i failz0r
I trashed the metalwork project that I worked all week on. No glorious four-inch-tall A. titanum with gigantic gleaming copper phallus stamens for me. I miscalculated the necessary width of four of the flanges, under-allocated metal to the other four (should have just made them all equally wide) and didn't anneal the base often enough. As I was shaping one of the outer petal sheaths that wrap around the stamens, the narrow bit of metal holding it to the base cracked. I tried annealing it as a last-ditch hope, but it slumped and almost broke off just from the shock of quenching. Yeah... fuck that... What I turned in shows what I was trying to do, including a pretty nice attempt at anticlastic shaping if I do say so myself, but it does not look finished and it isn't anywhere near what I was hoping for. >:(
(The whole thing had to be made out of a single continuous copper square, so I cut a sort of Maltese cross without removing the negative space between the arms.)
Lesson the First: The word "finish" means FINISH. It does not mean "intermediate". Don't finish until you're finished (liek omg duh.)
The Second: Anneal more often than you think you need to.
The Third: Don't try to make a flange less than 1/2" wide into a load-bearing joint.
The Fourth: Don't bend sheet metal more than 45 or 50 degrees without annealing it first, if it's going to be worked after that.
The Fifth: Plan hammering treatments in order of the necessary force, as much as possible. See points 2 and 4.
Now I go back to school... er.. work?
(The whole thing had to be made out of a single continuous copper square, so I cut a sort of Maltese cross without removing the negative space between the arms.)
Lesson the First: The word "finish" means FINISH. It does not mean "intermediate". Don't finish until you're finished (liek omg duh.)
The Second: Anneal more often than you think you need to.
The Third: Don't try to make a flange less than 1/2" wide into a load-bearing joint.
The Fourth: Don't bend sheet metal more than 45 or 50 degrees without annealing it first, if it's going to be worked after that.
The Fifth: Plan hammering treatments in order of the necessary force, as much as possible. See points 2 and 4.
Now I go back to school... er.. work?