Done!

Stars look beautiful in the frost.

Yesterday I had a meeting with representatives from the daycare center and Kalmar municipality for a final inspection of my work. Everybody was pleased. One of the guys from the municipality has his daughter at the daycare center and he told me the kids are always playing with and around the stars. It's been over a year's work with the stars and it's nice to see it finished. I'm glad that my clients are satisfied with the result.

Starman.

Another photo from the opening. Gunnar took this picture of Oscar balancing on the star.

Thank you all!

A lot of people participated in this project and I would like to thank you all for your involvement.

Jan Tegnemo at Mönsterås Metall who made the aluminium casting possible.

Bengt Selander and the guys at Nybro Rör och Mekaniska who fabricated all the stainless steel hardware.

Gunnar Englund at Fantasilaoratoriet who constructed and sculptetd the wood star.

Tobias at Kalmar Bläster och Lack who painted the green star.

Hans-Göran Martinsson at Kalmar Municipality for great collaboration with all the details.

The guys from Hansa Bygg for the foundations and help on site.

Anders Lönn who gave me some good advice on concrete casting and materials.

Jonas Forsberg who helped with the installation.

And finally Lars Gustavsson, designer, fabricator and inventor, who helped me in so many ways. General support, discussing ideas, helping me with the installation, concrete casting, transports and many other things. Many thanks Lars.

Opening.

Finally, the day for the opening! There was an open house at the daycare center and quite a lot of people showed up. The weather was almost as foggy as last Friday. The grass was in better shape than a week ago and I am pleased with how the whole sculpture look. The kids are still enjoying it, climbing it and playing hide and seek.

Photo: Elin Stenberg

Finish line!

Today was another foggy day and the day of final inspection of the stars. Everything went well and my clients were very satisfied with the piece. The official opening of the daycare center will be next Saturday, more from the opening later.

Last star.

With some help from Barks' movers and Lars I finally got the concrete star in place. After scrubbing and washing away loose pigments on the surface we left it for the kids to jump on. Tomorrow, the final inspection with representatives from the school and Kalmar municipality will take place. Left to do is adding material to the small mound to get the grass surface level with the stars.

Out of the mould.

I managed to lift the concrete star from the mould without any problems. For now it is resting, upside down in the old powerstation in Pukeberg, waiting for some movers to transport it to Rinkabyholm early thursday morning. My deadline is friday 10:00 AM so I can still make it.

On Site.

Finally I was able to install three of the stars. With a lot of lifting power from Lars, Jonas and two guys from Hansa Bygg, we got them in place. The kids at the day care center went crazy when they finally got to climb the stars, when i left after securing the stars to the foundations there were two to three kids on every star.

Jonas and Lars look pleased and they should be, actually it took four guys lifting to get the stars in place. Thank you guys for the help!

600

Ahter the 600 grit paper, I'm satisfied with the finish, at least for now. There definately will be a lot of wear from the kids klimbing and playing with the stars. Hopefully the stars will age to a beautiful patina.

100

I'm using a lot of paper, now 100 grit.

Concrete casting.

As you may notice the concrete im using in the upper photo is black. We pigmented that batch with Íron Oxide pigment. The black layer is about 20 mm, next is about 40 mm of unpigmented gray concrete. The outer surface will, when it has cured, be treated with a mixture of lineseed oil, bees wax and black pigment.

Lars helped me with the casting, a long days hard work. The concrete layer is about 60 mm thick and besides the reinforcement bars reinforced with polypropylen and glass fibers. The weight is about 250 kg. In about two weeks we will see the result.

Done.

The reinforcement bars are done, bent and bound.

Reinforcement bars.

Making templates for guides.

Cutting, bending and shaping stainless reinforcement bars.

Mould improvements.

I used some two by fours to reinforce the frame around the mould. Lars G came by and we discussed the casting on tuesday.

The bottom of the mould now sits about 5 mm from the floor. So when I start casting it will rest on the floor.

I also had an opportunity to use my new sander where I had spillt some resin into the mould.

3 stars.

I drove to Gunnar at Fantasilaboratoriet to pick up the wood star. After som heavy lifting we finally got it on the trailer. Gunnar has done an excellent work, sculpting the star, I'm really pleased with the outcome.

Now I've got three stars in my yard, I think it looks pretty nice.

Sanding

Now all traces from the sandcasting is gone. I am still sanding with 40 grit paper to get an even surface.

The other side.

Laminated some fiberglass reinforcement on the other side this morning. After finishing work with the sander the mould should be ready to use.

Epoxi.

Glued the plywood to the mould using home made glue made of epoxi resin and filler. Then I laminated with fiberglass for strength. After curing I will finish the other side tomorrow.

Reinforcement.

Working on some reinforcements on the mould. After consulting Göran I decided to make a quite deep frame out of plywood all around the mould. This way I will be able to fix the mould while I am working with the concrete.

Finish work.

Finally the mould is cleaned from the remains of the model. Used my new Festool Geared eccentric sander ROTEX RO 125 for the first time. A really sweet tool. Note improvised connection between sander and dust extractor.