Grant Thompson, the “King of Random,” has gone to new heights to turn trash into treasure. He previously made a tutorial that taught us how to make a small metal foundry in our own homes. In this video, he shows us how to use that foundry to turn old aluminum cans into something we can all enjoy.

First he shows us how to set up the foundry. The foundry itself is made of a metal bucket and plaster. You can see him placing a small ring of charcoal briquettes in the bottom. On top of this he places the crucible, which he made from an old fire extinguisher.

Next, he adds the metal pipe to the side and shows how to use that pipe, a plastic pipe, and an old blow dryer to create the air system for the foundry.

After that is set up, he adds more briquettes around the crucible until the reach the top of the opening. He lights the briquettes on fire and once they are burning, he puts the cover on top of the foundry to allow it to heat to temperature.

Once the crucible is glowing orange he removes the cover and begins to melt the cans. They melt quickly.

Grant then moves on to the fun part. First he makes ingot using full steel bake ware. The aluminum is poured in to the molds slowly to allow the slag to stay in the crucible. These ingots are pure aluminum in muffin shapes, bunt cake shapes, and a very adorable teddy bear that really is too cute to melt again.

He does melt them though and pours them into a sand mold he created with a secret object in the middle, which gives the end product it’s shape. It’s an aluminum sword, shaped like it could have come straight from a video game or cartoon.

He ended up giving the sword away as a contest prize on his YouTube page. It’s amazing to see such a wonderful item made from aluminum cans which usually end up getting thrown away or recycled. Talk about the ultimate upcycle!

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