Its 316L, 26" long.. good for doing knives.. I'll need another pot when i switch to high temp salt instead of draining one type and storing it. (the pot itself with the welded cap is pretty cheap).

All fab work done by Red at Stainlessandalloy.com Very good fab shop with GREAT prices on Stainless. Excellent service all around.

1.2 Gal capacity, approx. 2700 Watts to heat up to 1200F in 1 hr. I'll only have the top ceramic band heater on until salt gets molten.

Plan is to control using a Omega PID, two SSR's (240V, two plugs!).. and configure a mini stianless prop to agitate. I'll experiment with water addition at 500F and see how much just steams off at 720F.. water is impossible above that point.

Will place the stand on a solid brick strucure with bolts through the main bricks.

I need 1/2" thick radial ceramic insulation to avoid heating the 304 stand, ideas? you can see the 1/2" insulation gap i designed in. i was thinking about wraping ceramic blanket over the pipe until its compressed thickness was the 1/2" required for the clamp to engage. thougts?

I also have a nice cap to seal it when not in use.

http://home.comcast.net/~jcheck10/saltpot.jpg

do you plan on heating the tube with a band attached to the OD?

Where did you find the band heater?


The stand doesn't look large enough in diameter to accomodate enough insulation. Truth be told an air gap is a really good insulator one of the best actually. But you have to include a means to stop convection inside your air gap. You may be able to wrap Kawool around your clamp an secure it with stainless wire to allow you to slide the pipe up and down vertically the same for the bottom to break the conduction path. Then wrap the whole thing with sheetmetal stand and all so you have a tube in a giant tube and you can still remove the center tube from the top.

You may be able to modify your stand to clamp the tube directly and place the whole works inside a pottery kiln with a hole in the top to let the tube stick out. You could then remove and use the kiln for tempering, annealing etc.

Do you plan on putting a heating element inside the salt bath like a hot water heater.

http://www.tzknives.com/kf1136.html
These may be cheaper than what your thinking?

Thanks for the comments SamLS. I saw that sweet salt bath, and just had to make my own version! Isn't that just as fun as making the knives?? :madgrin: :madgrin:

I"m using two high intensity ceramic band heaters, 2300W each, 240V.

http://www.tempco.com/parts/bch/bch00045.htm

They are insulated with ceramic, most of the energy is directed into the metal. I'm a bit worried about corrosion on the elements and on the PID system, SSRs, etc.. they will be remote wall box mounted.

This is not austenetizing salt bath, so I wont need to contain 1700F worth of energy. Most of the energy will be convected off into the air.

1050F is the max temp i'll require for quenching and tempering S90V, CPM 3V, etc. If i have issues reaching that temp due to external heating elements not being intense enough, i'll simply wrap the entire unit in ceramic blanket until its hot.

Its so small (1.2 gallon capacity) that i can't really permanently insulate the unit. I need it to radiate and convect heat away quickly when a large knife is quenched. As you know, heat in must equal heat out, i may even need a quick attach heat sink (insert cool chunk of steel, can you say salt taper rod??)

I don't want to build up temperature during quenching.

I was not able to find a in tank element robust enough to tolerate molten nitrate / nitrite salt. most are just stainless covered anyway. so i use only thinner schedule 40 pipe, 0.2" thick, insulated body. I wanted to use sched. 80 but that would simply be too thick, too much heat mass.

FYI, this project is almost done. Its been the most challenging home project ever for me, and the most rewarding. Hope it works!

check out what happens when you normalize 4130 sheet in air:rip:


http://home.comcast.net/~jcheck10/salt1.jpg

http://home.comcast.net/~jcheck10/salt2.jpg

http://home.comcast.net/~jcheck10/salt3.jpg

http://home.comcast.net/~jcheck10/salt4.jpg

http://home.comcast.net/~jcheck10/salt5.jpg

http://home.comcast.net/~jcheck10/salt6.jpg

http://home.comcast.net/~jcheck10/salt7.jpg

http://home.comcast.net/~jcheck10/salt8.jpg

http://home.comcast.net/~jcheck10/salt9.jpg