Greetings. I recently became interested in woodcarving. When I told one of the 'old salts' at work this, he suddenly remember an old set of carving tools that someone gave him about five years ago; he stowed them and promptly forgot about them. Since I was interested, I got a half-dozen assorted small gouges, a veiner, a pocket knife (a spear blade and an 'A' clip blade, Â*I think), a back-bent gouge or chisel or something, all for free! He refused to be paid for them, bless him! I've spend the past day and a half sharpening that old pocket knife; I've seen shaper butterknives!

I work at a boat company that uses different woods, and we wind up with a lot of scrap that seems like it would be great for doing miniature figurines 'n such things. We don't do anything in basswood, unfortunately. I was wondering what would be a good wood to start with from what we have available at the shop: a little cedar (red), mahogany, cherry, a bit of ash, poplar, I have a chunk of oak... mostly what we throw out is fir, but I read that resinous woods should be avoided by carvers. Would clear fir be an okay material? Which of the others would be best? Should I forget shop scraps and buy wood instead?

???

~Andrew
King_of_Blades

I don't know about most of the woods that you have listed, but cherry and poplar carve great! I have carved aromatic cedar, but not red cedar, altho I do see a lot of red cedar carvings.
Even if you end up buying basswood, those others would be good for practice.

Donna

Dont do it! All of these woods can be carved but they are harder to carve than basswood. Go get yourself a nice piece of basswood from your local woodcraters store or if you have to, get it online.

Basswood that is intended for carving is sealed on both ends with wax. Wood that is not intented for carving is usually dried differently and has a tendancy to split or chip.

Make a few things in the basswood that you can enjoy, learn how to use the tools and properly sharpen them.... Then try out those other woods.

[Shimmy]

I agree with Little Hack. If you get started on a bad peice of wood ,you may get disgusted with carving altogether.Where as if you manage to succeed with a good peice you can try anything later on.I started years ago on a hard peice of yellow pine that tore and chip .As a beginner don't handicap yourself for a few dollars.

[kaiserb]

Mahogany is very nice to carve and is similar in structure and hardness to basswood. What the heck give it a shot... 8)

[quote author=kaiserb link=board=Beginner&num=1017289218&start=0 #4 date=03/30/02 at 09:58:07]
Mahogany is very nice to carve and is similar in structure and hardness to basswood. Â*What the heck give it a shot... Â*8)
[/quote] I am a new carver also for about 1.5 yers. I have tried crving various woods other than basswood, even avacado.Best is sugarpine or mohageny. I prefer mohageny because it carves almost a good a basswood and the grannular structure is tight and consistent. Waldgeist.

Thanks for the advice, guys (and gal)! I'll keep an eye out for a basswood dealer (I'm already thinking about a couple). In the meantime, there's plenty of mahogany cleatstock in my shop. Maybe I'll try that next.

Incidentally, when I got my (free) knife good and sharp, I started practicing by whittling on a piece of aromatic cedar. I don't have much to compare it with, but it didn't seem too bad. I learned a few things about working with it:

1. Cedar splits ahead of the blade. You can use this to your advantage, *if* you make a good stop cut. Otherwise, depending on how deep you're cutting, you'll split right past it. I used this to split off quite a bit of waste wood after I figured out what I was doing.

2. Cedar does *not* like being carved across its grain. I still haven't figured out to do this cleanly yet.

3. Tips of fingers make excellent targets for tips of knives. I got sliced twice in as many days, in the same spot (left index finger, on the tip).

4. Bleeding should be done in an inconspicuous spot.


Gotta run. Thanks again...

With all of those little (oops) cuts I was wondering where the carving glove is? THINK SAFETY PEOPLE,,, If you truely want to enjoy carving, then practice safety at all times.
Otherwise you may find yourself becoming more interested in learning how to re-attach body parts!!!!
As for what wood to start with, red ceder should be your last choice, I don't have anything good to say about it except that it is pretty when finished.

[Captain_Bandaid]

...and another thing, the moths don't bother you when you are carving red cedar...... :

Yahoo! Free tools for me too. My dad does woodturning and he sent a handturned pen to a guy up in PA that he has done business with for many years. The guy (Bill) in return sent my dad (but I will be using them ) a set of four 8 inch FLEXCUT tools. He included a letter thanking my dad for the pen and also said that he and Dave Bennett (creator of Flexcut) were friends. Bill also said he help Dave get started with Flexcut and he actually made the tools that my dad received. I was in shock at free good quality tools and how small the world is!!

Skratch