help! I'm too stupid to understand :(

Hi, Please be kind (and treat me like a particularly stupid child) !

I have not understood the slightest thing I have ever heard or read about casting (cuttlefish aside). I'm wondering how I could make castings of things that are very delicate like flowers or leaves etc, so I could make sterling replicas of them. I haven't understood one word of any explanation of wax casting, and I'm wondering if there is a simple 'kitchen table' way of doing things - apart from cuttlefish which I know cant work for such delicate items. Sorry if this topic has been done to death, I think I need a 'casting for dummies' response. I need something low tech that can be done at home with little or no specialist equipment! It's not something I can try out just now anyway, but I just need to mull it over for now.

p.s. I do 'get' the gist of delft clay casting, but haven't had a go yet, but as I understand it - you have to press the sand down using a lot of pressure, so that also wouldn't work for delicate flowers and leaves etc.

Thanks
Stupid Sue

Sue, casting is not really for doing at home, it's a workshop process. If you want to make flowers and leaves and have multiples of them for some purpose, then make yourself some master patterns from copper and then send them to a professional caster who will make molds from your master patterns, make wax models from the molds, then use the lost wax process for casting in silver. They will charge you for the molds and you will then own them, they will charge you per casting and per gram for metals used.

If you do not want multiples then try shaping the flowers and leaves by hand, using a piercing saw to cut the shapes, hammers and punches to add shapes.
Did you see the tutorial I did on shaping a leaf? see;http://www.cooksongold.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4802

This shows one of my flowers and the copper patterns I made, but no casting here as I only made the patterns before committing my ideas to gold.

Attachment 9498


James

Perhaps I can just fill in the answer to the beginning of the question. To replicate an object by centrifugal or vacuum casting it has to be made of something which will burn away cleanly, to leave a mould.

Traditionally this is wax or resin, buried in a modified plaster of paris called investment, with channels, or sprues leading to a funnel shape at the surface.

Once the investment has dried out it can be heated to burn out the invested object and be replaced by molten metal.
Obviously this process needs to be controlled to avoid risk of fire and injury. Dennis.

Are you wishing to cast from actual leaves etc. if so have a look here http://carinarossner.com/caor1.html

you can use the lost wax principle with much less equipment, however it becomes more hit and miss

Thats a really good explanation of the process, thanks for sharing that China :)

Thanks for responses,

Thanks James, your flowers are beautiful and I could certainly try that method of construction - however, they wont turn out like yours - you are a master craftsman and I am a somewhat Kackhanded hobbyist. I will have a go at some point at making some simple ones in that way though.

Thanks Dennis, I see now that this isn't something to do at home! and not without really knowing what I'm doing either (don't fancy keeping the emergency services busy).

Ah Yes, China, that is exactly the sort of thing I had in mind - thanks for the link, its really interesting to see how its done (the visuals really help). That is so cool, I think its somewhat beyond me at present but its great to see how it is achieved, really interesting.

Thanks All
Not quite as stupid as I used to be Sue

Joella

Having made a leaf and flowers following James' instructions I wouldn't say its beyond you- obviously ours wouldn't be as perfect and stunning as James' but its a relatively easy method of making perfectly nice leaves and flowers, give it a go ;)