Casting Experiment

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jsolie

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Joined
Apr 25, 2013
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2,100
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Sunny Murrieta, CA
So I thought I'd try a little bit of casting and see how it goes. I'd never done any casting of any kind before, so I'm glad that this site has a good library and that there are some very informative videos on YouTube.

So my wife and I went to Hobby Lobby a couple of weeks ago. She had a 40% off coupon, which we used on the resin. They didn't have the largest selection of pigments, so I got some lavender, pearl and a small bit of fine silver glitter (Note to self: glitter gets everywhere even when you are careful).

For the molds, I used some old schedule 40 PVC pipe. I didn't have any corks, but I did have some duct tape. This made a dandy cover for one end of the PVC. The resin was poured into some 3 oz. cups, pigment, glitter and MEKP added. I was able to fill two and a half tubes.

I knocked out the blank the next day using a dowel rod, and turned this pen a few days later (wanting to give that resin plenty of time to do it's thing).

It may not look like it with the cell phone shots, but this is a chrome cigar pen with the lavender/pearl/glitter blank. Finished with MM and Hut's Ultra Gloss. The depth in this pen is incredible...you can stare into it, move it slightly and it just shimmers from a different level.

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I've since done a little bit more casting, which has turned out pretty well. I'm continually amazed at where the wood turning rabbit hole can lead you.
 
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turncrazy43

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Apr 22, 2012
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1,104
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Marietta, GA
Check out woodnwhimsies.com for your replacement resin and pearlex dies. I have found them to have the most reasonable prices for those items. If you are using 3/4" PVC pipes the #10 corks work well and can be reused numerous times. The 1/2" PVC pipe is good for slim line pens as well. CoastalScents.com has a wide selection of dyes at more reasonable prices than your hobby stores. Your castings look good.
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jsolie

Member
Joined
Apr 25, 2013
Messages
2,100
Location
Sunny Murrieta, CA
Check out woodnwhimsies.com for your replacement resin and pearlex dies. I have found them to have the most reasonable prices for those items. If you are using 3/4" PVC pipes the #10 corks work well and can be reused numerous times. The 1/2" PVC pipe is good for slim line pens as well. CoastalScents.com has a wide selection of dyes at more reasonable prices than your hobby stores. Your castings look good.

Thanks! I've been eyeing that site. I wasn't sure how the castings would go, and I didn't want to buy a bunch of stuff to find out that it wasn't for me.

However, I feel like I'm on the edge of another slippery slope and I'm glad that y'all are helping wax the skis, getting them properly set, and offering advice for the ride down that slope. :biggrin:
 
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