz]

Ryan,

I forgot to ask if you were putting virgin plastic in the pot or heating it in the microwave first? If you are dumping raw plastic in about how long does it take to get it up to temp?

[CrawChuck]

craw, do you have a link to one of those?

Nope, just an idea I had. Looking at your setup, (cool by the way!!!), looks like a wider blade bent to force an up flow might work.

Man I love this site :grin:

[Delw]

Ryan

Nice set-up

if you know anyone with a welder have them make you a mixing blade off that shaft, put big holes in it off set or bend it like craw was saying, try to keep 1/2"-1" clearnace per side.

Also I notice that pots has the non stick finish on it, how does that work? does the plastic come out pretty easy? or does it still stick?

If it comes out easy DONT scratch it up at all other wise it will start sticking.

Heres something that might help on clean up as well.

when the plastic hardens on the 90? bend (after it gets cold) just unsrcew it and lightly screw in another one, cleaning that one later. You might want to keep a few elbows cleaned and ready.

Also your using a ball valve thats very smart they shut off and open very easy when the plastic is cold( not real easy but easy) due to the sharp edges.

you might want to lubricate the ball valve with softener so the plastic doesnt get between the ball and the inside of the vale assembly , just a few drops.

keeping those fittings only hand tight wont hurt anything( ie wont leak) and they will make it easier for you to clean with out having tools all over.

Nice job

Delw

[jm]

Ryan,

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Here you can see the mixer I was using. I think I need a different one, though. This one does not do a good enough job. After about 20 sticks or so I have to manually mix it up a little because the salt gets shoved to teh bottom side of the pot.

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I suspect that the plastic is cooler near the outside surface of the pot. Insulating it might help the mixing quite a bit.

Thanks for the leading (or is it bleeding) edge ride into this topic. We're all blessed by your sharing.

jm

[GB GONE]

Sweet job Ryan... How are the sticks you made??? Comparable to your others in the cups??

I am interested in the clean-up as well. I know that Sta-warm is now offering a deal where they will coat the inside of your pot with teflon for an extra $60. That may be the ticket for these Fry Daddy's as well.

Just curious, do you do any other baits than sticks??? I am wondering if you can get a good thin flow of plastic for the small spots in the molds. Also is your flake staying mixed well or is it going to the outside of the pot as well??

Great job!!! Thanks for sharing your trials with us so we can be on the fast track for building one of these.

Jim