Carboard Rings

Finding beauty in trash and mundane objects is something of a hobby to me, and most of the time when i find a new material to work with my first thought is, "Can I make a ring out of this?"

I like carboard, its useful, easy to work with and wonderfully versatile. However when you think about carboard you don't think beauty, elegance or strength, three things that most people want in their rings.

So this started as a fun experiment to see if cardboard, (with some help) could become beautiful.

For Ring Blank

• Carboard (Shocking I know)
• Box knife, (obviously, don't dare use any other knife.)
• Resin, (I used polyester resin as it cures fast and hard, but you can use whatever you like, just make sure to give it plenty of time to get nice and hard)
• Tape
• Two short pieces of scrap wood (to hold the blanks upright, i used melimean so the resin doesn't stick, but you could line them with a glossy tape as well)
• Mica powder and pigment in your desired colours, (I don't recommend using anything but very fine powders, as the holes in cardboard are quite small.)
• Small mixing dishes
• Stir sticks
• torch, or heatgun

Tools

• Drill and a forshner bit (slightly smaller then you want the inside of your ring to be.)
• 2 clamps
• Bandsaw, or scroll saw, (optional, it will just save you a bit of sanding)
• Belt Sander
• 220g, 320g, 400g, 800g sandpaper
• Caliper
• Polishing paste.(I used FLITZ)
• Soft Cloth
• a vacuum chamber would probably be helpful as well, sadly I don't own one of these, so I will not in fact be using one.

PPE

• a least two pairs of nitrile gloves (getting resin off your fingers is a bitch)
• safety glasses (resin dust in the eyes is not a treat ether)
• respirator ( a lot of resin has fumes that will kick you in the face, especially polyester)

To start with you need Carboard, you will want some nice fresh pieces, with all the curves uncrushed.

Cut it into 2 inch wide stripes, then cut the strips into 2 inch squares. this doesn't have to be extremally precise.

Now we glue the cardboard together.

i make most of my rings 2 pieces of cardboard wide, you can do as you please.

I mixed a tiny amount to resin (about a table spoon) and used a stir stick to spread a thin layer all across the back of one piece, and sandwiched the other on top, keep going till its a thick as you want.

Keep a firm hold on the sandwich you just made and wrap it securely in tape, being sure to cover the bottom

Stand up all your blanks against on of the pieces of scrap wood, i set them in groups of 4 for easer pouring.

Sandwich all the blanks together with your second piece of wood tape them together.

Or if your making them all the same just sandwich them together in one free standing bundle.

First, out of all the resin projects that I've done this is by far the messiest, so cover your work surface unless your planning another interesting art project. Also make sure that this is in a well ventilated area.

Now, I poured all of my rings in one batch, I don't recommend doing this, it takes time to pour one blank, and alto you can switch from one to the next, if its your first time making these stick with small batches of resin, as you need to pour it when its as runny as possible.

I recommend planning out all the colours and which blank you'll do how before hand, however I've found that making rings in solid, opaque colours, gives them a flat, line art look, whereas the rings that use colours mixed into clear have more of a 3D look, both can look really nice.

Once you have everything planed and ready, put on gloves, (I recommend double gloving) and your respirator.

Mix your resin as manufactures instructions. I used a cup for about 5 of the 4 layer ring blanks.

Pour your resin into the smaller mixing containers, this will also slow down the curing process.

I mixed in the pigments one ring at a time, mix carefully you want a few bubbles as possible, once all the colours were mixed, hit them lightly with the torch or heat gun to pop the surface bubbles

Pick your first Ring, I started with an all black and an all white one.

Now pour your resin in as slowly as possible, try to make the stream as thin as possible, i poured one then let it settle a bit, while I poured the second one. It may that a while for the resin to stop slowly filling all the cracks so be patient and keep topping it up until it looks full, here is where a vacuum chamber would be help full. Tapping the blank lightly on the table, and giving it a few squeezes' helps get the bubbles out as well.

Continue this for all the rings and colours you want.

Fav colour combo:

First I poured a very thin stream a black onto the left side of the blank then a thin stream of white on the right, followed by a thin stream of clear over the middle, I continued this a couple of times, stopping now and then to tap the blank on the table and lightly squeezing it to get most of the bubbles out.

another one I really like is adding drops of alcohol ink into the clear resin and pour that with out mixing together, this also makes for a lovely and interesting ring.

Once all you blanks have been poured, set the to dry, you want them to be very hard and not flexable in the slightest so waiting a couple days is recommended.

Once everything has hardened completely, remove them from the wood, and unwrap the tape.

If your blanks aren't full you can sand them down on the belt sander till the top is solid, this is optional, but can help give you an idea of where to put the center of your ring.

Now clamp the blank down using the method shown in the pictures, this is a simple way of clamping small items.

Used the drill and forchner bit to carefully drill out the centers, go slowly and clear away the shavings as they can hear up and clog up the bit.

Using a band or scroll saw cut of the corners and edges of the blanks to give the sander a head start, try not to go to far.

once you have it roughly circular we can move on to sanding

While it is possible to do this by hand or with a Dremel tool, a belt sander is best, to keep your edges even and straight.

When sanding Resin on a belt sander I find it best to keep a dish of water next to me and dip the ring in when it starts to heat up.

As always go slowly using the calipers to be sure that your not going to far. don't forget the top and bottom of the ring, personally I like to remove all of the cardboard from the outside.

Once you have your ring roughly the size and shape you want we move on to fine sanding.

Start with 220g sand paper, to get a nice curved edge, place the sandpaper into the palm of your hand, be sure to sand the out side and inside, alto be carful you don't want to make it to big, keep a caliper near by and use it to keep everything even and symmetrical.

i don't normally wet sand with the rougher sand paper, but as you move on to the 350g and so on, wet sanding can help make the sanding smoother, so polishing will go easier. once you have the surfuse of the ring even , and smooth we can move on to 400g sandpaper, wet sanding is best for this step.

Use a soft cloth to dry the ring ever so often to make sure there are no deep scratches, if you do see a scratch go back to 350g to smooth it out before continuing, when the ring is smooth and uniform, move on to 800g, be sure to get every part of the ring both inside and out, don't worry about taking of more material, as the 400 - 800g doesn't remove very much.

If while sanding your ring starts to split, or a section feels loose, just add a drop of super glue and you should be good to go.

Once you have a smooth even finish, you can choose to take it to the next level by buffing it, this step is optional, if you want, a matte finish looks good on these rings as well,

To buff place the soft cloth in your slightly cupped palm, coat the ring in a thin layer of buffing paste, and rub the ring against the cloth, to get the best look you may need to rub hard, but not to hard or you may crack the ring.

Once you've buffed every part of the outside, use a clean part of the cloth and do the same thing, if you did this corectly it will bring out and glossy, shine.

I only buff the outside as I like to inside to keep a matte finish,

Here are a few of my favorites' so far, along with one I made with just clear resin.

Honestly, all of them have their own appeal, and I'm looking forward to seeing more!