Clear Coat Problems

[voluminous-viking]

This may end up being one of those questions in which the answer is so simple and commonly known that I'll want to bang my head against the keyboard in marvel of my own stupidity, but here goes:

I'm having a problem when I spray a clear coat on finished/painted carvings. I usually lay them out on newspaper and spray them. My problem comes in when I try to pick them up. Apparently the stuff seeps under the carving and sticks to the newspaper, pretty much leaving the Huntsville Times permanently bonded to the carving. How do I keep this from happening? Any suggestions?

The reason I'm kind of wondering now is that I'm trying to finish up a nativity set (I'll post pictures soon) for my church's harvest festival a week from Saturday. (Harvest Happening at St. Anthony's Catholic Church in Fayetteville, TN on October 1, if anybody's in that neck of the woods. Kind of a good time. Spaghetti dinner, crafts, rummage sale, silent auction and the like. (Had to get a plug in there for it.))

Any advice is appreciated. Thanks folks!

[Eddy-Smiles]

Fine a Hobby Lobby or (shutter) Michaels and buy yourself a flower Frog. It's the handiest thing since sliced bread!

[mpounders]

What I do is stick a finishing nail, screw, or straight pin in the end of a dowel and glue it in place with the pointy end out. Depending on the size of the carving, you can screw or attach it to your carving so that you now have a nice handle to hold it while painting! Drill a hole in some scrap the size of the dowel so that you have a place to sit it down after you spray it.

[One Thumb Carver]

voluminous-viking For a clear coat I use Polyurethane clear satin. I do not spry I use a small brush and brush the Poly on Then I take the same brush or a different brush and dry brush to remove all the excess. Then I use those triangles (yellow) to keep them up so I can air dry all sides I feel I have more control with a brush. I hope this helps.You can use the same system with a spry.

[One Thumb Carver]

O' yes do not use paper use Wax Paper I keep a roll in my work area.

[Buffalo Bif]

i like to find a way to hang em when small- screw eye in the bottom or similar, check for drips after 10 min or so

[Bob K.]

I have banged a finishing nail through a piece of scrap wood. The small nail holds the carving in place and the scrap wood keeps it off the newspaper. I also spray on paper plates occasionally.

[cut up]

I have a board about 12" square that I put roofing nails through about 1" apart, so there are 10 rows of ten nails.

[Claude]

For small carvings, I just put a couple of toothpicks on the work bench about 1.5 inches apart and set the carving on the toothpicks. Varnish runs that cause the toothpick to stick to the bottom of the carving are easy to shear off with a flat chisel...
Claude

[Midnight Carver]

I use the same technique as Mike P. I like it because it gives me the ability to move the piece easily to be sure I'm spraying all the surfaces, even the underside. Can't wait to see the nativity set!

Eric