The Best Field Trip Ever (or: come see our sign!)

Wednesday we had The Best Field Trip Ever, in my HBCO.  [I am expert enough at field trips to assert this, being a person who, I think we can safely say, over-volunteered for her children's school outings.  You may think this fact is unrelated to developing a love for craft beer, but if you have spent much time around kids you will know that chaperoning school trips and loving the peace and over-21 interaction that craft beer encourages are closely intertwined.]  At any rate, we journeyed to Berthoud to see how our sign was coming along. The fellow making it, Chris Gugelman, has his operation there at Madd Castings in this unassuming warehouse (which is actually a series of warehouses, but you can only see this one from the front):

Step inside and check out this amazing foundry they've got going.  They cast (I think I'm using that term correctly?) in bronze for all sorts of artists from all over the States.  Chris kindly interrupted his busy day and gave us a full-fledged tour.

Step one is creating a wax mold from the clay an artist has sculpted.

Step two is here, dipping that puppy in a series of liquid ceramic material and sand -- superfine first, then another layer of ceramic, then medium grain sand, and another round with coarse sand.

Those things dry

and then are fired in a big ol' kiln that is, as it proclaims, HOT HOT (1635 degrees when we were there).  The wax melts out and is reclaimed, leaving a hollow ceramic mold.

Then these guys, who are fearless and quite expert as well, prop the baked (and piping HOT HOT) molds in a gravel bin and pour liquid bronze into the molds.

This part was a little terrifying.  It is a James Bond scene waiting to happen.

Even the tools are red-hot.

Eventually the mold and bronze cools and they break the ceramic off of the bronze.

They sandblast it and trim it and eventually proclaim it ready for assembly into the final sculpture/statue/whatnot.

This is this foundry's first machine-tooled piece:

And here's the reason we went in the first place!

**Some clarification, after a couple of comments here and on the FB page (sorry to have left this out!):

I should have noted that our sign isn’t being cast, as in this process in the photos above. It’s being made by a whole ‘nother technique that includes, I think, the design being water-jetted (?) out of 2 sheets of metal and Chris welding all the pieces together in layers. We can’t wait to see the finished product!

I should also have noted that Chris is an avid homebrewer who, judging from the looks of the 2 new kettles he’s got in one of the warehouses, brews on a much larger scale than Tatum’s and my experiment of a couple of weeks ago. (Which, by the way, I’m supposed to be bottling today. It turns out the bottling is a lot more tedious than the brewing. All that sterilizing. Ugh! Can’t there be a blue-cheese-type of beer, where we say the bacteria is good for you? [And the answer to that, apparently, is yes! Let the bacteria thrive and call it a lambic or a sour or somesuch, and you've got not contamination but style. I'm certain Linsey -- and Heather and Luke and Jesse and Steve and Tim and myriad other good homebrewers -- would be horrified by this interpretation of lambics and sours. Future H&D customers, never fear. They aren't letting me brew!])

[In which:  I have vise envy.]