Question on color effects in alumilite resins

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midmaik

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Hello Maik - Welcome to this forum, lots of good folks here.

Tell us a little about yourself.

Have you been turning pens for a while or are you new to it?

Do you like to turn other items as well?

How much casting have you done?

Can you show us some of the things you've made?

How have your castings turned out that you've tried with burls?

Happy Turning
Tom
 
Right now i have nothing done with resin castin.

I have done some pens with normal wood. Normally I'm a usual wood turner, but I would like to extend it with some resin/wood casting.

My idea was to fill up some burl wood with resin like in the links in my first message.

I like these color effects and by the side I can reuse some unusable burls to turn vases and bowls.

I've got now everything, pressure pot, alumilite clear resin, some dyes and pearlescent powders.

But I would like to keep my trial and error attempts as low as possible, so therefore I'm asking you guys, if you can help to bring me on speed.
 
I would suggest contacting Alan Trout (the creator of those pieces) and asking his advice. I recently sat in his demo on CA Finishing at SWAT. I actually handled a few of the pieces shown in your link, and his CA finish on them is flawless.

I'm not sure Alan would be willing to give out all his "secrets" - but he might steer you in the right direction. I understand he is a mentor in the San Antonio, TX area. you will need a CA finish on these mixed media pieces in order to get a similar "shine" to what you see in those photos.
 
Thanks, i tried to contact him, but since some weeks no answer.

Do you know how he does the CA Finish ?
 
To answer your question...yes, you can get all of those effect with liquid dye and metallic powders, either pearlex or Alumilite metal powders. For ideas, check the library for my "Worhtless Wood" tutorial which is what started all of this!
 
midmaik said:
I"m very new to resin casting and I would like to use some resin for some burl woods.

How do I get that color effects, like those in the links below ?

Thanks

Maik
Click to expand...

Most of the effects that you see on those pieces, are simply the result of mixing your resin with Pearlex powders. Most single colours produce the "wave" look where is appears that is a lighter colours in there but that is the Pearlex effect. Some of the best for that is the Sky blue, Red Russet, many of the "duo" colours, etc...!

Some pieces have 2 colours, you simply mix them separately and then pour them at the same time so that they mix as they enter the mold. To get some colour separation you need to wait until the resin is start gelling, that require some practice (making smaller casts), the working time is reduced dramatically and too jelled and the resin won't penetrate all the cracks and crevasses when put in the pressure pot as the resin "sets" before is is pushed everywhere in that mold.

I suggest you to pours your mixes not waiting, if you put one colour at the time, you run the risk of the first colour filling most of the holes and then the second colour will only stay outside the wood, that way pouring the colours together, will correct this. There is not a lot of need to "stir" the colours if pour together however, pouring 2 colours at different times, will require some sort of stirring, that is achieved easily with a piece of wire or a kebab skew, swinging it around in figure 8 or other movements of your choice.

The biggest problem is mold preparation, in some of the pieces from this turner, the wood pieces were turned first with a recess where the acorns were glued in a close pattern, these acorns had the have the cut in half or at least the outer end so that the resin would fill them but your question is on the colour mixing effects to, no need to get into any more detail on how some of his pieces were done, they are in fact beautiful pieces...!

Hope this helps...!

Cheers
George
 
MesquiteMan said:
To answer your question...yes, you can get all of those effect with liquid dye and metallic powders, either pearlex or Alumilite metal powders. For ideas, check the library for my "Worhtless Wood" tutorial which is what started all of this!
Click to expand...

Absolutely Curtis, credit to where its due, in my books...!:wink::biggrin:

Your "Worthless Wood" PDF file that you made readily available to everyone, some years back, was what started it all for me, and for that I'm most grateful for.

Resin and wood cast together...??? call it what you want, we all have to thank Curtis for his original idea and his willingness to share it with everyone, some people sometimes tend to forget that so Curtis, allow me to remind everyone of the facts...!:)

Cheers
George
 
Thank you all very very much. That helps me a lot. I did a lot of reading and research last weeks about resin casting and coloring.

But as a beginner, all the new words and materials and that in a foreign language is very hard to sort and understand everything.

Yes, that was also my understanding, put some pearl ex into the dyed resin. But here it was at the beginning the same, so much new stuff i never took care about, MICA powder, pigments, luster pigments, different kind of resins, metallic powder, and so on........was a little bit too much for my brain in some days :)

Thanks again !!!

Maik
 
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