Eames Tulip Table Base Casting Success

The first cast of the Eames tulip table is out successfully.  It, naturally, was not as easy as I thought.  Twice, I had to throw out the rubber mold because the "mildew remover", as the woman at the store called the mold release, was not for rubber-to-rubber two-part molds, but instead for removing originals from a resin cast.  The third time, using vaseline in between the two halves (thank you, internet), worked.  Then, the first two plastic casts failed because of the extremely narrow opening at the mid-point, so the third cast I mixed and poured extremely rapidly, and it worked!

   

So, I now have a cast!  I'm going to fashion the marble top using the same marblizing process I used to create the marble base to the Castiglione Arco lamp.  I need to remove the flashing from the cast, and it didn't turn out as white as I thought it should, so I'll give it a spray of plastic spray paint.  As is obvious from these absolutely mesmerizing photos, I am extremely excited!

Real World Applications of Math

Dowel + mirror + paint + protractor + ruler =
a $300 mirror made for $10.
How do you like THAT math? 

"When are we ever going to use this?"  I hear this refrain from my middle school students quite a bit.  The obvious, though not satisfying, answer is "on the test next week".  A more thoughtful response, but mostly lost upon tweens, is that math, like any academic pursuit, builds different neural pathways that help us become rational, problem-solving adults.  However, truthfully, a lot of math in the upper grades they may never use (I'm looking at you, square roots of negative numbers and surface area of a triangular prism), but most of middle school math is used in real world situations.  Of course, we want kids to be able to balance checkbooks, make sure they're using coupons in the right order (not that you're allowed to use more than one coupon that often anymore), make change correctly, or to maybe one day use the circumference formula to determine if the drain snake is reaching all the way to the basement without having to uncoil it.  The latter scenario could probably only occur in a household with two math teachers in it.

If you'd like to make this pelmet someday,
you'll need math.

I just received notification that my first project on DonorsChoose is now fully funded.  I am going to have the students make miniatures.  Math and miniatures do overlap in that miniatures are scaled down versions of real world items.  Scale factors and proportions need to be considered in miniatures.  The students will research an item that they would like to create, and then they will find the dimensions of this item, scale the dimensions down, and then build them.  I'm hoping to appeal to the nearly universal love of mushing clay and having small things to cherish.  I hope they respond to it.  I used clay one other time, during a cross-curricular project on Mesopotamian math, where the students had to use cuneiform to create their own equations on a "tablet".  It enlivened a lesson about base-60 number systems (yawn) and Iraq (not the most popular country circa 2005).  They loved it, I enjoyed it, and it's a lesson I still remember some 6 or 7 years later. 

In my DIY decorating, I have had to use ratios (mixing plastic and rubber compounds), angles (to measure rays on a starburst mirror), create nets for boxes, transform patterns, etc.  I have always loved math; in the beginning because it was definitive and exact, then because I was good at it, and today because I appreciate the wonder and miracle inherent in this human invention in its interplay with the natural world.  Getting kids to appreciate math, especially in this day and age where entertainment is everywhere, "covering" the material for the standardized test is critical, and immediate gratification does not encourage subtle discoveries nor small victories, is the hard part.

Final, Final Working Miniature Arco Lamp Tutorial and Pictures

The prototype for the working miniature Arco lamp is finished.  The two improvements from my last post is the addition of lead tape, to prevent the tipping, and a marblized cover surrounding the battery box.  It is done.  Cue Handel's Messiah.  I will be selling this on ebay or etsy, I haven't decided which.  And, before I do so, I have to work out the cost, so I can recoup my material outlay when I sell all of the Arcos that I can make before I bore of it.

The complete tutorial, with sources for the harder to find items, follows:

Materials:                      Source   

3/32" aluminum tubing           K & S

Plastic silver Xmas bulbs       Kurt S. Adler

Knife                           I had this on hand

Sandpaper                       I had this on hand

AA Battery box                  Pololu

AA Batteries                    CVS

2 strand mini electrical wire   Dollhouse Heaven

Shrink tubing                   Dollhouse Heaven

1.5 volt LED bulb               Dollhouse Heaven

Solder & soldering iron         I had on hand
Super Glue                      Loctite
Lead Tape                       Find Tape

Optional material:

Plastic spray paint             Rustoleum

Painter's tape                  3M

Polymer clay                    Sculpey

Pasta Machine                   Amsco

Procedure:

• Tape off the switch of the battery box and spray with plastic spray paint.  Set aside to dry. 
• Insert the 2-strand electrical wire into the aluminum tube to prevent kinking while bending the tube into a curve.  Then bend the wire.
• I used 3 colors of Sculpey clay to fashion a "marble" cover for the battery box.  I chopped the white into 1/8" bits, and added small, ball-bearing size bits of black and pewter (which has a nice sparkle to it like real marble).  I rolled this into a log and twisted and folded it until it was nicely streaked.  The I put this through a pasta maker, and cut out the sides and top of the box.  The top also needs a hole for the tube to fit through.  Once baked, I used Loctite gel glue to glue the sides and top together.
• Using a hot knife (I run mine through the flame of my gas stove), slice off part of the Christmas ornament on the side with the opening for the wire.  Sand the edges smooth.  Take a straightened out paperclip, heat that, and push into the ornament to make a hole for the tube to pass through.
• Strip the wires from the battery box and the 2-strand wire to a size you feel comfortable with.  It should be less than an inch, the smaller the better.  Feed a small piece (just long enough to cover the bare wires plus a little extra) of shrink tube onto wire, and the solder the wires from the 2-strand wire to the wires from the battery box.  Heat the shrink tube to fit tight.
• On the other end of the 2-strand wire, send the marble cover and the cut ornament down the tube,  then strip this other end to a short length that you are comfortable with.  Place a small bit of shrink tube (again, just enough to cover the bare wires, plus a little extra) over the bulb to the other end of wire.
• Open the panel on the top inside of the battery box.  Pull the wire taut and push the extra into the open space on top.  Replace the panel.
• Put a dot of glue at the opening of the battery box to secure the tubing to the box, and another dot on the ornament to secure it to the tube.
• If necessary, place lead tape along inside of marble cover to weigh it down more.
• Lift marble cover, toggle the switch, and enjoy!

Funnies - These Just Made Me Laugh, So I'm Sharing!



Poor Cookie.  He's always been a bit slow.




This appeals to my computer
programming, flowchart side, and
THE-ONLY-HIGH-SCHOOL-MUSICAL-MOVIE
-that will-ever-count side.



This is only funny to those who
eat xioa ban (did I spell that right?)

 


A cross-eyed rhinocereros.  It's just such a bizarre take on things.



  


Because I've considered making this exact thing,
and fully expect it to look like the bottom photo.



 



Yup, everyday.



 

Plain silly.

Unreasonable Effectiveness

The mold box worked well. 
The mold, however,
was sadly a complete bust.



Lego scaffolding as glue dries

Since I assume most of you are not holding a master's of education in Mathematics, you may not be familiar with the phrase "the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics".  It was coined by Nobel Laureate Eugene Wigner in a paper of the same name.  It basically states that math not only describes but predicts phenomena in the natural world, which, if you think about it, is amazing.  Some famous examples are when Newton invented calculus before he needed it for his Laws of Motion (was this man ever a genius!), Maxwell predicted radio waves with his equations before Heinrich Hertz detected them, and how the seemingly quixotic 19th century knot theory work eventually helped explain quantum field theory.  No one could imagine life without their cellphones, but did you know that without fractals, in order to pick up all of the frequencies for Bluetooth, walkie-talkie and Wi-Fi, it would look like a porcupine?  And even though we haven't found them yet, Einstein presaged the existence of black holes.  Math is the bomb (literally, if we're talking about the A-bomb)!  Ha!  Math humor.

A lego lathe!!!

Ah-hem...There is a less well-known phrase called "the unreasonable effectiveness of Legos", which pertains to the unexplained usefulness in miniature making of the already very cool Lego.  The phrase is not as famous because I just made it up.  I have used it as doll house scaffolding, as well as an easily assembled and disassembled mold box.  Has anyone found another use for Legos besides their use as a building toy?  I can envision all sorts of uses.