I've been casting for a while off a friend's blacksmiths forge using
coke as the fuel. It's a fairly easy process, and we haven't had any
trouble so far getting up to melts of about 12lbs. of bronze. Takes
15-20 minutes to do a melt from cold metal.

I also got out an old foundry text book, which has some useful tables
on the energy per pound from burning coke, air consumption etc. No
units given - this is a fairly old book.

My question is: does anyone know where I can find a table for the
energy required to melt different alloys and metals? Not the
temperature required, but the total energy required to get the melt.
I'm looking at building a coke furnace, and I'd like to be able to do
some ballpark estimates on how much metal could reasonably be poured.

regards,

Matt Turner
Turner Racing Shells Ltd.