to all the other day the most intriguing thought occured to me ! w
hy not fill a new wax injector with chocolate chips and inject the
molten chocolate into silicon molds ! you cuold make chocolate copies
of the customers engagement ring or other jewelry. you could let the
customers do it themselves people would talk about your shop to all
thier friends word of mouth would be ongoing for years and months to
come !!! -
best regards
goo
Very interesting, chocolate jewelry…
anyway here is another use for your wax injector using (oh no!!)
wax…
I use mine to make wax sheet to match the injection wax I am using.
Take two pieces of glass about 4 inches square or so (I like to use
1/8 inch glass) tape a small piece of metal, (the thickness of the
sheet of wax you want to make) about the size of a dime in each
corner of one piece glass or a little contact cement works as well.
Using a low pressure (this takes some experimenting) extrude the wax
from the injector onto the sheet of glass, now while it is still hot
compress it with the other piece of glass. When it cools you will
have a smooth sheet of wax the thickness of the pieces of metal taped
at the corners. I like to use plastiwax for this as well as carving
wax that I have melted in the injector. I find them much more
functional than the sticky sheet wax you buy. I still like the
chocolate idea, wish I had a new wax pot to play with. Maybe you
could set sugar crystals for stones in the chocolate… sweet
treats!!!
Frank Goss
fill a new wax injector with chocolate chips and inject the molten chocolate into silicon molds !
Goo, that is such a good idea that I convinced my (gordon bleau-ish)
wife to lend me some chocolate to inject. Watch my blog, to see the
results, (if any) in the next week or so.
Cheers,
Hans Meevis
Goo,
Certainly an intriguing idea if there were a way to clean the wax
injector and the molds to food safety standards. Failing the wax
injector, you might be able to use a regular pastry bag to inject
into a silicone mold that had been cleaned in the dishwasher a
couple of times to ensure no residue remained?
Intriguing…
Karen Goeller
No Limitations Designs
Hand-made, one-of-a-kind jewelry
Failing the wax injector, you might be able to use a regular pastry bag to inject into a silicone mold that had been cleaned in the dishwasher a couple of times to ensure no residue remained?
Jewelry silicone is not officially food safe. The food grade
silicone is very expensive.
your concerns about food saftey are warranted but not in this case
because using a brand new wax injector would solve that problem and
silicon is food grade material to begin with any way have you not
noticed the popularity of silicon kitchen gadgets on the market
these days -goo
Hello Gustavo
I think that you may have had a very enjoyable New Year’s Season.
But this could be fun. To facilitate wax entry and release I powder
the mold with talcum powder. I could substitute this with powdered
sugar. Do you think that a dark chocolate might give better results
than milk chocolate?
If this were feasable I think that clients would be standing in
line.
Lois
www.loismartens.com
I think if you were to try this you would find several problems.
First setting the wax pot temperature low enough. chocolate melts at
about 80 F. Second it is nowhere near strong enough to pull it out
of anything but the simplest of molds. And it needs a treatment
called tempering to have the proper consistency of crystal structure
(yes chocolate is composed of fat crystals). Tempering is holding the
chocolate at 88 F and stirring so that a fine small crystal structure
will form then allowing it to cool. If you just melt the chocolate
and allow to cool without tempering you get big crystals of coco
butter and a dull looking soft mess instead of a shiny hard
chocolate.
Jim
James Binnion
James Binnion Metal Arts
lois - i love the powder sugar idea the wife says to use cocoa powder
as well for mold release for your regular wax operations though you
should switch to silicon rubber from zero d ! try the quick cure it
vulcanizes in 17 min’s for 1/2" thick mold and you do not need
release agents such as powder or spray to et the wax out wax doesnt
stick to the silicone but i still powder the air vents
goo
Hi Goo: (Et ali)
Great idea…with a few really serious issues.
Unfortunately, “silicone” doesn’t specify exactly which particular
formulation it is. A jewelry silicone mold wouldn’t be food safe.
(It’s like saying ‘brass’. Yeah, but which brass? Whatall’s in it?)
The other issue, even with a brand new injector is the lube oil in
the injector nozzle, and the oil contamination from the compressor.
(An injector with a hand operated air pump would still have oil
contamination.)
If you had one of the old hand pumped injectors that had a manual
wax pump that lived down in the wax melt, you might be able to clean
that up to food safe. (the old ones that had an open pot, with a
plunger and nozzle that stuck straight up out of the center of the
melt. Lots of fun, those. I still have one. )
If you had a lathe, you could certainly rip off the design to allow
you to machine up a stainless version that was food safe. (and that
didn’t have the original’s habit of blasting wax (chocolate) all
over the ceiling.)
It’s a great idea, and I wouldn’t hesitate to do it myself, or even
to serve them to family and friends. To allow customers (and their
lawyers) anywhere near it? Not on your life.
Regards,
Brian Meek.
PS–> Your shop’s right around the corner from where I grew up. (Back
in old Beechwold) Next time I get home, I’ll stop in and say hi.