funny how things work out. I am in the middle of making my own wax press foundation, and found this thread.
here's a few tips that I learned. keep the silicone THIN. Too thick and it won't cure and dry soon enough. In the following video
someone posted earlier. He uses ONLY a wax foundation as his mold. why?
so he can MELT IT back out in the oven, or atleast soften it. I followed this method...except I used a 100% plastic foundation, sprayed
with Smooth-On Universal Mold Release. .......not so good. ha! :( I used 3 tubs of GE II 100% silicone. Love this silicone, sets up nicely, rather
tough, feels good, looks durable. But what happened? plastic! Once I pressed my 2 boards together, I let dry 24 hrs. I added my handle, piano hinge, etc. Went to use my air compressor to work apart...not happenin'. even BLEW OUT wet silicone from deeper inside. Mmm?
I learned, silicone needs AIR to dry. Can't even budge them apart. Even set in front of oven at 130F, to warm. Not happening. dang!
2nd attempt failed. first attempt was with OOMOO-30 ....mixed well...seemed rather thin. used my plastic foundation to lay on top of poured
OOMOO.....not cool. air pockets have to be worked out of plastic foundation. should have laid foundation down, poured OOMOO over the foundation, using spreader to work out air pockets in holes. Now what? Cap's attempt looks good. My 3rd attempt will be; I'd rather use GE II, but do it a bit different.
spread GE II silicone over board, with sidewalls. I used my Cappings fork to drag marks up and down the board, to give a rougher surfice for silicone to adhear to. seems to work well. spread only 1 tube of silicone on board, as even as possible. using only wax foundation, since it's ONLY wax and the RIMS of the cells aren't as STEEP as the plastic foundation, it should release better. spread a thin film of Vasoline over wax foundation making sure to cover all. lay foundation on top of spread silicone. should be able to work our air gently. Or, spread silicone over vasoline covered wax foundation and lay on top of silicone on board. either way...should work. Since it's rather THIN, it should dry nicely within 24 hours. I'll do 2 boards like this....both seperate....not putting them together until the silicone is dry. but will they match? you should be able to look
at the foundation pattern and set them up opposite, so when they come together, they should match close enough. we only need a mild pattern of cells, nothing deep or aggressive. My question to Cap, how do you get the OOMOO patterns attached to boards, or are they already? will have to look again. More pics from Cap please? This is certainly do-able....just gotta find the right combination of system vs recipe. ha! I used OOMOO-30 first round, found it expensive. bought 12 tubes of GE II 100% silicone at $6.24 each. well.....expensive too. whatever. Still not as expensive as a Mill Roller, $1300 to $2500 bucks! I won't sandwich the boards together this time, will gently press in wax foundation uniformly and let dry. After 12 hrs, I should be able to gently remove or blow, foundation off. Or, wait 24 hrs and blow off. My 2nd attempt, I used 3 tubes of silicone....this seemed WAAAAYYYY too much. Will only use 2 next time, 1 for each board. I think they'll dry faster and much better. My first attempt, with OOMOO-30, one side came out pretty good. The other, bad. Air pockets. I used the good one, as a test bed. sprayed water over the mold, laid in hot wax, pressed with greased board....held for a minute, pulled off board, PRESTO! wax molded nicely, even stuck to board when pulled up. the water, sank down into the deeper crevises around the cells. The plastic foundation, gives a much deeper cell wall, vs wax foundation. I don't like this. I only need THE SHAPE of the cell....with a mild ridge. the bees can take it from there. I prefer the 100% wax foundation mold now. My 3rd attempt should work out ok. Am waiting on delivery of wax foundation. even ordered more plastic foundation, to experiment with. will try to post pics after finished. if you've ALREADY done all this....please advise. hope i helped someone. thanks, ken