Using pressure is necessary if you want crystal clear bubble free castings and allows you to cast deeper than without pressure. If you are going to be doing a lot of large items such as bowls you really don’t want to risk getting large trapped bubbles which will ruin your blank and end up wasting large amounts of expensive material. I cast with epoxy and have successfully made a few small blanks with barely any bubbles. I have also had a few blanks where I’ve had really large trapped bubbles rendering the blank unusable. If you are casting with embedded objects you will most certainly get bubbles if you aren’t using pressure. I would recommend investing in a pot if you plan doing this regularly as resin is just too expensive to risk wasting it. If you end up deciding it’s not for you I’m sure you would have no problem selling the pressure pot on.
