Human Torso
This project was a really time consuming project of mine. It took a special the of solder that I have never used before that was hard to use and a tough material to shape. It took me multiple weeks to complete and was a big learning experience for me.
Elements
The Shape
The base shape didn't take long to make. I originally had a much larger scale but made it smaller since it would demand too much supplies. The second outline that I made was too complex and would require me to solder over the same point multiple times. The final outline of the 2d section consisted of 2 wire pieces soldered in two places. The 3D arches took longer to solder together with multiple tries.
The Wire Body Section
Each piece of wire was shaped individually to fit a specific part of the body. This took about a week to complete. Originally I had the section to be tightly fitted together but as I began to solder them, I found that there were gaps that I could not fill. To fix this, I decided that I will make the gaps look like they were like wounds showing the clockwork inside. The soldering took three weeks to complete as I had to constantly fix wires that unsoldered, reshape wires, and carefully line them up which was a tedious and patient process. I used thin wire to wrap around and fill in holes.
Research
Before I could start to work on this piece, I had to figure out what materials I am using, how I will use them, what they are made out of, and what is safe. Since I work with metal, fire, and acid, I have to make sure I know what I am doing and that I know my materials completely. I use recycled parts since metal can be very expensive if bought. I found some barbed wire at my house that I would use as the base and main part of the project. I was given old clock parts from a local business in town, and the pieces of sheet metal are recycled from the jewelry class. With barbed wire, it is galvanized to prevent rusting. This meant if I soldered it like I do with the sheet metal, then it would produce toxic fumes known as Zinc fumes. To prevent this, I had to find a way to remove the galvanized coating or find a solder that melts before the reaching the temp. 392. The first option was clean off the zinc by dipping the wire in muriatic acid. However, this would still produce fumes and is a dangerous process. The second option was this special solder that melts at 350 and is used to solder pieces of galvanized metals. I have never used this type of solder before and it took some time before I was able to solder joints properly. Â It took about 3 weeks before I would get the solder.
