savethebeer

Well done Ruben. Fantastic job. Bob

Louis. Lovely work. I too like working with mdf, mainly because I have lots of it. What are you using for the finish. Bob

Frank. Lovely job and lovely idea. Bob

Welcome David from cold wet Ireland. Nice work. I do like your clocks Bob

thanks guys. As I was typing the above question I realised I did not know what speed the saw was set at from the factory and it was not mentioned in the manual. So I went and cut my glued up block anyway. It was set at low speed as I found out. I cut straight lines no problem then half way through an S cut the blade jammed so next step is to change the belt to high. I'll let you know how that goes. As Ron says, it was the way I was feeding the wood into the shape that caught me out. The model is Fox but the manual comes in all languages except English so I'm assuming its a medium standard European make. [English version was downloaded online] Bob

Just bought a new bandsaw to replace a smaller one. New one can cut 180mm as opposed to 65mm with the old one. It was the biggest that I could get and still be a tabletop size. I can set the speed to either high speed [for soft wood types] or slow speed [for hard woods], 660 m/sec or 960 m/sec, by adjusting the belt on the pulleys. Question is this. Anyone had issues with too low or too high a speed and burning to the wood or blade breakage. Changing speed involves loosening the motor to allow adjustment of the belt so I don't think I'll be doing that too often. I want to leave it set at the one speed if possible. I have wanted to do bandsaw boxes for a while and I have just glued 5 sheets of plywood to use as a 1st practice. Other ideas I have will include glueing soft and hard woods together to give contrasting colours. 10 minutes ago I realised I have a serious shortage of large clamps to hold the plywood whilst the glue dries so I happened to have 9 large volumes of bound magazines from WW2 that I am giving to a friend for a car boot sale so my bench is stacked vertically right now.

I like both the drip table and the downdraft table. I wish I had the floor space to use, but everything I use has to be moveable. Are you using the drip table just to dry things or are you doing the painting as well Bob

Welcome from Ireland. Bob

I lost my internet for a few days which was annoying but guess who now has the most sawdust free workshop, the best organised workshop and the biggest stock of waste wood, including things I cut or half cut years ago (and kept just in case I decided that I liked them again) that will warm my house tonight. Anyway back to this thread; Below is Russell's pattern and then is my effort. The biggest issue is Michelle's eye. I knew it looked awkward from the pattern, but it looked OK whilst i was cutting it. It just looked bad when I removed the pattern. Russell. I'm hoping you can help me out again. Rather than burn it, I'm hoping you can help me retro fit an eye. See if you can make out an eye and I'll draw it in and cut it. If it does not look right after that,then I can burn it. Thanks Bob

Well I did Mahendra's pattern again and framed it. This is for one daughter. As you can see I increased the size, which made it much easier to get into all those small spaces. I have now started on Russell's pattern for my other daughter. Both these are done in 9mm ply [just cause I had some spare!]. What I have discovered since the first effort is that I now start off by doing all the eyes, then all the mouths, then everything else to do with each of the faces. That way if I make a mistake with the important part, I wont have spent too much time before I have to toss it. With the first effort I used # 3 Pegas skip tooth, now with the thicker wood I've found that #7 Pegas Modified Geometry is good for tearing through (in the best possible meaning of the word) the pattern but it was far too aggressive for the delicate facial details. For the important cuts I'm using a # 7 Pegas double skip.

Thanks very much for that Chris. I'm about to start learning GIMP and I'll use your advice when I get to make my own patterns. Bob

Hello Chris. I've been busy driving snow plows in work for the past few day and I'm only getting to deal with this now. Do you change any details in these three areas such as size, or ratio. Why photoshop it all together again? Bob

Pattern makers of the Village I salute you. Portrait cutters of the village I stand in awe of your skill. Below is what Mahendra produced for me and then is my first cutting. I looked closely at the detailing of the pattern and the size of things like the eyes so i decided to use some unknown type of ply to do a practice cut. (the fact that it is minus 3 and snowing and having to set up my table saw outside on the patio to cut down 4ft by 4 ft BB into useable sizes has nothing to do with not having BB to play with) I have done faces before but not real people so it did not matter if there was some small element of cross eyes or mouth too far on one side or the other. Portraits have to be spot on. especially when you like the person. I was reasonably happy with my cutting here especially around the eyes, I got caught out 2 or 3 times where delicate cuts were only done after surrounding supporting wood was cut away. I knew that I would get lots of grain lifting when I remover the tape, but I also noticed how changing the angle of viewing gives you different result. This wood is 5mm and my BB will be 6mm. I've posted two photos of the same wood showing different angle but I dont know if the site will let me upload them due to size. If it does accept the 2 of them, see how some faces show better at one angle than another. [This is probably true of all cuttings but I've never noticed till now.]

Everything looks straight when you move fast .......................... Speaking of how things look, all this talk about about Pegas blades made me go look at my Pegas blades because I have never gotten the impression of them being so much better than any other type of blade. Mine, bought in Ireland, are made by SCIES Minatures SA. They look identical to Pegas packaging as seen in scrolling magazines. Are all yours made in South africa?

This is something I did in 2015 for my daughters wedding. It was my first real 'display' piece and I hated how I could not get those corners straight and the only way out for me was to hide the joints. That was 3 years ago and I'm not much better at straight lines. I have done other jobs with BB, MDF, ply, and pallet. All my straight lines leave something to be desired whether its with scroll or band saw. Reading here about different blades people use and the different results made me realise that I never took note of blade types that I used on each type of wood so that's no help to me. The other point raised earlier about cutting clockwise or counter, I discovered I prefer Clock to Counter. When I realised this I deliberetly did a few pieces using Counterclock cuts as much as possible to test myself and found the end result was as good as clockwise. Bob

Welcome Florin, Don't focus on €1000. My first saw 5 years ago was about €180, and the one I use now is about €650. Check the members Map on the top line. There are about 40 members listed for Romania. There may be someone near you who had an old saw to lend / sell you till you decide what to do. Bob

Its me again ................. I found my previous free downloads. https://www.ac-holzkunst.de/Laubsaegevorlagen-kostenlos:_:17.html

Jim, I found my download and I think I have attached it. It is from Volkers site but I cant remember how I got it. Try the attached. Bob www.ac_holzkunst.de_laubsaegevorlage_kostenlos_minischwibbogen_12.pdf

Hello Jim. Volkers German site is http://www.va-holzkunst.de/ and includes English version pages and instructions. I know there is an American Volker site but I cant find the address. Failing all that you could try Pinterest for lots of ideas [but no tutorials that I could find]. I do have some free downloaded patterns but I cant find the address that I downloaded them from. However there was no tutorial so I'm going to wing and see if I can put a Schwibbogen all together by myself. If you decided to build German Pyramids you can start here is a tutorial; http://vividcognition.blogspot.ie/2009/12/christmas-pyramid.html#!/2009/12/christmas-pyramid.html If you decided to go down a different road [but still Continental] You could use this tutorial for a winter villages. It includes print off buildings etc for your displays http://www.christmas-village-displays.com/ Bob

Thanks Erv. Steve had a set of Teddy Bear letters which will do nicely. Thanks AK. interesting site. Bob

Thanks AK and Fred for mentioning that. I've just realised the shelf where I store/stack my tape is in a bright sunny spot and sometimes it is difficult to unroll, whereas a new roll that I've just removed from within a press is such a pleasure to unroll. So I'll keep all my tape in a covered place from now on. Having said that it would normally be a few days at the most before I peel a pattern off so I've never had too many problems. Bob

Folks. Can anyone point me in the right direction. I am looking for decorated alphabet letters for my granddaughter Matilda. I was going to do the train with each letter being a train carriage, Then I found the following photo on Pinterest and decided these were even better. Clicking on the below photo just brought me to knitting patterns. I've also look at Sue's site but there is nothing similar on it. Its the right hand C I'm looking for, Just simple decorated letters suitable for a 24 month old

Today when I was tidying the workshop I came across 2 pieces of wood with a pattern attached. It was some unknown ply and the pattern was a Christmas tree (2 identical pieces that slide into each other at right angle so it stands on its own) I remembered starting it about 2 years ago but giving it up because it was just not exciting me and it was just dragging whilst I was doing it. I half cut one piece of wood and then just threw the two pieces into a corner and forgot about it. I had just finished 2 new pieces this morning, decided to tidy the shop, found the 2 old pieces and decided I didn't really want to tidy after all, so I finished off the first piece in 20 minutes. When I started peeling off the pattern I found it peeled off very easily, without pulling off any grain. I was so pleased that I decided to cut the second one and between the band saw and the scroll saw I did this one in about 20 minutes. Two things I discovered today, I'm obviously doing my cuttings far quicker and easier than 2 years ago, and I was very surprised at being able to remove a pattern after over two years and not damage the wood. What is the longest anyone has left a pattern on before finishing it.? At the end of the day I still don't like the finished product so I'll probably just add the tree to my fuel pile. Bob

I Have a humidifier/heater which I only need to use on heat. It is fitted under my second counter top and blowing straight at my seat at the saw so my work space gets nice and comfortable and eventually the rest of the shop heats up. As I said yesterday I've forced myself to get back into the shop and was then pleasantly surprised to find myself very comfortable. We had Storm Eleanor pass over the country all yesterday and today so what I did was start a Steve Good pattern of 'The 10 Commandments' which is intricate enough to keep me distracted from the weather. Bob

I had been planning on making lots of things this winter. And guess what? I've made nothing for several weeks now. There was the cold, there was the weather, there was Christmas, there was good things on the telly, there was the cold, there was several episodes of me and the sniffles, there were several episodes of others having the flu and the sniffles etc. I was using any excuse. I have a granddaughters 1st birthday, an 80th birthday, 2 wedding anniversaries all getting closer so I went out to the workshop this afternoon for the first time in weeks and I got productive. I feel like writing this on Bragging rights (not the items I cut, just the fact that I got off my backside and switched things on). I even used the new table-top belt sander (that I got 2 months ago) for the first time. Bob