Stacey, Try a 2 part casting resin - let it dry 24 hours, then "bake"
at 200 degrees in oven (kitchen). Once done, you can file, sand and
polish it like metal. Good luck. --Sherry Terao
My question is, how long do you bake it - and when sanding, do you
need to wet-sand. Does it produce volatile fumes while baking? do you
bake it in a glass container - and what do you use for polishing?
Zam/fabulustre? Can this resin be molded? and if so, what material
do you use for the mold? If drilling it, do you need to wet drill?
Bakelite is a sort of semi-translucent, isn’t it? In that case, I
might use a combination of pure pigment, in the color of your choice,
and a bit of ground up oil pastel crayon in a matching color. I like
to use oil pastels in epoxy because they are readily available and
come in brilliant colors. They add opacity, though. I’m not expert and
don’t have extensive experience, but it seems that the pure pigments
result in a clearer color. So, using mostly pure pigment with just a
pinch of pastel crayon might give you what you want.
Christine in unbelievably humid Littleton, Massachusetts, USA.
Sorry to argue, Christine but no, it isn’t. Bakelite is a phenol
formaldehyde resin - in fact one of the first of it’s type, and is
dark to mid brown in colour, opaque, very hard. A test for all
plastics is to cut a tiny sliver off and heat it in the torch flame.
The phenol and resorcinol based plastics all give off an odour of
phenol - carbolic acid. Epoxies give an unpleasant smell akin to
burnt mattresses(!) Many of those can be colourless and transparent,
amenable to colouring with pastels and chalks. The cellulose based
plastics when heated give a fruity smell as do the acrylics (Lucite,
etc) but different; nearly all plastics give a distinctive smell when
put in a flame – Cheers, John Burgess; @John_Burgess2 of Mapua
Nelson NZ
Being a bakelite jewelry collector, I must butt in. The early
bakelite was definitely opaque and dark, black, brown, blackish
greens, etc. Very quickly they learned to add color and made
wonderful yellows, greens, blues, reds, etc., all opaque. These soon
developed translucency, and by the forties to fifties or so they were
able to make it transparent (brand name Prystal). So, there is
definitely a bakelite ‘look’, generally opaque to semi-translucent,
but as always there is a margin for interpretation. Oh, and please
don’t test a piece of suspected bakelite jewelry by heating it with a
torch or sticking a pin in it or anything potentially destructive.
There are much better tests which won’t destroy the value of a piece.
As far as epoxy resin goes, I have tried the Durenamel and really
like it. I like that I can grind and sand and polish it, just like
stone-cutting. Unless you are making very dark colors I think it is a
little too opaque to really look like bakelite (at least to my
practiced eye), but if you matte it a little bit it could probably
pass.
Hi to Kara Campbell, I hope you won’t mind if I butt in on your
answer for Tiffany Soo 15 June, Christine Quiriy 16 June, John Burgess
17 June, on the question about obtaining a bakelite effect from
pigmenting resin You mentioned that you use Durenamel resin. I’m a
novice to resin enamelling and I’m interested to know how much of each
colour you mixed at a time? Was it in 13 to 15 gram lots as
recommended by Durenamel literature? or did you mix much smaller
amounts? Did you end up with much wasted colour at the end of each
enamelling session? How did you find the use of opaque as opposed to
transparent enamel? Have the colours retrograded in any way or do you
think, in your opinion, resin enamel is about the equal of the
traditional fused glass vitreous enamel? Any replies you are able to
give will be much appreciated. Best wishes, Derick.
Kay, SORRY THIS WAS STUCK IN MY “DRAFTS” FOLDER. The instructions
are on the can of resin. Bake just a short time; the exposure to heat
(altho’ low) “sets” the resin. I don’t think it releases toxic
fumes…check the can. I haven’t drilled it, but do not think it
needs to be wet. Sand and fiile like metal. Good luck!