Treeing - The critical part of gravity-poured bronze casting; a badly tree-ed collection of wax models will not only cast badly, thereby wasting a lot of time and money in materials, it will induce me to start smashing things and biting the heads off of innocent bystanders in a fit of infantile, frustrated rage (...uh, wazzat my outside voice?)
I use a variety of spatula tools, a Bunsen Burner and sometimes the Wax Pen to affix the models to the central sprue, called a "gate." When gating a piece, one must choose the point on the surface of a wax model that will be both easy to chase (i.e., grind away the gate) later and will allow the easiest flow molten bronze into the cavity in the investment.
Wax welds, like a pickpocket, require a light and swift touch to take properly.
|