Lend a (concrete) Hand

Got some spare concrete? Got an old rubber glove? Excellent.

Let's make a concrete hand.

Almost as good as a real one. Certainly heavier.

I had some concrete repair mortar left over from the concrete chicken instructable, and obviously had two rubber gloves I used for mixing.

Rubber moulds can make useful formwork. Gloves are an interesting shape so I thought I'd give it a go.

I needed to add a bit more water to the mix, as it had already started curing by the time I came to fill the glove. Other than that, no change to the mix was made. I used the same wooden spoon to spoon the mix into the glove, and tried to shake it as much as possible to work the trapped air bubbles to the surface.

Note I did this outside, as there was likely to be some spillage.

The glove bulged slightly due to the weight of the concrete. If I were to do it again I would try to squeeze the palm a little more to retain a more human thickness of the hand overall.

Once the glove was filled, I hung it from the back of an old garden chair to keep it in the right orientation whilst the concrete fully cured.

I left the glove overnight, then removed the mould, by a process of rolling th glove up, and cutting it up.

It came away from the concrete really easily, and there's no need for specialist tools.

It's also useful to put some newspaper down to avoid lots of concrete debris littering your floor.

One concrete hand, Perfect for hanging keys, decoration and halloween parties.

Also if you have a job where you need to press one button for a really long time, this might be able to help.

The holes you can see in the hand are called blowholes and are caused by trapped air bubbles. You can eliminate these by using a wetter mix, and vibrating or shaing the concrete in the mould a bit more.

Good luck!