Sourcing bronze for casting

Over the last couple of days people on the Norsefolk list have been talking about bronze for buckles.

Someone pointed out that since the exclusion of lead from most freely available items, plumbing solder is now almost exusively tin. He says he has taken 98% tin solder and combined it with stripped-back copper wiring in the necessary proportion (85:15?), melted it in a ceramic crucible using two propane torches and produced bronze for casting.

Another person from the list says he finds is much more sure to make a one off wax model and send it to a casting house to have the item made than to try to cast the items himself and lose the wax model.

They are both ideas worth investigating. Since I am focussing in on the model and mould making, I probably won't have time to also learn about the casting side of things during this challenge. A cast item would be nice to have at the end, instead of just a series of wax lumps.

article - Scandanavian Bronze casting (Anders Soderberg)

Scandanvian bronze casting in the Viking Age and Early Middle Ages

'Bronze casting is an elegant play with a couple of cubic-decimeters of borrowed hell.'
               Anders Soderberg

This website has information on all of the main topic involved in VA bronze casting. I have really enjoyed reading this collection.

It covers bronze compositions in the VA, taking into account the need to make adjustments once the zinc levels drop due to refiring of the product. Anders also outlines some of the properties of migration era and VA crucibles, as well as practical suggestions on how to replicate these mixes. The discussion on the use of wax models to imprint clay to make moulds has a some great, trialled theories about the speed of mould production and cleaning up. I even like the references to VA hearths and smiths. But most useful were the pictures. There are photos of methods being used and products alongside their moulds and the tools.