On my (old) blackwood D flute, some touches are wrong and difficult for my odd-length fingers.
Did some research, and came up with this stuff-
Apoxie Sculpt.
Got it from a craft supply place,
It comes in lots of different colours- I went for black. As promised, it moulds and smooths when just mixed like firm clay, and sticks to anything. When air-dried, it is incredible strong, and hard. And not brittle, even when very thin, once fully cured (24 hrs)
And it carves like a dream, with a scalpel-type knife. The final result can be as elegant as you have skill and patience for.
Waterproof, self-hardening (no heat needed), resistant to practically everything.
That is revolting grammar. Ugh.
So you can mould the rough extension shape onto the end of the key, then carve in situ when dry, or remove (having lightly greased touch first), carve, then glue back on with good glue, having de-greased.
This could be a boon for those who don’t want to make a whole new key out of an old fork, or who have no facilities for extending a touch with metal.
Sounds rather like Milliput. I haven’t used it on flutes before, but it’s good stuff. I have in mind (when I get a chance) bushing a couple of knackered embouchures of flutes in my possession with it and cutting new holes…
It would be superb for a new embouchure - it takes an extremely sharp edge, which is fully stable when cured, harder than the wood.
And you can add more and re-sculpt if it goes wrong.
Casting with molten nickel- no. Milliput takes up to 130 degrees centigrade, Apoxie up to 177 degrees. Melting point of nickel is approx. 1453 degrees.
I did think of reverse-casting key touches, using just the product- grease key end, make 3/4 mould, remove, grease mould, press in more Apoxie, remove, de-grease, add stem as needed.
They do it in silver colour, but have doubts about how ‘silver’ it would be. Not very, I reckon. Any feedback on this welcome- if it looks exactly like nickel…wow.
I wasn’t talking about casting nickel into this material, rather using the material to make a copy that would be used to make a rubber mold impression that is then used to make wax copies and the cast into silver, using the lost wax process…
Of course. That would work, superbly.
Why go through the rubber process? You could just try cutting a whole-key apoxie blob off the key in two halves, or even doing something clever with wafer-thin separating resist- mould round half the key (horizontally), set, make even and grease joining edge, then mould round other half… then use that negative to cast the wax copy? You can drill it, too, for the wax-pouring hole.
Yes, I thought of that, but PVA mould making material might be easier, it is two part resin, makes nice moulds… The hardest part is getting a good key master made, I ink this would be an easier material to work with.