We knew Salvatore Mastrangelo at one of the many pleasant meetings we organize in the shop of our friend Daniele (left in the first pic). Salvatore is a really pleasant and exclusive person,  full of life experiences. A true professional, filled with an uncontrollable passion for everything is related to woodworking. 

He expresses with great skill most of all his outstanding artistic vein  in the art of carving. 

This time we have "forced" him to teach us some good rule to acquire the best practice in this work and, under his leadership, we have tried to do some exercise. The quality of carving tools and their sharpness are fundamental prerequisites for best results.

In this regard, it is very useful to have a sharpening stone on the bench for honing more frequently the cutting edge of most commonly used tools. In the picture it shows a concave shaped oil stone that best fits the profile of some edges.   Unfortunately the time available is never enough, but we memorized some good advice on strategies of work, the importance of a good initial design and  the respect of plans on which the various details are located, in order to obtain a perspective effect.

Finally we add a couple of pictures that illustrate the Salvatores work. I think they comment themselves. 

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The sliding bevel is a useful tool when you need to get a different angle from 90°, being the blade  full adjustable. A pivot screw allows you to lock the blade in place. It can be screwed directly into a thread cut into the brass side metal plate, or be provided with a wing nut.Another possibility, in my opinion the best, is when, instead of the wing nut, there is a lever with a threaded hole, very convenient and easy to operate with a simple thumb movement. One of my two squares adopted the screw tightening system without blocking nut and needs a screwdriver for tightening and loosening.

So it was easy to change the system and I had the opportunity for replacing the steel screw with brass fittings, a metal which contrasts nicely with the mahogany wood.

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Now that the wands were just about shaped, I thought about the carving. Kenneth’s wand that I was using as a design basis is covered in wonderful carving that he managed to create using just a set of cheap carving tools. I had picked up the same set of tools, so off I went. First I practiced on the initial blank that I had turned to a dowel with my spokeshave. Then I went on to the first wand.

Marking lines I drew on the initial blank to carve. In the background
you can see a close up of the awesome carved handles of Kenneths wand.

I found the carving results to be acceptable (I certainly wasn’t thrilled with the results). They were however, far too time consuming. At this point I was beginning to seriously run low on time. Knowing that un-carved wands derived in time for the movie premier were better than carved wands delivered weeks later, I completed the carving on the business end half of the first wand handle and called it quits on the carving.

The one wand I half carved (dont tell that the order of the
description is slightly out of  order for better continuity)

Even though the carving phase of the project was aborted due to time and the results leave something to be desired, the process did intrigue me enough that I plan to take Kari up on her offer to provide some guidance. Having gotten my feet wet and seeing the beauties she’s able to turn out, carving is now certainly on my list of woodworking skills to learn.

Whos ready to sand?

Once the carving was done aborted it came time to sand. Though I normally enjoy sanding (thanks to my nice random orbit sanders, vacuum boom arm and headphones), I found the hand sanding of these damn wands almost unbearably tedious. By the time I had worked though the 80 and 100 grit sanding pads I was ready to call it quits. Luckily the small windows of evening shop time I get meant that by the time I was fed up with it, it was time to call it a night anychoice. Over the course of a few days I did manage to sand all four (4) wands to 320 grit.

Do youre natural work breaks break up the tedious tasks too?

Its Wanderful: Part 1

Its Wanderful: Part 2

Its Wanderful: Part 3

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