Trials, Errors and Triumphs

Mini Project

For the past week, I have been busy with a casting project to create a mini mass produced range of jewellery. It all started through a customer wanting a bracelet with a custom link filled with bright coloured enamels. Although this does not fall under my Btech umbrella of work, I still feel that the findings of this little project can help me with my academic work.

Sprew

the bracelet that I have been making consists of a disc shaped link with curled and curved designs cut out of the surface. I will be filling these empty cavities with opaque enamels of different colour. My first challenge came about after I made my master copy, I realized that I did not have a sprew cone and that I needed one before I could make my rubber mold. This then lead  me to come up with a solution. I pierced a cone shape out of copper plate and formed it into a DIY sprew cone which I then could use in my mold making process.

DIY Sprew

my disc link design

Vulcanizing and mold making

Before I started up my vulcanizer, I realized that Had a problem, I couldn't calibrate the temperature of my vulcanizer without a rod thermometer that can reach up to 170 Degrees. I searched my mother's cupboards and phoned friends to see if I could find a chef's thermometer but I was out of luck, or so I thought. I remembered one Channuka-Christmas feast that we had, My sister in-law cooked a beautiful pot of pomegranate brisket in our gas braai and I remembered seeing a temperature dial fastened to the lid. I had an 'AHA!!' moment. I went and unscrewed this little dial off of our family braai and converted it into a rod thermometer (which I tested with a cup of boiling water at 90 degrees). Finally, I was able to calibrate my machine and start molding. 

Vulcanizer (In my Mother's kitchen... guess who wasn't happy) with rod thermometer. (Please notice my mother's "Kitsch"en art. Portrait of my dad eating an egg)

 Wax injecting.
I set up my wax injector and I was ready to work, but after about 50 injection attempts having no successful models at all, I realized that I had a big problem, 99.9% of my injects were failures. I played with the wax pressure and temperature but I had no improvement at all, then it became a reality that the fault was with the placement of my sprews and the wax was having a hard time filling all the cavities. So this took me back to square one and i had to redesign the master model's sprew placement.

All my duds 

Old sprew placement

new sprew placement

Square one
After I realized what my problem was, I had to remake the master model, rubber mold and set up all the equipment again but this was all worth it because after I started injecting into my new mold, 50% of my wax injections were successful and I am able to cast them.

Interpretation
For me, the most significant part of my mini project was the vital knowledge I learned From the project. I learned to double check my work before going on to the next step of the process as this could save me plenty of frustration and time in the long run. At first, I thought that this project will be quick and I would be able to finish within a day but I soon realized that this was not the case. Sometimes you cannot plan out the problems that you will face unless you jump in and take each step at a time and when faced with a complication, to jump in the deep end and tackle the problems head on, even if you have to think outside of the box to find a solution. In addition, it is important to carry on and not lose focus even if you feel like you want to give up, the determination pays off in the end.