Continuing from last week, the first thing I did during this week was look at how my first colour prototype turned out. I was very surprised how well the colours combined and created a slightly marbled effect.
However, I did not think that the combining was perfect, possibly because there was a lot more orange than red or maybe because I did not fold and twist it enough. I just wanted to try it again and see if I could maybe perfect this process. So I did. This time I used a yellow and a bronzy colour.
I really liked the layered marbled look on the inside! However, the surface was not visually exciting at all. Since that is the surface that customers would see, I want to try and see if I can get the marbled look onto the surface instead of just the inside.
Since our Mark 1 Presentation was coming up very soon, I wanted to finish the manufacturing process, particularly how I would use the plastic from my mould and create a finished rectangular block out of it. I started off by cutting off the edges and then proceeded to cut off the top incase the surface was slanted from uneven clamping.
This then created a relatively straight surfaces for the blocks. I then went on to sand each edge to get rid of cutting marks and make the surface very smooth.
Below the image clearly demonstrated how much neater and smoother the surface of the plastic block looks when it is sanded down. The top right diagonal side has not yet been sanded, while the left diagonal side has been.
However, while sanding the sides generally smooths the surfaces, it created small fine lines. Malcolm advised me to go to the jewellery workshop and talk to Lee. She gave me good advice on how to properly smooth down the surface and polish it.
I’ve also thought about how to possibly get different finishes for the surface. While I really like a matt finish on the surface, I want to explore different options. Maybe a shiny surface will look better? Having said that, the problem with creating a shiny surface is that I cannot add any varnish or other material. If I add anything that is not HDPE or cannot be removed easily from the surface, I will make my table top not recyclable, which would defeat the whole purpose of only using one type of plastic. One possible solution for this problem could be to put it into the over? I will test this out next week!