USB casting in transparent resin

I've made a USB dongle in transparent resin. The technique used is resin casting by using a silicon mould. That's the list of items and tools used:
-USB dongle, best a old one the first time, due it's a bit of risk to damage it.
-LEGO pieces to make a shuttering for the silicon mould.
-Modelling paste or any sculpture paste.
-Rubber for moulding, silicone. You can find it in some shop of toys, RC modelling, handcraft modelling or similar. I've bought it in a Spanish site called Feroca
-Transparent casting resin. Also you can find it in the same place than the silicone.
-Some system to measure the quantity of silicon, resin and catalyst. I've used a plastic glass and a syringe to calibrate the glass in ml and to add the catalyst.
-latex gloves to not touch the resin, the silicone rubber is easy to clean but the resin is like glue and smell very hard. You will need a very well ventilated place to use the resin.
-Vaseline to unmould the dongle
-Sand paper very thin, for a best finishing you will need a polish paste and a polish tool for your dremel.
-You could also insert some little pieces in the resin to make it more custom, I've added some little SMD resistors.

Let's go then..

Step 1 Preparing the shuttering

First, make the shape of the USB dongle with the moulding paste.
Then you need to make a shuttering with the lego pieces that cover in height the dongle.
Put the dongle inside and fill the shuttering to the half with the paste.
Make four little spots of paste to make a union of the two parts of the mould.
Cover all, paste and shuttering inner sides with vaseline to unmould easily later
A plastic bag in the table will help to not dirt too much the work area, due the silicon rubber do not glue to it.

Comments

[explosivemaker]

seems rather fat....would definitely want it thinner for computers with ports closer together...

[godofal]

this looks amazing! ive got to try this someday!

[daulef]

I'm gonna give this a go with some clear acrylic rather than resin, curing under heat and pressure will eliminate bubbles and itll be as clear as glass (I'll have to make sure the heat wont do too much to damage the circuitry though). Also, it's a good idea to look for dental silicon such as this:http://www.coltene.com/index_en.php?TPL=10034&x1200_node=47&x1200_article_id=207 its often cheap, always super accurate and damn easy to use!

[protoman]

Good, I've made this project to test my skill with resin moulding. I will use this method to make a light guide in a big push button and I will need the harder resin or composite. Thanks..

[daulef]

If you need to know anything about specific acrylics or resins, lettuce know!

[james.mcglashan]

This is very much like cip curcits in plastic on the new nventors lol.

[MicroKID]

Can you please link some sites which sell the CORRECT type of RESIN and SILICON, please. Also, what prices would we be looking at? Any place we can pick up these at bulk rates? Thanks.

[protoman]

This is what I bought:
http://www.feroca.com/productos_detalle_02.asp?co_producto=36
http://www.feroca.com/productos_detalle_02.asp?co_producto=70
It's a Spanish website, I don't know if they sent outside EU but you can compare prices.
1Kg of silicon rubber whit its catalyst cost 25,8€, you can do a lot of moulds for tiny pieces and use every mould several times.
1Kg of resin with its catalyst cost 9,5€.
Is not easy to find a website that sells this things, but you can search for tunning materials or miniature modelling shops

[MicroKID]

Thanks for the info. :)

[rc jedi]

whoa! very cool!

[Ward_Nox]

heh i'm thinking you could make some stargate data crystals using this method

[pledgeissex]

how did you know the resin and the chemicals used wouldn't eat away the electronics inside?

[protoman]

That's why I've used an old dongle, I didn't knew. It works well, but if you want to be sure you could paint the circuit with acrylic lacquer