Friday, December 14, 2012

finally complete! And to my satisfaction


The arm textured with a needle scale and sand blasted to cover up the welding seams

 Patination: heating up with a propane torch until the pores of the bronze open up and sweat


 Then a wax seal after a night of aging

 Final steps for the stand, 1''x1'' steel squares to weld to the base of the legs to fit the wheels

 after a bottle of glass cleaner!









Sunday, November 25, 2012

putting together the stand


Laying out all the polished pieces to clamp together 

 Not a one man job, thank you matt for helping me clamp and hold the piece in place.

 This is the clamped together stand up right

The creation of the pedestal


Precise measurements are key 



I am creating a stand for my bronze arm piece, roughly 35+ pounds, so this stand must be build right.

The stand frame is build from 1'' angle steel cut at 45 degree angles to create two precise rectangles. The rectangles will be enclosed with tempered 1/4'' glass, that I will fuse with a silicone binder. The glass box is 21.5'' X 12'' X 6''. The steel frame extends down from the box roughly 3' to the ground where I will install steel wheels on the end of each leg.






I had to re-make the steel frame boxes a couple times because they were not up to par. 
After the boxes are assembled to satisfaction, I grind down the welds so that the glass will lay evenly in the boxes. 



the re-cast and piecing of the arm parts


I used a tack welder to weld together the finger and arm parts, using bronze rod
My final piece is going to be displayed on a mirror so that the underside can be reflected down and seen







Friday, October 26, 2012

Re-doing the arm casting


The first bronze pour, the arm part did not come out the way I wished, the ceramic shell had trapped an air bubble. Thus, filling the top portion of the arm to be solid and the lower end was deprived the bronze creating holes. 




Here is the first arm pour you can see the center filled with bronze.