The Becoming of a Bonded Hand

Not quick, but dirty!
Here you get a step by step intro, how to weld a static-robot-extremity and how to plan a simple stand from solid wood.
Enjoy and remake it if you like.

a) Strain your brain and think about the part you want to shape:
- Think about the time you want to place on the project
- The size is not the proper point
- The more details you want, the more time will be needed

I decided to model my left hand, because I'm righty and the left hand is rather easy to measure.
Pic1 shows the amateurish figure drawing

b) Think about an adequate stand for the blob of iron:
In my case I wanted to have a smooth swing in a solid block of beech-wood
Take in mind:
- Straight is easy
- A dome is also easy and feels just fine when it's smoothly grinded
- The inward curve sucks! The smoothing is really hard going and not advisable for quick stands.
Pic2 shows some sketches for the stand

I used a 0,5mm steelsheet. It's easy to bend and fine for welding.
- Draw the cutting lines on the plate and cut them.
- Think about your fingers curve and cut some pieces as shown in Pic6
- Cut small pieces for the fingertips
- Bend it and hope for a good shape :)
After each step compare the fingers with yours and the already done ones

Here's my sequence:
- fingertips
- single parts of the fingers
- knuckles (consider the right curve of all fingers)

- the palm of hand is a little tricky to do. Take care to get a realistic shape with some cuts and slight hammer strokes
- put both parts together and bring it to the right form

- add the grinded fingers and weld everything together

--> almost done :)

Unfortunately I took no photos from the early stage.

The stand is made from three discs of beech, cutted with a usual saber-saw.

They were glued together and grinded smoothly (That was maybe the hardest work with small rasps, grinding mashines and different kinds of sand paper (from 80 to 400))

For the finish I made a fitting for the hand with a firmer chisel.

If the fitting is tight enough you won't need any glue to assemble it.


Now it's really done :)

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If you didn't like it, click the red X in the upper right corner and get off my back! ;-|