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Been working on this since I picked up a few hanafuda and poker tile sets last month or so.

Wanted to cast my own set of hanafuda tiles with little sculptured scenes inside - made a bunch of molds using standard small mahjong tiles and made a few gooey messes with some casting resin, then a few bubbly messes, and finally some non-messes

Now that I have somewhat of a grip on the epoxy I whipped up a test fuda set in a simplistic abstract style - as I figure chances are slim it survives creation and this just becomes another step in the learning process - but should it manage to become I wanted to make it a functional set


Here is the set, before being embedded in tiles - all the needed banners, brights and tens are there, along with the lightning card, rain man, sake cup, curtain and moon so it should be fully playable for koi koi


The molds each got the top clear layer of resin the other day, now a second layer of resin and the first layer of the cards


The background layer for the cards will be added after that resin firms up (somewhere in the 5-12 hour range, perhaps with another resin layer first)


After that its more clear layers until most of the way to the top - cure them for a day and pop them out, then cast a set of backs - then join the fronts to the backs, polish the sides, call it a day

Joining backs and fronts rather than trying to do it in one piece seems to be the easiest way to make sure the tops and bottoms are perfect - the center join can be done quite invisibly and precisely - this was a quick test with a yellow back and opaque white front:


Some backs and clear fronts (early errs with bubbles for the clear):


And the first experiments (from very early on) some quick sculpts of a standard card and some general embed and pour testing - bubbles abound and the top edge is rough as can be from the top of the mold. Fugly things, but give a general idea of at least one direction I will go (figure I will make a few, as that tends to be what I do)


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Going with a few clear layers before the backgrounds, probably another 3 or 4 layers before I take these out of the mold and get to see if they worked out…

I am refraining from giving any specific tips at this point, as I am hardly in a position and as the multitudes of resin compounds out there all require their own special touch. The most helpful tip I can give is follow the instructions carefully - if they say thin layers they mean it - keep an eye on it over the first few hours to take care of any errant bubbles - and mix SLOW to avoid getting bubbles in the first place.

I also have a vacuum chamber, which can help degass things - but with care and thin layers you do not need one for this. I am using it here to degass a bit after I stir, just because I have it - but I am not putting the molds in there after pouring.

So far, so good - looks free of bubbles…


Another two layers of clear added, looks like the backgrounds are ready to go in with the next layer, late this evening or early in the morning, depending on when the last layer gets firm enough to keep the parts from sinking…


I have a fair number of ideas on how to get those background pieces in without trapping air, and the same number of ideas on how bubbles will get trapped - coating them with resin before laying them down is supposed to be key… Figure some careful slow laying down from one edge might do it

I do wonder if the vacuum chamber should be used at this point - but a bit too much of a greenhorn to know if that will ease my troubles or cause more bubbles…

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Added the next layer - all the backs are on for brights, banners and tens - chaff backgrounds will go in after another layer or two more are added to the blank tiles (since they have nothing embedded they are less full than the others at this stage)

Did the, insert an edge and let them slowly lay down - fingers crossed…. Still a day or two away from popping them out of the mold to see.


Chaff remaining:

All the fronts are poured - coming out of the molds tomorrow night

So far so good - fronts all came out of the molds in fine shape. Next I will cast up the backs and sand everything down for joining - and a bunch of polishing…

Poured the backs, ended up getting fancy. In a few days we will find out if that panned out.

They should end up with some nice depth and contrast to the fronts - a bit of organic interest…. A bit of silver flake in the clear layer, which is poured on top of the color drop layer while its still liquid so they blend in odd 3d ways


Outer layer, flaked silver:

Damn... that man's crafty. I still have no clue of Hanafuda but those tiles definitely look cool.

Backs came out well - should take a few days to two weeks to get everything sanded, joined and polished - depending on how much time I get to spend on it. Figure there are a day or twos concentrated work left to finish it off.

Haven’t decided which backs go with which fronts yet…

WTF this is amazing

Here we go, the fun bit…

I do have a power sander, but it would be too violent and risky for these - an orbital sander might do it, but for now, elbow grease and patience


About an hour and a half later, nearly done, with the backs - so nearly half done…

Oh - forgot I still need to sand down from 60grit to 320 or so - so tack on another half hour or two each side…

Sanding the fronts underway…. Shouldn’t be long now before I get to glue em up - then I have to make a box for them…

All sanded and ready to join. I think at this point I just leave them sit overnight and the elves will finish them…

Picked up an orbital sander to finish the job - any excuse to buy a new tool…

Almost there - 36 glued up, 12 to go - takes a bit of time but I think I’ll manage to finish this evening…

Fini. Will take some pics tomorrow…

Dude, those turned out great. Thank you for sharing this whole process.

Fantastic.

I will post some more pics over in the Railroad thread once they are all polished up, but here are some shots of the set with hopefully decent lighting - along with the types of cards and hands for koi koi they represent

The set laid out in order - first column is January through June, second July through December - when playing you pick up cards by matching a card in your hand with a card on the table from the same month (4 cards in each month)

So each row of 4 cards is a set that matches, represented by the main background color oval - January being Brown - browns match browns.

Once you have a match it goes into an area on the table where you build scoring hands.

Below I’ll cover the card types and hands.


These are the Brights, denoted by the twisty worms - the rain man is special in scoring, and thus is a different shape, 3 or 4 brights is a scoring hand but you cant use the rain man to build that hand. 5 brights (with the rain man) is a higher scoring hand.


These are the Animals or Tens - denoted by the small circle - any 5 of then is a scoring hand


The second set of Tens (above) are special (hands described below) and are marked with different colored circles


There are 3 types of flag cards, red with writing, red and blue - represented with colored and striped rectangles - I won’t cover all the hands they can make, there are a variety.


The Moon and Sake Cup cards make the Moon Viewing hand


The Curtain and Sake Cup make the Flower Viewing hand


The above two hands are only made up of two cards, and in Koi Koi you can end the round when you make a scoring hand - thus making the Sake Cup one of the best cards in the game. Note that getting all three, Curtain Moon and Sake Cup makes Flower Moon Viewing hand for more points.


The lightning card can be a wild card or have other special uses depending on the game varient


These special Tens from above make a hand - Butterfly, Boar and Deer - they are marked with matching color circles

So good!!! Love the mapping to the standard deck.