Through the years we have applied many different types of leaved and greenery to our sculpted trees. We've cut apart fake Christmas trees. We've purchased specially made outdoor plastic foliage. And we've left many trees bare. Our search was always for a permanent leaf, often of a larger than normal scale. With the PNE project we decided to simply make our own. The cut file only took minutes and the CNC plasma cutter dutifully and quickly cut out the shapes I needed from some 1/8" thick plate steel. We made the leaves in two sizes - 14" and 16" long. I bent each one to a different shape and then formed and welded the curved stem down the middle. A few of the leaves received giant mechanical bug bites from them to add some authenticity. We'll send them off to the powder coaters this week to get their long lasting green. These leaves will be tough!
Magical mud
Concrete is the most wonderful thing. It can be troweled on and then carved into anything imaginable. Today we went all out to cover as much of the tree as we could. We mixed and troweled on about three cubic yards of concrete mud. We let the magic mix set just enough so that our carving tools didn't pull it off the galvanized mesh. We then set about making it look like a gnarly old tree. Once painted, few will believe it is concrete. A ride operator's booth never looked so fun!
Big goal met
It was a busy day in the shop as we worked on the PNE project. Today's goal was to attach the galvanized mesh and also create and mount the sign to ready the piece for the sculpted concrete tomorrow. With the entire crew pulling together we made it with seconds to spare.
