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Author Topic: coin impressions using sealing wax?  (Read 4129 times)

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Offline areich

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coin impressions using sealing wax?
« on: September 22, 2012, 01:54:17 pm »
Does someone have experience on how to do this? I've only managed to find a bunch of really old books on Google books and would be grateful for any more recent information.
Andreas Reich

Offline *Alex

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Offline areich

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Re: coin impressions using sealing wax?
« Reply #2 on: September 22, 2012, 02:34:17 pm »
I know about plaster casts but sealing wax is a different story.
Andreas Reich

Offline PtolemAE

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Re: coin impressions using sealing wax?
« Reply #3 on: September 22, 2012, 09:01:54 pm »
I know about plaster casts but sealing wax is a different story.

popular 'craft' materials like FEMO seem to work well.

PtolemAE

Lloyd Taylor

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Re: coin impressions using sealing wax?
« Reply #4 on: September 22, 2012, 09:52:29 pm »
    
coin impressions using sealing wax?   I am intrigued. May I ask why and for what purpose?

Offline areich

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Re: coin impressions using sealing wax?
« Reply #5 on: September 23, 2012, 05:04:51 am »
Not really for a different purpose, apparently this was quite normal in the 18th/19th century. I simply bought a large quantity of it cheaply at a flea market and wanted to try it. They should be more durable than plaster casts and maybe more decorative. I don't think it would be practical and a replacement for plaster casts, I just want to give it a try. But I only have a rough idea (make a negative impression in clay, pour in the molten wax) and was hoping for instructions similar to Curtis instructions for making plaster casts.
Andreas Reich

Lloyd Taylor

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Re: coin impressions using sealing wax?
« Reply #6 on: September 23, 2012, 05:29:51 am »
Thanks. I was completely unaware that study/research casts were made in anything other than plaster. I had thought the wax was used for the mold into which the the plaster was poured and then the wax was easily peeled away and removed from the cast. I would have thought wax too soft and readily damaged to be useful for study purposes, but I guess it depends how carefully the casts are handled and stored.

Offline areich

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Re: coin impressions using sealing wax?
« Reply #7 on: September 23, 2012, 05:40:12 am »
Perhaps I used the wrong word, it's the kind that is quite hard when it has cooled.
Andreas Reich

Offline benito

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Re: coin impressions using sealing wax?
« Reply #8 on: September 23, 2012, 05:54:42 am »
Perhaps I used the wrong word, it's the kind that is quite hard when it has cooled.

This type, I suppose.

Lloyd Taylor

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Re: coin impressions using sealing wax?
« Reply #9 on: September 23, 2012, 06:01:20 am »
Sealing wax as in seals! That make sense - a lot more durable than what I was thinking off.  Presumably to make such casts you'd have to make an impression/mold in modelling clay or similar and then pour the molten sealing wax into the impression to harden. And the casts would be much more impressive than those of plaster.

Offline curtislclay

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Re: coin impressions using sealing wax?
« Reply #10 on: September 23, 2012, 11:29:30 am »
I've never heard of making the actual casts out of sealing wax: just plaster or sulphur.

I do think, however, that I have seen or heard about making the impressions in sealing wax, followed by making plaster casts from the sealing wax impressions.

Two possible advantages: the melted sealing wax might be softer when you pressed the coin into it, meaning less danger of breaking the coin or damaging its patina.

Plus the sealing wax impression, once hardened, would be pretty much indestructible, so you could store it indefinitely if you so desired.

Storing the sealing wax impressions would require a lot of extra effort, space, and money, however, with little compensating advantage. You could remake the cast if you broke or damaged the first one, but that rarely happens; of you could make additional casts for other scholars who might desire them, also a rare eventuality.
Curtis Clay

Offline SC

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Re: coin impressions using sealing wax?
« Reply #11 on: November 12, 2012, 06:08:15 am »
I am no help to this though I am following the thread with interest.

However, it stirred up an old memory for me.

I remember being thoroughly confused as a child when the poem The Walrus and the Carpenter was read to me.  I could understand speaking of sailing ships, cabbage and kings, but I was very very confused about ceiling wax! 

It was only when I read it much later as an adult that I understood what they were talking about.

Shawn
SC
(Shawn Caza, Ottawa)

marrk

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Re: coin impressions using sealing wax?
« Reply #12 on: November 12, 2012, 06:58:31 am »
http://en.zhermack.com/Technical/Silicones/Duplication/C400821.kl

try with this silicone. tolerated melted wax.

 

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