BURNERS!

My forge burners arrived in the post. I'm so excited, unbelievably excited to. Set them up and get going. 

PlatAfrica test piece

In the mad rush to get my platinum piece finalized, I was busy with my test repousse piece on Thursday. It looks a bit frumpy but it will get better with the practice. I need to polish up the punches I had made on Thursday. 

PlatAfrica 2014

For the PlayAfrica platinum competition this year, I am going to be doing some repousse. Inserting the platinum onto the top of a beautifully carved African black wood ring. I will post drawings later, here are some pictures of the punches I made today to help me with the job. The three on the left are yet to be heat tereated and polished. 

A make shift forge with some kiln shelving. 

Functional and pleasing to the eye. 

Guitar bridge piece

To take a break from the craze was of my current situation. I made a new bridge piece for a friend of mine, the bridge piece on his Gretch was cracked. The bridge piece is made from African black wood. Sanded to 400 grit and finished with some bees wax to seal it. 

 

The original looks like it may have been a type of rose wood, it was lite weight. And roughly finished, not what you would expect if you're paying R12 000 for a guitar. I'm sure they have good reason for using this specific type of wood but I know the African black wood will be plenty strong enough, if not better sounding.