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#1
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New Project
It's a lot easier to talk about a new project than to actually get
started. However, talking about it can provide the motivation to actually get started. Sort of putting my money where my mouth is. I never got any farther with my wine glass than the 3 oz martini glass. The challenges of a larger casting were just too daunting so I quit while I had something I could use. I never got into the sheet metal version because I don't have the tools or knowledge to do it. I was inspired at dinner recently through the mechanism of frustration. Ever chase a plastic butter dish around the table trying to get the knife clear with some butter on it? I don't do as civilized people do and just cut off a pat. I butter the bread from the butter dish which is a lot more difficult if you don't use the other hand to hold it down but I have the piece of bread in the other hand. As my martini glass is a lethal weapon because of its shear weight, precisely that weight would be just what is needed for a butter dish. I am thinking of using the one we have or something similar as a pattern for a sand casting in silver and the plastic cover that came with it. The cover stays in the kitchen anyway. My guess is this would weigh about 2 lbs and solve the problem along with being a nice project. BTW, the martini glass is most amazing. I put it in the freezer a few hours before "martini time" on Friday and it will almost chill the martini to drinking temp just as is with no ice at all. It is incredible how fast it gets cold in the freezer. My wife has to drink from a humble glass glass so I shake the drinks with ice and pour when the temp is 36F. Mine keeps getting colder while hers gets warmer. On the other hand, we can not leave my spoons in very hot soup as the handles get too hot to touch very quickly So there it is and I am committed but just thought of a problem. I don't know if my crucible will hold that much silver. js Astronomy, Beer, Cheese, Fiber, Gems, Nature, Radio, Sheep, Sausage, Silver http://schmidling.com .. |
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#2
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New Project
Jack Schmidling wrote:
I am thinking of using the one we have or something similar as a pattern for a sand casting in silver and the plastic cover that came with it. The cover stays in the kitchen anyway. My guess is this would weigh about 2 lbs and solve the problem along with being a nice project. 2 lbs of silver? Send me the silver and I'll make you a sturdy butter dish and I'll keep the left over excess silver. :-) -- arnold .. |
#3
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New Project
Jack Schmidling wrote:
It's a lot easier to talk about a new project than to actually get started. However, talking about it can provide the motivation to actually get started. Sort of putting my money where my mouth is. I never got any farther with my wine glass than the 3 oz martini glass. The challenges of a larger casting were just too daunting so I quit while I had something I could use. I never got into the sheet metal version because I don't have the tools or knowledge to do it. I was inspired at dinner recently through the mechanism of frustration. Ever chase a plastic butter dish around the table trying to get the knife clear with some butter on it? I don't do as civilized people do and just cut off a pat. I butter the bread from the butter dish which is a lot more difficult if you don't use the other hand to hold it down but I have the piece of bread in the other hand. As my martini glass is a lethal weapon because of its shear weight, precisely that weight would be just what is needed for a butter dish. I am thinking of using the one we have or something similar as a pattern for a sand casting in silver and the plastic cover that came with it. The cover stays in the kitchen anyway. My guess is this would weigh about 2 lbs and solve the problem along with being a nice project. BTW, the martini glass is most amazing. I put it in the freezer a few hours before "martini time" on Friday and it will almost chill the martini to drinking temp just as is with no ice at all. It is incredible how fast it gets cold in the freezer. My wife has to drink from a humble glass glass so I shake the drinks with ice and pour when the temp is 36F. Mine keeps getting colder while hers gets warmer. On the other hand, we can not leave my spoons in very hot soup as the handles get too hot to touch very quickly So there it is and I am committed but just thought of a problem. I don't know if my crucible will hold that much silver. js Astronomy, Beer, Cheese, Fiber, Gems, Nature, Radio, Sheep, Sausage, Silver http://schmidling.com . Hi Jack, good to see your working away at some onerous tasks. Its coming up to midnight here in the UK, and ive gotten myself up from my bed after a couple of hrs sleep following me dinner. It was a hard day here in the bronze and titanium smith household in a no of ways, a sleep after a meal is a natural thing for me to do. So I fires up me computer to check the rainfall radar and tomorrows pressure forecast,and check our newsgroup just to see whats up. Well, you shure have a problem on your hands. Problems are fun to resolve even if there someone elses,. This will require some serious research on my part. Where to start? The first place is the kitchen. After much deliberation it has to be my butter dish. this lives on top of our bread box, that has a front drop down door. Now my butter dish is a rectangular box that takes a half pound block of butter. with a loosely fitting lid. I put my rt hand behind my back, to simulate your one handed problem, using my left hand, im left handed, take off the lid, pick up the butter dish and place it on the work top in front of me. so far so good. Then i pull open the cutlery drawer, takeout 3 knives, 2 kings pattern, large dinner and small teasize, circa 1930,, and a parallel bladed round ended bone handled ditto. Still with my rt hand behind my back, and your right, the butter dish wants to slide along the worktop if I want to scrape a curl of butter off the top of the block. But this isnt what I normally do. to continue with this test, I take down the biscuit tin, which lives on the shelf above the worktop, again with one hand, then im stumped, as i can t get the lid off without using my other hand. Inspiration to the rescue!!! not to be beaten by such a simple thing, eureka!! I place the tin between my knees and lift off the lid. put them back on the worktop and take out 3 biscuits. Now to the difficult bit, i take each knife in turn ,just to randomise the test, and dig into the butter with the knife end, lift it out and press down the butter onto the busicuit.Thats what I normally do. The buscuit is stuck to the knife, would you believe! so resoursefullness to therescue again ,i pick up the buiscuit with butter and knife attached and take abite. No crumbs or buiscuit on the floor. Repeat the test with the other 2 knives and biscuits. all goes well To extendthetest further, i now need a cup of something, what better than coffee. Still one handed, 1st the milk, that lives in the fridge below the worktop to my left. open it , takeout the milk, place on the worktop shut the fridge. unscrewing the top needs some thought, managed this, by using 2 fingers on the lid and 2 fingers holding the container top, still only left handed. Next, one cup from a hook on the 1st, shelf, one tea sized spoon also Kings pattern, only the best in the Frater household, one saucepan on the hook by the gas cooker,~Propane fired, like my enamelling kiln, Pour milk into cup , to measure right amount, pour milk into saucepan, place on cooker top and open gas valve. Self ignition from a pilot light, very modern these 1960's cookers. Next take lid off sugar tub , that lives on the worktop on the right of the cooker. Thats a 1920's white enamelled french, marked sucre. Next the coffee, at this time of the night it has to be instant granules in a jar. on the shelf above the sugar position. Again single handed with the coffe jar between my knees unscrew the lid and repeat thetasks as per the biscuit tin. By this time the milk is ready, coffee is in the cup sugar added. Turn off the gas and pour. Just to show willing, dried on milk on saucepans are a pain to wash up, I take the saucepan, over to the sink, turn on thecold tap, run some in and put on the rt draining board. Here its used on the left , washed up on the right. turn off the tap. all simgle handed. So after this exaustive controlled trial, the conclusions are, theres a fault in the design of the butter dish. Not only with yours, but with mine as well.!! the butter dish designers must have been to the same university Strange coinceience. Its now time to go back to first principles, and redesign the butter dish. What else in my kitchen uses a dish? Lots of things, What comes to mind 1st is the cheese dish. Now the designers of cheese dishes knew what they were doing. The cheese dish, in my house hold is the other way up to the butter dish. IE the cheese sits on the lid with the rectangular box over it, with the handle on the bottom! would you believe! but it works!! tho my cheese dish isnt rectangular. it has a sloping top to simulate a wedge of cheese. Now to the crucial bit of my test, put the butter on the cheese dish, and take any one of the 3 knives, biscuits by now have been eaten. take acurl off the butter by pressing the knife downwards along the side of the butter. The table will resist this pressure and the knife will provide butter you so desperately need on your bread. So leave your silver as it is, a nice paper weight perhaps or a door stop, get yourself another cheese dish if you havent a spare, and mark it with the logo "Butter" Hope this helps. Ted. PS. Coffee was just fine. |
#4
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New Project
On Tue, 04 May 2010 12:52:05 -0700, in rec.crafts.jewelry Jack Schmidling
wrote: So there it is and I am committed but just thought of a problem. A couple easier answers for you. The backwoods version is a roll of duct tape. No doubt it would not be a problem to figure out how to affix the offending butter dish to the table. I suspect it would not take even a full roll of tape. The more elegant solution would be velcro. You can get these little self adhesive patches of the stuff. One piece conveniently in front of your seat at the dinner table, another under the butter dish. You could still pick it up to pass to the wife (who, most likely, long ago mastered the use of a butter dish without it sliding. She's a woman, after all, and they're good at such manual dexterity sorts of things in the kitchen...) or put in the fridge, but once place in front of you, it wouldn't be likely to slide. And finally, for your silver version, why bother making it a dish? Why not just plunk the whole silver ingot (I do recall you're once saying your silver was in big ingot form, didn't you?) onto the table and put the butter on it. Silver is somewhat antibacterial anyway, so total cleanliness isn't an issue, and your clear plastic lid would still work with the sliver slab. Oh, and if you prefer your butter chilled or gently warmed, the thermal lessons of the martini glass would also apply here. Only real difference between a big ingot and a butter dish is the rim, right? And so long as you don't melt the butter... Peter |
#5
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New Project
On May 4, 2:52*pm, Jack Schmidling wrote:
It's a lot easier to talk about a new project than to actually get started. *However, talking about it can provide the motivation to actually get started. *Sort of putting my money where my mouth is. I never got any farther with my wine glass than the 3 oz martini glass. * The challenges of a larger casting were just too daunting so I quit while I had something I *could use. *I never got into the sheet metal version because I don't have the tools or knowledge to do it. I was inspired at dinner recently through the mechanism of frustration. Ever chase a plastic butter dish around the table trying to get the knife clear with some butter on it? *I don't do as civilized people do and just cut off a pat. I butter the bread from the butter dish which is a lot more difficult if you don't use the other hand to hold it down but I have the piece of bread in the other hand. As my martini glass is a lethal weapon because of its shear weight, precisely that weight would be just what is needed for a butter dish. I am thinking of using the one we have or something similar as a pattern for a sand casting in silver and the plastic cover that came with it. The cover stays in the kitchen anyway. *My guess is this would weigh about 2 lbs and solve the problem along with being a nice project. BTW, the martini glass is most amazing. *I put it in the freezer a few hours before "martini time" on Friday and it will almost chill the martini to drinking temp just as is with no ice at all. *It is incredible how fast it gets cold in the freezer. My wife has to drink from a humble glass glass so I shake the drinks with ice and pour when the temp is 36F. *Mine keeps getting colder while hers gets warmer. On the other hand, we can not leave my spoons in very hot soup as the handles get too hot to touch very quickly So there it is and I am committed but just thought of a problem. *I don't know if my crucible will hold that much silver. js Astronomy, Beer, Cheese, Fiber, Gems, Nature, Radio, Sheep, Sausage, Silver * * * *http://schmidling.com . Seems to me there's also an opportunity here to combine a little lapidary with the silversmithing. perhaps making a nice stone 'base' on which the actual silver is attached. less expensive, and maybe presents an opportunity to learn a new skill. Some jade of course would be nice, as well as sturdy in case of being dropped, or some agate or other stone with an interesting pattern. Tiger Eye occurs in flat-ish chunks and just squaring a chunk and polishing the 'edges' could make a unique, heavy base. Snowflake obsidian, or turitella agate or Llanite or ??? So many beautiful stone materials. |
#6
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New Project
Hi Jack, good to see your working away at some onerous tasks. Its coming up to midnight here in the UK, and ive gotten myself up from my bed after a couple of hrs sleep following me dinner. It was a hard day here in the bronze and titanium smith household in a no of ways, a sleep after a meal is a natural thing for me to do. So I fires up me computer to check the rainfall radar and tomorrows pressure forecast,and check our newsgroup just to see whats up. Well, you shure have a problem on your hands. Problems are fun to resolve even if there someone elses,. This will require some serious research on my part. Where to start? The first place is the kitchen. After much deliberation it has to be my butter dish. this lives on top of our bread box, that has a front drop down door. Now my butter dish is a rectangular box that takes a half pound block of butter. with a loosely fitting lid. I put my rt hand behind my back, to simulate your one handed problem, using my left hand, im left handed, take off the lid, pick up the butter dish and place it on the work top in front of me. so far so good. Then i pull open the cutlery drawer, takeout 3 knives, 2 kings pattern, large dinner and small teasize, circa 1930,, and a parallel bladed round ended bone handled ditto. Still with my rt hand behind my back, and your right, the butter dish wants to slide along the worktop if I want to scrape a curl of butter off the top of the block. But this isnt what I normally do. to continue with this test, I take down the biscuit tin, which lives on the shelf above the worktop, again with one hand, then im stumped, as i can t get the lid off without using my other hand. Inspiration to the rescue!!! not to be beaten by such a simple thing, eureka!! I place the tin between my knees and lift off the lid. put them back on the worktop and take out 3 biscuits. Now to the difficult bit, i take each knife in turn ,just to randomise the test, and dig into the butter with the knife end, lift it out and press down the butter onto the busicuit.Thats what I normally do. The buscuit is stuck to the knife, would you believe! so resoursefullness to therescue again ,i pick up the buiscuit with butter and knife attached and take abite. No crumbs or buiscuit on the floor. Repeat the test with the other 2 knives and biscuits. all goes well To extendthetest further, i now need a cup of something, what better than coffee. Still one handed, 1st the milk, that lives in the fridge below the worktop to my left. open it , takeout the milk, place on the worktop shut the fridge. unscrewing the top needs some thought, managed this, by using 2 fingers on the lid and 2 fingers holding the container top, still only left handed. Next, one cup from a hook on the 1st, shelf, one tea sized spoon also Kings pattern, only the best in the Frater household, one saucepan on the hook by the gas cooker,~Propane fired, like my enamelling kiln, Pour milk into cup , to measure right amount, pour milk into saucepan, place on cooker top and open gas valve. Self ignition from a pilot light, very modern these 1960's cookers. Next take lid off sugar tub , that lives on the worktop on the right of the cooker. Thats a 1920's white enamelled french, marked sucre. Next the coffee, at this time of the night it has to be instant granules in a jar. on the shelf above the sugar position. Again single handed with the coffe jar between my knees unscrew the lid and repeat thetasks as per the biscuit tin. By this time the milk is ready, coffee is in the cup sugar added. Turn off the gas and pour. Just to show willing, dried on milk on saucepans are a pain to wash up, I take the saucepan, over to the sink, turn on thecold tap, run some in and put on the rt draining board. Here its used on the left , washed up on the right. turn off the tap. all simgle handed. So after this exaustive controlled trial, the conclusions are, theres a fault in the design of the butter dish. Not only with yours, but with mine as well.!! the butter dish designers must have been to the same university Strange coinceience. Its now time to go back to first principles, and redesign the butter dish. What else in my kitchen uses a dish? Lots of things, What comes to mind 1st is the cheese dish. Now the designers of cheese dishes knew what they were doing. The cheese dish, in my house hold is the other way up to the butter dish. IE the cheese sits on the lid with the rectangular box over it, with the handle on the bottom! would you believe! but it works!! tho my cheese dish isnt rectangular. it has a sloping top to simulate a wedge of cheese. Now to the crucial bit of my test, put the butter on the cheese dish, and take any one of the 3 knives, biscuits by now have been eaten. take acurl off the butter by pressing the knife downwards along the side of the butter. The table will resist this pressure and the knife will provide butter you so desperately need on your bread. So leave your silver as it is, a nice paper weight perhaps or a door stop, get yourself another cheese dish if you havent a spare, and mark it with the logo "Butter" Hope this helps. Ted. PS. Coffee was just fine. Well Ted I followed that routine with bated breth - an impressive account for sure. It reminded me of this email I received just yesterday - copied below It's Hell to be Old OLD people have problems that you haven't even considered yet! An 85-year-old man was requested by his Doctor for a sperm count as part of his physical exam. The doctor gave the man a jar and said, 'Take this jar home and bring back a semen sample tomorrow.' The next day the 85-year-old man reappeared at the doctor's office and gave him the jar, which was as clean and empty as on the previous day. The doctor asked what happened and the man explained, 'Well, doc, it's like this -- first I tried with my right hand, but nothing. Then I tried with my left hand, but still nothing. 'Then I asked my wife for help. She tried with her right hand, then with her left, still nothing. She tried with her mouth, first with the teeth in, then with her teeth out, still nothing. 'We even called up Arleen, the lady next door and she tried too, first with both hands, then an armpit, and she even tried squeezin' it between her knees, but still nothing.' The doctor was shocked! 'You asked your neighbor?' The old man replied, 'Yep……, none of us could get the jar open.' |
#7
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New Project
Nice to see some serious consideration for my lifetime of frustration.
There is one issue that has not been taken into consideration other than the obvious. Temperature has a profound effect on the stickiness of butter. Over a range of temps, the knife sticks to the butter which of course, follows my knife to the bread I am trying to butter. Not infrequently, falling back to the table after being hoisted into the air and of course, landing upside down, spreading the butter on the table instead of my bread. I never even thought about curling the butter off the top because of tremendous forces involved. This seemed hopeless until the idea of a full 100 oz ingot was suggested. The butter must be cold to curl (no problem in the Brit homes) but would have to be kept in the fridge here. Unfortunately, being cold enough to curl would mean it is not sticky enough to stick to the slab so we would have to do some serious graving to create a rim to keep the butter on the slab. And then there is the problem that my wife is left handed and I am normal. It's not clear whether it's easier to sit opposite each other or around a corner of the table and I am too old to do the math so I cut and butter bread for both of us. Keep the ideas coming. The longer this goes on, the more I can procrastinate about getting started. Jack Astronomy, Beer, Cheese, Fiber, Gems, Nature, Radio, Sheep, Sausage, Silver http://schmidling.com .. |
#8
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New Project
On May 10, 12:43*am, Jack Schmidling wrote:
Nice to see some serious consideration for my lifetime of frustration. There is one issue that has not been taken into consideration other than the obvious. *Temperature has a profound effect on the stickiness of butter. *Over a range of temps, the knife sticks to the butter which of course, follows my knife to the bread I am trying to butter. Not infrequently, falling back to the table after being hoisted into the air and of course, landing upside down, spreading the butter on the table instead of my bread. I never even thought about curling the butter off the top because of tremendous forces involved. *This seemed hopeless until the idea of a full 100 oz ingot was suggested. * The butter must be cold to curl (no problem in the Brit homes) but would have to be kept in the fridge here. * Unfortunately, being cold enough to curl would mean it is not sticky enough to stick to the slab so we would have to do some serious graving to create a rim to keep the butter on the slab. And then there is the problem that my wife is left handed and I am normal. *It's not clear whether it's easier to sit opposite each other or around a corner of the table and I am too old to do the math so I cut and butter bread for both of us. Keep the ideas coming. *The longer this goes on, the more I can procrastinate about getting started. Jack Astronomy, Beer, Cheese, Fiber, Gems, Nature, Radio, Sheep, Sausage, Silver * * * *http://schmidling.com . Just reverse-engineer one of these into precious metal; http://www.oneclickbuttercutter.com/ |
#9
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New Project
On Mon, 10 May 2010 20:09:26 -0700, in rec.crafts.jewelry 1 Lucky Texan
wrote: Just reverse-engineer one of these into precious metal; http://www.oneclickbuttercutter.com/ Clearly someone's idea of a better mousetrap. Or butter trap. er. well, something. if you buy one of these, you could disassemble it, and use the plastic parts directly as models, assuming it's a plastic which would burn out of an investment mold. Most thermoplastic plastics will do that. If you use one of the high explansion (dental industry) crystobalite investments, you can use the thermal expansion of the mold itself to compensate for the metal shrinkage in cooling, so your castings end up the same dimensions. (It wouldn't do for your butter to not fit into your new silver cutter...) Of course, perhaps this is just too easy. And after all, there are intellectual propety rights issues involved, what with simply copying someone elses idea. So improve it. You're a tinkerer Jack. So your silver one should be motorized. Preferably cordless and solar rechargeable (which might be a trick in itself, since the thing is supposed to be stored in the fridge, which normally doesn't get a lot of sunlight inside...) After all, if deluxe pepper grinders can be motorized, and with a convenient light so you can see where your pepper is going (as if you couldn't before), then why not a deluxe solid silver motorized and lighted butter cutter. For real luxury, design it so that while the interior keeps the butter at the correct chilled temp, the exterior is a comfortably warmed surface. if BMW and other cars can put heaters into the car seats to keep your butt warm, why shouldn't a butter carrier/cutter do the same for fingers... OK. Now I'm being silly. A nice warm butt is obviously SO much more important than warmed fingers... But since the butter needs to be chilled to slice, but is nice when warmed and soft in order to spread on your bread, you might figure a way to drain the heat from the fingers in order to prewarm the butter pat. Silver is such a great heat conductor, there must be a way... :-) Peter |
#10
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New Project
Ted Frater wrote:
Its now time to go back to first principles, and redesign the butter dish. What else in my kitchen uses a dish? Lots of things, What comes to mind 1st is the cheese dish. I read your dissertation to my wife who kept asking what has this to do with the butter dish? I kept saying just hang on but just when we both got discouraged, she left the room and placed something on the dining table and declared that Ted is a genius. I got up and beheld a stick of butter under a cheese dome and suspected she may be right and I had missed the eureka moment. My excuse was that I could not comprehend a cheese dish with a handle on the bottom. Ours has nothing to do with yours but it seems eminently suited to the job and saves about 2 lbs of silver. It is a round marble plate, inlaid into a round oak disk with soft rubber feet and has a big and heavy glass dome for a cover. The latter does not help as it is very hard to remove butter with the lid on. Just so happens that she had a hot loaf of whole wheat bread right out of the bread machine to go with her also excellent lasagna pie. As we were both interested in the test, we decided that we would each butter our own bread and issued two Schmidling 1/2 lb silver butter knives for the test. It was a smashing success. The dish never budged from it's original position. Thanks Ted. Will be back again in a few years. Jack Astronomy, Beer, Cheese, Fiber, Gems, Nature, Radio, Sheep, Sausage, Silver http://schmidling.com .. |
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