Art Categories

Featured Bronze Castings

On the Workbench

Yan Wu 1

 

I find that I now want to do sculptures of far more substance and complexity. My work is changing. I do not expect to cast superheros or other such bronze in the future. I am now starting a new sculpture based on Yan Wu by PKKing. This work should be a spectacular bronze piece. According […]

Western Gold Mine 8

 

I now have a functioning water wheel with water. A few still pictures of the operating water wheel follow. The water pump was put into one end of a reservoir fashioned from 1 1/4 inch ABS pipe. The reservoir hold about 350 ml or 1 and a half cups of water. The pump fills the […]

Western Gold Mine 7

 

I am beginning to assemble the water mechanism for the water wheel. The water reservoir will sit underneath the mine office. This reservoir will contain a submerged pump driven by the battery and electronics in the office that will pump water into the water tower. The water will come out of the tower at the […]

Western Gold Mine 6

 

The smoke generator for the mine office is now working. Dave Bodnar posted an interesting implementation of a smoke generator that created smoke by burning glycerine using heating coils from electronic cigarettes. Like Dave, my implementation uses KangerTech 1.8 ohm heating element coils to make the smoke. However, my original implementation of his solution, although […]

Western Gold Mine 5

 

The mine office and crusher and water wheel are now mostly complete. The water wheel gear assembly went through a few iterations of development. I couldn’t find metal drive gears of the proper size so I thought that plastic drive belts could be used for the gearing. However, I abandoned this plan when I realized […]

Western Gold Mine 4

 

I have started to cast the mine office. This building will contain the water pump and reservoir for the water system and the electric motor with gears and bearings to turn the water wheel at 3 RPM. Switches, batteries, electronics, and solar panels for a self-contained system are all contained in this building. I created […]

Western Gold Mine 3

 

It is now time to prepare the engineering drawings and do the arithmetic and finalize how my complete sculpture will be put together. This piece began with the idea to build another western sculpture for the Calgary Stampede in 2020. The idea was to create an 1890’s gold mine setting. I thought I could build […]

Western Gold Mine 2

 

I have started to construct my old wooden mine cart. The mine cart, to me, is a tool that uniquely symbolizes the old west. These are the gold rush days with mining towns and saloons and lawlessness and the development of the frontier. This actual wooden ore cart dumps from the end but it can […]

Western Gold Mine 1

 

I am starting a new, completely original sculpture that will replicate an old 1890’s western gold mine. I am creating this work as another piece that I may submit to the Calgary Stampede in July, 2020. This work will be at 1:18 scale and similar in size to my Stagecoach sculpture. My plans are to […]