this is a rather comprehensive and excellent post of Norris', just
wanted to add a couple of things to help with your considerations...
.
>
> If you could get an original one you could easily have male and female pres
> s tools made from it, by casting, possibly in bronze as this material would
> be strong enough to press quite a number of badges using annealed thin gua
> ge brass or copper..or aluminium. It would be interesting to try to make to
> ols, just to run off a couple or so badges, using cold cast polyester or ep
> oxy resin as the die material. Alternatively with an original to work from
> tools could be made from composite materials, such as hard resins, and the
> female form could be used as the tool on which to deposit copper and nickel
> by electro deposition...like those replica leaf broaches that women used t
> o wear on their Sunday=-best jackets.
referring to the above is electroforming. as your are able to get a
casting from it in rubber, there are (microcrystalline) waxes used in
jewelry and dental industry that make excellent and detailed casting
that can be electro-deposited with copper (and nickel, but everyone i
know uses copper).
good article:
http://www.ganoksin.com/
When I get a little time later today I will send you a jpeg
> of my own headbadges made by photo-etching, of stainless steel. If of cour
> se the badge is to be in brass or copper, the etched relief could easily be
> enamelled.
This is a very interesting process that I have a fair bit of experience with using zinc, copper, bronze and aluminum. I have done it with commercial photo resist etch products (radio shack is one of the suppliers in the US, it is used to produce printed circuit boards), but i prefer using laser printer output which results in a 'looser' image. basically, it is printing out the reverse image as dark as possible from a laser printer, and transferring it to the metal through heat, then etching the metal with the appropriate mordant/acid. For copper/bronze the item is placed face down in ferric chloride, face up with zinc and nitric acid, and aluminum face down in sodium hydroxide (lye).
I am sure you are aware of the implications of the care in disposal and handling of these chemicals, this is very important....
I have used this process for both the final object and to generate plates for intaglio- for the latter the images are not reversed as they are in the printing process. I have made an oval heron headbadge for my early Raleigh using this process.
in chesterfield new jersey usa
gabriel romeu
--
G L Romeu
ø http://studiofurniture.com
ø http://lessplusmore.com
ø http://journalphoto.org