Kuksa tips

[Stanleythecat]

Does anyone have any good advice/experience/ideas on how to rough out a kuksa?

I was in the woods today trying to shape the outside of the bowl and struggled a bit! I was using a side axe.... I know that needs changing as it's quite cumbersome but for what?

All help greatfully received!

Leo

 

[sandbender]

Does anyone have any good advice/experience/ideas on how to rough out a kuksa?

There is a very well laid out tutorial on 'Jon's Bushcraft Site'...

http://www.jonsbushcraft.com/Kuksa%20tutorial.htm

Good luck

 

[brancho]

Big tip is to use green wood and keep it in a plastic bag between sessions and use a saw the rough it ou then on to the knife for that I would recomend a Frost Sloyd 106 as they are great instead of some clumsy woodlore clone.

 

[mr dazzler]

Find an example you like a lot and try to do a copy. Or do sketches on paper to sort out ideas, plan front and side views if necessary. I find this helps a lot when I have done ladles and spoons, it can save time and wasted materials. And it helps to see more or less where your next cuts are going to be to create the desired form-less of the lets chop here and hope for the best . If you keep a wet blank in a plastic bag dont leave it too long and in a warm place it will start to go mangy and mouldy. I keep work in progress in a bag surrounded by damp chippings or chainsaw chips.

PS Branchos sawing tip is very good. There seems to be a type of assumption that the blankx on a kuksa or ladle or spoon must ne done with an axe and knife. I saw a bloke on youtube make a spoon from a half birch log, and watched, and watched.......and watched-as he continued to cut more and more wood and reduced the log until there was like a teaspoon sized blank. Many times I use a big rip saw to cut the sides of a ladle handle, apart from anything this greatly reduces the risk of splitting the bowl sides off as can happen with a badly placed axe cut. AND it leaves me 2 very nice smaller blanks to do 2 little spoons. So I get 1 ladle and 2 spoons instead of 1 ladle and a bigger pile of waste. Some wood such as alder is so nice to carve I'd rather do that to it than waste it away into chippings

 

[Stanleythecat]

Thanks guys, some top tips.

I have found Jonsbushcraft site and must say I'm very humbled by his skills. Although I must say that I assumed he had used an axe and strolled of to the woods with that in mind. Then as Dazzler suggested might happen... I managed to split it! I have to add the birch I was using seemed to have quite an irregular grain which didn't help.

And Bracho's and Dazzler's tip of using a saw is new to me. Would that be a bow saw type saw or a coping saw that can do curves? or am I asking to much for that phase. I hoped to make a larger Kuksa, mug sized! the ones I have seen that others own seem more like a tea cup!

Leo

 

[mr dazzler]

Then as Dazzler suggested might happen... I managed to split it! I have to add the birch I was using seemed to have quite an irregular grain which didn't help.

Everyone must of done that at some stage, dont be discouraged, try again If the birch was on the floor (eg a fallen one that was there more than a few months) it might of gone spalty, was it sort of mottled inside with dark veins and soft bits like the inside of a crunchie bar? Irregular grain can be a pain but then most wood has it Just one of those things. Woodwork (in most any form) is really a developed series of procedures and processes that find effective ways to deal with and minimise that fact. It is possible to split off those side pieces, but unless your log has ruler-straight even grain, chances are one side or the other will run off and take the bowl section with it LOL Its happened to me lots of times thats why I rip them now.Keep trying though!
A coping saw wouldnt help much, but a bow saw would be OK to do the rough form. I use a big beautiful old disston rip saw, and basically just remove the 2 pieces either side of where the handle (of a ladle) is going to be, just a very basic squre box formm which is then refined with axe and knife. Do the curves where the handle meets the kuksa bowl with a narrow bladed knife, it will travel smoothly around the radius

 

[Stanleythecat]

Cool, thanks for that.

And you rough out the outside of the bowl with an axe? Just wondering what type and size would be best. I have a swiss side axe which is really a roofer's axe for shingle roofs, it was an axmister purchase a few years ago and is ideal for cleft post and rail fencing and the like but a bit heavy for fine work like bowls and kuksas!

Have just ordered a Ray Isles side axe hoping it might be more suited, it is marketed as a bowl turners or trimming axe... i'm still a greenwoodworker at heart!

Leo

 

[mr dazzler]

To do the outside of the bowl yes I use a hefty axe usually (brades) about maybe 3 pound weight?? not sure exactly but its a kent pattern and the cutting edge is maybe 5 inches across? I also use a sandvik (magic little axe!) or roselli axe for smaller forms. Most of the time my right hand is only a few inches from the axe head, I use shorter slicing and planing cuts similar to a ulu inuit knife in some ways. The extar weight helps there. As a rule that axe alone will get me to shape so that the knife stage is not too complex or time consuming. The roselli axe will additionally do concave forms (up to a point). I did a couple of wood shovels and trough type things with it. I also own a modified henery taylor adze. It came with a short club hammer type handle and I couldnt get along with it, so I replaced it with a longer slightly more slender handle and it was like getting a brand new tool, it balanced and worked sweetly after that. That is good for more extreme concave hollowing. I have a bunch of hawthorn from last year waiting for it to dry to make some elbow adzes. I can wait

 

[Stanleythecat]

More good advice, thanks

Just one more! I was about to buy a crooked knife from Ben Orford which I pressumed would have an external bevel... he then asked whether I wanted an internal or external bevel! I assumed as a carver than an external bevel tool is for gouging out material (working in to a concave like a bowl) where as the opposite would apply to an internal bevel; it is for use on convex surfaces... I want mine for working on the insde of bowls and kuksas.

Can anyone give me some advice please!

Many thanks

Leo

 

[riggers]

gents any tips fof smothing the inside of the cup any wee tips i am using sand paper just now but very fidly

 

[mr dazzler]

I have just this minute finished the inside of a largish ladle, the bowl is roughly a half sphere about 4 inches across. I used a mora hook with the tight radius to hog out most of the waste, then used the bigger radius one to do the finishing cuts. I used a mixture of a stabbing grip (as you would hold and use a crook knife, cutting toward and away from me; also the potato peeler grip sometimes, side to side. I stropped the hook on 4 or 5 ocassions during the last few minutes of work so as to get a nice polished burnished surface, no tearout or chatter, I think I now have that hook at about its maximum sharpness. I have it with the bevel inside the radius of the tool (the part of the blade that rubs against the wood is flat much like a chisle edge) A sharp tool is the key I think, also reading the grain direction, you get the cleanest sweetest cut when you are cutting downhill of the grains. Like if you rub a cat or dog fur the wrong way, its hard to stroke them, easy if you follow the direction the fur grows in. Its the same with wood fibres. If you have areas of wild and twisty grain take very light gentle slicing cuts with a sharp blade; better to do 10 cuts like that to gradually remove the high spots, than take 1 heavy cut that tears out a chunk of grain and does your head in I learnt that principle from hand planing wild bits of elm and oak, but its the exact same principle. Easy does it!