Thread: Using rifflers

Hi folks. New to this side of the forums. I had my first try at carving today and am baffled by one part of the process so I thought I would get some clarification here.

I have long wanted to do simple relief carving to embellish the furniture I make. I chose to do an oak leaf abut 100 mm long in a piece of silky oak. I removed the wood around the pattern down to the desired depty, then trimmed and undercut the edges slightly. Then using hand carving tools I modelled the object - if thats the right term, in other words I cut it into final profile. At this stage the surface was rough and the chips highly visible. The next step was to smooth the surfaces. I pulled out some rifflers (I have two pretty standard sets of these) thinking they would do the job but they were very hard to use, they basically just dug in. Dragging them backwards was OK, but I cant imagine that is how they are designed to be used.

So my question is how do I go from rough to smooth when the carving is fairly small and detailed? What am I missing? I dont want to use power tools, or do a lot of sanding. The rifflers teeth just seem to be too large, though I have never seen finer ones (at least not designed for wood).

cheers and thanks
Arron