Behind the Scenes

Artist Bill Worrell taught me the lost wax, or investment casting technique for making jewelry at his studio at his ranch in New Art, Texas on the Llano River. This technique has been around for thousands of years, and can be accomplished using either a vacuum or centrifugal casting method.  We used the centrifugal casting method for the original Lubbock Tornado Bolo Ties.

To start, a wax sculpture (Fig.1) is set in the center of a cylinder which is then filled with an investing slurry and allowed to dry.

Figure 1: Wax Sculpture

Once dry, the cylinder is placed in a kiln at ~ 1600 degrees to “burnout”, or melt the wax sculpture from the now hardened investment, thus creating a mold. This mold cylinder is next infused with molten metal, such as bronze, silver or gold. Using an acetylene torch, the metal is melted in a crucible (Fig. 2) that is placed in the broken-arm centrifuge in continuity with the mold.

Once the metal in the crucible has melted, the arm of the centrifuge is released, allowing the arm of the centrifuge to spin (Fig. 3), thus filling the mold with the molten metal. After this mold has cooled, it is placed in water and the investment is broken apart from the casting.

This rough, cast piece is then cut from the sprue tree (Fig. 4), and put through several polishing and finishing steps (Fig. 5 & Fig. 6). All of the Lubbock Tornado bolos have been individually designed and hand made.

 

Figure 4: Sprue Tree

Although these bolos are currently cast using white bronze, the original 50th Anniversary Classic and Contemporary Bolos and Tips were cast using sterling silver and salvaged copper used in the construction of the Buddy Holly Hall of Performing Arts in Lubbock, Texas (Fig. 7).  The casting of these bolo ties and tips using sterling silver and salvaged copper will remain an option at special request.

 

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