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Making A Corn Cog Head Badge

Got this awesome design from a client, I was inspired to try something a little different, a multi-layered riveted design.  It turned out better than I would have thought!  I also did something different than I normally do and documented the process.

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Start with a sheet of 22g brass and the design broken out into the layers.

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Using rubber cement I attached the cut out designs on the brass sheet.

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After they were cut out I filed and cut out the interior of the design, what you can’t see in this picture (but you can in the following) is where I etched the lines of the design in and filed the kernels of the corn.

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the final cut outs with etching and filing.

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Dry fitting getting ready for the riveting.

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I did the rivets in two layers for strength and also so that they would fit better into the final design.  I didn’t want rivets showing on every layer, but also wanted it to be strong, so there are three “hidden” rivets.

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Five layers of brass is almost impossible to bend, so I annealed the metal to make it softer.

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after a quick bath in the pickle it came out much softer and I was able to hammer it into shape with a plastic mallet.  It also however is ugly from the fire scale.

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After the initial hand polishing to get all the fire scale off and start the buffing process.

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After an hour in the tumbler and some more buffing on a wheel it now has a high shine and glows gloriously in the sun.  I really like the way this design came out, and it was fun using rivets instead of solder for a change.