Project "Royal Entourage"

[Tor]

Well, you are certainly doing well at making that look good. Not sure I would do well at intarsia (it is the sanding I don't like the thought of), but I certainly enjoy seeing what others do.

Tor

[JudyV]

What are you planning for the overall size? I am guessing it is framed, if so, what are you using for a background? The progress pics are my favorite and you are really explaining and teaching it well.

Judy
www.jlwooddesign.com

[workin for wood]

I don't have those answers Judy..not yet, although I can tell you it will have some sort of frame. I never measured the size, it easily fits on 36" paper with plenty room to spare on all sides. It's still big, but it's as small as I can get it to be at the same time. I prefer small pieces to big ones. The overall size is only big because of the amount of little pieces. There's a long way to go, I'm only about 5% done.

[workin for wood]

Can't do a lot today since I have company. Measured the pattern for Judy, it's about 22x30.

Eventually there is going to be a torch. The torch is going to be built from this white top burl. I re-sawed the burl into a 2.5 inch thick slab and ran it through the drum sander a hundred times it seems, until it was flattened on both sides. The black line is just a burn mark as the inclusions in the wood are full of gum which clogs up and trashes out the sandpaper. Because of all the bark and gum inclusions, the wood is pretty much worthless as it is. This is normal though for wood like this. I turn on the belt sander and hold a cup at the back as I sand some scrap ebony, capturing it into the cup. With my pocket knife, I scraped out any loose bark and then blew out all the holes really good with the air compressor. System 3 bar top epoxy is mixed up and the ebony is added to the mix. The product is simply squeegeed onto the wood to fill all the holes. The system 3 is a bar top finish, not the glue type. It is more liquid and takes several hours just to set up. Because of this, it will slowly work it's way down into the cracks. Another coat will need to be applied in the future to fill the holes as the first coat seeped down in. The board will also need to be flipped over and the edges will also need to be worked too, so this is a long process that is best done long before needing the wood. Notice, the wood is taped around the edges to stop any seepage to the outside and wax paper is under the wood. The end result will be quite impressive and make viewers very curious.

[hermit_scroller]

Jeff, I have enjoyed seeing your wip on all your projects. I had never thought of filling cracks with epoxy and the dust. I bet it will make for a very intresting effect. How will the epoxied places finish out and will it be hard to work, like cutting and sanding? Just wondering because I have some old walnut and red cedar that was given to me that has cracks and is worthless as it is.
Thanks for any answers you give.
Fran

[workin for wood]

It will cut fine once the epoxy is fully cured which could take a few weeks. It will sand and polish if you want, but it isn't necessary. You can just sand it along with the wood and any dullness or fine scratches will disappear when sprayed with a finish. Since I don't have a pressure pot, I can expect an occasional void on the inside, of course even with a pressure pot, I can expect that on a piece this thick which will have some hidden incursions inside. If you have large voids, you can us PR with paint to fill the holes. Lets say you use black paint, then after pouring into the hole, you drip a couple drops of greyish white and swirl it with a toothpick to give it a swirling grain effect. Or you can use yellow in your PR and swirly a few drops of black into it. You do your home-made grain after you pour the colored PR into the holes.

[Trout]

would you be doing projects like this if you didn't have this forum?
I couldn't imagine doing a project without being able to show off it's work in progress...

I though I put in a lot of though into a project but you takes the cake!

I'm with the rest, I can't wait to see this project finished...

Trout

[Tor]

Looks like that burl will come out nice. Of course you then must have a place to use it where it actually works The best piece of wood in the world will be ugly as all getout if used in the wrong place (something I have run into myself).

Tor

[workin for wood]

This is the aluminum, 3/4 thick. I tried cutting it with the scrollsaw, foolish me. Takes 20 minutes to go 1/8". So I started drilling all around it. Any spots where the holes didn't quite merge I then cut through with the scrollsaw. I did have to cut into the V with the saw, that took almost an hour and my arms felt like cement bags trying to hold the aluminum down. Good thing I'm stubborn, because the aluminum is what I wanted. I used a carbide cutter to carve close to the pattern and then used a stationary disc sander to sand the tip to size, along with the drum sander for the inside curves. It will still need to be shaped later too, can't wait for that moment <wink>.

The aluminum gets really hot, I had two pairs of gloves on and still had to bear some heat pain. You touch it and , well, you know!

[workin for wood]

The aluminum was the final piece to be cut for the inlay into the music pages. The pages are lined up on top of the pattern. The pieces to be inlayed are set on top of the pages and lined up by eye to the pattern way down below. Doesn't have to be perfect, just really close will be fine. The pieces are traced onto the pages, it's as simple as that. There are a couple holes and tight places that are very difficult to access. A pencil is sanded down to a very long sharp taper. This pencil is used for tracing inside those tight areas. The tracing has to be done very gently so just keep tracing over and over again until you have some darker lines. All outside lines are cut to the inside. All inside cuts are cut on the outside of the line. You have to vision that if you trace the outside of a donut, the pencil line is outside of the donut so you will leave the line when you cut. If you trace the inside of a donut, the line is to the inside and therefore you will actually cut the line away for a tight fit. This is the most critical of cuts, there is no going back from here or the pages have to be completely re-built.