Jewelry 1 min read
A Week in the Workshop: Notes on Failure
Five failed castings, two redesigned molds, and one very patient assistant. A diary of the week everything went wrong — and what it taught me.
Some weeks are for finishing things. This one was not.
Monday — the first crack
The mold cracked on the second pour, not the first, which somehow felt worse — like it had decided to fail only after being convinced to trust it.
What I tried
- Reinforcing the sprue.
- Slowing the pour by half.
- Preheating the mold for twice as long.
- Only the third one mattered.
Wednesday — the assistant
Every failed casting teaches you something the successful one will not.
My assistant pointed out — gently, the way you point out something to someone who clearly should have seen it themselves — that I had been measuring the wrong wall thickness on the pattern. An hour with calipers saved the rest of the week.
Friday — what shipped
The full process write-up, with measurements, lives in the engineering project log, for anyone trying to avoid my exact mistakes.