Xeriscape sculpture garden sprouts ancient MFA figure.

I sez to her, I sez, “What are yuh, 18 years old now? Time to get out from under my roof!”

I had some extra steel in the shop from building out the Rocket Mass Heater and decided to put it toward art’n. Yesterday I welded this cantilever base, bolted her back leg through the metal tube and welded a strap across the bronze between her feet to make sure she stayed put, then set her in the yard with a concrete footing.

She feels like she has always been here.

The aluminum figures around the ponds aren’t sure what to make of a bronze figure.

Trout Transport

Sunday morning re-installation of Bonneville Upstream.

My friend Jed arrives with his handy trailer. This will make 21 fish he has helped me install.

Jed backed his twisty little trailer all the way inside the shop, all in one smooth line from the street. Impressive! The upright 2×4 is his steering guide.

I levitate the triple group of trout while Jed backs the trailer underneath.

Trout settle down, making ready for the next group.

Safety Comes When Man says, “Attach the hoist before freeing the sculpture.”

My neighbor, Chris, drops in to lend a hand. The three of us removed the trout months ago after their auto/ichthyes incident, and we will also put them back in.

Lashing down frisky fish for a ride through Sugarhouse.

We’ll be moving upstream about a mile, and trout need to move upstream to breath. This should wake them up from their long dormancy in the studio.

The Bean Whole fish transport; fueled by Jed’s craft-roasted coffee.

The rest of the morning was up at the intersection of 2100 S 1300 E, with the long turn lane still closed for street construction. This gave us a nice safe space to park and work from. The City’s public art coordinator, Kat Nix, brought hardhats and safety jackets for the guys, and pitched in with the work. The director of Salt Lake City’s Arts Council, Felicia Baca, also stopped in, joking around at how I used to be her boss back when I ran Global Artways for the City. After Jed and I had dug out the holes and installed the paired group into concrete footings, Chris made a quick trip up to help us lift the triple group into position and slurry in the concrete. Everything went swimmingly, and the trout are happily in the current again.

On-site at the intersection in the closed left turn lane. The spot just in front of the oncoming car is where they will go.

We have loosed the fish from their tie-downs, and they are ready to leap into place.

Kat keeps on eye on them while I get the fish food.

Professional fish wranglers, like Lion Tamers of yesteryear, know the essential function of a bristling manly mustache when confronting The Wild.

The pair-group jumps right into place and gets their treats.

The triple group jumps next, sassing for treats.

Jed and I stand about while the concrete cures.

They are excited to be back out in public again, among the rushing cars.

Once the concrete sets, we spread the soil and ground cover so everything looks tidy.

Another good day of fishing.

Triple Fish Double Sticks

Yesterday the pair received stainless poles, today the triple got theirs.

Today I levitated the pole into position with my mind. Why didn’t I think of that sooner?

Triple with double poles. Welding took a bit more knowhow today; filling gaps between the sculpture and the pole by building up wide platforms with fat bead on the sculpture, then switching style for a strong connection to the stainless- all with the same too skinny rod, and always in an awkward crouch that makes running the foot pedal tricky.

Fish Sticks.

This morning’s email had a message from the City; the shattered poles have been removed from the sculpture site and re-installation is game-on. Time to get the Trout on their new poles!

The shop becomes a fishbowl again. Time for the fish to sprout legs- stainless steel poles.

The clamps and rulers and sticks are how I establish Level & Vertical when the trout are suspended upright. Here they are suspended on their sides, with the stainless steel pipe aligned to the base of the stream hoops. I thread the pipe through ladders to establish Horizontal & Parallel from the upright measure of Level & Vertical.

Then the poles are welded in place. A bit more than half way around.

I welded the new pole to the original pole, after getting them to seat together. The force of the accident is apparent here, as the the old pipe is crushed up into the steambed form.

Almost flipped over enough to weld the underside of the pipe. The hoist was blocking the rotation, so down it came and the webbing was refit, then it lifted clear.

The pair is finished up and tied off to the float beam and its support leg, making space for the bigger group.

This rowdy bunch.

Rolled onto the side after establishing Vertical & Horizontal.

The force of the accident really pushed the bronze around. This is as close as it could come back, as the positioning of the trout are what hold the group together. The portion of pipe to the left will be cut at an angle to butt up the adjoining pipe in alignment with Horizontal & Parallel. Tomorrow.

Mass Heater Bench

8 shorts from the end-cuts bin at Wasatch Steel, cut on my Evolution metal miter saw and welded up. This bench holds the Mass Heater from the previous post at the correct height to align stovepipe from the J-Stove.

All this pretty metal will be under the Mass Heater.

Spray-painted in “Oiled Bronze”

The rear ladder is a guard for the J-Stove, as I’ll store lengths of wood under the bench.

Each leg has a large nut welded within, and a bolt to adjust height to align with the J-Stove vent pipe.

E spotted 3 boxes of this stone veneer at 1/8 price.

Enough to cover three of the sides (short ends and this long side), all but the side facing the wall. I’ll cover the top with native flagstone.

Less Massive Mass Heater

Hooray for the learning curve. This iteration of a mass heater weighs in at just over 100lbs, and took a day to create.

simplicity. Mold form is a plaster hardy-backer board that is an aspect of the form, rather than the previous pop-away mold form. An external frame holds the thin board in place and will absorb the liquid pressure against the form. The seams are sealed with drywall paste.

The stovepipe ends are added in with AL tape and drywall paste on the bottom, and a salvaged board with a routed hole holds the top pipe in-situ. AL vent pipe taped together makes an “S” in the stove, using two straight flexi pipe connected to the stove pipe ends, the straight flexis meet at a short flexi forming the bottom curve of the S.

The drywall screws poking into the interior will help anchor the walls and the aircrete. This is my maximum size possible with a 3’x5′ panel; 14″ x 36 “floor, 13″ x 14″ front/back, 16″ x 36” sides.

Two days of curing in 75 degree temps, an inch or two of shrinkage at the top- and so I poured an un-airated concrete & perlite backfilled with cured aircrete “stones” from the demo’d mass. This will make a nice hard top for the form, and I may grind it flat for a reveal of the red aircrete backfill stone and white bits of volcanic perlite.

Rolled up in the old rubber pond liner to retain moisture in the desert wind, and build heat for a better cure. This form I can easily move into the studio for the weekend snowstorm, and has about 1/4 of the footprint and 1/3 the weight of the demo’d mass- so the trip to the ranch will be easy. Now I just have to weld up the little bench it will sit on to align with the J-Stove.

Weight reduction as pretext to demolition.

After a week of curing. At least 300lbs. The mold is unscrewed and pops away clean. Some settling and a bit of layer separation at the bottom where I had technical issues with the first few mixes and they collapsed as they cured. A lot more red dye in those first mixes.

I back poured some collapsed areas with quickrete/perlite- the gray area…

The underside is the bench seat, and it came out smooth and strong.

The bench was an easy weight reduction of 40lbs. The mesh caused issues of a hollowed out collapse in the body of the form. It deflected the mix in a few other areas as well.

And the narrow bit of wall sawzalled off like styrofoam (embedded with rebar). Still over 200lbs. WTF? you might ask. Well; too big is too big, and a fail is a fail.

I ripped the top layer of aircrete & mess away without too much trouble, exposing another layer of solid concrete back-pour into a big gap.

Salvage the expensive bits. This bit of stovepipe is worth more than the all the concrete.

Sawzall weight reduction so I can expose the bottom. The venting system was flawless.

Easily tipped on its side now, this would have been the top.

Stovepipe salvage complete.

The is the Gorn’s stash of throwing boulders for lobbing at Captain Kirk.

All tidied up for round two.