Burning Brands
A burning brand is useful to mark the handles of tools, boxes or anything made of wood by burning a name or a design into them.
How to Make a Burning Brand.
—To make a burning brand, say with your initials on it, make a cardboard box ³⁄₄ inch wide, 1 inch high and 3 inches long and without a top.
Mix up some plaster of Paris, fill the box with it and let it set. When it is perfectly hard and dry tear the cardboard box away from it, and on the narrow side of it, that is the one that is ³⁄₄ inch wide, mark out your initials, reversing the letters just as they are on type.
Take a sharp pocket knife and cut away the plaster from around the letters to a depth of ³⁄₈ inch, thus leaving the letters standing out in relief like type letters as shown at [A in Fig. 81]. Give it a couple of coats of shellac varnish[85] which not only protects the plaster to a certain extent but prevents it from sticking to the mold.
[85] You can make this varnish by dissolving yellow gum shellac in alcohol or you can buy it at a paint store.
A PLASTER OF PARIS PATTERN FOR A BURNING BRAND
THE BURNING BRAND COMPLETE
Fig. 81. a burning brand of iron or copper
Now take this pattern to a brass foundry and have a brass casting made of it. When you get it file it up nice and smooth and be careful to keep the surface of the letters perfectly flat. This done, drill a ³⁄₁₆ inch hole in the center of the back of the brand to a depth of ¹⁄₂ an inch and thread it with a ³⁄₁₆ inch tap.
The next and last thing to do is to get an iron rod ¹⁄₄ inch in diameter, and 12 inches long, bend a ring on one end, thread the other end with a ³⁄₁₆ inch die and screw it into the brand, when it will look like [B].
How to Use the Burning Brand.
—To use the burning brand put it in a fire and when it is about red hot, take it out and press it firmly on the wood you want to mark and your initials will be left on the wood as long as the wood lasts, nearly.