How do you ensure that the wax just made is perfect in all aspects.
When I want to check a wax model for its quality I’ll look for its
size, gauge of the wax, the prong sizes, orientation of the main
stone after setting etc etc. What criteria you use?
Murtaza Haide
Visual inspection under magnification, “perfect” mold material and
handling of same, “perfect” model to make a mold from and knowledge
of what is/may be needed to get mold filled properly to give you the
"perfect" wax, using wax and injector that you are familiar with and
staying within pressure/temperature parameters that work for your
setup, have a good deal of experience with the entire process and not
changing things once you get this “system” to work and give you what
you are after. Time, time, time - experience, experience experience.
John Dach
Good question, wax can be deceiving, especially in regards to
symmetry and planar orientation of stones. I use a few sets of
modified drafting compasses for measuring and marking. A good
understanding of geometry helps. Of course anything custom starts
with a good plan, lay it out on paper or a cad program and make sure
the design is doable. I realise I havn’t answered your actual
question but the way I quality check is to build it right in the
first place or start over and learn from the mistakes of the first
attempt :)…
Bil Peebles
www.williamjosephdesigns.com
One thing that can destroy a created wax original model is voids in
the construction. One has to be very careful not to create voids in
the creation of the wax model. Those voids can expand during the
vacuum investment stage and bust the wax.
When I an concerned about this problem I vacuum the wax model before
I sprue it. Any voids that would break the wax model during vacuum
inventing will show up during the vacuuming of the model. These
areas can be fixed.
Remember when vacuum casting sterling silver use my no fire scale
casting technique. It is a very easy process that will prevent fire
scale.
Lee Epperson
I think you should not ask more of the wax than either you or the wax
is capable of. An example might be trying to make a complex single
wax when maybe a two component set might be better.
I have some trouble seeing symmetry and precise contour in wax. Ex,
a simple dome ring. Should be easy right, just keep cutting evenly?
Three file strokes this way, three strokes that way etc etc. Except
once its cast and polished even a small asymmetry is apparent because
now the surface is shiny. In a case like this I’ll make the wax to
allow for significant adjustments after casting. If its a one off
then I’m done. If I need a production mold I cast it in sterling,
refine to my heart’s content, then mold that. You need to allow for
shrinkage but depending on the design it may or may not be a big
deal.
So basically I DON’T make a perfect wax. I make a wax good enough for
the next stage. If my job was just carving waxes 40 hrs a week, this
wouldn’t cut it though. Mea culpa, but sane at 5 o’clock.