Hello to all lovers of homemade products, every specialist knows well that the tool plays a big role in the work, namely its reliability and build quality. Thinking about this topic, thoughts arise to make the perfect handy tool with your own hands, in this case these are wood cutters, and cutting out patterns with their help is quite exciting activity, which cannot but rejoice. The main thing in creating cutters is to be more careful, since you will have to work with sharp objects, namely the cutting part. The author’s idea to make wood cutters with his own hands was accompanied by the fact that there was no such tool nearby, and there were no local stores either.
Properties that should be good knife for wood carving the following:
High-quality steel that increases the service life of knives and maintains their sharpness for a long time.
Ergonomic (comfortable) handles.
Relative ease of manufacture.
Reliability.
To create this homemade product, you don’t need any hard-to-find materials; they shouldn’t be here, since it was planned in advance that all the details would be easily accessible to most carpenters and woodworking enthusiasts.
Required materials and tools:
* Pieces band saw, made of durable steel, which from experience confirms their long-term sharpness retention.
* Remains of oak boards left over from previous work, since oak itself is durable, beautiful and technologically advanced material in its own way.
Tools you will need:
* Electric sharpener.
* Belt sander with a grit of about 40, as well as sanding paper (grit 80, and for finishing - 240, 800 and 1000).
* Hacksaw.
* Respiratory protection - respirator (gauze mask).
* Wood glue.
That's all the details with the right tools ready, now let's start the step-by-step assembly.
Step one.
The first step is to make a blade. From pieces of a saw blade about 8 cm long, the author turned metal blade blanks the desired shape, and provided the blanks with shanks, their length is about 4.5-5 cm, these dimensions guarantee sufficient strength for fastening the blade in the handle.
For greater reliability of fixation (protection from loosening and the knife falling out of the handle), I made semicircular cutouts on the sides of the shank.
The cross-section of the knife blade has a wedge narrowing, the angle of which ranges from 10 to 15 degrees from the butt to the cutting edge, which is the descent of the blade. Well, the cutting edge is given this shape by a small chamfer, that is, a large narrowing, and therefore an angle of 25-30 degrees close to the blade blade.
A large chamfer on knives must be made even before the moment when the shank is not glued into the handle. The chamfer shape must be given on both sides, while maintaining a certain angle, and the grinding of the metal must occur symmetrically. It is known from materials science that during intensive grinding the metal heats up, which causes it to temper, and this leads to the fact that the metal becomes softer and loses the ability to maintain an edge. To prevent this from happening, the workpiece to be turned must be periodically cooled in water, thereby avoiding overheating. It is most convenient when the container is cold water is nearby and does not require lowering the workpiece a lot of work. To finally shape the blade, as well as sharpen and polish it, you need to install the handle, which is what will happen next.
Step two.
After much work with metal, we move on to making the handle; oak bars are well suited for this, the dimensions of which were 12 by 22 mm in cross-section, and the length was slightly more than 120 mm. These bars were selected so that the surfaces to be glued were smooth. To simplify the work, we make a selection of a socket for the shank in one of the halves of the future handle.
First, the shank is processed using a grinder along the edges in order to get rid of burrs. Then, placing the shank on the prepared block, we outline it with a pencil. Using chisels, we select a socket to a depth that is equal to the thickness of the workpiece, periodically assembling the structure assembly dry to check the fit of the bars to each other. If the depth of the socket is insufficient, the handle will either not stick together or, if the connection is poor, it will simply crack during use. Also, a socket that is too deep will cause the blade to move from side to side, which leads to undesirable consequences, namely cracking of the handle or deformation of the shank. Therefore, be as precise as possible when selecting the socket for the shank.
After you have made sure during the dry control assembly that all the parts fit tightly, in this case the shank, and also that there are no gaps between the bars-halves of the handle, then you can start gluing. We apply carpenter's glue to the surface of the block and into the socket under the shank, since it is impossible to achieve accuracy in depth when manually selecting a socket, then just in case it is better to fill it with glue, after which dries the shank will be held in place due to its hardness, in case of inaccuracy. You also need to apply glue to the adjacent part of the handle, but in a smaller layer.
Step three.
Then we combine the parts (you need to connect the ends of the blocks located closer to the blade as accurately as possible), and tighten them with clamps. Remove excess glue with a damp cloth and leave for 12 hours until completely dry.
Step four.
Now let's adjust the handle to the appropriate shape for cutting tool, usually this is a slight bend on the back for support thumb.
But you can’t do without the features of these pens; they differ in that
their back part is wider and rounded than the one closer to the blade, because of this, all blanks for handles in the first stage of processing look more like a truncated elongated pyramid, and there is also a recess for the index finger.
After gluing the workpiece, the back part is sawed off with a hacksaw to a size of 12 cm.
Then tape grinder We grind the ends of the handles, do not forget to use personal protective equipment - safety glasses and a respirator, since oak dust can cause allergies.
Sanding is started with 40 grit, and then in increasing order until the workpiece is smooth.
Cover with nitro varnish.
Step four.
We are finishing the cutting part, we need a small chamfer, the sharpening angle of which for these knives is approximately 25-30°. To form a small chamfer, the author uses sandpaper of different grits, gradually increasing the grit, starting from 240, moving to 800, and then to 1000, finally everything is polished on a leather belt clamped on a block. If sharpening is successful, then the wood should be cut both along and across the grain without much effort, and the cut surface should be smooth and shiny, the so-called “butter” cut.
Several knives were made using this manufacturing template; in general, they are quite reliable and easy to use, which is quite decent for a non-professional.
Wood carving is a complex and fascinating activity. It allows you to create unique crafts, decorate your home, give gifts to friends and acquaintances.
Also, carving will be a constant source of positive emotions, and for some, even generate income. For children, this hobby will be a great way to occupy free time and develop artistic thinking.
Most often, wood carving tools are made. This happens for three reasons:
- Firstly, you can rarely find a good cutter on sale.
- Secondly, many people cannot afford it, especially teenagers and children who are interested in carving. Most often, cutters are sold in sets, have a high price, and half of them are unlikely to ever be needed.
- Finally, the third reason is that experienced carvers prefer to make a tool “for themselves.”
DIY wood carving tools (drawings) can be divided into three types - knives, chisels and gravers.
A knife is a tool that works with a straight or curved cutting edge.
Wood is cut under a force directed primarily across the axis.
A carving chisel is a tool in which the force is directed along an axis, similar to a regular carpenter's chisel.
A shtikhel is a tool that is a type of chisel. First, it cuts into the wood, and then a small layer of wood is “torn off” with the skillful movement of the carver. Stichels include all kinds of cranberries - a special tool popular in Transcarpathian wood carving.
Let's start with something simple - a cutter for geometric carving
Geometric carving is the simplest type of carving.
She will be best choice if you just want to try your hand at carving.
Despite its apparent simplicity, it allows you to create drawings with a “three-dimensional” effect.
It is also a national artistic craft in Russia, Karelia and Finland.
Geometric carving does not require great “hardness” of the hands, like, for example, carving with a chisel. It consists of simple elements– splits and triangles.
Making a wood carving tool with your own hands is easier than any other. Objectively, this is the only tool that can be made at home without the use of forging.
A geometric carving cutter is a knife. Outwardly, it looks a little like a shoe leather knife with an oblique blade, but that's where the similarities end. The main difference is the width of the blade and the cutting angle of the knife.
The width of the cutter for geometric carving should be about 2 cm, however, this will depend on the size of the chips that are intended to be cut.
The “bevel” angle of the cutter should be quite steep, almost straight - from 80 to 70 degrees. It is not advisable to work with a nose that is too “sharp” - the cutter during such work will cover the drawing and it will not be visible what you are doing. In addition, if the angles are too large, the tip of the cutter will constantly break during awkward movements.
Blade material
Most the best option– make a forged cutter from a rod.
The part of the blade protruding from the handle must be forged from a round section into a flat knife.
It will cover the picture less when .
Unfortunately, most carvers do not have access to a forge and do not have forging skills.
It would be optimal for them to make a wood carving tool with their own hands from an old metal hacksaw blade.
The blade is made of steel R6M5, sometimes of carbon steel. It has a width of 25...50 mm and a thickness of 2 to 5 mm. If possible, take a blade 25 mm wide and 3 mm thick, it will be optimal for the cutter.
How to cut the canvas the right size and under the right angle? After all, it is hardened! There is no need to cut anything. Clamp the blade tightly in a vice under the desired one.
Then, using a hammer, simply break off the blade as needed - in the vast majority of cases, the break will occur along the clamping line of the vise jaws.
Then straighten the cut line on an electric sharpener and pre-sharpen the cutter. The blade is fixed in the handle using teeth that used to cut metal. The best way to do this is by drilling holes and hammering in rivets, but the hardness of the material will make drilling extremely awkward.
Perhaps you will find another, more suitable one. The main thing is that it must be made of high-quality steel. Some people make cutters by sharpening them from files or surgical instruments, from the blade of knives for stripping wires. Excellent incisors come from broken ones. disk cutters for metal from steel R18. All these methods are good.
About homemade wood tools - in the video:
(Continuing the theme “Wood carving behind barbed wire”)
Let me make it clear right away. I am not trying to glorify camp romance here, but look at things from a purely practical side. I have heard about the hatchet cutter, the No. 1 cutting tool in places not so remote, for a long time. But, as I already mentioned, there were no familiar carvers from the “zone”, and former inmates-eyewitnesses, straining their brains, drew on paper cutters of such a configuration that these life-cutting knives were the most appropriate place could only be in horror cartoons. What’s funny is that the shape of the handle (as it turned out later) was depicted quite accurately, but the geometry of the blade did not want to emerge from memory.
I was able to find only one place on the Internet where the “hatchet” was briefly mentioned:http://forum.woodtools.ru/index.php?topic=325.75
Based on the photo from the previous page of this topic on woodtools.ru, one test “hatchet” was made, which somehow didn’t quite fit the bill, especially since geometric carving, apparently, is a thing of the past for me.In the article “Wood Carving Behind Barbed Wire,” I already wrote that I would like to communicate with a person who went through the original camp school of wood carving. And such a person appeared. Even sooner than expected. And not in the virtual, but in the real world itself, reaching us from afar in a completely unexpected way. (We should probably make something else in LiveJournal). And it is necessary - precisely with the legendary “hatchets”. Here they are.
The handle of the largest “hatchet” is made from a guitar neck. However, even if it were made from a Stradivarius violin, I was more interested in the blade and the techniques of working with a chisel in relation to relief carving. After “testing” the middle incisor for several hours, I made my own tool in its likeness, changing only the shape, size and finish of the handle to something more familiar to me.
The blade is R6M5 steel, 2 mm thick. Sharpening - double-sided wedge. The sharpening angle depends on the hardness of the wood being processed and is selected experimentally, from larger to smaller, according to the cut at the end of the board made of the working material. Handle - birch, burnt gas burner until black and then sanded sandpaper until the charred layer is removed. No varnish or oil coating is used. This handle sits very comfortably in the hand and does not cause calluses. From my own experience I can say that the palm does not sweat even after 9-10 hours of almost continuous work.
The geometry of the blade and the shape of the handle allow the “hatchet” to be used as a fairly universal tool. He cuts both “for himself” and “for himself”. The cut can be made with the “heel” (“with the heel away from you” - this is, in fact, the main and most often used cut), or with the “nose”. Cleaning the verticals in the recesses - with an “inverted spout”. Various convexities can be cut well with the middle of the blade.
The speed of work, the depth and cleanliness of the cut with a hatchet can be very high, but this depends not only on the tool, but also on the hands in which it fell.
