Casting duck feet

[Nancy C]

I have used alginate to cast the feet on a day-old gosling and it worked "okay" but I had a lot of problems with it.
Also, the foot was in a relaxed position, sort of like a flying pose, so it was fairly streamlined and I was able to slide it out of the mold without causing any significant damage.
I think it would be a real pain with a "posed' foot.
If all else fails, and the eider feet are too rotten to cast, you could probably cast a pair of WW scoter feet to use as substitutes - if you can get any, that is.

[Redwolf]

They will be flying. They are frozen is position and I'll use hot water to mix the alginate. I'm hoping they will thaw enough to slide out without ruining the mold.
There's only one way to find out

[bill@hogheaven]

What do you plan to cast with? None of the casting plastics Im familiar with will work well in an alginate mold. The moisture in the alginate reacts with the urethane & you end up with a very rough bubble pocked cast. Use the silicone for best results.

[Redwolf]

The same I use for snake heads 50/50 resin/bondo.

[George Roof]

Bob, I want you to look up a word.  The word is FRANGIBLE.  What you have there is a very frangible casting. Bondo (even with extra resin) has microballoon fillers mixed with the bonding agents of fiberglass resin. Though castings may seem rigid, they are susceptible to humidity and absorb other disbonding chemical relatively easily. That's why fiberglass boats are done in climate controlled environments and that's whey most are cast in a single operation.  Fiberglass doesn't "stack" very well when cured fiberglass is used to support new fiberglass.  I will make simple rigid molds out of Bondo in order to cast antler caps, but for 3D work, it's silicone and real casting resin.

[AFWS]

The same I use for snake heads 50/50 resin/bondo.

OUCH!  make you a mix of 25% krowtann, 25% resin, and 50% bondo and you should be good to go LOL The krowtann will "TAN" the feet 

[Dan Bond]

I  do Georges method, just read his post no need for me to explain he hit the nail on the head!