Perfect Mold 1.5lb Mold Making Material for Detailed Molds

First, there are a lot of negative reviews complaining about how the mold isn't durable, or that it sweats water, to which I have to say: It's alginate; what did you think you were buying? This product is water-activated and meant for very short-term use. Most alginate molds in the medical field are designed to last for ten minutes and then be discarded. This is not an alternative to silicone or urethane, and you will not be able to cast multiple positives from it. Once it sets up, you have maybe 20 to 30 minutes to pour your casting material into it before the mold begins to degrade. In most cases, you will need to break the mold apart and peel it off to demold your cast. It's a single-use product.That said, if you're looking for something skin-safe that reproduces excellent detail, and you don't want to shell out the money for platinum-cure silicone, this is a good option. I found that I needed to use a bit more alginate in my mix than what was recommended to get the right consistency, and it took a bit longer to set up than it said on the bag, but my casting results were satisfactory and showed very good detail. For large life-casting projects I still prefer using silicone, but this is much cheaper for something small like the custom glove forms I was making. It can also be done by a person working alone, whereas applying silicone paste and building up mother molds can be difficult to do one-handed. Just mix well, eliminate lumps as much as possible, and beware of bubbles clinging to your positive original (this can be mitigated by dunking your hand or your molding object into the alginate several times to coat it before leaving it in to make the mold).While it's possible to cast plaster into an alginate mold (and indeed, that's what most of those hand-casting craft kits come with), I've found that if left too long in the mold, plaster tends to absorb water from the alginate and can become damp and brittle, which can make it difficult to demold without damage. I ended up having better results with a fast-curing resin like Smooth-On's Smooth Cast 300, which heats quickly enough to compensate for the low temperature and short library life of the alginate. If using resin, you need to cast it as soon as possible after the alginate sets up; you must make sure that the inner surface of your mold is *completely* dry (moisture will impede curing of the resin); and I recommend warming the mold first with a heat gun or high-temperature hair dryer to prevent the cold alginate from sapping the heat from the resin, which will slow or stop the curing process. The photos I've attached show a resin cast poured into a Perfect Mold alginate mold.A note on containers: Like silicone, alginate is self-cleaning, which means it will stick together and peel off of most smooth, nonporous surfaces. This means that rather than using disposable containers for everything like it says on the package, you can reuse (dedicated) smooth plastic buckets and just peel the material out after it's cured, or even line a reusable container with a heavy-duty freezer bag and pour your mold into that. (As a frequent moldmaker, I have an entire workshop full of dedicated plastic food or paint containers that I reuse for molds. I've been mixing my silicone in the same glass container for more than ten years.)

This was my first time using this product and I was doing a little bit of an experiment.For what I needed, I required use of the whole bag. It mixed very easily. I recommend mixing in your water and not mixing the powder into the water in order to minimize dust and get a better mix.It set up within 6 minutes and I could easily get my hand out. Clean up was easy as well.My experiment was to fill the mold with polyurethane foam. It didn’t work. That’s no fault of the mold, however. Just a heads up if it’s something you wanted to try. Next time I will use something that fills better. But hey, you never know until you try!I’d definitely buy this again.

I have used alginate before (not this brand) with great success, but this turned into a nightmare. I bought this because it was enough for me to make two molds in case the first one messed up, but in the end, both molds were unusable. The first time I followed the directions on the package (including using bottled water) and I mixed it as thoroughly as I could within the working time by using a paint stirrer. It still ended up with several grape sized dry clumps next to the piece I was making a mold of. When I removed the piece from the mold, the powder came loose and left voids next to the cavity.Figuring this was just user error, I decided to use one of my kid's sand toy sifters to make sure the alginate was 100% clump free before I started. After rereading the reviews on here and some other sites, I decided to mix it by hand so I could feel the clumps and try to break them up while I was mixing it. Even with the sifted alginate, it formed so many clumps when I mixed it with the water that in the time I spent trying to mix it by hand it started setting up and I never got to pour it and I ended up with a mold of my hand.I'm not sure if I received a bad batch of this stuff, but it just sets up too fast for proper mixing. I guess if you get really lucky and there are no clumps next to the piece you're making a mold of, you'd never know there was an issue. I dissected both molds after they set up and the first one was riddled with clumps of varying size; the second only had a few clumps the size of raisins (which was great) but with the set time being so quick, I just can't bring myself to rate it more than 1 star. It was a waste of money.

This is a good product. Does exactly what it says it will. However, it didn't specify on the the instructions that it the mixture would be super thin. We added more powder. Then it took longer than what the instructions said it should for it to set. But when it did set, it did exactly what it was supposed to. We tried to use it but it was too far set. You have to be patient. Next time we will know!

Excellent to use for you front loader. I haven’t cleaned mine for years and needed to use 4 little bRick in 4 separate purify or ‘cleaning’ washes to remove all the years of residue, gunk and smell that lingered in my washer (even though I would clean my filter). Now I only need to use this every 2 months and use only 1 little brick as maintenance from here on. Worth the buy!

sets up very fast. sometimes too fast, sometimes not fast enough. you know, life tends to throw you curve balls. but for most things, it seems just about right. got some really good detail out of the cast as well.

This mix makes excellent, detailed molds of objects but the mold itself has a tendency to split when removing the object so extra care is required.

Works perfectly, I just wish it came with more detailed instructions. Temperature is really important so that it works.

Works as described, the trick is all on the water

The amount of water recommended on the label made it set way too fast, I did not have time to insert any object... In less than a minute it became too hard, and I had to throw the whole batch out. Try mixing it with equal 50 /50 water,NOT 1 cup plus 1/3 cup for every cup of water like the label said... It should look like cake batter consistency.

Very esasy good instructions