Carving vermiculite

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mikefromitaly
Posts: 67
Joined: Thu Apr 03, 2003 7:47 am
Location: italy-sicily
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Carving vermiculite

Post by mikefromitaly »

Hi guys
anybody of you use to carve Vermiculute boards by hand or cnc router to make molds?

I would appeciete any reply
Thank you.
thanks for sharing !

mike from italy


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Ed Cantarella
Posts: 155
Joined: Mon Feb 26, 2018 3:49 pm
Location: Highland, Michigan, USA

Re: Carving vermiculite

Post by Ed Cantarella »

Mike, I use what are known as "ribbon tools" for carving vermiculite board and I also use them a lot on clay. On clay they are nice as they remove clay, not just push it from one place to another like solid tools would do.
Like these.
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30372-1006-1-2ww-m.jpg (60.25 KiB) Viewed 15917 times
You can use any router bits that are commonly used on wood on vermiculite board. It will make one heck of a mess.

I would suggest you make some by hand, get used to cooking out the binders, applying kiln wash and seeing how you like them before going crazy with the CNC router. After the kiln wash has been fired once they generally cast much cleaner if they have some mica rubbed into the pores of the mold.
HER last words were, "I'm melting, melting . . . " Dissenting opinions generally welcome for comic relief or personal edification. Sometimes both.
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