2013-02-14

Mirror, mirror almost on the wall

After some considerable delay due to dealing with bronze boxes et al, I decided on a trial design for a means to mount the bronze mirror on the wall. For this I used a 100mm length of scrap brass, 2mm thick and about 12mm wide, then added two grooves separated by what I guessed might be a comfortable distance to act as holders for the upper and lower reaches of the hinge pin of the mirror. I drilled a central 1mm hole near either end for the actual pin. I used a triangular file for the grooves so that when the end tabs were folded up for soldering, they made an angle of about 60° instead of the usual right angle. Then to make sure that the pin would still fit now that the holes had been slightly tilted, I re-drilled them with the brass strip held vertical in a vice, using a pedestal drill and the same 1mm drill bit.
The next step was to saw away the end tabs to leave only slim strips centred on the drill holes, and fit it to the mirror. This depended on the elasticity of the iron wire used as a pin, to enable one end to be fitted at a slight warping angle, then the fitting slid down the wire to hit the mirror top hinge. A pair of pliers was used to withdraw the pin until it just cleared the bottom pin, so that the wall fitting could then rotate into place. Finally the hinge pin was again pushed down until it was now held at both ends by the new wall fitting. At some stage I will have to drill the flat face of the brass so that it can actually be screwed to a wall!

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