Frustrated with a block of wood!

[Chahlie]

Hi All,

Well today has been a real relaxing day. Didn't do much of anything. But then again on father's day us dad's are allowed.
Made dinner for my son and his fiance yesterday(mesquite smoked chicken, Texas cole slaw, potato salad, cornbread and washed down with Texas sweet tea....mmmmm good!) Got a call from my daughter and a dear friend who hasn't called for weeks...apparently I was a test call to find out if her cell phone would work in an area that her old phone usually went dead. All in all a most excellent weekend.

Now to the frustration...I am working on my second Santa carving (same pattern different wood), on the Santa hat at the back, the little fur ball. As I try to carve the detail there of how it meets the cone of the hat, the wood fibers seem to want to crush. My first thought was dull chisel. I spent everal minutes stroping the tool. No improvement...so I changed tools. Again same problem...little or no improvement. The rest of the blank is carving pretty well, nice shavings/chips on the end grain, carving with the grain yields nice shavings and chips. Is it just a bad area of the wood, maybe the blank is to dry, or is it time to consign it to the kindling box.

And I thought laminated poplar was frustrating. Oh I did get a few light coates of clear matte varnish on the 1st carving and I will begin painting this coming week.

[MelNM]

Don't give up, try using a knife or a detail knife to detail the ball, if that doesn't work lop the ball off or change the hat style. But keep carving till your done, you may end up pretty happy with it.

[Dave_from_Toronto]

If it's a bad section of wood lop it off and replace it with a new piece. Plane it flat and laminate a new piece on.

Or if the santa is going to be painted, carve away the bad section back to good wood, get some Quickwood epoxy and press a big blob over the bad section. When it cures carve it to shape.

[jamesfa]

don't send it to the wood pile-the previous suggestions are all possibilities.it would be to bad to give up after putting in the work to this point

Chahlie, I run into that before and chucked the piece of wood. Yesterday, I ran into it again on a piece of oak. I was too far into the project to trash it, so between my detail knife and my flex-shaft, I was able to somewhat get the effect I was looking for. Then I deluted some wood glue and painted the bad spot. Firmed it right up

[Kenny_S]

Dave(HI HO) told me to use super glue and that firmed up or strenghtened a bad spot. I use that on the Mallard duck bill cane head as I was concerned that the bill may be weakened over useage.

Hi Kenny, your piece of wood dosen't sound very good. An old addage, is to make your first loss your best one. Chuck it and start again might be a possibility. I have planned for years to build a big sling shot, or a catapult. When something like bad carving, a no good c---y truck or something of that nature shows up, I can put it in the sling shot and hopefully never see it again. An wise old man once told me that for somthing to finish right, it had to start right. My little bit of humour for today!!

[Chahlie]

Hi All,

Thanks for all the advice, some of it tongue-in-cheek though some of it may be. I think I will change his style of hat...LOL! should be easier than anything else, cause it would be painful to chuck it into the kindling box! Will let you know how it turns out!

Chahlie