The Hot Plate Project
OK...so I sold some fishing rigs recently...the customer picked them out from our ProCatch page, checked out using our checkout cart, and sent his payment via PayPal..all I had to do was pack them up and ship them out...BUT...I was short on some egg sinkers...so I decided to try an old hot plate I bought at a local thrift shop and 'quickly' pour some of the sinkers. The weather was poor..looked like rain and I didn't want to use expensive propane to heat up a full lead pot only to have to shut down right away due to inclement weather.
I picked up this cheapo hotplate at a local thrift shop...I think it was $7.50. I was stoked to get home and quickly melt and pour some sinkers....unfortunately this hot plate has a thermostat control inside that kept shutting the heating element off....just as it was starting to melt well. So I shut it off and pulled the bottom panel off
This is a shot of the hotplate bottom...a simple screw held the top to the bottom...easy disassembly.
This shot of the inside of the hotplate shows how I removed the power lead from the temp control pot and reattached it directly to the power input side...no more temp control.....just All ON ALL the Time....so if you ever try this Do Not Walk Away from the Heater...it now has no safety features and could easily start a fire if left unattended.
I got a small pot to melt the lead ingots in, it fits well on the hotplate heating element.
To help hold even more heat I place a piece of tinfoil over the melt...it helped a little...also since the ingots had sat about for some time and may have moisture I preheated them on top of the lead pot to drive out any residual moisture. Water will flash to steam so be very carefull.
SEE our Fishing Tackle made with our Ultra Fine MarksWorx ProCatch Sinkers!! Click Here
