Bard Blog

Part 1: Rapid Prototyping & 3D modelling
Part 2: Making the Silicone Mold
Part 3: Pouring the resin

Step 2: The Resin Pour
Material used:
Axson F32

Once the mold was done I measured the amount of resin needed by filling it with normal rice. This gave me a decent estimate as to how much I would need to pour to get a one figure. Mine ended up at 4 dl, however it would I soon realize I only needed 3 dl.

I then added rubber bands around the structure of the mold to keep it together and avoid spillage from resin. I first used a series of cardboard pieces around the edges, but this isn’t really necessary if you have a small and sturdy mold. I made a little cardboard box to put it on.

Axson F32’s second component is highly toxic and should only be used in a well ventilated area. If you breathe it in directly, you’ll have to spend a week in hospital. Doesn’t sound much fun. Unless you’re into nurses or second hand infections. Then it’s great!

So, you’ll probably want to get a big fan and do this next to a window. It might also be a very good idea to have a proper gas mask just to be sure.

After the mold was ready and my ventilation was in order, I poured together the two components of the Axson F32. I set a timer for 2 minutes, stirred it around for 1 minute and then poured it into the mold at a height and titled it slightly while pouring. Once it was filled up, I gave some light karate chops on each side to make the resin fill into every cavity. Doing this tends to help avoid bubbles.

Here it is, the first resin cast I did!
As you can see, it’s pretty much a perfect replica of the rapid prototype model, even the rougher texture has been replicated. At this point I realized my model was stuck inside of the silicone because I had put the model in the wrong way. Had I rotated it by 90 degrees, it would be much easier to extract from the mold. However, I managed to fix this by cutting a line in silicone from the chest down. The models after this had some additional resin around the chest, but this was easily removable.

After the I cast a few more models, I started to sand it down while spraying it with a primer, then sanding, then priming, sanding, etc. x4. At this point, they look pretty much perfect.

I then sprayed them with some normal Montana spray cans to see how they would look in color! The ideal thing to do now would be to perfect one casted model to make a master mold. This would give mea perfect casting every time and I would not have to spend ages on priming and sanding for each model.

I hope this little tutorial was useful to you! Check out my resources list underneath to learn from the places I learned…

Tips and Tricks:
-Pour the silicone from as high as you can to avoid air bubbles
-Flip the two-part molds to an 60-70 degree angle when pouring the resin
-Remember to make ventilation shafts. The more the merrier!
-Wear protective gear!

Resources:
My Flickr Set
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hellobard/sets/72157607454804214/

Resin is the New Vinyl Flickr Group
http://www.flickr.com/groups/resinisthenewvinyl/pool/

Rapid Prototyped Chocolate Monkey Faces
http://bebop.cns.ualberta.ca/~cwant/chocomonkey/

Yoshii’s ZBrush Toys
http://www.zbrushcentral.com/zbc/showthread.php?t=47708

Sci-Proto:
http://www.sci-proto.com/sla.html

Shapeways:
www.shapeways.com

Smooth-On Mold-Making Tutorial Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSH19G_6Yeo&feature=related

Freeman Supplies Tutorial Videos:
http://www.freemansupply.com/video.htm

Part 1: Rapid Prototyping & 3D modelling
Part 2: Making the Silicone Mold
Part 3: Pouring the resin

Step 1: The Silicone Mold

Material used:
Elastosil M4503 by Wacker Silicones combined with Wacker Haerter T-35. Random clay for the first layer of silicone poured, use Klean Klay or something similar instead.

The first thing I did was to get a big bag of my LEGO collection as a kid. I estimated the measure I would need to fit my model without using too much silicone but still remaining within a safe limit to avoid a flimsy mold. I then proceeded to build a giant castle of LEGO! To my surprise, this was not as much fun as it was when I was a kid

After the Lego was built, I filled half of it with clay and inserted the toy inside. As you can see, I put the body into the clay top-down. This was actually a really bad idea! It could make it nearly impossible to extract the casts as the body is stuck inside the silicone. What I should have done is to have flipped it around 90 degrees to the side.

After this, I added small holes with a pencil in the clay all around the model, so that the silicone would fill inside and create a locking mechanism to combine the two pieces later. Someone on Flickr pointed out that I had made these too deep, but they served me well through the process as they are. I then created two vents using some pencils at the ears and a pouring tract at the top. That is where you will be later be pouring the resin into. This tract should be much larger than the pencil-sized ones I made. It should also be formed as an up-side down cone for ideal pouring. I had to cut this with a scalpel at a later point as once again some of the excellent people from the “Resin is the new Vinyl” Flickr group pointed out.

The left ventilation tract was a very bad idea, I filled this up with silicone as it makes no sense. The resin would just pour out to the side!

I then built up the LEGO so it would cover the entire husky. I mixed together the two-component silicone (Elastosil M4503 & T-35) and poured it down onto the husky from as high up as possible to avoid air bubbles. Remarkably, this technique and/or choice of silicone had no air bubbles at all. The silicone then needed 20 hours to cure.

After that was done, I turned it upside down, removed the clay and then poured another batch of silicone on the other side, filling up the LEGO castle.

After another 20 hours, my two pieces of silicone were done! This silicone didn’t even need the silicone mold release spray that the Smooth-On YouTube videos say you should use. It came out quite easily, but I’m sure it might be even easier if you did use some of that spray. I think it depends on the silicone and what your model is made of.

All ready for casting…

Resources:
My Flickr Set
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hellobard/sets/72157607454804214/

Resin is the New Vinyl Flickr Group
http://www.flickr.com/groups/resinisthenewvinyl/pool/

Rapid Prototyped Chocolate Monkey Faces
http://bebop.cns.ualberta.ca/~cwant/chocomonkey/

Yoshii’s ZBrush Toys
http://www.zbrushcentral.com/zbc/showthread.php?t=47708

Sci-Proto:
http://www.sci-proto.com/sla.html

Shapeways:
www.shapeways.com

Smooth-On Mold-Making Tutorial Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSH19G_6Yeo&feature=related

Freeman Supplies Tutorial Videos:
http://www.freemansupply.com/video.htm

Check out the quick review of the Cintiq 20WSX drawing tablet I wrote for Ultrasquid!

read more | digg story

Seriously, techmogology is getting so very very good… I did this quick render of a lamp for a product I’m working on, should hopefully come something cool out of this after a little more work… Right now it’s just a strange-looking lamp, but soon. oh soon. just you wait, me and Techmogology are going places! 

We are such geeks at work…

 
 They made an iPod dock shaped as a giant, plastic pig with an ectoplasm-breathing mouth (from hell, i’m sure)! Just for ME! Thank you Amethyst, you Chinese gods of tech and animal stuffs, you are teh awesome. Please send it to my home address. I will wait in glee!
Source: Gizmodo.com

Happy new year people! Here’s to a 2008 filled with squids, monkeys and total world domination!