in a foundry, why does the molten metal not melt the vat in which it’s being heated?

Question

I mean, obviously the vat must be made of a metal with a higher melting point. But then how did they cast the metal to make that vat?

In: Chemistry

Answer 1

* The vat can be made of something other than metal, like ceramic. Ceramic is a slurry that only gets hard once it dries, cures, and is fired.
* A lot of smaller smelting crucibles are made of graphite (carbon) which has a high melting point but is soft and easy to just carve out the desired shape rather than casting it.
* If it’s a metal vat, it didn’t necessarily have to have been cast from completely liquefied metal, it could have been just heated enough to soften and then pounded into shape.