Casting an Aluminum Snowman with the Lost Foam Method (Aluminuman)

An aluminum snowman is made using a snowman shaped piece of styrofoam. The styrofoam is packed in casting sand (Petrobond) to create a mold. When poured into the mold, the molten aluminum vaporizes the styrofoam and fills the mold. This is known as lost foam casting. Holes are then drilled and tapped to attach common hardware such as screws and bolts to make the features. It’s a little weird, I know, but I wanted to do something with sand and lost foam casting, so this is what I came up with.

In the end I did a stop-motion animation with the snowman which turned out much better than I thought it would. I had an alternate ending with a Santa Clause and presents but I ultimately chose this one. I may post the alternate on my Instagram page.

The snowman was not actually harmed in the end. That was all camera tricks.

I’ll make some more ant colony casting videos soon.