Businesses as diverse as cabinetmakers, motorcycle accessory dealers, tattoo parlors, giftware wholesalers, and antique reproduction manufacturers need metal parts. If they want to make their own, they'll need a foundry, and Lost & Foundry, of Spokane, has discovered a worldwide niche selling small foundry kits to such customers.

Steve Hoerner, who owns the business with his wife Donna, says the company sells its kits primarily through its Web site, which gets about 10,000 hits a month. The couple has sold the foundry kits to customers in all 50 states and in 21 countries. Customers from Australia are willing to pay $400 to $500 in shipping costs for the $370 to $425 kits, which weigh 100 to 120 pounds, Hoerner says, because they can't find them elsewhere.

Hoerner started the venture after working for 30 years in commercial foundries in Mead, Spokane, and Arizona.

"Over the years, things got mechanized. There were no journeyman positions," he says.

At Metallic Arts, a Spokane foundry, he learned what he calls "old school" foundry practices. That included the technique of sand casting, which involves pouring molten metal into an impression in what's called greensand, a mixture of sand, clay, and water. He says sand casting has become a lost art, a fact that's the inspiration for his company's name.

When Metallic Arts closed in September 2000, Washington state put him through a four-month retraining program, Hoerner says. He learned computer skills, but decided to continue the foundry trade from his basement workshop rather than seek employment in a different sector.

Hoerner had designed a small furnace from sheet metal lined with a thick molded layer of refractory material, which looks like concrete but can withstand extreme heat. He'd attached a high-pressure propane tank with a hose, then added a lid also made of refractory material. His design worked, so he cast metal objects by melting ingots or scrap metal in the furnace and pouring the molten material into greensand molds formed in wooden frames.

He found he couldn't make a living by selling the small metal items he'd cast, however, so in December 2001, he decided to dispose of his furnace by selling it on eBay.

"It sold very fast. So I made another, and another, and another," Hoerner says. They continued to sell quickly.

In 2002, Donna Hoerner gave up her day-care center in the family's home to help her husband with Lost & Foundry. It was her idea to increase revenues by selling foundry kits that include clay crucibles, small forms for molds, greensand, and small tools, along with the furnaces her husband fabricates. Lost & Foundry also began selling and shipping individual foundry supplies, including 25-pound boxes of greensand and aluminum ingots for casting.

The Hoerners continued to sell the foundry kits on eBay until six months ago, when, Steve Hoerner says, eBay raised its seller fees beyond what he was willing to pay. At that point, he switched to marketing the furnaces solely through a Web site he designed, at www.foundry101.com.

Now, Hoerner says, he ships a foundry kit every day.

"It's pretty hectic. I go for months without a day off, but as long as I can keep up, that's OK," he says.

Hoerner still occasionally takes special orders for cast metal objects. For example, he makes the medallions placed along the Centennial Trail to commemorate donors' gifts. He recently cast a solid silver golf putter, which he sold for $400.

"Now, I only do castings of historical significance, or if they're just cool," he says.

Lost & Foundry does about 5 percent of its business in the Spokane area. Hoerner knows of three large commercial foundries here, including Travis Pattern, which casts objects of aluminum, brass, and bronze; Spokane Steel, which Hoerner says makes wheels for the New York subway system, among other items; and New Castings, a subdivision of Travis Pattern that casts with iron and steel. He says Travis Pattern occasionally sends him customers that have small orders for metal castings. Spokane Industries Inc., of Spokane Valley, also has substantial foundry operations here.

The Hoerners also teach classes in metal casting to hobbyists and small-business owners, who come from as far as Florida to learn how to use Lost & Foundry's equipment. During a two-hour class, for which the Hoerners charge $45, a student can make two or three items of their choosing.

Hoerner says that during a class, participants create a mold by pressing greensand around an object in a form. The top and bottom of the form are separated, the object is removed, and the form is put back together. Hoerner melts ingots or scrap metal in a crucible in the furnace, then pours the molten metal into the mold through a hole in the sand while the participants watch. When the poured metal has cooled, participants take apart the form and brush away the sand to reveal their newly cast object.

When the Hoerners grew tired of hauling equipment and sand to classes around town, they decided to build a shop in their back yard. They hold classes there around a large table made of plywood. Samples of a variety of metal castings hang on the walls. A wood stove in the corner keeps the shop warm during winter months. A band saw in another corner cuts sheet metal or trims unwanted "appendages" from metal castings.

The Hoerners have no desire to hire employees for their business, which they say gives them a comfortable living. The couple has three grown children.

Steve Hoerner says the company's customers have many uses for the foundry kits they buy. One makes bronze copies of a tyrannosaurus Rex dinosaur tooth, which it sells to museum gift shops. Another makes small metal skulls that can be attached to motorcycle headlights. Another combines metal castings with blown glass to create unique lighting fixtures.

A mining company uses a Lost & Foundry furnace to assay metal ores and to melt flakes and nuggets into bars. An arson investigation company uses the furnace to study what happens to keys in a car fire.

"There are so many things people have an idea or an invention for," Hoerner says. He's happy that others can use his furnaces to "make prototypes of the invention that's going to make them rich."

Although many foundries have gone out of business because metal casting has been mechanized or outsourced to other countries, Hoerner says he isn't worried that Lost & Foundry's kits will become obsolete.

"There's only one way to make complicated metal objects," he says.