Lost Wax Casting - Part 2 ( Part 1 actually)
I imagine this this actually part 1, because all the work we are doing here, comes before the last post.
The first photo is of me setting up the wax molds on a "button" of wax. I fit as many wax pieces on the button as elbow-room allows, as long as the pieces are not touching. We had anywhere from 10-15 pieces per button.
The next step is to "make the biscuits" as Horace puts it. You mix up a fine-grained white powder with water, vaccuum out the bubbles and carefully, pour it over the flasks. They also get vacuumed for air bubbles. They are then put into a kiln for about 9 hours to squander out the wax on the buttons. Once that is accomplished, you can can shoot the hot silver into the areas of the flask that don't have the wax and...."ta-da" you have silver pieces like the ones I show below.
Ok, so perhaps there are a few more steps..like cutting the pieces off the button and cleaning them up, tumbling the shine back onto them and buffing them to a high shine. It is good-looking much a two day process though and one that Neil is getting pretty good at.
...
The custodial and janitorial staffs have been buffing and polishing, so even the buildings look glittering and new. (The exception being Greene, of course,
In gross, there are six steps: the initial cut, followed by grinding, three stages of sanding, and finally a run on the buffing wheel to give the rocks a and more »
