|
|
Post by Vapin'P on May 7, 2018 20:01:17 GMT -5
A cast resin "spring"?
I have the need to cast a resin "spring". This is for appearance and not to act as a functional spring.
Has anyone ever attempted such with any success? If so, please share how you made your mold.
If you attempted but were not successful, please share what did not work so I might shorten the experimental phase of this project.
Thanks for any and all replies....
|
|
|
|
Post by mike on May 7, 2018 21:10:04 GMT -5
Hey Vapin'P ... give us some dimensions ... are you talking really small and thin or bigger and thicker ... like the size of a Slinky (sorry couldn't think of anything else to compare it too)?
|
|
|
|
Post by Brian on May 7, 2018 21:19:57 GMT -5
...Yes, I have attempted to cast a spring....turned out to be a total waste of time and material. Since what I need is pretty small, about the size of a click pen, I just use real springs or wind my own.
|
|
|
|
Post by Vapin'P on May 8, 2018 6:46:03 GMT -5
Mike, As to the size of the spring: 3/16" to 3/8" ID x 1/4" to 1/2" OD "wire" thickness between 1/16" and 1/8".
Brian, I'm curious about how you made the mold and what was the outcome that didn't work.
I've considered injection into a three part mold: center core with a two part shell. seems this will leave parting lines that would be difficult, if not impossible, to clean up.
|
|
|
|
Post by Brian on May 26, 2018 22:23:53 GMT -5
My apologies for not getting back with a response sooner.....  some times life gets in the way.... The size of spring that I attempted was quite a bit smaller than yours.....aprox. the same size as you would find in a click pen......for what I needed it for, it was far less hassle and time consuming to just wind my own springs using 22g floral wire wound around a small dia. piece of round plastic. The spring is for a static display and did not need to be functional. What I used for the mold was HS-3 There was absolutely no issue at all with the HS-3....poured RC-3, absolutely no issue at all with this either. Where my issue was, removing the flash and having to cut the spring to length with out damaging it. If you know anyone who has a transmission shop, you might want to ask them if they have any springs the size your looking for....an automatic transmission has a lot of different size springs and when a tranny gets rebuilt , if its determined that it may have a weak spring(s) , the springs are replaced and new ones are installed. Another source for springs would be better hardware stores anywhere. |
|
some times life gets in the way....