What would your local cut stone supplier charge you for a couple of decorative pier caps . . .
32″ x 32″ x about 7″ thick,
cut to a shallow pyramid on their tops,
all surfaces plain sawn, no handwork required,
made from stone from the local quarry
????
I am being quoted almost $800 each, and it seems very high.
Replies
Yeah, it does seem high, until you start thinking about what it would cost you to do it yourself.
What kind of stone is it?
Gene,
What kind of stone?
WSJ
Our local granite. Or anybody's local stone.
We have a LOT of blue limestone here, very easy to work with. I would think granite is much harder to work with. if ya want limestone, I can do it for about half of that price. Plus you pay shipping.
Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
I'll just do it>
How in the world would you cut it?
Jon Blakemore
http://home.tiscali.no/loste/images/big/sag.jpg
Of course...Why didn't I think of that.
Jon Blakemore
I cut the stuff for my wall with a diamond blade for the score, then whack it with a rock hammer to break it.It works real easy. all the stone from my chimney was hand cut and chiseled to shape.I have a few pcs. from the hearth that are 36'' by 8'' by 7' long, all nice and squareed up.Chisel the fractured face and smooth with a diamond cup wheel.
Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
I'll just do it>
Sphere: I do the same w/ GA granite, or any other granite you can get. I sacrificed a B&D diamond blade cutting three inch thick granite. Make a whole series of passes across the stone, going about .25 in deeper each pass. Cut about 25 lineal feet before it became egg-shaped. When I get sick of all the dust I flip it over & whack it a couple good ones along the underside of the kerf w/ a big ol' honking brick chisel & a 3 lb hammer. Makes great, straight cuts.Warning to the uninitiated - this is essentially dangerous work - you need a Niosh 100 respiratory protection mask; a pair of safety goggles; wear leather gloves; wear hearing protection. There is also a finite, non-zero probability that you will shatter the blade - wear heavy clothing to protect against fragments. I have a pacemaker, so I wear an old flak jacket I bought off E-Bay. ( I cannot imagine the pain if that thing took a shot from a fragment.I don't think the price he was quoted was out of line for the job, considering the time it would take on an expensive piece of machinery and the fact that it would only be few pieces. The set up time for such a job would be steep.DonThe GlassMasterworks - If it scratches, I etch it!
How big is your diamond blade? If I'm reading Gene correctly you would have 16"+ faces of the pyramid. It seems you would only get 3" or so with any blade then your hoping the rest fractures without major gouging?I've never worked with stone other than slate roofing. I would imagine it would take forever with a cup wheel to fair the surface somewhat smooth. Am I misunderstanding something?
Jon Blakemore
I did a bunch with justa 4.5" blade. Kerf and break off the chunks like notching a post for a beam.I helps having good stone chisels too...I got a slew from an old buddy..I don't know the names of some of them, but they have teeth and remove a lot of waste quickly.An air hammer will smooth a rough surface quick too..
Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
I'll just do it>
Stone as described would most likely be cut with the type of saw shown in the picture. It would take four cuts to do the sides, then four deep cuts to do the facets of the pyramid. In granite it could take quite a while, perhaps half an hour per cut. So the charge out rate for a piece of equipment could conceivably bring the cost as high as quoted. There may be grinding after cutting, too, to remove the saw marks.
That thick - with the puyramids, depending on kind of stone it sounds about right to me. Maybe a tiny bit on the high side. Delivered and set?
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Got a second look by a competitor, and it is now at $950, down from the $1500+ earlier. Both quoted per the drawings, FOB their fab yards.
The first yard quoted all sawn surfaces, the second quoted all with surfaces thermaled.
Sounds OK to me, now.
IMO, thermal cut will look better anyways
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i could build a form & cast em for about $10 ea and u'd be as impressed with them as you would any stone.
white portland... fine white sand... any small pea rock or gravel ..prefer it be a light color but not required... and a little metal or wire...
and it will look like limestone... it's not rocket science... i just cast 20+ lintels 12" x 4" x 80" depending on the release agent i used i got some really cool stone looking parts... i might have $10 a unit in em... vs the $160 i was quoted for cast and $440 for stone...
pony
I thought about that, ponytl. I've done a little concrete countertop work with melamine forms I built, and the result was quite good.
What would be your form material, and post-forming surfacing technique for getting the cut limestone look?
I have attached part of the drawing the stone guys quoted from.
for forms whenever i can make it work (like my lintels) i use sheet metal the forms (i made 2) for these i had bent up at the sheet metal shop with a 1" lip that i then attached to some 2x stock for the frame and i added 2/3 plywood under the whole thing for support and protection from be putting dings in it that would transfer to my lintels.... i made em 8ft long and made up a block i could clamp into the form to set how long i wanted to cast em... i'd clamp this in place and caulk the edges with cheap white latex caulk before i'd apply my mold release agent (murphys soap oil usually) but i have tried wax'n the molds with paste auto wax which works great almost too good for my taste you get a super slick product out of the mold this way..looks polished... the soap oil leaves a few voids... as does the pink RV non toxic anti freeze... i vibrate the mold with my cordless dewalt recip saws ...no blade... the corded saws don't seem to vibrate as well....
anyway... back to your project ... if i was going to be casting alot of these... i think i'd build a wood plug exactly like what you want the finished casting to look like... get it as smooth as you can... make sure you have a few degrees of "flare out" so that your casting won't lock itself into your mold... i'd take the finished plug to a local sign shop that has a vacume forming set up (for raised letter plastic sign faces) and get them to form u a mold over your wooded plug... they should be able to use some 1/4" plastic lexan type materal and leave a 1 to 2" lip... now you have your super slick plastic formed 1 piece mold... that with care should be good for casting hundreds of castings... last time i had a sign shop do this for me the guy used some left over or used yellow plastic and charged me $20... i'd have been happy to pay $100... but after he started casting some "stone signs" so it worked out well
the above will not give you hard sharp corners ... for those i use the sheet metal and i weld em up and caulk the seams & joints
pony
Where are you located? I am in Michigan and I have two sitting in my backyard you can have for cheap.
jim
I'm over 700 miles away. The freight would kill me.
I got some 26" x 26" x 3" limestone caps with flat tops from a quarry in Indiana for $22 each, plus shipping. I'll go to great lengths to avoid paying retail for stone, because the markup is freaking insane.