Quality time.
As a kid, I used to cast metal figures.
Now that I have kids, and now that Miss 12 likes chess, it seemed like a great idea to cast a chess set. So, in came a mold based on Saladin, in Al Andaluz, which combines the Spanish heritage of my kids with the origins of Chess. We photoshopped a tile that was abstracted from a tile from the Alhambra into a chess square, manipulated it again and changed colour, and made it into a chessboard. (¡Viva Excel! I don't know why people use it for anything else than making chessboards... it was clearly designed as the perfect tool for this.)
A trip to the copy store, a lumber mill and some dark arts (involving tea, vinegar, steel wool, and a special glue and some peeling) and the image from the paper transferred to the board we bought with only a few imperfections.
Onto the figures. Finding lead free casting metal is tough, but possible.
But getting the DETAILS from the lead free casting metals demands a higher temperature than my portable electric burner will allow. I could go out and get a solder pot for not too much money, but I think that it adds dangers that I am trying to avoid... I want my kids to do the casting and make the figures, and they are still a little nervous about playing with molten metal. (Go figure.) I still remember enough to vent the molds...
... finally getting the front legs on this horse by cutting a hole in the mold so the air escapes and it fills.
But it is also a question of the metal not being hot enough to flow properly. Saladin's sword still doesn't come through yet. The spears don't cast perfectly. I am frustrated because it doesn't meet my expectations of quality. An expectation I don't have with the imperfections of the board. And an expectation my kids don't have with the figures. They think it is all amazing, and they love the project and family time. They will cast it, paint it, and then play chess on a unique board they made. It is for them a quality product.
Knowing the "client" and their metrics is not only necessary for defining quality in business. It is important for getting out of our heads and into an "us".
And giving ownership of the project to my kids is worth Saladin having a cruddy sword.