Help needed in muggy Southeast!

[harrisna]

Greetings y'all, I just found this site while trying to locate a source for replacing cast iron oven parts. My mother has some property in SC upon which a 50-year old brick oven sits that she would like to restore and get some use out of. Mainly cast iron doors, grates, etc. that have rusted in the elements over the years. Any suggestions/ideas? TIA!

[dmun]

Re: Help needed in muggy Southeast!

Custom iron castings are a problem. If you give us a picture, we might be able to make some suggestions. Besides, we like pictures of old ovens.

[nissanneill]

Re: Help needed in muggy Southeast!

Old cast iron grates are a rarity nowadays unless you are very good at patternmaking and cast new ones, if you can find a foundry who will bother with fiddly one offs.
As dmun suggests, some pictures would held a lot but off the top of my head, I would get some steel, the profile(s) of the castings, either find a metalworker or make new ones. I know that they are not the same, but are you restoring it for museum use or to simply get it working to use.
If the castings are there but broken, they can be welded by one who knows what they are doing, but you need the bits. A close friend of mine spent a week welding some 150 year old 3/4 ton cast iron gates that a car crashed through. Irreplaceable but repaired with a great deal of time and effort, but back in place and in use.
I love doing that sort of work! Very satisfying, especially when I have to get the forge going and blacksmithing that red hot steel.
Neill