Using gold leaf on my Samurai Swords

[Allan]

Hi fellows,

No piccies yet, maybe in a day or two, but for the past coupla nights I've been sitting at the dining room table slowing applying gold leaf onto my Japanse samurai swords.

Aircav/Steve kindly sent me a sheet or two or three some months ago. The reason is that removing the parts from the sprues and trimming them into shape caused some of the gold plastic coating to be removed from the sword handles, sabbards and sword guards. Painting them wasn't an option as I couldn't find a good enough enamel paint-what I wanted was something that flowed nicely onto the plastic and looked like shiny gold. Couldn't find anything.

The gold leaf sheets are the thinnest and lightest things imaginable. Cutting them into strips, which was the best shape for sticking onto the plastic, was really hard. I first tried cutting them with razor-sharp new modelling knife on my cutting mat, but that only tore the bloody things. And holding them in my fingers only caused them to tear into pieces.

The solution I came up with was to first cut out a rectangle wih my scissors. That wasn't too hard as I didn't have to actually touch the sheet to do that. Then I held the small rectangle with a pair of tweezers and used my scissors againd to cut the strips, about one centimeter long and 3 mill wide. Good progress so far. Then what to stick them on with?

I used something called Tenax, a kind of liquid glue. Gloss varnish was tried but didn't really cut it. A dab of Tenax on the place where the strip had to go then carefully place the strip in position with the tweezers. Dip a small brush in the Tenax and carefully paint over the strip to fix it into position.

Invariably I then let out a sigh of relief and the puff of air from my nostrils made the other strips flying around the room for a few seconds.

I've read somewhere that Indians sometimes put small pieces of gold leaf on their curries.

Thanks again Steve for the gold leaf. I still have a lot left.

Allan in Canberra

[lancer]

Where is the gold leaf going?

[Allan]

Onto the scabbards-there're small gold caps on the ends and near the places where the swords go in.
also on the handles and the sword guards.

Allan in Canberra

[John Howling Mouse]

Is this similar to Bare Metal Foil but another brand?
The Bare Metal Foil sheets are nice because they cut easily and are self-adhesive.
Pricey, though.

[Allan]

No Barry,

It's not sticky on one side like Bare Metal Foil, which I might add I've never actually seen. It's three sheets of very thin gold paper in between some thin sheets of tissue paper. It looks like it's gold tissue paper made by pounding a small piece of gold for hours and hours and then cutting it nicely into a couple of squares.

It sticks to your fingers just by touching it gently and tears much too easily for my liking, but looks good when you place it carefully on the plastic and glue it down. Covers up the dark, bare plastic spots quite nicely.

Allan in Canberra