(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
10-13-18 Saturday
79 degrees early morning 89 in the afternoon, mostly blue sky after a quick shower before dawn. A light breeze helped with the heat. There was some humidity in the airDuring the week, we received a few feeder bands of showers from the storm but nothing else. This weather report is brought to you by The City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.
Mom’s neighbor’s lawn needs to be mowed. The wet lawn in the morning precluded any mowing. That is my excuse. Mid day, while at the neighbor’s house. a man came by asking to mow the lawn. “I said that was my job. It is the only exercise I get.”that is better than paying for it to be done...
I was so frustrated with not finding tools I need, I brought some tools from my condo. I had a jig saw, a circular saw (really did not need that) a dremmel, a pair of battery powered drills, the battery of one is dead, I learned later, and a drill with no reverse. It is really old with a metal body, and is strictly a drill. That is something you won’t see anymore. I might not have brought that but I did not realize it did not have reverse. I also grabbed another dremmel body. I have several and a few at hand, but it was there when I was grabbing stuff so I have it.
In the morning, I mounted my two by stick in the vice and cut out blanks for my gingerbread houses. I first cut the roof. I broke the blade that I had in the jig saw. It was dull. I went to the local True Value (used to be an Ace years ago) and picked up a package of three blades. I installed the coarsest blade, and should have used the finest blade as the coarsest blade has a lot of grab. That really was not a serious problem as I was working with the wood in the vice.
I worked until the vice was in the sun. by then, because of the angle I was at and the position of my legs, my knees told me to stop for the day. I have 9 blanks made. A couple are not great and with the two I had already done, I would need to make one, and one I have has a knot in it where it does not belong and another is a bit short, so I might make a some more to make sure I have some good ones made. In all, these will be very easy to do so having extra won’t be a problem.
I had tried to add a new top to a desk. I used shelving materials for this I glued them down and it is down, but the desk is so heavy that if you try to lift it by the boards I added, which has much more overhang, it would break the glue bonds. I found that the phillips bits I was using was stripped, so I picked up a package of bits. It was a box of them. Later I tried to put the screws in. Some went in nice, but some balked part way in. I have to try it again using some wax or soap to lubricate them so they will go in easier. There are some I have to get on the floor to do. Getting on the floor is the easy part. It is when you need to get up that is hard.
I am happy I accomplished something today. Will see what I do tomrrow.
Year 18, Week 40, Day Two (week 978)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
10-14-18 Sunday
Mostly blue sky, loads of sun. 79 degrees as the low, 89 degrees as the high, light breeze to carry some of the humidity away. This weather report is brought to you by The City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.
We had lunch and talked until two. The bench with the vice is against the fence. Then there is another bench against the house. Then at about three, I went out and sat at the house bench and carved on four of the gingerbread houses, creating the overhangs on the roofs. My tactic is to slice where I want the eaves to be, and then work the wood away. Sometimes I work the peak end of the house first, but usually I did the side eaves, since they were not even, It would take a little more work to get them where they will look nice. To get beneath the overhangs, I slice straight in with the knife and then cut, and sometimes split the wood away. The removal of the wood at the walls, to get them set in beneath the overhangs, is done by splitting the wood out as much as possible, and by slicing to even them out, or where the wood is resistant to slicing. I am working different angles of the wood as slicing from the side sometimes is easier to remove the wood.
A wood block has six sides. The end grain on both ends react the same to the knife. Except for pieces from the outside of really big trees, (and these are cut from near the heart of the tree usually) the sides have a different grain profile. With these two by twos, the heart is usually right near one corner so two sides are actually edge grain and you have the back grain. How much depends on what pieces of wood you get them from. Face of the grain cuts differently than the edges of the grain. Also, the wood is sawn, rather than split from the tree so the grain might go into the side rather than parallel to it. When you are cutting on the piece of wood, you end up rotating it all the time to get the best angle of attack on the piece. It will cut better from one side than the other. Also some directions the wood will split easily, while a different direction will have to be shaved down.
I split when I could, but made sure I cut deep enough to make the split stop. These stop cuts are sometimes simply a straight-in slice into the wood where you want it to stop. Usually, though, I would V cut the place where I wanted it to stop, and work carefully, sometimes having to slice deeper at the stop cut because my split is below it..
I ran out of shade by the house at about four. I could have moved and carved more, but I wanted to try something I talked to my brother about. I had seen in videos where they used a jig saw as a table saw. I was not going to go that far but I decided I would try mounting the jig saw in the vice upside down. I had to tighten down the plate several times but the side of the plate that goes against the body of the jig saw is larger than the part that is up when you angle the plate. In my cutting, other than slicing pieces off the stick, I would hold the work on that side.
I decided to make blanks for the coffee pots. Here is where I learned that I need a finer blade. I needed to cut the corners off the pieces. I first held it at a 45 with one corner down and instantly saw there was no way to hold it like that. I then realized I could set it down flat on the end and cut it from the side. I had to use a stick to hold the piece down as the grabby blade would lift it up. I also needed it as I was not about to get my fingers near that blade. I imagined all sorts of damage it could do. I was working a quarter to half an inch away from that blade.
After the first couple cuts, I found that the jig saw was tipping as the handle part is tapered so only one spot is held by the vice. I tried several positions and none worked, and then tried several boards to stick between the end of the handle and the vice to keep it from tipping. A piece of board for my rocking horses did the trick.
I tried different levels of removal. Because the grabby of the blade, My fingers were getting tired with all the force I needed to hold it, A couple, I cut in for the spout and handle, others I just removed the corners and in every case I removed far more than I planned. Part of it was the force to hold the pieces in place caused the blade to bend so they were not even. The last batch were just the corners cut off. One thing I did was since I was not cutting them off the stick straight, I would find the highest corner and decide that was the spout and then cut the side corners off for the body.
Next weekend, I will carve more on the gingerbread houses, get them all roughed out so I can do finer detail, and then finish them. I will also work on the tea/coffee pots. I might re-cut some of them. I will mount the finest blade in the jig saw and see if that will make my cutting easier. I would like to make the tea pots (which is what these are actually supposed to be) fatter and the way the course blade wandered it never happened. I might completely re-cut them.
There is a saying in metal working, “The more time you spend at the saw, the less time you spend machining.” that is also true for wood working. It is why I like to cut blanks to work from.
I remember hearing from a friend where he was up in the Ozarks and stopped to see a carver. He asked to do a carving and the guy grabbed a blank and rounded and detailed it. My friend was disappointed that he did not start from a block of wood. He felt cheated.
Anyway, I am excited about my accomplishments the past couple weekends and hope to do a whole bunch more next weekend. I still have to work on the rocking horse and if the fine blade is gentle enough, I will try to use it as a scroll saw for the rocking horses.
I will see what I do next weekend.
1798
My jig saw mounted in the vice. the board locks the handle so it does not tip. The left side of the base plate is large, stable and us close to the blade so that was where I sat the work. I used the thick stick in the picture to hold the piece down.
My jig saw in the vice. If you notice, the blade is mounted backwards (usually facing forward in normal use) so the plate becomes my saw table.
The houses I have started, four carved rough out and five to finish.
tea/coffee pot blanks. I might make fresh ones with less corner cut off. the effort to hold the piece and the way the blade chose to go made it difficult to remove less wood.
I also grabbed this pant box easel and brought it to mom's. I intend to do some painting from life and if I have it at mom's the chances go up. I just have to fill it up with paint and brushes, grab something to paint on and go out. It folds out into an easel with the box behind the painting.
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