The Clusterfuck continues
I am beginning to believe this place does not want me to cast anything.
So I come in preparing for a marathon casting overnight that has seen me get locked out of both the costume shop and vent hood twice. Went to borrow a key so I can work finally, and now upon troubleshooting one of my molds have discovered that the conditions downstairs will not allow me to cast my molds properly.
I started noticing bubbles in some of my metal cast, and especially in my wood casts. So I used less release agent and thoroughly mixed all of my resin to cut down on my air bubbles. I was then casting my stick-handle grenade fully, no hollow casting on this, so it would be solid and strong. When I was trying to hollow cast it so I could fill with plaster, I found that the handle would clog with material, and it was much lighter than it should be for the amount of material required to fill the handle. So on my attempt to say "fuck it" let's waste material and just cast the whole damn thing solid I run into a fun problem. I mix up a lot of plastic with my pecan shell flour in it, and while I'm ensuring a good thorough mixing, it starts to foam on me, and expand! It expanded over twice it's original volume, overflowing out of my mixing contanier and onto my workspace. So i trashed the whole conatainer, probably ruined the mothermold on my stick-handle grenade in the process, and lost 14 tbsp. of plastic (which I really don't like)
So upon some investigation on Smooth-on's website, I find that urethane resins like to bubble and foam in cold areas of high moisture content. I have no other place in the building to mix this stuff, so I come in super-late at night to not be in anyone's way, and store ALL of my casting materials downstairs. With the vent hood running it sucks in air from outside and then spits it right back out, for excellent ventilation. The only problem is that when it snows, and it has been every day for the last week, it sucks the snow in and the vent room gets filled with moisture. So there is absolutely no way I see getting around the moisture, because they tell me I have to run the vent when I mix plastic (even though the MSDS doesn't site any dangerous fumes). It's a smart idea, so I won't do it without a vent running, but there is no way I see to get the moisture out of that room (it IS the dye room), or to mix my plastic in the prop shop....So I'm screwed. No stickhandle grenades due to environment....I can finish my other grenades and my clips, but it just foams too much for the stickhandles. Oddly enough the metal powder castings are doing fine, but the regular resin with pigment, and with pigment and pecan shell flour foam to an unacceptable level. I don't know if there is anything I can do.
The part that frustrates me the most is that I may have contaminated my new 2 gallon set of smoothcast by opening and storing it down there. I feel like I can't win. I guess it's a good thing this is theatre and not film, you can get away with a WHOLE LOT more in theatre....
So I come in preparing for a marathon casting overnight that has seen me get locked out of both the costume shop and vent hood twice. Went to borrow a key so I can work finally, and now upon troubleshooting one of my molds have discovered that the conditions downstairs will not allow me to cast my molds properly.
I started noticing bubbles in some of my metal cast, and especially in my wood casts. So I used less release agent and thoroughly mixed all of my resin to cut down on my air bubbles. I was then casting my stick-handle grenade fully, no hollow casting on this, so it would be solid and strong. When I was trying to hollow cast it so I could fill with plaster, I found that the handle would clog with material, and it was much lighter than it should be for the amount of material required to fill the handle. So on my attempt to say "fuck it" let's waste material and just cast the whole damn thing solid I run into a fun problem. I mix up a lot of plastic with my pecan shell flour in it, and while I'm ensuring a good thorough mixing, it starts to foam on me, and expand! It expanded over twice it's original volume, overflowing out of my mixing contanier and onto my workspace. So i trashed the whole conatainer, probably ruined the mothermold on my stick-handle grenade in the process, and lost 14 tbsp. of plastic (which I really don't like)
So upon some investigation on Smooth-on's website, I find that urethane resins like to bubble and foam in cold areas of high moisture content. I have no other place in the building to mix this stuff, so I come in super-late at night to not be in anyone's way, and store ALL of my casting materials downstairs. With the vent hood running it sucks in air from outside and then spits it right back out, for excellent ventilation. The only problem is that when it snows, and it has been every day for the last week, it sucks the snow in and the vent room gets filled with moisture. So there is absolutely no way I see getting around the moisture, because they tell me I have to run the vent when I mix plastic (even though the MSDS doesn't site any dangerous fumes). It's a smart idea, so I won't do it without a vent running, but there is no way I see to get the moisture out of that room (it IS the dye room), or to mix my plastic in the prop shop....So I'm screwed. No stickhandle grenades due to environment....I can finish my other grenades and my clips, but it just foams too much for the stickhandles. Oddly enough the metal powder castings are doing fine, but the regular resin with pigment, and with pigment and pecan shell flour foam to an unacceptable level. I don't know if there is anything I can do.
The part that frustrates me the most is that I may have contaminated my new 2 gallon set of smoothcast by opening and storing it down there. I feel like I can't win. I guess it's a good thing this is theatre and not film, you can get away with a WHOLE LOT more in theatre....