The Little World

Ve haf vays of making you pay attention. You may see und make your choice of ze conseqvences…

No, no, no. Not that kind of movie. This is scale model building in the Little Workshop and we are all peaceful here.The only screams are when a fly walks over a fresh paint job.

I have sourced instruments from all over to help with the modelling. In some cases I went into the dental supply warehouses that used to deal with me when I was in practice because I know what their products could do. I discovered that if you are not registered any more they regard you as worse than a bum. I was surprised at this as I had paid my monthly bills promptly…but so much of my former profession has become unappetising that it is just one more thing to comfort my old age – I need have no regrets.*

Back to the tools.

a. This is a cement spatula. Used to mix zinc oxide and eugenol for temporary fillings and zinc phosphate cement to kill the pulps of healthy teeth. That’s cynicism, but it’s an emotion born of experience. Nice material but only in the right places.

The flat part of the spatula is the working and mixing bit – the chisel on the other end is for scraping dried cement off the glass mixing slab. The use it is put to now is to mix and apply Tamiya filler putty with their lacquer thinner to make a smoother filling paste.

b. This is a Lecron carver. Used to shape porcelain powders as they are applied on  gold matrices to build up porcelain jacket crowns. The blade and the scoop are used variously to add and remove powder but the ribbed section in the handle is actually used to create vibration on the matrix to help the wet porcelain powders settle.

In the Little Workshop it is a wax carver and a shaper of filler putty.

c. This is a Hollenback carver. The ends are little elliptical knife blades used to carve blue and green wax for chrome casting models and gold inlay models.

In the Little Workshop it snugs down masking tape over canopy frames before painting as well as carving filler putty.

d. This is a mystery. It was equally as baffling to me as to the man from the Burfitt stand who sold it. I think now that it might have been a part of an instrument set for dissections. I bought it on a speculative basis before I knew what it might do.

What it is perfect for is the application of Maskol or white PVA glue in areas that need to be excluded from paint. Far better than the traditional toothpick, because it has a balanced handle for control.

In the future I’ll try to show some of the unique tools and instruments I’ve discovered in the workshops of other Little World builders.

*  It has become like the battle of Verdun but not as cheerful.