Melted aluminum in Egg?

Ozzie_Isaac

Okay, so cooked a roast today.  Did the regular setup, then turned wick up to high and seared it.  Went back out and the aluminum foil melted and maybe burned?  Now I have white inside my egg and on my rack.  Not sure if melted/redeposited aluminum?  What is best way to clean this mess up?

GrateEggspectations

Guess you wrapped your thermo on that cook. 😅 Melting point of 1200F. No idea how to clean from here. I will be interested to see suggestions. 

lousubcap

Here is the simple solution-toss it all, defer a routine maintenance on that Porsche (to cover the $$) and get an old school DFMT.  Nothing like new accessories.  

alaskanassasin

@Mickey might be able to offer some insight?

Mickey

alaskanassasin said:

@Mickey might be able to offer some insight?

Cook some wings. Hell i don’t know…..

Dyal_SC

That’s impressive actually. You literally hit cremation temperature. 

Botch

When I worked on the Space Shuttle boosters (RSRMs) at Thiokol, I was surprised to learn that the "fuel" was actually just aluminum powder; it was suspended in a matrix of an epoxy binder, an oxidizer (ammonium nitrate iirc), an iron oxide catalyst (yeah, "rust"), and possibly a couple other ingredients I can't remember (I do have the full specs in a book somewhere in my basement, it wasn't Classified).  The final consistency was that of a pencil eraser, and the "sleeves" of propellant up the sides of the boosters had solid baffles every few feet, as the propellant couldn't support its own weight any further than that without tearing.  
Aluminum oxidizes fairly quickly with exposure to air, in fact your aluminum cookware develops a layer of aluminum oxide fairly quickly, but it's only molecularly thick due to metalluric/chem things I never understood.  It washes off every time you scrub your frying pan, but redevelops in a few hours (you won't live long enough to "wear thru" your cookware, so no worries).  
 
I don't know if, at Egg temps, the aluminum evaporated, and recondensed at the exhaust, or if it formed aluminum oxide that condensed.  I do seem to remember than Al oxidized at extremely high temp/pressure in the RSRM, and that's when it released so much propellant energy (that probably didn't happen in your egg)  The exhaust from the RSRM was CO2, H2O, whatever the epoxy/additive byproducts were, and fine sand (aluminum oxide!)   

Ozzie_Isaac

Botch said:

When I worked on the Space Shuttle boosters (RSRMs) at Thiokol, I was surprised to learn that the "fuel" was actually just aluminum powder; it was suspended in a matrix of an epoxy binder, an oxidizer (ammonium nitrate iirc), an iron oxide catalyst (yeah, "rust"), and possibly a couple other ingredients I can't remember (I do have the full specs in a book somewhere in my basement, it wasn't Classified).  The final consistency was that of a pencil eraser, and the "sleeves" of propellant up the sides of the boosters had solid baffles every few feet, as the propellant couldn't support its own weight any further than that without tearing.  
Aluminum oxidizes fairly quickly with exposure to air, in fact your aluminum cookware develops a layer of aluminum oxide fairly quickly, but it's only molecularly thick due to metalluric/chem things I never understood.  It washes off every time you scrub your frying pan, but redevelops in a few hours (you won't live long enough to "wear thru" your cookware, so no worries).  
 
I don't know if, at Egg temps, the aluminum evaporated, and recondensed at the exhaust, or if it formed aluminum oxide that condensed.  I do seem to remember than Al oxidized at extremely high temp/pressure in the RSRM, and that's when it released so much propellant energy (that probably didn't happen in your egg)  The exhaust from the RSRM was CO2, H2O, whatever the epoxy/additive byproducts were, and fine sand (aluminum oxide!)   

I think thermite is made with iron oxide and aluminum powder.

I did appreciate your write-up. In college we had a professor who used to mix up concoctions of powdered metals in a binder of some sort, pour it into tubes mounted on a huge heavy cart, roll it out to loading dock, strap on a huge pressure plate and fire it off.  The loading dock was right outside the machine shop I worked at.  He didn’t x-ray, vacuum bake, or anything.  We kept waiting for his “experiments” the blow up and kill him and his grad students.  Thankfully it never happened.

Botch

Ozzie_Isaac said:
In college we had a professor who used to mix up concoctions of powdered metals in a binder of some sort, pour it into tubes mounted on a huge heavy cart, roll it out to loading dock, strap on a huge pressure plate and fire it off.  The loading dock was right outside the machine shop I worked at.  He didn’t x-ray, vacuum bake, or anything.  We kept waiting for his “experiments” the blow up and kill him and his grad students.  Thankfully it never happened.

Hah!  There was a similar "mad-scientist" type at one of the CAD/PAD manufacturers we had in Phoenix.  He showed a video at a conference of him testing different explosive mixes (very small amounts, iirc they were set off inside a small cement mixer, but not really any measurements attached other than the video/audio.)  You could hear his vocal responses: "Ah", "Hmm", "Eh", "Wow", and "Holy Sh*t!"  The guys in the conference loved it!  
I got to visit his lab once.  He had two PC computer towers on his desk, covers removed, with jumper wires going to various rackmount measurement devices and custom electronic boards on his side desks, with additional leads ending in alligator clips all over the place.  I really admire these guys who can harness current tech and make it do what THEY want; a skill I don't have at all.    

DoubleEgger

I’d probably take a foil ball to get the big stuff off and then hit it with some fine sandpaper. For the grid, I’d use Easy Off. 

Corv

My feel for this is that you won't get the aluminum off. It's permanent. Sorry!

RRP

Botch said:

When I worked on the Space Shuttle boosters (RSRMs) at Thiokol, I was surprised to learn that the "fuel" was actually just aluminum powder; it was suspended in a matrix of an epoxy binder, an oxidizer (ammonium nitrate iirc), an iron oxide catalyst (yeah, "rust"), and possibly a couple other ingredients I can't remember (I do have the full specs in a book somewhere in my basement, it wasn't Classified).  The final consistency was that of a pencil eraser, and the "sleeves" of propellant up the sides of the boosters had solid baffles every few feet, as the propellant couldn't support its own weight any further than that without tearing.  
Aluminum oxidizes fairly quickly with exposure to air, in fact your aluminum cookware develops a layer of aluminum oxide fairly quickly, but it's only molecularly thick due to metalluric/chem things I never understood.  It washes off every time you scrub your frying pan, but redevelops in a few hours (you won't live long enough to "wear thru" your cookware, so no worries).  
 
I don't know if, at Egg temps, the aluminum evaporated, and recondensed at the exhaust, or if it formed aluminum oxide that condensed.  I do seem to remember than Al oxidized at extremely high temp/pressure in the RSRM, and that's when it released so much propellant energy (that probably didn't happen in your egg)  The exhaust from the RSRM was CO2, H2O, whatever the epoxy/additive byproducts were, and fine sand (aluminum oxide!)   

Whoever says you can't learn some interesting facts from this forum must not read ones etc about egging brisket or such!

Tspud1

Bet you will need to replace gasket also

Ozzie_Isaac

Tspud1 said:

Bet you will need to replace gasket also

Yeah, the gasket is toast.  Definitely on my list for fixes.  Will probably do a clean burn today to see if once my later of grease and everything burns off the white deposits leave too.  Then I will clean it all and fix everything.

DoubleEgger

Ozzie_Isaac said:

Tspud1 said:

Bet you will need to replace gasket also

Yeah, the gasket is toast.  Definitely on my list for fixes.  Will probably do a clean burn today to see if once my later of grease and everything burns off the white deposits leave too.  Then I will clean it all and fix everything.

Gasket? You don’t need no stinking gasket! 

Battleborn

DoubleEgger said:

Ozzie_Isaac said:

Tspud1 said:

Bet you will need to replace gasket also

Yeah, the gasket is toast.  Definitely on my list for fixes.  Will probably do a clean burn today to see if once my later of grease and everything burns off the white deposits leave too.  Then I will clean it all and fix everything.

Gasket? You don’t need no stinking gasket! 

I bet Ron would say otherwise. 

Elijah

He better watch out or he'll end up on the front page

Ozzie_Isaac

Did a clean burn.  Maybe should have used more charcoal, but overall it looks better.  I may do what I did on my medium and just but a nomex gasket on the bottom.  It chugs along perfect.  I will need to realign my XL though, it looks pretty wonky now.  The bands didn't like the heat.

DoubleEgger

Ozzie_Isaac said:

Did a clean burn.  Maybe should have used more charcoal, but overall it looks better.  I may do what I did on my medium and just but a nomex gasket on the bottom.  It chugs along perfect.  I will need to realign my XL though, it looks pretty wonky now.  The bands didn't like the heat.

I had to buy new bands after a high heat episode on my XL. They were never right after the excessive heat. 

alaskanassasin

I was thinking the same thing @kl8ton