Tried my hand at Mosaic pins.

slatroni

slatroni

Well-Known Member
They turned out OK but what a mess I made! I watched some YouTube Videos and thought I would give it a try. Anyone else making their own pins?
mosaic pins.jpgmosaic pins1.jpg
 
I've made a few with my Rhino Head pin and found that since I don't have any kind of vacuum pump to use and I put the butter in the tubes with a spatula that it worked best doing it in 6" lengths. And Yep! It makes a mess!

Rubber gloves and lots of newspaper!
 
What color did you put in the epoxy or did you use any? I've done several over the years . hobby shops have all the tubes ,squares, and rods you need.
 
I've made them using a hand held brake bleeding vacuum pump from an auto parts store to draw the epoxy up into them. I made fittings for various size pins with different sizes of clear rubber tubing found at the local Ace Hardware.

I had pretty good success with not much mess in lengths of 4-6" depending on the complexity of the pins.

Ultimately though, I determined it was far more time consuming and too much hassle to deal with. For me, I'll buy the pins from others that make them if I need any. I rarely use mosaics these days.

It's cool that you made some and had some success though.
 
I make my own pins. I agree, it can be messy. I have better luck with black, blue or red. White is more difficult. I make them in 2 1/4 inch lengths. I do not have a vacuum pump. They turn out okay.

DeMo

Lobo - thank you for the link. I will look at it when I have some time.
 
What color did you put in the epoxy or did you use any? I've done several over the years . hobby shops have all the tubes ,squares, and rods you need.
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I used a amber color, hadn't seen that color anywhere.
 
I had watched Walter's video a while back and wanted to try it, but I wanted something completely unique. Does anyone have any idea how a guy on ebay says he can take "your" drawing or shape and turn it in to a pin? Expensive though, like $30 per 2" pin. I just wanted a pin with the letter "S" inside of it, but can't find any "S" extrusions anywhere. I've seen "H" and "I" a lot though.

Here's his pic, how is he doing this? Maybe a 3d laser printer?
custom mosaics.jpg
 
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I've made them in 4" lengths before. I also used a hand brake vacuum pump. I like the ones in black best but, have used red, blue, yellow, and clear. I stopped doing it a couple of years ago due to an increase in knife production. Better return on knives than pins.
 
Self Made Knives said:
I had watched Walter's video a while back and wanted to try it, but I wanted something completely unique. Does anyone have any idea how a guy on ebay says he can take "your" drawing or shape and turn it in to a pin? Expensive though, like $30 per 2" pin. I just wanted a pin with the letter "S" inside of it, but can't find any "S" extrusions anywhere. I've seen "H" and "I" a lot though.

Here's his pic, how is he doing this? Maybe a 3d laser printer?
View attachment 54068
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I had the rhino head in the center of my logo done by a man that use a EDM cutting machine. That's Electrical discharge Machine. That's why its so darn expensive.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrical_discharge_machining
 
Steve, sorry if I'm hijacking you, you just struck a nerve with me! Laurence, have you got a pic of your pins? Guess I've never seen it, sounds cool. I've heard of EDM but never really seen one or what it could do. Pretty amazing that it can cut out something like that. Guess that might explain the cost a little. If you used that guys custom pins you could get one knife done per 2" pin, might be hard to justify $30 for pins per knife. But, I'm sure Steve is going to source his to us really cheap!
 
DSCN5574.jpg This is a short piece that i used on the head of a wine stopper. If the guy can reduce your line drawing or itinals he could make one for you. It very expensive to make and then screwing around with the epoxy and dye so I only use in on my $600.00 and up.

Bossdog sells great quality dyes for this kind of epoxy coloring. Thats where I buy mine.
 
Anthony, a while back I saw some ying yang pins for sale. I cant find them now. Its kinda a S.

Steve is going to source his to us really cheap!
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HA! I am still chipping epoxy off my table! Now I know why they cost like they do. I will never make Micarta again ether, its cheaper to buy!
 
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