Making of World War One Bayonet replica Part Two Demolding and Finishing

Greve Museum haired me to make croud safe bayonet for their world war one rifles. We have strict gun laws and restrictions, so it was vital that they looked the part but where harmless to the visitors.

If you like, you can read about how i've made the mold here. This post will be mainly about how i molded the peace and how the painting and weathering was done.

I wanted to reflect the age of the bayonet, It was as most of the Danish war equipment warned down. In the beginning of the word war one in europe, Denmark was neutral, and they literally didn't have the means to defend themselves

So Danes waited and prepared for four long years, but the war never came, and the country was spared the devastation and humiliation of war.

Well no more history, lets paint and mold that bayonet

  

  

I started by sandwiching the two mold part together in between some lumber peaced i had lying around. It is important her to remember to distribute the clamps so the pressure will be distributed equally throughout the peace. We don't want to squeeze the silicone to much that would probably result in a wafer thin blade (c:

  

For the metal finish i've used silver auto spray paint. I've sprayed it directly on the silicone, which is quite messy but will insure good color disbursement on the peace. Silicone is a wonderful material it will not stick to anything but itself (c: so the paint will stick to the plastic as it cures instead.. that is the theory ..

  

And it worked like a charm, id does every time ,.. the was a bit of flashing but not to much the air vents that i cut in the mould did their job no bubbles and holes,i was very pleased with the result

  

the next step was to paint the finishing touches and give it a bit of thrashing. I've masked out the handle with some gaffa tape. The rivets on the handle where to small so i smeared each one of them with toothpaste.

Here is the finished piece, now one done,... on to making a couple more (c: