Resin castings (1 Viewer)

[blaster]

I made numerous castings of modular elephant parts for future projects. The moulds were malleable putty silicone rubber and the castings were two part resin and hardener. I didn't experience any real problems with air bubbles and if mixed properly, the resin was pourable and set correctly. the curing time was a mere few minutes! There were a couple of iffy castings which were discarded. I have enough parts to assemble 5 elephants here.

 

[zblang]

Cool! Can’t wait to see what you do with them

 

[blaster]

Hi Zach,

Thanks for looking in. I had done these casting previous in metal but the overall weight was just cumbersome. Besides, the mode of casting in molten metal was less convenient and more dangerous!

The master was from a toy soft plastic elephant. Hence I wanted to work with a rigid material for posterity.

I have several ideas swirling around for these beasties offhand. Indian, Sassanian, Khmer, Mammoth etc etc.

Rgds Victor

 

[blaster]

I ve started to assemble these parts. The first pic shows a basic configuration. The 2nd shows a conversion to a different pose.

 

[blaster]

I've added the heads and proposed trunks. I think that the poses are starting to get interesting.

 

[blaster]

I've also made resin castings of some pillar plinths for another project.

 

[blaster]

I've completed all the castings for pillar tops for my project. Here are examples of each of the three types that I wanted. I sculpted the masters and made bas-relief castings. These are intended for a shadow-box diorama.

 

[blaster]

As can be seen, some work is required on the elephants. Here's WIP on one of them.






I also made some simple castings for background scenes.

 

[blaster]

And here is the other elephant. As most of the basic assembly of the castings have been completed, I'll post further updates on the elephants in their separate threads.

 

[Markster]

I made numerous castings of modular elephant parts for future projects. The moulds were malleable putty silicone rubber and the castings were two part resin and hardener. I didn't experience any real problems with air bubbles and if mixed properly, the resin was pourable and set correctly. the curing time was a mere few minutes! There were a couple of iffy castings which were discarded. I have enough parts to assemble 5 elephants here.

View attachment 246621

Cool ! I have done a little resin casting, I have some problems with trapped air causing incomplete casting. I have put vents in which helps some. I read You can thin the resin with isopropyl alcohol ( hopefully will cast better if thinner ) ,looking forward to trying that !

 

[blaster]

Hi Markster,

interesting suggestion to add isoprop alc to resin. The stuff is not cheap, and there are two parts to it, resin and hardener. Once mixed, I only had less than a minute to pour before the hardening started.

My biggest bugbear was insufficient mixing causing parts of the resin to remain uncured. There was no choice but to junk the casting and try again.

Maybe you can try to dust the inside of the mould with graphite powder? It works with lead tin castings to give you smooth castings.

Rgds Victor