My First Fork

[Harvestman]

Well, not counting my pickle fork.

A combination of Dave Bromley's build along thread, and Dean's replacement fork thread inspired me to have a go at one of my own. I have spent most of today carving this, and am quite pleased with the result.

Not as good as Dean's though.

I managed a slight bowl, and there was a small knot on one of the tines.

I left the back curved, as is traditional.

I've no idea what the wood is, as this came from my 'fragments and bits to be made into a spoon at some point' box, but it has a nice subtle finish. A bit of hot walnut oil, and we're done. It was fun to make too.

 

[crosslandkelly]

Oh, I do like that, nice work.

 

[Two Socks]

Impressive!

 

[Harvestman]

Thanks Twosocks. Just added your blog to my favourites.

 

[Macaroon]

That's a good fork, looks like it'll be a friendly thing to have along sometimes........very good effort indeed!.....atb mac

 

[Elen Sentier]

Oh that's really nice

 

[Niels]

That's lovely. I would love to try that. Would willow work? I still have the other half of the log I made a spoon out of this morning. I fancy trying a fork tomorrow morning.
This stuff is addictive.

 

[Harvestman]

Would willow work? Don't see why not. I just made three cuts with a saw, and then gradually widened them with the point of a mora carving knife, and then sanded like mad, carved a bit more, and repeat until satisfied or until terrified of breaking it.

Start with a thinnish bit of wood though, because thinning down those fork tines is a slow job.

 

[Niels]

Thanks. Will try tomorrow. I'll post a pic of how it turned out.

 

[HHazeldean]

Thats very nice work - like that one a Lot!! Sounds like a painful process having to open up the gaps between the tines!

 

[Harvestman]

Thats very nice work - like that one a Lot!! Sounds like a painful process having to open up the gaps between the tines!

Next time I will use a saw with a wider blade! A Laplander would be ideal, actually, but I used a junior hacksaw :11doh:

 

[Niels]

My futile attempt:





What did we learn here today:

When you sand willow coarsely, it goes all fluffy.
A 4 mm thick bushcraft knife is not ideal for carving a the 1 mm gaps between the forks.
When you carve into a concave surface it's harder to get smooth lines.

I'll let it dry in the hope it will be less fluffy and then I'll thin it out further and sand it better.

 

[Harvestman]

That is excellent. As you say, let it dry and tidy it up. The trick is then getting the tines narrow enough to actually be able to stab things. I put a chisel tip onto mine as that seemed most effective.

 

[Elen Sentier]

Great stuff, Neils - all this forking, I'll have to get onto it

 

[Mouse040]

My futile attempt:


It's all about the doing not the ending

 

[Dean]

Nice work there Harvestman, don't worry about the knot it adds character.

Niels - Let it dry out and use the tip of your knife to thin out the tines, you want them stiff with just a small amount of flex.

Both of you have the basic idea sorted now it just practice practice practice. My replacement fork is my third fork, I used a Gerber bone saw blade to cut the tines as it gives a finer cut and required less work to clean up.

 

[Two Socks]

Inspired by your attempts I had a go as well. I began by losing a prong:

So, apparently I was making a three-pronged fork:

I encounter the same problem as Niels: the fluffing of wood around the tines. I haven`t found a solution for it yet, but I guess I`ll sand it eventually.
Thanks for the inspiration guys. It is fun to try new things.

 

[Stringmaker]

What you have there is a small trident!

This is a great thread; I now have forks to whittle as well as spoons.

P.S. Lovely job Harvestman, that is setting the bar high.

 

[Niels]

Nice work two socks. The knot in the fork just gives it a bit of character

 

[Dean]

Great work guys you should be proud of your efforts, it makes a nice change of pace making forks from the usual spoons.

I have finally got around to taking better photo's of my my replacement fork "really should stop taking them on my phone" you can really see the detailing now.

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