Someone (I believe it was Mr. Rowe) He also said something about
CAD/CAM taking longer three or four weeks to pickup. (Jeezh is
this guy ever wrong,)
I’m wrong? could be. Actually, I’m not even sure it was me who
objected to your claim of quick learning. Maybe, but my main
experience with CAD is peripheral. I’ve yet, after several years of
occasionally fooling the Rhino, actually managed to learn it well
enough to be really useful to me. Others’ experience, with more
dilligent study, may vary. But my opinion is colored as well by
familiarity with the graduate program in metals and jewelry at Tyler
School of art in Philadelphia. There, most graduate level work is
done concentrating on CAD/CAM and RP methods, and I know those very
bright young grad students spend a LOT of time learning and mastering
CAD/CAM and RP methods, all in the intense and competative
environment of an MFA program, and most of them take the full two
years, or more, to really become fluently masters of the technology
and software. They’re making simpler objects, of course, within
their first semester or even first few weeks. But “simpler” is the
operative word here, rather than fully having mastered the medium.
Perhaps part of the question is just what level of skill and mastery
you define as having learned the skills. Want to make a simple cigar
type wedding band with no details? That will probably take you less
than a day, maybe just a couple hours, to learn to make. But that
would hardly even be considered baby steps…
I'll save that for another post!!! any way he suggested plain old
corn starch and guess what, he was right, Corn Starch seems to have
a finer grain structure or is just mulled much finer than Jewelers
talc
I’m not sure I actually suggested corn starch. What I believe I
mentioned was that standard drug store type Baby Powder, often
thought of as talc, is these days made of corn starch, not talc,
since actual talc is often contaminated with asbestos, and is thus
considered a carcinogen.
By the way, another materials you might try for various powdering
applications is mica powder. Not so much, I’d think, for injecting
waxes, but it works quite well with the vulcanizable silicone rubbers
that are packed like a stiff clay in the mold, if you wish to make a
poweder seperated mold that you essentially just tear apart again
after vulcanizing, instead of cutting. Mica, being very flat little
platelets, when used as a seperating powder, would tend to coat a
surface rather better than powders that are blockier particles. So
it makes a better seperating agent for such uses. I don’t think I’d
want it on a mold during wax injection, though, as if incorporated
into the wax, it’s something that doesn’t burn out, and might remain
in the mold cavity during casting. Perhaps not a concern, but why
bother. Contenti, among other sources, carries mica powder if you
wish.
Peter