Post #784210 by danlovestikis on Wed, Feb 21, 2018 7:01 PM

hang10tiki you are so right. No one enjoys making molds. The monkey was made by MadDogMike to decorate VampiressRN's room at Tiki Oasis a few years ago. He also made a plane. We got to bring them both home to decorate our garage and man cave.

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PART FOUR making the mold for the Sacramento Crawl 2018 in October.

First I remove the soft clay that formed the opening for the mold.

I make this opening large so that I can have it hold a lost of extra slip that will disappear inside as the mold sucks out the water. This way I don't have to keep returning to top off the slip.

The first mold pieces are held together with a strap. When the last (bottom) piece is poured it will level out so the mold won't look so wonky.

I use a cantaloupe scoop to make more locks that will keep the last piece from slipping.

I coat the plaster with four layers of mold soap and blot between. This is poison so gloves should be worn if you think you might touch it. Also a mask should be worn but we never take ours off on a mold day.

My wooden mold sides are not tall enough to this last piece so I took wood and placed it around the mold to support the sides.

I put the box together on top of the wood supports.

Here's how it looks.

We mix the plaster together. I measure the water and then slowly sprinkle in the plaster until it's just like buttermilk.

We have two buckets one with water that is for mixing the plaster and one that I use to wash my hands and Dan runs the mixer in to clean off the plaster before it hardens.

In this photo you can see the clay snakes I put at all the seams and around the edges where the mold is against the wooden box. This prevents leaks which are a nightmare. I also run a wet paper towel along this clay to make it seal better.

45 minutes and the 5 piece mold will be finished.

Cheers, Wendy

[ Edited by: danlovestikis 2018-02-21 19:02 ]