- Joined
- Oct 4, 2010
- Messages
- 1,315
"Sometimes you eat the bear and sometimes... well, he eats you" ("The Big Lebowski")
I started my latest set of Mule scales a few months ago. I picked up a chunk of stabilized red mallee which was really beautiful - swirls of red and white, wonderful grain with lots of eyes. I sat on it for a few months to let it stabilize and acclimatize. These types of burls, even when stabilized, are notorious for warping and twisting even months after you think they are stable. After a couple of months, I sliced a couple of 3/8" slabs off of the block for Mule scales. To be safe, I clamped them to the bench tightly for ten days.
When I was ready to start fabricating the scales, I unclamped them, and sanded them flat on both sides. I found a nice sheet of 1/16" red G10 for a liner and glued the mallee slabs to the G10 liners using West GFlex epoxy, clamping them down flat for a couple of days. When they came out of the clamps, I trimmed them up and sanded them down - everything was nice and flat. So far, so good!
I worked on the scales for a couple of weeks - cutting them out, drilling and counterboring holes for pins, contouring with files, filling cracks with CA glue, and sanding to shape. I had them all trimmed up and flush with the tang - just about ready for final sanding and finishing. About this time, I noticed that the scales were starting to pull away from the tang a little - and over the next 24 hours, the scales warped significantly.
At this point, the only option was to crack the G10 liners off of the wood, sand the scales flat, and epoxy new liner onto the scales. However, since I'd trimmed the scales flush with the tang, the process of breaking the epoxy and and reattaching fresh liners wouldn't leave me with any margin for error. Sigh.
I just smiled and quickly sanded the set of scales out to 400 grit and put them aside. Next week, I'm going to build a jig to clamp them flat for a few months to see if they twist back into shape. We'll see... Anyway, as you guys know, natural materials are sometimes a bear to deal with - even if they have been stabilized.
Off to my next project!
TedP
I started my latest set of Mule scales a few months ago. I picked up a chunk of stabilized red mallee which was really beautiful - swirls of red and white, wonderful grain with lots of eyes. I sat on it for a few months to let it stabilize and acclimatize. These types of burls, even when stabilized, are notorious for warping and twisting even months after you think they are stable. After a couple of months, I sliced a couple of 3/8" slabs off of the block for Mule scales. To be safe, I clamped them to the bench tightly for ten days.
When I was ready to start fabricating the scales, I unclamped them, and sanded them flat on both sides. I found a nice sheet of 1/16" red G10 for a liner and glued the mallee slabs to the G10 liners using West GFlex epoxy, clamping them down flat for a couple of days. When they came out of the clamps, I trimmed them up and sanded them down - everything was nice and flat. So far, so good!
I worked on the scales for a couple of weeks - cutting them out, drilling and counterboring holes for pins, contouring with files, filling cracks with CA glue, and sanding to shape. I had them all trimmed up and flush with the tang - just about ready for final sanding and finishing. About this time, I noticed that the scales were starting to pull away from the tang a little - and over the next 24 hours, the scales warped significantly.
At this point, the only option was to crack the G10 liners off of the wood, sand the scales flat, and epoxy new liner onto the scales. However, since I'd trimmed the scales flush with the tang, the process of breaking the epoxy and and reattaching fresh liners wouldn't leave me with any margin for error. Sigh.
I just smiled and quickly sanded the set of scales out to 400 grit and put them aside. Next week, I'm going to build a jig to clamp them flat for a few months to see if they twist back into shape. We'll see... Anyway, as you guys know, natural materials are sometimes a bear to deal with - even if they have been stabilized.
Off to my next project!
TedP
