Thread: Im stumped about my skull moulding!

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Ok, heres the deal....I am looking for about 25-30 skulls that are flat that can be mounted to the white trim (facia or however you spell it? duh!) on my house. The idea is that it will look like skull moulding all around the peaks of my house. I need them to be about 5" tall or so and want them 3d. I thought about getting standard foam skulls and cutting them in half to have a flat mounting back. I can't find any for a reasonable price however, and wanted to see if anyone had any ideas where I could find these. Thanks for your help in advance!

I'll reply in this thread as well as your other, in case you don't look at both (other one being in General)

Perhaps you can make your own?

A quick plaster mold of one of your foam skulls (since it's just the front, making the mold should be pretty simple.
A jar of latex rubber - anywhere from $8-$15 dollars.
Lay in a thin coat of latex, let it dry (about a day), then use spray foam (about $5 bucks a can - can probably get 8-10 skulls from a can) while the latex rubber is in the mold (will keep the rubber from distorting).
Foam will take a couple of hours to set up - leave it in a day to really allow some good curing.

Pull out, and there's one skull for your fascia - make a few plaster molds (a bucket of plaster of paris is $5 - $6 bucks), and you can do a few at a time.
Just paint, and mount - nice and light too.

Admittedly, this will be a lot of work, and take a lot of time, but if you make 5 molds, you can do 5 every 2 days (if you take your time), and have 30 in less than 2 weeks, at the cost of about $30 bucks.

how about buying dollarama skulls and splitting them down the side view. you can get 20 side view skulls for 10 dollars and be done in no time.

Take what ever skull you want to use and lay it down face up. Make sure to fill in all of the holes, eyes, nose, jaw, behind the eye sockets, so that your mold material does not leak into your skull. This is unfavorable. Place clay around it so the skull is in half.

Apply your mold release then put up your mold walls and pour in your molding material. I am using a self curing RTV. When you are done you have a mold for half skulls.

Originally Posted by scourge

Take what ever skull you want to use and lay it down face up. Make sure to fill in all of the holes, eyes, nose, jaw, behind the eye sockets, so that your mold material does not leak into your skull. This is unfavorable. Place clay around it so the skull is in half.

Apply your mold release then put up your mold walls and pour in your molding material. I am using a self curing RTV. When you are done you have a mold for half skulls.

Where do you buy RTV?

I buy mine at a local pottery store. I use Pathway polymers por-a-mold 2020. It is expensive but the molds are very durable. I have the same molds back as far as seven years with no loss of detail or tearing.

Hey Scourge, what are you using for your mold walls?

those skulls are SICK! I am so going to make a ton of these.

Would Elastomeric work for a mold? Its the stuff you paint on a stone wall to keep moisture out.

Since you are hanging a lot of them you are stuck using foam or plastic. Foam skulls you need to make a mother mold around your mold strong enough to with stand the expansion of the foam. I make hollow plastic skulls by rotating the mold to produce a hollow skull. I am not sure what Elastomeric is but, when you start using materials made for a specific job rather than the one you are attempting, you usually run into problems. Maybe someone else has better ideas for light weight castings. Here are pics of hollow half skull.