Thread: From wood to marble

That looks great. I am jealous.

Ahhh!! The kraken wakes. Good to see you haven't vanished old mate!!!

Imagine that as a bonnet mascot!

Mark, that is just excellent! Very reminiscent of your carving style (long haired chicks in a gale ).


I tell you what, yer a tough old rooster.


All that snow, and you in shorts and T-shirt. Were you wearing a thong or two as well?

How do you ever uncover the availability of such classes?

Clearly, you had a very productive time. It's been -32C for the past 3 mornings here.
You try to do that up here and you'll wait 4 months to find your marble in a snowbank.
The garden setting for the class works is disgusting. How I wish.

Must admit, there's a finished, breezy flow to your carving that is really attractive.

waouuuuuw, BRAVO !

Sorry Mark, I was in a flippant mood when I posted my first entry and
forgot to say what a really great piece that is.Beautifully done!!!

I'm jealous too... I'd love to try stone, if for no other reason than it weathers better than wood when left outside. How do you get those beautiful smooth surfaces? What's the stoney equivalent of sandpaper?

Thanks Claw
This has added fuel to my desire to try marble. Are the classes regular/yearly?

Nice work and thanks for posting.

I've got local stone carving classes set up for April (when ever we can drag our collective a$$es out of this winter.)
Stone mason was over tonight to check out all my stone, tools and toys.
I am pleased. 1hr/week Q&A for $20. The rest of the week, I do the best I can.

Between 7A Sunday and 12 noon Monday, the temp came up 25C.
S wind, -7C and light snow for most of today.

Don't let anyone fool you, light snow isn't like light cheese with 27% less cholesterol.
Of course, light yoghurt belongs in the big white telephone.
Not even like light outside as opposed to dark.

I could get up tomorrow and find my entire engine compartment in the Burb packed solid and white
like styrofoam.

Come and visit. Freeze your buns off.

Thanks for all the nice words guys. No, classes are not regular but if you inquire with Graham and Margit at the Phoenix Sculpture Gardens they may organize some more. Sand paper is sandpaper at least I have been using the coloured stuff I buy from Michael Moggy and it seems to do the job. FF my rasps (rifflers from Liogier) are standing up just fine too so if you are only using them on timber trust me they will last a long while . I have also been using my Auriuo cabinet makers rasp (didn't want to wear out my Liogiers) and its working well too. FF I may be after a few different stone rasps soon though . You can probably inquire at your local stone masons and get off cuts if you don't want to import stone from Italy etc, also plenty of stone merchants around for kitchen stone etc google is your friend. No problem artme all good , I'm a professional flippanter. Robson, bugger the cold mate, and I imagine the stone would become more brittle in the cold although I don't know that much about it yet. Well worth a try though, any of you guys who are even half good at timber give it a whirl. The chisels are tungsten tipped but with marble (not too hard) you could even have a play with some old wood chisels to see if you like it. Lessons are the go though to give you the heads up and short cuts.
Miss Capelli will be at the Gateway Building at Circular Quay with the Sculpture Society Exhibition from 3rd of March to the 29th March if anyone wants to have a look. I will be there on two days to baby sit so I'll try and remember to post the days so I will be around for a chat if anyone is interested and in the neighbour hood. If you join your local sculpture societys these sort of classes etc get emailed out or the news letters. A few of the Queensland Sculpture Soc group were on this course, what a great bunch they were too, I'd recommend joining if you are up that way.

Thanks, Claw.

I will try stone. Got into a stone countertop business and was allowed to take as many offcuts (sink cut-outs, etc)
as I wanted for free ("just don't mess up the piles.")
The local stone mason dropped by last evening to check out my hand/power tools and stone, safety gear and so on. Lessons start in late spring so I can do the work outside. He suggested that I buy a couple of smaller TC-tipped tools as they should last the rest of my life and he's set up to sharpen them, too.

Hard to believe the sizes and weights of his rock-busting chisels & hammers for chimneys, fireplaces, etc. A couple of his TC chisels must have 4cm shanks.

I'm having a glorious winter wood carving. More productive than I expected, finishing 2 at a time. But, there's a stone carving project that I'd like to try. Not in love with it so if I bomb the thing, no tears.

Originally Posted by Claw Hama

FF my rasps (rifflers from Liogier) are standing up just fine too so if you are only using them on timber trust me they will last a long while . I have also been using my Auriuo cabinet makers rasp (didn't want to wear out my Liogiers) and its working well too. FF I may be after a few different stone rasps soon though .

Mark, that was the original reason for Liogier adding the Sapphire coating to the rasps - for stonework. At 3800 Vickers, it's way harder than T.Carbide at 2283. As I understand things the only difference between wood and stone rasps is the teeth shape, but I'd be surprised if you didn't come up with some out-of-the-box requests for shapes/sizes .

Good luck with your lessons when they stat RV, you'll have a lot of fun I'm sure.

Give me time FF and I'll dig up some requests I have gone back to Huon for the moment, I want to finish the mermaid
that I started last year. I'm sick of her standing her in my workshop watching me all the time. I'll try and get her done and
have another stab at Sculptures by the Sea. One pick I took today.

Very impressive result Mark ! Love it. Some could even say it is unfair that it seems so easy for you to reach this on the first attempt.

Originally Posted by Claw Hama

FF my rasps (rifflers from Liogier) are standing up just fine too so if you are only using them on timber trust me they will last a long while.

Originally Posted by FenceFurniture

As I understand things the only difference between wood and stone rasps is the teeth shape, but I'd be surprised if you didn't come up with some out-of-the-box requests for shapes/sizes .

Yes, the stone rifflers differ from the wood rifflers by two things : the shape of the working parts are different (mostly its bending to suit better stone working) and the main difference are the shape of the teeth, that are rounded for stone instead of triangular for wood : we call this kind of stitching for stone « fish scale », it improves the durability of the tool and the smoothness of the rasped surface.

Also, Mark and FF, before you guys come up with some of your new creative ideas that will make me scratch my head all night long , please note the typical tool for stone carving are the « spurs », with their very specific stitching : the teeth are done in both direction (to work on push strokes and pull strokes) and the « crest » of the tool is something inbetween a hand chisel and a rasp.