Clifton Sears
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This article applies to you if you would like to begin carving but: _ You do not have easy access to a club or others to show you how. _ Would like to try it without spending a lot of money. _ And you wish to do your own thing, rather than follow a pattern someone else has drawn for you. Carving with Mallet and Chisel I think this is the method least likely to result in cuts or injury, if you have reasonable eye-hand co-ordination, and you form a few simple habits. First, never point the chisel toward any of your various body parts. Also, you need to have patience. A bunch of little whacks will get you there, with control. Don't hit the chisel with a sledge hammer! Finally, make sure the wood is held firmly in place, between sand bags, in a vise, or using a hold-down strap. The wood: I am a great believer in starting small, learning the techniques, and then gradually increasing the size and complexity of projects. I have seen potential carvers show me their half finished monument ... that they have not worked on in three years. You don't learn mountain climbing by traveling to Mount Everest. So if you have an eighteen foot diameter tree that just fell in your back yard, I would strongly encourage you to begin with a small piece. Tackle Goliath after you have completed several smaller works. Being creative in a medium you enjoy can bring many hours of pleasure. But learning how to shape wood and think in three dimensions takes practice. Enjoy the journey. In general the harder woods do not require the chisel to be as sharp. Soft wood tears more easily.
Choose a small piece, plan a simple form, and have at it. My personal preferences in carving woods are
the poplars, birch, and maple. Wood that is of a medium hardness. The tools: A buck saw works well for cutting pieces of logs, tree branches, or driftwood. If you own, or have access to, a band saw or scroll saw you can do some pre-shaping of smaller work, but it is not necessary. I began carving in 1972 with a librairy book and two chisels.
I was drawing and painting at the time but I enjoyed the carving a lot. There is nothing mystical or magical about sharpening. Some chisels come presharpened. Most do not. If you are timid in this area, find someone to do it for you, watch, ask questions. Hand sharpening on a stone is used to remove nicks and get the initial edge. Hand stroping works, but I prefer a power strope. Stroping is necessary for a keen edge. The simplest is power method a felt wheel, turned by a motor, with paste honing compound. It rotates away from the sharp edge of the blade. Hand stroping is done on leather, glued to a stick for support, and loaded with honing compound. If you find you like carving and plan to continue with chisels, a power strope will probably be high on your wish list. I like to use a rubber mallet, available at hardware stores (the large size) for about $12. You can make one by glueing a piece of broom handle to a hunk of hard wood, but do make sure it is well attached. Holding the wood is a matter of preference, but it must be secure and able to withstand the blows. You may find a lot of the clamping methods used by power carvers are too weak for mallet and chisel. The simplest method is to fill a couple of bags with sand and place the work snaugly in place. Another method is to strap it down to a work bench, or other support, using a a tie down strap. These are inexpensive and common at most hardware stores. If you like a vise, clamping waste parts firmly in a heavey metal vise works well. A method for relief work, or 1/2 log things, is to attach it from the back to a bech, or to waste wood that is then clamped to a bench. CLICK HERE if you would like instructions on making a clamping system with a screw on base. Happy Carving, |