As with most of our projects we use a variety of materials, methods and tools to make them a reality. The stills have a heavy duty framework of plasma cut steel which is all welded together. The tank and base will be hand sculpted fibreglass reinforced concrete and the logo is routed from Precision Board high density urethane. All of it will be painted and then aged using hand brushed acrylic paints. The bulk of the welding is now finished on the first of the stills for NEB's. I created the routing files for the dimensional logos yesterday and today we routed them on our MultiCam CNC router. They look great mounted to the stills! With the logos in place we could begin the dismantling of the first still. It came apart in two pieces and after building a sturdy carrying frame on wheels from square steel tubing we lowered the two halves into a horizontal position. They are much easier to work on in that position and they will be shipped to Ontario that way too. They will not be reassembled until they get to their permanent home.
Barrels sculpted!
Each day a little more of each project gets finished. This morning we gently lowered the giant barrel ends onto their wheels. Then we applied the fibreglass reinforced concrete onto the galvanized lath and when it had set a little we carved in the woodgrain. Once they've cured for a few days the barrels will be ready for the painting process to begin. Tomorrow we'll roll them out of the shop to make room for the next giant feature. It's the BIG one we'e long been anxious to start...
And the Shaggy dog
I had a little fun today finishing up the shaggy dog sculpt. Above him, nailed to the telephone pole is a notice. It will say 'LOST DOG' with a description. a few of the contact number tabs have been torn off. It looks like the dog isn't nearly as lost as his master thinks. Now it's on to next fun detail.
