Getting Yuma Pins Ready

This will probably be my last post before the conference. I wanted to illustrate the tradition of pin making the "Yuma way". Yesterday, I decided to make my Yuma pins. I took five hours making a rubber mold, using the wax injector (not cleaning up the wax because there was no time), investing three flasks and left the kiln running at night so that early morning centrifugal casting could be done. Morning rolled around and I cast in record time one hour before I needed to teach class. After my afternoon meetings, I ran back to the studio, threw on a series of Bones on Netflix and cut all the sprues off the newly cast forms. A belt sander, buffing wheel and the fastest soldering attempt ever left me with eighteen pins. Upon returning home, I sanded the pieces as rapidly as possible and did a final patina in my kitchen (I wouldn't suggest this). Finally a layer of wax, and my pins are ready. In the spirit of Yuma, I generally bite off more than I can chew when creating my pins. On Thursday, I will meet at Lutes Casino in Yuma, Arizona with the bag of pins in my pocket and I'll trade with other last minute pin making warriors. I will repeat my speech, "I would have cleaned up the forms more, but I ran out of time...". I try to explain to the metalworking heroes that you can leisurely meet at Yuma, and generally they pull out their pin and say "Yeah, me too." This is the start of the Yuma Symposium. I'm excited. I'll let you know how it goes.