Carvings

[Dead_Men_Tell_No_Tales]

Just thought I'd share a couple of my carvings... plan on doing a pirate next.

Just another extention of my love for handling sharp pointy things.

Early stages;

Finished;

[Diego Santana de la Vega]

I liken that ye find time in this day and age ta sits back without the pressures of the inner big city and ye can work these kind a miracles mate my hats off to ye! Ye be a sure fire talented man indeed. God bless ye.

[Bonnie Red Weasel]

Beautiful, beautiful stuff!

[Dead_Men_Tell_No_Tales]

Thank ye for your kind words.... would be a true pleasure to carve a ship's figurehead too.... the master carver who taught me did a beauty of King Neptune.

I think the secret to leavin' the pressures behind is taking the time to do things like this.... we all need a means to express ourselves and just get lost in the moment for a few hours.

[Red-Handed Jill]

Really great attention to detail - these are wonderful!

[Sealegs Constance]

Tis really great work you do luv. Waiting patiently to see when ye get the pirate done. :)

[Rumba Rue]

Aye ye have masterful hands (I suspected that it was in more ways than one ) an' an eye for detail.

Looking forward to seeing more.

[CaptainCiaran]

Very nice work, man! What type wood do ye use? Are they of any chief in particular (reminded me of Glooscap)?

[tishsparrow]

those are great looking!

[Dead_Men_Tell_No_Tales]

Very nice work, man! What type wood do ye use? Are they of any chief in particular (reminded me of Glooscap)?

Those two fellows be carved from poplar, a member of the aspen family... I like to work with birch also.

Not carvings of anyone in particular, just my own interpretation.

[Dead_Men_Tell_No_Tales]

Here is another of my hobbies.... even made my own forge out of a 16 inch truck brakedrum lol.

[hitman]

Could you post some pics of the forge mate and by the by fine work sir ever blend the two with a carved handle?

[Capt.Rummy]

yeah mate nice work. Very well done. What kind of tools do you use? can u buy sets? i wanna look for a set, what would u recommend?

Ive tried with some old tools but they werent strong enough.

[Dead_Men_Tell_No_Tales]

Could you post some pics of the forge mate and by the by fine work sir ever blend the two with a carved handle?

Will have to snap a pic of it... it's a 16" brakedrum welded onto a tripod made from rebar, the holes are welded shut except fer the center where a piece of 2" pipe is welded in, then a 'T' with a straight drop tube with a flapper for an ash dump, and a 90 degree pipe off the 'T' for the blower.

Will get some pics for you tho.

I haven't done any intricate carving on a handle, but I do make the handles by hand as well. The blades pictured have handles made from 'bubinga'.

All my rough work is done on a piece of steel flatbar the width, thickness and length I want the blade to be, the rough shape is drawn out and then I take an angle grinder with a 120-80 grit flapdisk to rip away the mild steel and shape the blade and tang, next comes the rough tapering of the cutting edge.... same tool. I keep going with finer disks to refine the blade. Once I get it the way I want I decide if I want to harden it, temper it, leave it as is etc..... depends on the application. The handle/ handguard are done last but the handguard is permanently welded to the tang for strength. It's really not that hard if you are good with a grinder and not inclined to burn yourself on hot things... assuming you want to heat-treat it. Unless you actually plan to cut something with it, or cross blades there isn't much point. If it's just for a 'hanger' (on your wall) you can leave the blade as is.

[Dead_Men_Tell_No_Tales]

yeah mate nice work.  Very well done.  What kind of tools do you use? can u buy sets? i wanna look for a set, what would u recommend?

Ive tried with some old tools but they werent strong enough.

Here's a few of the tools I use;

I only use Pfeil tools (Swiss made and pronounced 'file'... come pre-sharpened from the factory) and a few Stubai (Austria, pronounced 'stoo-bye'... don't come pre-sharpened from the factory), although I do have two flexcut knives which are quite good. Just remember you have to keep em razor sharp too, so you'll also be needing a 1000/4000 X waterstone and a good leather strop with some honing compound. For the inner edges of gouges you'll need a good slipstone too. Some carvers recommend an 8000 x stone as well, but quite frankly the 4000x is plenty and the strop/compound will do just as well as the 8000x stone.

I can tell you straight out, you will be frustrated with poor tools, buy the best you can, even if you only splurge on a couple at first, a nice gouge, a parting tool and a good knife will go quite far.

Size is dependant on how big the carvings you intend to do are.

Gouges come in many differ'nt sweeps as well.... take a peek here; http://www.woodcraft.com/depts.aspx?DeptID=2263

Although you can likely find a dealer in your area.

PS.... yes, those ARE dental picks to the far right.

[One Eyed Willy]

lobsters are tasty.

[Capt.Rummy]

wicked that helped a lot thanks.

Yes, lobster is good.

[Captain Midnight]

That is truly outstanding work, my friend, on both the carvings AND your forgework...I too do a bit of wood carving and have a brake drum forge that I piddle around with...alot of fun.

[Bonnie Red Weasel]

I'd love to see you do work on a masthead - it would be amazing, i'm sure!