Advice on using a bowl adze

[tombear]

Now I've handled it securely and comfortably I've been having a go with my shiny new bowl adze.

Can anyone give me some advice as its being harder work than I expected. The bald patch on my forearm testifies to how razor sharp it arrived so it doesn't need sharpening. The piece I am trying it on is a round of really hard beech I rescued from a maybe 40 year old work bench. I suspect that its my crap technique, I tend to dig in rather a lot like I'm grubbing up a root
.
Unfortunately I'm having trouble getting the sycamore I want to do stuff with although I've a lead on a place that does quarter sawn oak that's about a hour away at Hathersage which would be great for some other projects on hand.

atb

tom

 

[mountainm]

I thought it primarily a green wood tool? Old beech would be rock hard for any tool?

 

[crosslandkelly]

+1 to the above. I used mine to make a bowl earlier this year, on a piece of one year seasoned Ash, and found it pretty hard going. Try going across the grain, using lots of shallow cuts. I found this worked best for me.
http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=123532&highlight=carved+bowl

 

[mountainm]

+1 to the above. I used mine to make a bowl earlier this year, on a piece of one year seasoned Ash, and found it pretty hard going. Try going across the grain, using lots of shallow cuts. I found this worked best for me.
http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=123532&highlight=carved+bowl

Your adze appears to have an inner bevel. From the little research I've done apparently this is more suited to sculpting whereas an outer bevel is better for bowls. Not speaking from experience though.

 

[tombear]

Yup I think you're right folks so I've left the steel like beech until the Myford is up and running. Which leaves me in the hateful position of having a new toy, time for once and not having any green wood to have a go on. There's nowt wide enough in the wood pile and short of stealing it fro m the councils wood no source nearby.

Cheers! I stopped before I ruined the edge, thankfully!

ATB

Tom

 

[crosslandkelly]

Your adze appears to have an inner bevel. From the little research I've done apparently this is more suited to sculpting whereas an outer bevel is better for bowls. Not speaking from experience though.

You're quite right. It also has a nail puller and hammer face on it as well. I believe it is a Romanian roofers adze. Holds a decent edge though, certainly good enough for me to learn on, without worrying too much. Next bowl adze will be a Dave Budd one.

 

[Paulm]

Shame you're not closer Tom, I've just been taking down a couple of old apple trees, saved all the decent trunk and larger branch sections for projects, and had a huge bonfire with the brash, smelt lovely

Cheers, Paul

 

[crosslandkelly]

Yup I think you're right folks so I've left the steel like beech until the Myford is up and running. Which leaves me in the hateful position of having a new toy, time for once and not having any green wood to have a go on. There's nowt wide enough in the wood pile and short of stealing it fro m the councils wood no source nearby.

Cheers! I stopped before I ruined the edge, thankfully!




ATB

Tom

Do you know any tree surgeons in your area, I'm sure they would be happy to let you have a few logs.

 

[mountainm]

I have a cherry and a silver birch that both need a good pruning.....

 

[tombear]

Cheers folks! I did try contacting the local tree surgeons a few years back and none of them were at all helpful, and the council who own most of the woods and they just didn't want to know. Their felling teams are quite different if you happen on one while they are working they are happy for you to take as much as you want, everything else gets chipped! When the 150 year old ash went over out front. They arrived mob handed and allowing for the rotted area turned some prime hard wood into so much chips in the eight odd hours I was away at work. There were a few 9 inch or less sections left they were happy for me to take as it saved them the effort of chucking them into the lorry back chipper! Ones still out back, I was going to count the rings or turn it into a table or something, that's growing mushrooms according to the wife.

The sad thing is the middle son got a prize at school which he didn't want so with the magic of eBay turned it into 112 quid, plus postage, and has said he will invest it in some wood so we can make some stuff together. So for once we can actually afford to blow it on wood rather than scrounge it! Unfortunately I don't drive or I'd be taking up some of the generous offers I've had. The wife's probably willing but I don't like to impose, its been only a week since she took a day off work to drive me down to Tamworth to collect a big ol' Myford lathe ( and paid for it ) .

atb

Tom

 

[Dave Budd]

I did wonder how much fun you were going to have when you mentioned that you had a nice hard piece of beech

When you do do finally manage to get some fresher wood, it will be much less hard work You'l find that it gets less hard work as the bowl progresses, the flat surface is harder work than working into a hollow I find.

If you are willing to pay the postage, I expect somebody could send you a lump of fresh wood. I'll be cutting after christmas, so if that appeals then let me know (I won't charge for the wood, juts the post)

 

[Robson Valley]

Practice in the wood pile = practice your striking accuracy.
Side-by-side,then in a row the length of the wood.
Then a left-to-right row, side-by-side, cross grain.

I do rough outs and the backs of masks, with an elbow adze and a D-adze, both from Kestrel tool.
I have a Stubai carver's adze, about a #7 sweep, for cross grain.
I whipped the Stubai and the elbow adze handles with #18 tarred nylon seine cord.
Not dirty enough to come off on your hand but just barely sticky enough so that you don't
have to sustain a death-grip on some over finished piece of wood. (if that's what they did).

The bevels to be honed are all on the inside. I can wrap card with CrOx around a carving mallet
to get that done.

The "Holm Constant." From the exact edge of the bevel, run a line at 90 degrees back to the handle.
That, in the Pacific Northwest elbow adze tools, represents a nearly ideal placement for your index finger on the handle.

If you can't strike equally well with either hand, it's time you learned.
Comes naturally to me and that has been an enormous advantage.
Slow down = strike at your heart rate. It seems stupidly slow but
your accuracy will improve and you can work all day.

 

[tombear]

Cheers for those bits of advice.! It's all academic for a couple of days as i'll be doing all the family stuff and cooking etc, and with my typical excellent timing reactivated a old injury in the heal of my right hand. Not from anything butch and manly, oh no , just grabbing the banister in a funny way!

It suddenly occurred to me to put adds' up on the local recycling sites, freegle and freecycle and despite the time of year I've had a bite already. Although I maligned them earlier a tree surgeon has made a tentative offer!

Dave, cheers for the offer and if I fail to get any suitable wood ( looking out at all the woods around us ) I'll take you up on it.


atb

Tom

 

[Robson Valley]

tombear: that's the right attitude. Nobody knows you want wood, need wood, until you say so.
Take it all, figure out what to do with it later.

I can still see the difference in my right-hand and left-hand strike patterns with any adze.
Big wood is plentiful and inexpensive where I live. I've reduced some nice wood to 100% chips,
just to practice my striking accuracy.

Don't hack into a prize piece of wood without control.
Yeah, I've bombed a few carvings that way, too.

 

[humdrum_hostage]

Yup I think you're right folks so I've left the steel like beech until the Myford is up and running. Which leaves me in the hateful position of having a new toy, time for once and not having any green wood to have a go on. There's nowt wide enough in the wood pile and short of stealing it fro m the councils wood no source nearby.

Cheers! I stopped before I ruined the edge, thankfully!

ATB

Tom

shame your not closer to me either as I have over stocked on green silver burch just to make sure i didn't get bored over crimbo.
I also tried an adze for the first time recently and it definitely isn't as easy as I thought it was going to be.

 

[Robson Valley]

HH, I was every bit as clumsy as you claim to be when I first hafted an elbow adze blade.
Then things only got worse when I built up a D-adze. What a klutz.
Aimless practice to cut down edges and surfaces has made a world of difference.
You need 1/16" shaved off? Hold my beer, watch this.

All 3 of my adzes are wood carving tools for rough to moderate shaping.
It seems in every case to make several strikes together to take off a chip.
Moving up for the next "bite", the void from chip #1 becomes a sort of stop cut
which #2 connects to.

 

[humdrum_hostage]

It seems in every case to make several strikes together to take off a chip.
Moving up for the next "bite", the void from chip #1 becomes a sort of stop cut
which #2 connects to.

what you are saying makes sense, I have just been having a mess around in the garage and I had a bit of a technique going. I also found turning the wood 90 degrees every so often makes it easier to "clear" the void.

what also doesnt help is that I have made the adze with a welder/mechanic at work, but that is for another thread.

 

[tombear]

I've had another offer, sycamore, birch, beech etc to be cut down after the holidays before the sap starts rising in spring. Better get on with getting the Myford lathe back into one piece!

atb

Tom

 

[Robson Valley]

Get organized, Tom. Carving big bowls means a whole lot of waste wood from big blocks.
Get as much of that wood as you can. A 24" length, even with checked ends, should give you 16"
for carving.

I did a rectangular bowl in western red cedar, maybe 16" x 5" x 4", it weighs less than 24oz.
Just for a giggle, I weighed the starting block and some others for other projects.
That particular bowl block was 18 pounds to begin with.

1. Paint all the ends of all the blocks with any paint. Yes, Anchorseal is supposed to be the best.
The purpose is to slow down the rate of water loss from the open, cut ends.
2. Skin off all the bark. Don't cut it, skin it. Cut lines often are weakenings where splits can
and will start. Plus, bugs like the juicy stuff under the bark.
3. Now, consider which is the ideal half-round of wood for a bowl. Fewer branches on the North side of trees.
One way or another, make a saw cut right to the core of the block, end-to-end. This does wonders for relieving the
major drying stresses. Me? I'd whack away 1/4 of the log on what I decide is the "ugly" side.
4. Stacked and stickered in the shade outdoors.
5. Some carver's keep their works-in-progress in a barrel of water, or in a big plastic bag with water-soaked chips,
anything to slow down the speed of drying. Gotta keep an eye out for unwanted fuzzy mold.

 

[mrcharly]

small chips and try to cut through. Shallow, and rapid is the way to work. Swing through with an adze, don't chop into the wood.