Create Mirror Polished Stainless steel Sculpture from Drawing

Mirror polished stainless steel is commonly used in modern public art because of its stunning finishing and beautiful artistic appearance.  However, it is also well known that it is not easy to fabricate perfect mirror polished works. In this post, we’d like to introduce the technique and workflow Tany Foundry  employs to create art fabrication works.

This sculpture is called Fluid Movement. They are four pieces swimming arm like stainless steel sculptures. The size of one art is 12 feet long x 3.5 feet height.

Here is a brief description on how we made it.

Step 1: Digital Modeling.  The commonly used digital model applications are Zbrush, 3DMax,Rhino, etc.

Step 2: Engineering and Preping stainless steel sheet.

High quality stainless steel is the foundation to create beautiful works. We use the marine grade stainless steel sheet 316, which features superior corrosion resistance performance and high strength. It is crucial to make sure that the stainless steel sculptures will never get corrosion placed outdoors, even in warm and high humidity environment. Compared with stainless steel Grade 201 and 304, stainless steel 316 works much more better on build quality.

Stainless steel sheet.

The armature and the base of the sculptures is 16 MM thick,which is extremely strong for the structure. It can even stands a couple adults climbing on the sculpture.

Cutting and bending the stainless steel sheeting according to design.We use high precision water jet cutter or plasma cutter to cut stainless steel sheet into the shape we wanted.

Step 3:  Building Armature of the sculpture.

All joints are full welded to maximize strength. We use TIG and MIG for welding.  The welding rods have to be exactly the same as the stainless steel sheet. Otherwise there will be imperfection on the finished works.

Step 4: Fabrication

This is the crucial steps in the entire fabrication process. Only experienced fabricators are assigned in this stage. The sculptures will be formed as its design. All the welding joints and seams have to fulled examined.

We double check the angle of the sculpture to make sure it is correct. In theory, the measure should be correct as long as the armature is right. However, it is import to double check the measurement during fabrication process. This can guarantee the precision of the final work.

We lift the sculpture to examine its overall look. It looks fine.

Step 5: Polishing

Polishing is a dirty job, involving many steps, which have to be performed in correct order and in right technique.

These are material commonly used for polishing: polishing wheel, cotton wheel, non-woven wheel and polishing paste.  The hard and tough polishing wheel is used in first stage and then softer cotton wheel. Polishgin paste of different colors are also used in different stage.

Step 6: Shipping and Installation

Feel free to let me know if you have any technical question on how to fabricate stainless steel sculptures or you need a quote for your own project. Click the link below or call us.