Patterns/Ideas

[Wdcarver55]

I've been carving Santa's for quite a while now and want to start carving canes. Where do you guys get your patterns/ideas for carving on the shaft as well as the handle.

Thanks,
Greg

[Waitpinga Whittler]

There are lots of places that offer patterns for faces and animals. (including this magazine). Some are specificly designed for canes some you have to adapt. If you can carve a santa, that's where I'd start. Just adapt your current technique of carving in the round to one in which you carve on the side of the stick only. This means letting the carving sort of 'fade out' as you go around the sides. The principles are exactly the same.

I did a simple WIP on Spirit Faces (just a modified Santa face) on another site. I've put the link below
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Once you have the techniques down for carving one thing, try modifying it a bit... change the hair line, add wrinkles, take off or put on beards and mustaches, hats etc. Play around with expression. You'll be amazed at what is possible.

You can also do in the round carvings and attach them to stafts. The carving becomes the 'knob-like' handle. You need to pick carvings that will fit reasonably comfortably in the hand... no pointy wizard hats or sharp ears etc.!!

Pete LeClair and Marv Kaisersatt both have 'how to' books out which you can find if you Google their names. Kaisersatt in particular is good for teaching you the componentary of the caracature head so you can develope your own patterns.

I've attached a few more examples to give you an idea of where you can take this.

[Wdcarver55]

Thank you very much for responding to my request so quick, I'll certainly look forward to working on a few canes. Also can you tell me how you attach the handle to the shaft in such a beautiful way?

Thanks Again
Greg

[Waitpinga Whittler]

You've inadvertantly stepped into some controversey asking that one! Lots of different opinions but here's what works for me...

I use 10 mm aluminium dowel and drill holes at 10.3 mm. This minimal clearance is necessary to allow glue to cover all of the dowel and hole but still be tight enough that things maintain their allignment. If its too floppy in the hole the strength of the joint is also weakend.

The hole in the handle (bottom of your carving) and the top of the prepared shaft is one you need to get as perfectly alligned as you can. Its hard to do by hand. If you can make yourself up a jig its easier but its not impossible to do without. Make these holes at least 30mm if you can for added strength. (This assumes that your cane shaft is at least an inch in diameter... otherwise you'll need to use a round mortice and tenon type joint straight into the handle without spacers)

The spacers are made separately on a lathe, but you could do it without if you want. When I get interesting small pieces of wood off cut I will sometimes turn these into 1 1/2 inch cylinders and drill the centres at 10.3mm. These I just put into a box until needed. When the time comes I look at the colurs of the shaft and handle and try to pick contrasting colours from my box of drilled cylinders. Then I cut sections off the end of my selected cylinders about 5mm thick.

Finally, you can cut your aluminium dowel (you could use wood here but I like the extra strenght afforded by the metal), to lengnth by measuring the depth of handle hole plus shaft hole plus thickness of however many spacers.

When you assemble it, do so without glue at first as you'll likely find that there are lots of unsightly gaps between the various bits (spacers, shaft and handle bottom). Now take it apart again and sand the faces of your components one at a time until you get a gapless (or almost gapless) fit. This is the trickiest part of the whole operation but worth persevering with. You may find it helps to twist the various components around the shaft a bit to get a better fit. If this is the case, mark their alignment relative to each other with a pencil so you can reassemble them in the correct way when glueing.

Once you have a gapless fit, then you can glue it up. I use two pack epoxy for this as its the only one strong enough in my opinion. Let it dry for 24 hours, then file/sand all the surfaces of the components level with each other and oil.

Photos below show part of the process

First the components layed out prior to assembly

Now the joint is glued up...note the alignment marks in pencil so I am sure that there are no gaps

Finally the joint after file and sanding to 440 prior to oiling. You already have a photo of the finished cane handle and spacer joint.


Hope this all helps and make sure you post a photo or two when you get a finished cand done. I'll really be interested to see your work.

[Marvin Little]

A coupleof additional points might help. I sand the top of the stick and the bottom of the handle flat on my disc sander. This allows you to get a flat surface on both.

I also have made two clamps out of 5" pieces of thin hardwood with a bolt and wingnut on each end. I clamp one on the shaft below the joint and one on the handle above the joint. I then put multiple rubber bands over both ends to hold the joint tight and in alignment until the epoxy cures.

Marvin

[mpounders]

Inspiration for designs can come from any place depending on what you like in a cane. Some addition things you might like for patterns: Celtic knots, gunstock patterns, leatherwork patterns, flowers and vines. I use a similar as mentioned process to join handles carved separately, but I have a long pipe clamp with some padding for the handle that I use for clamping.

[Wdcarver55]

Thank you all for the valuable information and great suggestions.

Greg