Hello all,
My name is David Cowling. I’m a dentist in Arkansas, and a medieval
reinactment hobbyist(SCA). Part of what I do both in work and play
involves casting. My technical casting of crowns and such I have no
problems or lack of on. What I hope to get out of this
list is direction in obtaining good resource material to back my
medieval studies. In the past I’ve done lots and lots of pewter
castings using RTV materials (Citricon mostly…a Kerr material
that’s been discontinued), and some lost wax casting of silver.
Recently I’m more involved in totally recreating the casting process
of silver, bronze and gold in the Viking and Middle Ages.
At this time my biggest hangup has been finding a source of leaded
brass and/or bronze of proper period proportions, that I don’t have
to order by the pallet load. Any resource materials you might think
I’d be interested in regarding period lost wax
casting…sandcasting…stone and metal polishing and stone setting
would be much appriciated.
Thanks for your time.
@David_Cowling
At this time my biggest hangup has been finding a source of
leaded brass and/or bronze of proper period proportions, that I
don't have to order by the pallet load. Any resource materials you
might think I'd be interested in regarding period lost wax
casting...sandcasting...stone and metal polishing and stone
setting would be much appriciated.
For your alloy metal, you are probably going to have to compound
your own. Dress Accessories by G. Egan and F. Pritchard (ISBN
0-11-290444-0) has a good analysis of the metal of the finds
detailed within (circa 1150 - 1450), as does Medieval Objects in the
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston: Metalwork by Nancy Netzer (ISBN
0-87846-327-5). Actual historical sources spanning from the 10th to
the 16th century, include On Divers Arts by Theophilus, The
Prirotechnia of Vannoccio Biringuccio, De Re Metallica by Agricola,
and The Treatises of Benvenuto Cellini on Goldsmithing and Sculpture
(all of these are available as inexpensive Dover editions). There
are a few others, but they are obscure, and/or out of print, but if
you want the info, e-mail me off list.
Ron Charlotte – Gainesville, FL
@Ron_Charlotte1 OR afn03234@afn.org