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Thread: Carving tools

  1. #1
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    Default Carving tools

    Morning all.

    Have been carving a couple of spoons, having been inspired by a Robin Wood's site.

    Anyway, can only get so good a result out of the old swiss army knife and have been looking about to find an Australian source for Mora knives, namely their Eric Frost range of carving knives.

    Does anyone know if such cutlery is available in Australia, or even if there is an Australian made range of carving knives.

    Cheerio,
    Virg.

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  3. #2
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    I am sure Underfoot and Whittling will be able to give you the answers you are looking for.

    Plenty of information on the net but it is nearly all North America.. Our guys here are a very good resource for Australian carvers because they understand the difficulties with the hardness and availability of good Australian carving wood.

    I am starting to form the opinion that the reason nearly all the carvings I see in Australia are " In the round " or sculpture inspired. While in North America with the availability of softer wood chip carving or knife work is a lot easier.

    I will be very interested in the replies because I am always looking for a different approach. I use Jelutong an imported timber from Malaysia but even it can have a change in grain direction and with the sharpest knife still occasionally presents some trouble for this novice.

    Pete

  4. #3
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    Hi Virg,

    I don't know the brand of tool you are refering to but if it isn't available at Carolls or Caratec, I'm sure it would have sources on line. However, I wouldn't be too quick to abandon your pocket knife. While there are any number of 'professional' knives on the international market, a great deal can be accomplished with a good quality, multi-bladed pocket knife.

    The advantage of single fixed blade knives, in my experience at least, is that they are shaped for specific aspects of the carving process and the handles are designed to be comfortable and easily gripped.

    An ordinary multi-bladed pocket knife, with good steel and a handle you find comfortable can be modified to perform in almost exactly the same way as a range of 'purpose built' knives. There are some advantages/disadvantages to either way but in my opinion, the compactness and portability of the multi-bladed knife outweighs its few disadvantages.

    Below are a couple of knives that I use regularly. The first is made by Colt (same mob as make the guns...) and has 4 blades. The second is by Frost and is in the typical 3 bladed 'Stockman' format. The photos show them before and after blade modifications.




    You can see the obvious advantages of the modifications to carving. The finest tipped blades are shaped and beveled for softer woods while those with more mass at the tip are more suited to harder woods. The large clip blades are for roughing out in either hard or soft wood.

    The handles are very subjective which is why I keep a range of knives which I offer students. They all work about the same but people have preferances which lend them confidence, especially as new carvers.

    While I keep a range of these knives, I don't as a rule, sell them to anyone but students as there is a lot to understanding how to get the most out of them. I also don't want to be seen as trying to use this site for sales of my own products so I think that if you are interested in persuing this path it might better be done with a PM.

    Otherwise, you could try modifying one of your Swiss Army knives (the steel in them is quite good).

    Alternatively, you could make up your own fixed-bladed knives from old mini files or cutthroat razors, or old scalple blades. I've seen this done by a number of carvers who claim that making the knife to their exact requirements gives them an advantage when carving and an even greater satisfaction in knowing they created not only the carvng but the tool as well. I saw a photo of a set recently that I will try to get permission to post here if it interests you.

  5. #4
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    First, the hard steel Mora knives often show up as their series (180?) for farriers = the horse shoe people. I use a pair of Mora 'hook' = hoof? knives, they were a bugger to get carving sharp but they hold on and on for long sweeping cuts.

    I'm fortunate to be able to carve in local wood, soft wood, western red cedar, most of which is free for the taking (out of logging debris piles). I would think that you could work in Pinus radiata (Oregon?). Grows fast, relatively short fiber, not as brittle/splitting as my WRC. I'm hung up on using local wood which doesn't have the ability to hold much fine detail at all. OK, I don't really care in my style.

    I've cut pine for wood block printing, worked just fine as far as I can tell. You have the most outstanding diversity of really highly figureds and colorful hardwoods, from here at 53N, I'm just left shaking my head. There has got to be a way to capitalize on that. Maybe more motor tools for roughing out the blanks? Some fools get hung up on "was it all done by hand?". I'm at the point now where I DON'T want them to own a carving of mine.

  6. #5
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    Carvers,

    These are the tools I'm on about:
    Mora of Sweden slöjdkniv

    These look interesting too:
    S. Djärv Hantverk AB

    Have yet to find an Australian distributor. Was hoping some of the carvers would know where to source them or similar alternatives.

    A friend is about to go to Sweden so I might get her to do some shopping for me!

    Thanks again,
    Virg.

  7. #6
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    These are the threads that I really like. We can find heaps of information on line about carving, making our own carving knives, sharpening and knowledge of many brands of knives and the suitability of most overseas woods.

    But, unless I am looking in the wrong places very little about easily found Australian timbers. Because of the particular specifics of our wood maybe many of the techniques used on North American basswood do not really apply here and as such perhaps a slight variation in tools and technique is called for.

    This is why I find carving here for a beginner quite daunting and possibly why I mainly see highly polished carvings, heavily sanded which is the opposite to how i want my carvings to look at least at this point of my journey.

    This is why I am starting to investigate some miniature power carving using Dremels and rotary burrs and the like to speed up the process of removing excess wood very quickly so I can get to put the detail in with knife work.

    Is it cheating, buggered if I care now. I have too many other jobs to do. I like to have a go at a lot of things, Toy making, the odd pen, some small lathe work, making as many of my own hand tools as possible, plus all the other things we have to do like work and maintaining our small property , the animals plus the family commitments.

    It is a wonder anything gets done.

    Pete

    Pete

  8. #7
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    Virgil: email Mora/Sweden and ask about any Australian distributor.
    Quite possibly, it needs to be you?

    I did, to learn how to tighten the brass rivets to stop blade wobble in the Hook knives. (Two "pops" with a small ball peen hammer on a 3mm drift punch.) I had made the blades loose, I show no mercy when using them for scrapers.

    Star: Maybe I'm the odd one out but I don't care how you get it done. I'm intensely curious to see what your vision was for the finished carving. I don't read much about you Aussies using the Arbortech power chisel. If you wanted to leave typical tool marks in the wood, that thing looks like the answer. Me, I'm not so sure that I want to see much in the way of tool marks anymore........window shopping for a belt sander!

  9. #8
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    Hi Virgil,

    Just had a brief look at your last post and the links you posted there. Understand a bit better now what you were after. In my opinion you'll get more use out of a couple of fish-tail gouges which can be used for a lot of other applications in addition to making spoon bowls and they are a lot easier to find (and probably a good deal cheaper and easier to maintain too). Just a thought...

  10. #9
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  11. #10
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    Thanks for telling us about the finality of your choice. So often, help is given in this and other forums but we never hear what the outcome finally chosen.

    Whichever way you choose it is nice to know what the outcome was.

    Thanks

    Pete

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