What is it, and what does it do?
It’s a ring. It encircles a finger.
why are you making it (optional)
I want to develop my jewelry casting skills.
So I finally got a chance to start a small home project, so I 3D printed a ring that I downloaded from Thingiverse (or somewhere). I first printed in regular resin to see if the printer would hold the fine detail, and to get a bit of practice with proper supports, etc.
The second copy was printed in Jeweler’s resin for lost-wax casting. Tomorrow’s project is plaster and burn-out, if I can find some time. Stay tuned.
The photos don’t really do the prints much justice. Transparent/translucent resin doesn’t play nice with my phone camera. The lettering is very sharp and clear. I intend to practice my first cast by melting down a handful of pennies and casting in zinc. We’ll see how it looks polished. Like I said, this is skill-building practice.
What resin did you use? There are some things I would like to do this with. So far the things I’ve helped cast were in aluminum with a regular sand mold.
I used iFun resin, jewelry castable. I’ve seen mixed reviews on it, but it worked perfectly for me. Burns out pretty nicely, as well. I used the red stuff, but they also have it in green. Doesn’t really matter to me or the finished piece, but I don’t know if there’s any other difference like exposure time, etc.
I cut off the sprue and polished it up. Turned out pretty good, considering it is my first attempt, and it’s an inferior material (zinc). I hope the next one (in silver) will be a keeper.
Since it was zinc, it was at a much lower temperature (which melts at ~787°F) than say, silver (~1761°F) or gold (~1945°F), and the mold was not nearly as hot as a mold I’d use for those. In addition, I didn’t use any flux at all, so there was a considerable amount of dross that probably fouled it. But I was really just making sure I had all the steps and equipment laid out properly for a regular precious metal pour, so I was actually surprised at the amount of detail it did retain. There were places on the ring that the super fine detail was perfect, and others where it wasn’t, so I’m sure that the investment is capable of faithfully reproducing the detail. The wax print had all of it, so it is definitely one or more elements of the pour.
I’m still learning Blender, so I don’t have an actual model I want to keep yet. That’s what I’m doing now, so once I’ve retained enough skill to finish a model I like, I’ll do the next one in silver, most likely.
Or wait a couple months and get a Saturn! I’ve thought about getting a Mars pro to go with the Mars printers we have now but I think the Mars does well enough on its own. If they ever offer a monochrome upgrade I’ll probably do that.
