As part of the Design Academy Eindhoven student show at Dutch Design Week, graduate Jelle Seegers has presented a smelting machine with an oversized magnifying glass that focuses the sun's heat to melt metal more sustainably.
The Solar Metal Smelter features a large lens that is manually moved to follow the path of the sun and direct its heat into a crucible holding metal. Once liquid enough, the metal can be cast into a sand mould and made into a variety of products.
Jelle Seegers presented his Solar Metal Smelter at Dutch Design Week. Photo is by Iris Rijskamp
Seegers is a self-described maker, who uses the smelter in his own workshop and proposes it as a solution for metal casting companies looking to save the emissions and spiralling energy costs associated with powering industrial furnaces. "By making this thing manual, it really changes the casting craft from one where you just have endless energy coming into your workshop to one where you personally cooperate with the sun in order to melt the metal," he told Dezeen.
Seegers was moved to create the project, his final-year bachelor's work, after undertaking an internship at a casting company and realising what an "enormous" amount of energy is used there.
The smelter melts metal so it can be cast into sand moulds
He arrived at the concept of the Solar Metal Smelter after he remembered using a magnifying glass to make fire as a child. Compared to all the other methods of heating something, this seeme...