I am attempting to repair a gas-fired kiln that is used to fire the
shell moulds at a bronze foundry. The fire clay nozzles cracked and
caused heat to destroy the ignition transformers. The problem is I
can't find any supplier that carries these transformers. The brand is
Webster and I see many cross-references at other manufactures sites but
no one that carries Webster. This kiln was made at the shop from
commercially available (at the time) components, but the maker and his
sources are long gone. Any help with suppliers would be most
appreciated.
Thanks

Any reason not to use an "equivlanet" transformer from another
manufacturer, particularly when you have some cross-references
available? There probably isn't anything critical about that
particular transformer.

Bob

In the interest of brevity, I failed to emphasize that I am looking for
a source of supply for all things kiln-furnace-gas valve-high
temperature control etc. I do the maintenance at the foundry and there
is numerous gas fired ovens and blast furnaces. I was hopping to appeal
to the amateur "metal melters" or gas "kiln builders" out there
to find out if they had discovered such a source. It would also be
nice if located in northern California but that may be asking too much.
The kiln I am repairing also needs a new 4" long spark plug, and
other odd stuff like that.
Eugene

wrote:
In the interest of brevity, I failed to emphasize that I am looking for
a source of supply for all things kiln-furnace-gas valve-high
temperature control etc. I do the maintenance at the foundry and there
is numerous gas fired ovens and blast furnaces. I was hopping to appeal
to the amateur "metal melters" or gas "kiln builders" out there
to find out if they had discovered such a source. It would also be
nice if located in northern California but that may be asking too much.
The kiln I am repairing also needs a new 4" long spark plug, and
other odd stuff like that.
Eugene

Hello, Eugene.

The number one supply source for amateur foundry workers in the United
States is Budget Casting Supply, which is located in northern
California, so that is the good news. The bad news is that Budget
Casting Supply caters mostly to the hobbyist or small operator, and so
most of what you want will probably not be found there. I would
consult the Thomas Register about the spark plug. Both of these
sources are on the internet. By the way, those of us who build antique
miniature internal combustion engines sometimes build our own spark
plugs. I doubt that you would want to do so yourself, however. Good
luck.

Mike

You might check on parts for oil-burners as used in home heating furnaces
and in the "torpedo" type space heaters as these use high energy spark
ignition.
Don Young

wrote in message
ups.com...
In the interest of brevity, I failed to emphasize that I am looking for
a source of supply for all things kiln-furnace-gas valve-high
temperature control etc. I do the maintenance at the foundry and there
is numerous gas fired ovens and blast furnaces. I was hopping to appeal
to the amateur "metal melters" or gas "kiln builders" out there
to find out if they had discovered such a source. It would also be
nice if located in northern California but that may be asking too much.
The kiln I am repairing also needs a new 4" long spark plug, and
other odd stuff like that.
Eugene

On 9 Jun 2005 10:49:49 -0700, wrote:

I am attempting to repair a gas-fired kiln that is used to fire the
shell moulds at a bronze foundry. The fire clay nozzles cracked and
caused heat to destroy the ignition transformers. The problem is I
can't find any supplier that carries these transformers. The brand is
Webster and I see many cross-references at other manufactures sites but
no one that carries Webster. This kiln was made at the shop from
commercially available (at the time) components, but the maker and his
sources are long gone. Any help with suppliers would be most
appreciated.
Thanks

Look for a "continuous duty ignitor". Beckett is a leading brand.
Beckett acquired Phelon, may have acquired Webster as well.
Grainger stocks some Beckett transformers. Honeywell makes a
variety of "spark plugs" for gas and oil ignition, or used to anyway.
The electrodes are just bits of kanthal rod.

"Gas ignitors" tend to be low-energy sparkers, OK for
naturally-aspirated flames (like stoves). In a forced-air burner, a
higher energy continuous-duty oil ignitor would probably be more
suitable -- and give longer electrode life as well. They are designed
to operate in an air blast, have a discharge that looks like a flame
in moving air.

For this application I'd avoid the electronic ignitors and go with a
conventional copper-iron ignition transformer. All of the various
electronic ignitors I looked at when designing ignitors ran too hot
for good life expectancy. This was nearly 10 years ago, though, so
they may be better now.

On Fri, 10 Jun 2005 22:20:25 -0500, "Don Young"
wrote:

You might check on parts for oil-burners as used in home heating furnaces
and in the "torpedo" type space heaters as these use high energy spark
ignition.

Right. It isn't really a spark, but more of a soft arc: about 20
KV open-circuit voltage and about 1000 to 1500 volts at about 25 mA
once the discharge is established. They'll ignite a popsicle stick
in a second or two. In an oil burner the arc is blown into the
combustion region; the electrodes are not directly exposed to flame.