Tip page No 5 by Ian Sadler

Making Taper Buckets from Aluminium foil

You will need the following tools for this, pair of scissors and a rule or straight edge, and a suitable wad punch see scan of examples and, of course, the ubiquitous aluminium foil.

I have included a scan of the other wad punches I use these are graded in the following sizes, 3mm, 4mm, 5mm, 6mm and lastly 8mm. They can be bought as set or individually; the cost for a set here in the UK is about £5-00. Each wad punch will punch out discs or circles in plastic card up to 40 thousands of an inch and aluminium foil. It will also punch out discs in brass up to 20 thousand of an inch.

To make a taper bucket you need a suitable master I obtained mine from an Italeri kit, I removed all the tiny moulded on bits under the lip to give me a smooth edge. The hardest part is cutting the top edge of the aluminium to an arc. I did this by trial and error; at this stage I was not bothered about the bottom arc. It took two attempts to get it right before I was satisfied. I then scribed the inner face of the bottom edge against the bottom of the plastic master. It was then cut out using scissors and a file to make the final adjustments. After replacing it back on the master I was able to check I had enough overlap to form the seam down the length of the bucket and the correct taper. I then punched out a disc 6 mm diameter from 40^th plastic card to form the bottom of the bucket. A final check that the taper was correct and I super glued the bottom in first then after that was dry the seam down the outside. After it had set I made a handle from fuse wire, drilled a hole each side and inserted it and pinched the outer ends up to form the loop.

Note…

In the scan you can see the template for the bucket and the brass coloured worked example this is not made from brass but is in fact brass coloured aluminium foil, it is 8 thousands of an inch. This type comes from cat and dog moist food trays here in the UK.

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