I had a busy day both in and out of the studio. When I was in the shop, it was time to do a little more assembly and the first coat of prepaint. I hope that by tomorrow afternoon, we can do a final assembly of these bits and then get on to some sculpting. Stay tuned…
Downey's Farm sign in progress
It was a productive day of fitting, assembling and die grinding pieces of the tractor. By the end of the day, the tractor was welded to the base. With the carving mostly finished, we will begin the sculpting and preliminary painting before final assembly begins. While I fully understood the size of the tractor as I designed and routed it, the feature is definitely very large as the layers come together. The little tractor is going to look fabulous sitting on top of a nine-foot-tall plinth in the center of a stone planter. When it is done, this is going to be a very fun three-dimensional version of the Downey’s Farm logo. Stay tuned…
More than just a pretty face
There’s much more to our signs than just a pretty face. Precision Board HDU and sculpting epoxy are awesome materials, but they don’t offer much structural strength. Our signs often need to travel thousands of miles and need to be handled with cranes. They also need to withstand decades of wind and weather. That means we have to design, fabricate and embed structural steel inside the fancy features we create. This requires careful planning. In the case of the little tractor we are creating for Downey’s Farm, it means we will have to assemble it in stages, finishing it as we go, as many parts will not be accessible after they are all together. Today’s task was to weld the steel frame and glue up the first three layers around it. Tomorrow we’ll weld it to a 1/4” thick base plate and then begin the first of the sculpting and painting. Stay tuned…
