Earl, Please try my production model. A casting tray, 304ss molding tray with 12 ingot sections each connected by overflow. In this case ingots are sized at 25 Lb. each this allows casting off 300 lb. per tray. Role that tray under the bottom dump valve and let her go. Change trays as necessary, complete solder dump 15 to 20 Min. After cooling flip trays cut the sprue and stack ingots on a pallet. Twenty five pound ingots are pretty heavy for loading back into the solder pot, please size accordingly. We found them to be excellent for shipment to reclaim. When a quick dump is necessary for pot maintenance faster is better. Production time don't you know. contact me for more specific information. Fred Golisano fgolisan@ HADCO.com ______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________ Subject: Re: [TN] Seho Wave Soldering Process Procedures Author: "TechNet E-Mail Forum." <[log in to unmask]>, at corp Date: 9/18/98 1:17 PM Earl Moon, Draining molten solder thru a draing hole (or plug) is a very foolish and cumbersome way. I know all wavesolder mfg's instructions point to draining solder that way. Speaking from years of experience of removing and refilling solder pots, there is only one practical, easy, hassle-free and safe way to do this. I'm just kidding. There are many ways but my way is superior and very professional. Here's my way of getting the job done: 1. You pretend to be a professional baker and run down to a home depot, bakery shop, or safeway. Don't forget you wear a heavy duty and heat-resistant apron. A bakery apron is no good. 2. Buy a number of muffin bakery pans, flat & shallow retangular bakery steel pans, a large soup spoon with a long handle. Spec: - muffin pans= non-sticky, hold 12 to 15 muffin holes per pan - retangular pans= large enough to place a muffin pan inside with 1/2 to 1" wall - soup spoon= 3 to 4" dia flat & open top, half-moon shape, non-sticky is better 3. Now run back to the solder pot and cool the pot temp to 200'c 4. Place retangular pans on the floor and fill them with cold water about half-way 5. Place empty muffin pans in retangular pans 6. Using the soup spoon, fetch molten solder in the spoon 7. Pour molten solder into muffin holes up to the top, just like the way you bake muffins. The water in the retangular pan will sizzle and evaporate. Add water if water evaporate a lot. It usually take 10 to 15 min to cool enough to handle. 8. Fill each muffin pan with molten solder 9. Once cooled, flip each muffin pan and drop it on the floor from 6" to 12" height. That will release baked solder muffins . 10. Bake solder muffins again as per the above instruction 11. Store solder muffins in a gallon-size bucket containers for dinner tables Baked solder muffins are much easier to put them back into any solder pot than a gallon-size solder chunk. Solder muffins do no harm to solder pot heater elements when filling an empty solder pot. If draining solder thru a drain hole, better you get a propane torch in case solder freezes or the plugging screw and hole gets clogged. I know you gonna have a fun torching frozen damn thing to flow like a water fall, but biting a solder muffin with your teeth at a dinner table is more delicious and untried heck of experience. I am not thinking right, am I? It's Friday anyway. What the heck?? lets be gone from work. regards Matthew Park NII-Norsat International Inc. >>> "Stephen R. Gregory" <[log in to unmask]> September 18, 1998 11:34 am >>> In a message dated 9/18/98 10:32:57 AM Pacific Daylight Time, [log in to unmask] writes: << Earl, Been there, done that.....we 'drained' the molten solder into containers that would form the solder into sizeable chunks that could be 'dropped' into the new pot. It is the long way around, but it worked for us at the time. I am assuming the 'old' pot is heatable....if not......'never mind'! Richard Hamilton Clemar Mfg. / Rain Bird [log in to unmask] > -----Original Message----- > From: Earl Moon [SMTP:[log in to unmask]] > Sent: Friday, September 18, 1998 9:06 AM > To: [log in to unmask] > Subject: [TN] Seho Wave Soldering Process Procedures (Snip) > Also would like to know, as our solder pots were damaged during shipping > (750 and 950 kg - wonder why the damage) > > Any information greatfully received, > > Earl Moon >> Hi ya Earl! Yep, Richard tells ya' right...I've had to drain a pot once or twice, and you just gotta heat the pot and drain it into some containers...pain in the keester for sure, but the only way I know to do it. You might give your dross recycler a call and see if they can provide you with some containers. That's what I did out here the last time I had to drain one, and they were glad to bring me over some. What they might bring over looks like round, gallon-sized, paper containers that kinda look like what ice cream would come in. I was a little leery of draining molten solder into paper containers, but if you lower your pot temps to just a little above liquidous, and don't fill them too full, paper containers do just fine. If you fill them too full, it'll retain the heat longer and the outside of the container will start turning a "golden brown"...kinda' got my adrenelin going a bit the first time I saw it...was worried that I was about to have a nice solder coating all over the floor! As to why your pot got damaged, shipping the machine with a full pot of solder is done all the time, but really it's not a normal way of shipping. If the machine wasn't prepared correctly for shipping with a full pot or the van line did a little "four wheeling" so to speak, a machine can get damaged pretty easily with a full pot. Wave machines aren't made to move around with a full pot. One place I worked at we had bought an Electrovert UltraPak with a full pot, and when we were spotting it into where it was going to be installed, the guy on the forklift sat the machine down a little quick...it didn't appear that it was too quick that it would cause damage, but with the full pot the frame of the machine wound-up being tweeked, and we had to ship the machine back to the factory to get fixed, they couldn't do it in the field. So, you might make sure nothing else got damaged besides the pots. On the machine of ours the pot was fine, the frame was the only thing that got hurt. Sounds like you got your hands full pardner! -Steve Gregory- ################################################################ TechNet E-Mail Forum provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8c ################################################################ To subscribe/unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the body: To subscribe: SUBSCRIBE TechNet <your full name> To unsubscribe: SIGNOFF TechNet ################################################################ Please visit IPC's web site (http://www.ipc.org) "On-Line Services" section for additional information. For technical support contact Hugo Scaramuzza at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.312 ################################################################ ################################################################ TechNet E-Mail Forum provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8c ################################################################ To subscribe/unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the body: To subscribe: SUBSCRIBE TechNet <your full name> To unsubscribe: SIGNOFF TechNet ################################################################ Please visit IPC's web site (http://www.ipc.org) "On-Line Services" section for additional information. For technical support contact Hugo Scaramuzza at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.312 ################################################################ ################################################################ TechNet E-Mail Forum provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8c ################################################################ To subscribe/unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the body: To subscribe: SUBSCRIBE TechNet <your full name> To unsubscribe: SIGNOFF TechNet ################################################################ Please visit IPC's web site (http://www.ipc.org) "On-Line Services" section for additional information. For technical support contact Hugo Scaramuzza at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.312 ################################################################