Well, in the course of making a backup of TheDaguerreotypist this morning I wiped out some crucial WordPress files and brought down the whole site. Thank goodness for ISP’s that make periodic backups without being asked! After the restore I had everything except the most recent post about making a pair of buffing paddles. The pictures of the process are here.

The goal was to make a simple paddle that could be easily replicated in larger sizes, and had a system for holding on the covering cloth in a way that kept tension on the covering and also allowed the cover to be easily changed. The base material is a 1/2″ softwood board with a layer of felt glued to it. It is covered with Ultrasuede. The Ultrasuede has sewn in pockets to hold some pieces of 1/8″ steel rod that in turn are the anchors for a set of four steel springs. I also tried a string and spring version and a rubber band version, neither one of which worked very well.

The dimensions are not critical, you only need to make sure there is enough distance between the two steel rods so that the springs are under some tension. The free ends just tuck under the springs. The whole shebang just sits on the workbench and a plate held with a suction tool is rubbed back and forth along the top. It doesn’t move around much when polishing sixth plates. It might need some kind of hold-down in bigger sizes.

We will see how well it holds up in use. Now off to make a new ground glass for my camera to replace the one that fell out on my foot.  This was not my best day ever.

I spent a fair amount of quality time this weekend in castle daguerre. Several hours were devoted to experimenting more with polishing plates. Since I was dissatisfied with my copper polish in the last go round, this time I worked on a sixth plate that I have that was donated to me by a daguerreian friend. It is already coated with silver and has been used a number of times, so it was a perfect practice subject. I wanted to see in what way working with the silver is different than the copper. Read more »

What – the reader says – does this title have to do with daguerreotypy? Well a little more safety information heading your way. I recently stopped by my health care provider for some routine blood tests. I also arranged with my doctor to get a mercury blood level as well. Here are the results:

The screen capture is a little hard to read, but I passed.  I did this to establish a baseline blood level before I start working with mercury. I plan to get an annual test to get a definitve read on whether my safety measures are working. My health plan covered the test, so it didn’t cost me anything. I asked one of my nurse friends however and she tells me it is a pretty cheap test (about USD $25). Even if you are a longer term practitioner you might want to get one done the next time you have to get other bloodwork. You will quickly find out if you have anything to be concerned about.

Happy (and safe) dagging. :)

After some friendly goading from my closest dagurreian friends, I went out to the castle tonight to get some more hands-on practice with polishing. I’m sticking to bare copper plates still, since I don’t feel ready to tackle silver yet. True to my friend’s advice, I began to learn a few things that I didn’t read about in books – and confirmed a few that I had.

Fact 1 – Flat metal plates are not actually flat. Read more »

I haven’t been doing that great a job of keeping up the Dag Diary lately, mostly because all of the entries would read “Mercury Pot design research & Polishing research”. In spite of all the well meaning advice to “pick a lane” and “just jump in” I seem to still be wedded to the slow and careful approach. Alas, we are who we are. I tend to think in terms of full scale systems and it can make progress slow. Fortunately for me I enjoy the process.

I did come across a new (to me) resource this weekend that I thought I would share. It is an outfit in Los Angeles, CA, USA called McMaster Carr Supply Company. This is a company of great utility for anyone who builds anything. They claim to carry 480,000 products and after spending some time on their website I believe it. Hardware, Tools, Fittings, Raw Materials – the list goes on. What really sets these guys apart is that they completely “get” the web. Their interface cleverly assists you in finding items – even when you don’t know what you are looking for. Their choice engine lets you pick and choose between various specifications until you narrow down exactly what you need. Prices seem fairly reasonable and ordering is straightforward. Even if you are not in the US and don’t want to pay international shipping, this place is a treasure house of information when researching materials.

I seldom enthuse about merchants of any kind, but this one deserves it Many items even come with technical drawings showing exact dimensions in addition to the specification list. If you didn’t know about these guys check them out. If you did know, how come you didn’t tell me about them sooner?

In the meantime I will continue with the polishing plan and thinking about mercury pots.  In the polishing world I did decide to go Random Orbital with a final hand polish, but I am still trying do decide on a specific set of polishing compounds and my approach to holding and manipulating the plates. If (when!) I decide, you will be the first to know.  Happy Dag’ing.

Oh and P.S. I did get a little further on repairing the fume hood.