...back to the fork!

The fork has been resurrected for the manually-turned gourd hourglass.  It was too irresistible and the stem, although in interesting option, just did not seem reliable as a hanger. To make it work, a horizontal slit was made into the neck of the dipper gourd, and a parallel one was also made.  The fork was wedged through the neck and made stable in both slits with pieces of gourd to make the fit tight.

The belly of the dipper gourd had been weighted with sand, but more sand was added as additional protection against tipping. The birdhouse hole is till an issue but that will be addressed later.  Right now the hourglass hangs securely.  Holes along the outer part of the neck have been drilled to accommodate leaves made of gourd scraps.

So far, so good.

A Season Ends at Dollar Tree

Yes, it is time again for another season to end at Dollar Tree and the seasonal leftovers are 90% off so with hourglasses in mind a purchase was made. Hummingbird feeders, with their sloping sides and narrow bottom holes, were 20 cents each - the perfect price for experimenting without feeling a financial pinch.

Some are smaller than others and, of course, the color may be an issue unless dark particles are used but for experiments where the process is explored, these feeders will be fine.

What About the Fork?

As work progresses on the hanging hourglass, the big question is what can be done about a bent and twisted fork?  Surely there is a way to make use of it in other hourglass possibilities?  Surely!

Hanging Hourglass Discovery

Initially, a set of light bulbs used to make an hourglass was capped at both ends with small pieces of gourd scraps and wrapped with green wire to match the sand inside. There was no particular design in mind other than using the Dollar Tree materials already on hand.  The florist wire at Dollar Tree is available in several colors so it was matched to the color of the sand. Going through the pile of gourds and gourd scraps in the garage, this long neck dipper was found.  Started along ago as a birdhouse and then left behind, its time has come - so to speak. It has a curved neck and a long stem that also curves.  Also located were some leaves made from gourd scraps, so those were tossed into the pile for consideration.



Now a plan is starting to take shape: use the green wire to wrap the neck of the dipper gourd with leaves and tendrils. That will bring the elements together for a cohesive design....leaves, tendrils, gourd vines, and time?  It could work perhaps. As a test, the hourglass was held up to the long neck dipper and actually hung on the stem. The discovery is it hung on the stem just fine - no fork hook was needed at all! By inverting the hourglass and hanging it on the gourd stem, the hourglass works and nothing more needs be done except decorating the dipper gourd as the base.

A Hanging Hourglass

Instead of turning an hourglass over using a turnkey such as the one in a previous post, or by turning over the whole unit like a traditional hourglass, the hourglass itself can be designed with a hook at both ends that can be hung on a hook.  It will still be manually inverted but not with the whole unit. This allows for the construction being used as the base for the hourglass to remain stable and only the hourglass is moved.

To this end, and to stay within the earlier parameter of using Dollar Tree items and gourds, I picked up a couple DT forks and make a hook by twisting the tines with a pair of pliers.  Looking at it from two perspectives, the middle two tines are the hooks and the two side tines become ornamental curls.  The fork handle will be the part anchored into the gourd.  What gourd construction would make sense of these forks and the idea of hanging?

Multiple Hourglasses Bases

As shown in the previous post, the hourglasses have been set into pieces of gourd scraps from another project long ago forgotten.  Initially, they were settled into four scraps with E6000 and allowed to dry overnight, then turned over to nest into the second set of scraps.  Ultimately, these will be put together into a frame to secure the tops and bottoms so all four can be turned over at one time.

Once secured into one unit, and turned all at once, the sand will run
out in succession from left to right.

Multiple Hourglasses Expose Variations

These commercial hourglasses purchased at a home interior store were labelled 30 minutes, but visually the amount of sand varied....at least when eyeballing the amount of sand inside the glass bellies. Upon timing them with a stopwatch, it was found true that the times are all different by as much as a minute or more. They were put in order, left to right, by time. The finished multiple hourglass unit combining all four will have to be named something akin to 30 Minutes, Give or Take!

Left to right: 32 min., 11 sec.; 31 min., 45 sec.; 31 min., 40 sec.; 29 min., 45 sec.

a Multiple timer

The plastic fluorescent tube cylinder project is on the sideline temporarily while things dry and a broad base is being made to support the height. For now, the idea of timers combined with Dollar Tree supplies and gourd scraps has been conflated to do multiple times at once. Here are four purchased timers (not Dollar Tree, but purchased from the Home Goods store). They are the same height but with different sand amounts. Three appear to be similar but really are not. The goal is to construct a frame using gourds so all four can be turned over at once. This is a situation when a snake gourd would be handy since it is long and, after being sliced in half length-wise, could be used to cradle the hourglasses.

Plastic Tube hourglass

The plastic tube and the gourds in the garage have inspired an hourglass based on snow and snowmen. Initially, the tube was just too tall even after it was cut in half. To keep it stable, the base would have to be too broad and/or heavy to maintain balance once it had been turned over for the particles to descend into the lower chamber without tipping over.  [Eventually, the particles would collect in the lower chamber, thus making it bottom heavy but until then the whole structure would be unstable.]

Using bottleneck gourds as snowmen and cannonballs for snowballs around the snowmen to widen the base, the tube can be made structurally sound. Since the particles will be white sand, the snowmen's expression can be made to express surprise at the descending 'snow' and thereby offer the view a little levity.

From Colored Sand to a Fluorescent Tube Carrier

Having a bag of colored sand in the car tugged at my thoughts as I visited Lowe's to buy a new water softener system. On the way to the plumbing department, there were 7.5 foot clear plastic tubes intended for carrying long fluorescent light tubes. Normally these would not have caught my eye except I was stopping to compare the prices for chandelier light bulbs I have been using [FAR more expensive there than at Dollar Tree - a package of 6 came to a little more than a dollar each versus the 2-for-a-dollar package at Dollar Tree].

Of course, the light bulb came on about using the tube for an hourglass! The plugs at the end have a hole in them already. Although there is a small horizontal field at the hole, it is far smaller than other situations where the end is cut off and a hole is punctured into a flat piece of board glued to the end. Upon arriving home, the tube was cut it in half and sanded for a small edge

.

Trying Different Dollar Trees..

As work continues on this project which focuses on how can hourglasses and gourds be combined using materials purchased expensively at Dollar Tree, it has been discovered different Dollar Trees have different products.  The store usually frequented only had one color of sand, a neutral color. However, while visiting another area Dollar Tree to pick up more light bulbs with the broader end I found colored sand!  I purchased three colors, but there were others. This opens a new avenue of excitement in the hourglass studio!

Taking the Light Bulbs Vertical

Once the light bulb connection dried, several trials were needed to ensure the stability of the connection. The light bulb wall is thin enough that, even though the tip of the bulb could be ground to make an opening, there was not enough surface area to maintain a connection. Eventually, this led to using a connector between the light bulbs for added surface area for contact.



The connector turned out to be a Dremel sanding cylinder. It served not only as added surface area holding the light bulbs together but as a stronger element for the wire used to turn the hourglass over.

In hindsight, the glitter was not as good a choice as the sand due to static cling on the inside of the light bulbs. Suggestions have been made to toss the glitter with a dryer sheet before putting into the bulbs but, wow!, there is glitter everywhere now so adding another step involving tossing does not sound inviting at all!  The next attempt with the other light bulbs will use sand instead of taking this one apart. It does work, but the video seems to be too big to include on this blog.  Until that piece of technology is figured out, the moving action of these experiments will have to be imagined.

The Experiment With the Play Sand

Once the glue was dry and the new set of light bulbs were a stable unit, it was clear the play sand flowed easily without clogging. No jiggling needed to be done at all for constant flow. A piece of gourd was cut to surround the center and miniature bottleneck gourds were glued to the ends. This is not part of the structural integrity of the connection between the two light bulbs. There is no particular expectation except clearly the place where the two meet may be the issue to address as the project moves on.

The entire unit is propped up at this point for drying.

Clogging Up the Works

The bulbs were half filled so they balanced horizontally into grooves dug into Styrofoam so they could sit tip to tip for gluing. Using E6000, the tips were sparingly touched with the glue so they connected and, when set, the seam was reinforced.  This procedure worked and the bulbs became one sturdy unit. However, even though several trials were made beforehand to make sure the Dollar Tree sand would flow freely, it did not. The bulbs needed to be jiggled to encourage the flow to restart from time to time. Highly irritating!


Looking around the classroom, a different kind of sand was found - from the zen garden. (For the reader's  convenience, a zen garden is easy to make and inexpensive if made this way!)  The one in the classroom was made by pouring Lowe's play sand into one of the bookshelves' bins so it could be pulled out and used when needed.

The left is the Dollar Tree sand;
the right is the play sand.

A side by side comparison is a clear illustration of the point presented in an earlier post - the particle size matters! This factor was discussed but that particular post listed the factors as an intellectual piece of information, not as a piece of hands on wisdom.  Now there is wisdom.

Good knowledge for the next experiment!

Metaphors that Work

Talking with others, a metaphor about keeping the light bulb filament and combining it with the concept of time became the challenge. The points of focus are light and time - light reflected by the filament left behind as the sand descends inside the bulb and time reflected by the fact the whole project is an hourglass. A. Lynner, another blogger working on a magnetic car project, suggested When the time is right, the idea is bright. Love it!  Variations could be....

As time passes, the light is revealed.

With time, the light becomes apparent.

With time, all is revealed.

Over time, the light shines through.

Now, back to Dollar Tree for more light bulbs and into the gourd shed for some scraps!

The Problem with Chandelier Light Bulbs

The holes are made in the tips of the chandelier light bulbs. Now, getting the filaments out of the interior is another story.  A online tutorial prompted the technique for carefully breaking the black tip to open up the end.

This worked fairly well initially, but the wrestling the filament became more of a problem because, although part of the filament could be broken and shaken out, the biggest part could not escape through the hole.

So now the question is what is a way to broaden the hole at the socket end of the bulb without cracking the glass or should the hourglass be made with the filaments left inside the bulbs?  Is there be a metaphor to explain the presence of the filaments in an hourglass, something about light and time?

Making Holes in Glass

A visit to the local hardware store with chandelier light bulbs purchased at Dollar Tree and a hourglass plan raised some eyebrows among the staff. Eventually, after some brainstorming a purchase was made.  The plan was to rub the tip of the light bulb against a series of progressively very fine sandpapers: 220, 320, and 400 grit. Initially, double stick tape was put on a board and the pieces of the sandpapers were stuck onto it for stability.

The double-stick tape is put on the board, then pieces of
3 types of sandpaper stuck to it for a stable surface
to grind the light bulbs against.

The light bulb tip is rubbed on the
220 grit sandpaper in circular movements.

Eureka!  A simple way to make a hole in the tip that can be matched with a second one to make the hole for particles to pass through the center of hourglass.

Captivated by the Light Bulb Option

Staying on the recycled theme, there are several YouTube videos as shown in previous posts inspiring the idea of going with Dollar Tree items as the common denominator.  Light bulbs are more appealing than plastic bottles or hummingbird feeders because of the crystal clear appearance and the fragile nature of glass.  However, light bulbs present two problems.


#1 - The practical obstacle of opening a glass light bulb without breaking it is daunting.Opening the bulb, according to online tutorials involves a knife or heat or, frankly, danger. I am a chicken.

#2 - Then, there's the angle of the walls of the bulb leading to the hole through which the particles will descend.  It can affect the rate of flow, especially if there's a horizontal plate inserted between the bulbs as a connector. The type of bulb - a regular incandescent bulb, a round bathroom mirror bulb, or a more flattened shop bulb - can be vital for a relatively accurate hourglass.  Chandelier light bulbs have a steep angle wall, especially on the pointed end.  How can a hole be put into the end without breaking the bulb?

I avoided the whole glass issue by using round plastic Christmas ornament balls mounted into some pieces of gourd scraps. As is apparent in the video, the roundness of the ball makes an almost horizontal area where the particles have to flow into and through the hole to the bottom part of the unit.

(the unplanned background music is by Kenny Rogers - oops!)

Long-handled dipper gourds

After looking over the gourd options, it appears the long-handled dipper gourds may be the better choice for making stands to support the hourglasses. As arms holding the top and bottom together, the curvy-ness would add visual interest and emphasize the fact they are an agricultural product.  That is a nice contrast to the glass of light bulbs or the plastic of the re-purposed water bottles to be used as the hourglasses.

For the top and bottom, leftover scraps from other gourd projects can be used. In this case the hole cut for the those old projects serve nicely as secure places to put the hourglasses bellies. Here is an example/sketch of what a hourglass might look like using these components. The curvy arms may be a bit of dance to get evenly applied, but careful sanding will work.

Going for the recycle and fun aspects...

In this project, the goal will be to enjoy the fun aspects of using recycled materials combined with gourds - one is good use of man-made materials and the other is good use of an agricultural product.

So, what is a gourd?  The gourds used for this project will be hard shelled gourds, the inedible part of the squash family.  Gourds have been used for  years, in many cultures, as grain carriers, dippers, bowls, jars, and even musical instruments!

Here are charts of gourd shapes available from the American Gourd Society. All are hard shelled gourds useful for making projects. Once dehydrated, they have a wall structure similar to wood whereby it can be cut, sanded, painted, etc., much like what a person could do with wood. As shown, there is a wide variety of shapes. For hourglasses, they cannot be used for the sand containers, but the handles of the long handled gourds could be used as separators for the top and bottom (is that the right word? - what are the parts of an hourglass called?).

Recycling stuff and hourglass accuracy

 Many online videos show how to make hourglasses using recycled plastic water bottles and clear light bulbs.  It seems all of these options, though laudable, use a horizontal discs to separate the two bottles' or bulbs' openings. The sand or other particle material loses momentum as it descends toward the hole since the angle of the container does not continue directly to the hole so the stuff just piles up on the horizontal surface surrounding the hole.

This is not necessarily a bad situation if the desired end result is a fun timing device. However, if accuracy is the goal then the pile up on the horizontal surface surrounding the hole is a problem. The weight of the sand initially pushes particles through the hole combined with gravity but since the piles can potentially vary in size with each turning of the device, the time it takes the sand to travel from the top to the bottom could be different, making the time inconsistent.

Further information about affecting factors...

About sand hourglasses: Learning more about what determines the passing of time, and especially the accuracy of passing time, the factors can be further narrowed to 3 areas of focus - the size of the particle, the size of the aperture the particles move through, and the angle at which the particles slide against the container's wall toward the aperture. The Mechanics of the Sandglass lays out a mathematical formula for determining accuracy. The math focus on these 3 areas and even when approaching the dilemma in a practical, day-to-day fashion, common sense seems to concur.


If the hole is too small for particles to fall through easily, then their descent is slow or perhaps get stuck. Even if one could squeeze through a hole that was just big enough, all the particles would have to be the exact size.  With just one that is too big to easily pass through, there would be a back up.

Left shape - sharp, almost vertical wall
encourages more sand to fall toward the hole whereas
the right flattens out the angle discouraging particle fall.

Another issue concerns the angle of the container wall. As the wall becomes more  horizontal, the particles would have less gravity promoting the descent through the hole. This becomes a problem with hourglasses built from plastic bottles or jars using a horizontal pieces of board or plastic between the two openings with a punctured hole in the middle for the sand to fall through.

Sand Hourglasses - Factors Affecting Accuracy

The Library of Congress explains there are several factors that affect the way an hourglass filled with sand works. Paring down the factors, these are what need to be addressed in the current project of combing hourglasses with gourds:

- amount of sand 

- size and angle of the glass bulbs

- quality of the sand 

- width of the neck

- tight seal 

- level surface

In this project, the hourglasses being used were purchased from a local home furnishings store. They are glass, filled with fine sand, and are sealed shut so moisture cannot get into the glass bulbs to make the sand damp and therefore heavier. 

Historical Evidence of Hourglasses

hourglass on strings

The Guinness Book of Records says the first solid proof of hourglasses were in 14th century ship inventories where devices in which sand fell from one glass globe into another. These are far more accurate on the seas than the earlier clocks made of water since the movement of the seas would make the clock-water move as well.

Earlier time pieces were made using water. These had problems due to atmospheric pressures which made the water flow faster or slower depending on air temperatures and moon cycles.

Welcome to For a Gourd Time...

Welcome to For a Gourd Time.  Exploring hour glasses and gourds can be a challenge because, frankly, what does an hour glass have to do with gourds? Time is passed whether sand sifts through glass or a gourd grows on a vine. What are the possibilities?