a work in progress....

[Dan Noren]

a bit ago, my oldest nephew sent me a message with a picture of a certain type of chess board. he wanted to know if i could make one similar. since 50 cal. brass is rather expensive, we agreed to go with the various sizes of brass for the pieces. the pieces were going to be polished brass, and brass with a verdigris finish, but that didn't work out too good. ran a test on one with gun bluing, and just like steel screw heads, it turned the brass a nice shade of black. so, the new design will be polished brass, and brass blackened, with a clear coat of gloss spray lacquer. picked up the brass yesterday, from the range that i used to belong (total price for brass, $3), and set up the sizes. worked on the design for the top of the chess board, and came up with the design that will be laser engraved. instead of solid black squares, they will be deer heads, with the heads set up to face each player. the entire board will have a somewhat rustic design, not sure how it will look, but i have until next spring to figure that out.

 

[Leo Voisine]

Gonna be cool stuff Dan.

 

[David Johnson]

That is going to be great. Nice design.
David

 

[Paul Douglass]

Very unique chess set. Going to be a collectors piece.

 

[Dan Noren]

slight change on the board. he sent me a message, he would like deer on one side, bears on the other. will see if this one will work....

 

[Dan Noren]

updated version...

 

[Darren Wright]

It took me a minute to realize the bears were upside down...duh!

 

[Dan Noren]

blackened the one set of brass tonight.

 

[Dan Noren]

finally had another moment for this. polished the brass, and lightly rubbed down the black parts (for a more even look). then, got out the vacuum pack machine, and packed the parts in their own bags, so that nothing happens to the finish, until it is time to hit them with the clear lacquer. a couple of things were decided about this project, talking about it with my cousin, at the lunch after our uncle's funeral. to keep things rustic, i had decided to try and get a slice of a tree, big enough to fit the board. my cousin suggested, that in order to keep the parts from falling over, to use either a slice of a tree branch, or deer antler, with a dab of hot glue to form a base. i told him that i was originally going to use some birdshot, followed by a dab of hot glue on top. i am going to use both in the final design.

 

[mike calabrese]

Amazing concept, beautiful work.
calabrese55

 

[Dan Noren]

got the bases in the mail today. separated out the ones i want, and marked what part they were for, and put them in a bag, and vacuum packed them too, so as not to lose any of them.

 

[Dan Noren]

gave the first test piece a coat of lacquer. turned out pretty much ok. set it on top of one of the extra bases.

 

[Dan Noren]

while watching a movie (jakob the liar), hot glued the pieces onto thier bases. next will come the coat of lacquer, and they will be done until i can weigh them down a bit.

 

[Dan Noren]

got the coats of lacquer on them tonight.

 

[Dan Noren]

picked up the base for the board today. what would the best way to fill the voids where the bark pulled away?

 

[Dan Noren]

decided to go with epoxy as the filler. taped the bottom in advance.

 

[Dan Noren]

got the one side filled, the other side tomorrow...

 

[Dan Noren]

did a quick test set up to see what it may look like...

 

[Dan Noren]

even though it has been a very unminnesota winter around here, still waiting on the decent weather to keep going with this....

 

[Dan Noren]

even though the weather wasn't very cooperative (only got to about 31), got both sides sanded down, and marked for where the board should be laid out, and the center point. last thing done, was to add the feet on the bottom.