Drying wood

Living wood has a porous structure. The pores are filled with moisture - juices that nourish the tree. Therefore, by using fresh wood to make a knife handle, we risk the following:

1.Moisture begins to evaporate, and unevenly, due to the heterogeneity of the wood structure, which can lead to the formation of cracks.

2.When drying, the wood “shrinks,” that is, it loses volume, and as a result, we have gaps between the parts of the handle.

Therefore, any fresh wood must be dried.

In industry, special drying materials are used for drying wood. drying chambers. We don’t need volumes, and cameras, as a rule, are not available. Therefore, we will talk about methods that an ordinary city resident can do.

Let's start with the simplest thing - natural drying. It is better to dry the wood in “chunks” - cuttings of trunks. The bark can be left, and the ends can be tapped with a hammer to give the cuts density, and then covered. Here it depends on your imagination - you can use resin, tar, oils, even machine oils, oil paint and even plasticine. The prepared “firewood” must first be dried in a dry unheated room, preferably with a stable temperature, for example - a subfloor in a country house, a basement. Later, after about half a year, you can move it to a room with a higher temperature. If you immediately place the “blocks” in high temperature- in the attic in the summer, for example - cracking is almost inevitable.

The type of wood should also be taken into account. Birch, alder natural drying do not crack. Hornbeam, beech, ash, maple, and lilac crack greatly when dry. The same is true for fruit trees.

It’s easier with mouth guards and suvels. At the beginning of summer, I razed two medium-sized birch burls and threw them into the car along with cuttings of branches. I have a station wagon, so there's a lot of space. I carried them all summer, as a result - well-dried pieces of wood J

But this is an extreme method. Usually the process takes a year or two.

However, the drying process can be accelerated. And even in several ways.

Drying in newspapers.

Blanks small sizes You can dry it at home in a plastic bag. The workpiece must be wrapped in dry newspaper, placed in a bag, tied tightly and placed in a warm place - on the radiator central heating, in the sunshine. After some time - 6-8 hours, you need to take out the newspaper (it will be slightly damp) and replace it with dry one. This operation should be repeated until the wood is completely dry. It is difficult to talk about the exact time of the process - it depends on the size of the piece of wood, its initial humidity, and the drying temperature.

There is no need to rush - yes, by putting more newspapers into the bag, we will speed up the drying. But too rapid “dehydration” of the layers of wood can lead to rupture of the fibers - to cracks.

For the same reason, it is necessary to control the sealing of the package. Moisture, in moderation, should be absorbed into the newspaper and not evaporate uncontrollably.

Boiled in oil.

Small pieces of wood can be boiled in oil. You can use linseed, cotton, or tung oil. This method has long been used in the manufacture of wooden utensils. During the cooking process, oil displaces air and water from the wood, which protects the product from cracking. And in this case, you should not rush - the heating during cooking should be as minimal as possible. Otherwise, you may end up with fried cracklings. J I went through this, so don’t repeat other people’s mistakes. The process lasts about 6-8 hours, depending on the size of the workpiece.

Paraffinization.

Pieces of wood are immersed in melted paraffin. Maintain at a temperature of 40C for several hours. Then they take it out and dry it for several days at room temperature. The wood prepared in this way is impregnated with paraffin, which highlights its structure and slightly tints it.

Evaporation/boiling.

Moisture in a living tree is not just water, but solutions of various salts and substances.

Wood craftsmen have long noticed that removing these solutions from wood is much more difficult than plain water. This is what they are based on following methods drying.

1.

This method has been used since ancient times. The equipment you will need is a large cast iron pot and... a Russian stove J In the evening, pieces of wood are placed in the cast iron so that there is space between them for free air circulation. A little water is poured into the bottom, the cast iron is tightly closed and placed in the oven - well heated and freed from coals. The oven closes.

In the morning, the wood can be taken out and dried at room temperature.

2.

The method of digestion has also been used for a long time. That is, pieces of wood were simply boiled in water, sometimes with the addition of sawdust from the same tree. The task is to replace solutions and sap of a living tree with water - and it is much easier to evaporate water.

The method of boiling with salt also changed.

This method was described very well by Serjant on the Guns.ru forum -

"1. Cut off the burl, suvel.

2. Take an unnecessary pan (bucket) and throw a piece of wood there. The pan is unnecessary, since during the cooking process
A very tricky decoction is formed which is then very troublesome to wash off. It’s better to clean the wood of all rags
birch bark and other fragile and dangling pieces. they will still fall off.
I consider birch growth as the most accessible and beautiful, the rest of the growths are cooked according to
the same technology. The log is accordingly cleaned of any debris and fragile particles. Pour water. It's comfortable
make with a faceted glass (250 ml in it). The water should cover the piece of wood by about a centimeter or two. The tree naturally floats, but
Let's press it to the bottom and see everything. It doesn’t matter what kind of water you pour, cold or hot, it will still boil. You can put it in a saucepan
you don’t mind throwing a piece of wood on it, the volume of an individual piece of wood is important and not the total volume of wood.

3. Take table salt, whatever you don’t mind. We're not making soup. Add 2 large tablespoons per liter of water.
with a top of salt (who will count glasses of water??? Eh? ;). You can do more, as much as you like, it’s okay, it’s impossible to overdo it.
The main thing is that the water is sickly salty. You can use clean sea water (precisely clean, otherwise it will smell disgusting of mud).
The salt will draw sap from the tree, but will not saturate the tree.

4. Find sawdust of resinous wood. Spruce and pine are the easiest to get. Take a saw and go ahead.
We need two powerful handfuls of sawdust (raking the sawdust with both hands). Precisely sawdust, not shavings from a simple hand plane.
The shavings will come from an electric planer (you can get them at the nearest sawmill or plan them yourself). I always use them.
They are quite small and are usually plentiful and easy to obtain. The more resin in the sawdust, the better.
And the finer the sawdust, the better. Pour into a saucepan. You could have taken a bigger saucepan! Sawdust will add
Suveli has a pleasant ocher color. From soft pink-yellow to ocher-brown. And also resins will add strength to wood and show
texture.

5. When the water boils, reduce the heat and leave it simmering for 6-8 hours, longer if you have the patience.
If the saucepan is large, then you don’t have to turn down the flame, let the water boil and bubble. But you need to watch so that the water does not
boiled away completely. Salt, sawdust, temperature and time will do their job. Add water as needed. During cooking
A red “broth” will form. And scale. It is better to remove scale immediately. It is very difficult to wash off.

6. 6-8 hours have passed (depending on the size of the piece of wood). We take out the piece of wood. We rinse under running water to remove sawdust. Water from the pan
We throw it out as unnecessary, but you can leave it for next time if you have somewhere to store it. But it's easier to pour out the water. We throw the growth
wrapping it on the closet with nothing. Let it cool for a day or two.

7. We repeat the cooking and drying process 2-4 times depending on the volume of the wood.
To speed up the process, you can use a pressure cooker. The time is reduced to 4-6 hours.

8. During the last cooking, you need to quickly peel off the bark while the tree is hot. Although she herself must do this
time to fall off. Carefully!!! Hot!!! use gloves!

9. We throw it on the closet for a week or two. The tree is basically already dry, but let the remaining moisture go away.
The tree will “get used” to the atmosphere. After final drying, the wood will become bone-like and
It will be possible to cut, saw, grind. There will be no foreign smell. It will only smell like wood.

10. During the process of accelerated drying of wood, you need to remember that small cracks, and therefore you need to give
allowance for their removal in subsequent processing.

11. I remind you once again that large pieces cannot be dried like this. Cracked. Necessarily. Verified.

12. After the wood has finally gotten used to the atmosphere, we make a knife. You’ll find out how to do it yourself, big kids;) In any search engine you’ll type in “how to make a knife” and you’ll be happy. It is advisable to soak the suvel and cap with oil and, if desired, with wax too. The wood will reveal its texture, it will “play,” as they say, and all its inner beauty will appear. "

After all these boiling and steaming, you can dry the wood simply on the cabinet, or you can combine it with the “drying in newspapers” method.

My notes on drying various types of wood at home. I will be constantly adding photos over time. Drying is performed after various procedures. Let's see what happens in the end.

Pear

Cut down in April 2016. Thickness 30-40 mm, diameter 220-250 mm. Raw saw cuts with the bark removed just before coating. After 3 weeks, the saw cuts were covered with PVA glue and then with garden varnish on top. There are no cracks. After a week, the cuts became clearly easier. Under a layer of such coating, light mold (millimeter dots) appeared on all samples ( gr1, gr2, gru3).

group1. Photo 2 weeks after coating.

gr2 (left), and gru3 (right). Photo 2 weeks after coating.

Samples gr2 and gr3 after 2 months. They are in excellent condition. Didn't bend or crack. The color remains the same, maybe even a little richer.

Cut down in April 2016. After 5 weeks, cuts were made (3 pieces) with a thickness of 30-40 mm and a diameter of about 230 mm. It didn’t work out, there was no large capacity. It was decided to simply soak the saw cuts for a day in selenium water in a ratio of 5 tbsp. salt per 1 liter of water. After 24 hours, the tree drained for about two hours and was covered in three versions: 1 – PVA, 2 – garden varnish, 3 – PVA + garden varnish. Samples gru4, gru5 And gru6(below they will already be numbered according to the coverage, but for now these are just cuts under the future numbers 4, 5 and 6, since they went through the same conditions):

Photo after salt water, before coating.

Photo after salt water, before coating.

Below is a photo of the same three cuts under number gru4, gru5 And gru6. Obazets gru4 covered with PVA glue, gru5- garden varnish, gru6– PVA glue and garden varnish.

group4. Covered 2 hours after soaking in salt water with PVA glue.

gru5. Covered 2 hours after soaking in salt water with garden varnish.

gru6. Covered 2 hours after soaking in salt water with PVA glue and garden varnish.

A week later, the saw cuts were heavily covered with mold and moss. After another 3 weeks, the saw cuts were very heavily covered with moss.

After 2 months on samples gru4 , gru5 And gru6 The bark was removed and the fungus was cleaned off. After this, these saw cuts lost significant weight and the fungus no longer grew. Those. the presence of bark gave a negative result. Below are photos of the same samples:

gr4, before “revision”

Sample gru5 or gru6 (their conditions are almost identical), also before “refinement”, i.e. also with bark and fungus.

Samples gru4, gru5 and gru6. The bark has been removed and the fungus has been cleaned off.

In May, one of the end cuts ( gru7) was boiled in salted water (1 tbsp salt per 1 liter of water). But before that the cut was completed at planer. As a result, its thickness decreased to 20 mm, while the diameter was about 230 mm. After cooking for 15 minutes, cracks appeared on the cut. The cooking was stopped. The cut is dried without coating.

gru7. Photo before cooking in salt water.

Apricot

Cut down in April 2016. About 20 mm thick and 120 mm in diameter. After 3 weeks, the saw cuts were boiled in salt water in a ratio of 5 tbsp. salt per 1 liter of water. The saw cuts were cooked each separately for 1 hour. On one sample the bark was left ( abr1), on the other it was removed ( abr2). After cooking, the saw cuts were slightly dried and covered with PVA glue and garden varnish. Unlike pears, mold did not appear on these saw cuts; cooking in salt gave its results.

Left – abr1, right – abr2. Photo after cooking.

Apple tree

Cut down in May 2016. The cuts were made immediately after sawing the tree ( apple1, apple2, apple3, apple4). After that, they simply lay indoors for 2 weeks.

apple1, photo 3 weeks after cutting.

apple1 is closer, photo 3 weeks after cutting.

apple2, photo 3 weeks after cutting.

apple3, photo 3 weeks after cutting.

apple4, photo 3 weeks after cutting.

After 2 weeks, the wood was boiled in salt water in the same ratio of 5 tbsp. salt 1 liter of water. During cooking, after 15 minutes cracks appeared on one of the samples. Therefore, the rest were boiled for about 10 minutes to avoid this. After cooking, the saw cuts were not covered with anything.

Result after 2 months (samples apple2 And apple4), a couple of saw cuts are very badly cracked, the experiment on them is stopped, they remain apple1 And apple3:

apple2 in 2 months, experiment completed

apple4 after 2 months, experiment completed

In this article I want to talk about a method of harvesting wood that is suitable for both carvers and sculptors and woodworkers of other professions.

In our Club there are many who begin their journey in carving art, and they naturally face the question of preparation and choice of material. Particularly problematic is the preparation of hardwood and fruit tree species with the least loss of material volume, the number of cracks and a simultaneous reduction in the drying time of the workpieces, without resorting to the use of special equipment and inaccessible equipment. The recipe, passed down from generation to generation, is relatively accessible to everyone, is intended for all hardwoods, and can be implemented without special costs and devices.

1. Procurement of material

Tree cutting is usually carried out during the period of lowest sap content in the trunk - from the end of November to mid-February. For convenience, branches and twigs are cut off first, then the main trunk is felled. After this, remove the bark (it’s convenient to do this bayonet shovel, you need to first cut the end of the blade and, having sharpened the chamfer, use it like a straight chisel - this method is more effective than traditional processing with a plow) and saw it into lumps - round timber of the required sizes, depending on the author's ideas. At this stage, the workpiece needs to be marked somehow, for example, a notch can be made at the edge of the end of the butt side of the trunk. This fact should be recorded in a notebook for memory, so as not to get confused in the future.

2. Boiling of workpieces

The meaning of the next stage is that the method of boiling in boiling water accelerates the process of removing intracellular sap from the tree. For this purpose you will need a container; a regular linen boiler may be suitable (a woodworker I know made a pencil case from of stainless steel 2.5 meters long and installed electric heaters in it). In our case, the heating source can be a household stove, a Russian stove, or a fire. If the author has formed an idea - an image of a future work - then it is advisable to make a rough cut on the workpiece and you can still drill through hole in the center from end to end, followed by sealing with round plugs. This technique will speed up the rate of juice removal and reduce or eliminate the occurrence of cracks.

If the workpieces turn out to be longer than the size of the container itself, then by placing them vertically, you can turn them up and down during the digestion process. After placing the material in the container, pour water, bring to a boil and cook for 3 to 4 hours. To make the process more efficient, you can add table salt to the water (4–5 tablespoons per 1 liter of water), but if the work is to be done in carving technique, then it is better to exclude salt, since it crystallizes and the incisors become dull very quickly. But if the wood is processed by milling and abrasives, then in this case, boiling with salt is advisable.

Liquid remaining in a container after cooking, e.g. pear tree, can be used as a stain. Is there some more old way removal of intracellular fluid. The logs are placed in a pond with running water in such a way that the butt part of the trunks is turned towards the flow. The reason for this arrangement lies in the structure and properties of the capillary-vascular system of trees.

3. Preliminary removal of liquid

The next stage is the preliminary removal of liquid from the wood. We will need an unheated, unlit room; if there is a window, then it should be properly closed - draped to prevent a possible ray of light from hitting the surface of the tree without creating conditions for cracks to occur. The room must have a concrete floor; a basement is best. As you know, concrete has the property of absorbing moisture. Now we take our pieces of wood, find the notches and marks and place each piece on the concrete with the butt side up and the top down. This technique is due to the creation of a more intensive removal of moisture from our workpieces. As is known, moisture passes in an upward translational motion through capillary vessels located in the structure of the tree trunk, from the roots to the top. Micro-chamber vessels turned “upside down” continue to perform their function effortlessly in a more comfortable mode and release liquid to the insatiable concrete. Coefficient useful action thereby increasing, and we get an acceleration of the process and eliminate the occurrence of cracks in the workpieces. The duration of this procedure takes 2–3 weeks (depending on the size of the material).

4. Ventilation–withering

The ends of the tree will need to be protected. This can be done by painting the surface of the ends oil paint, cover with paper. I prefer to cover with heated tar (it’s more thorough). We choose a place in the open air, preferably on the north side of a building and under a canopy (from rain, snow and sun). We stack the pieces of wood on top of each other in a “well”.

Wood logs that are related to each other, from the same tree, placed in one pile, dry better. This process takes at least one month. The longer the natural withering method, the greater the guarantee to avoid cracks in the future. After this, you can continue drying in a room with room (residential) heating mode, occasionally ventilating.

Consistent implementation of all preparatory stages and strict adherence to the conditions of this cycle guarantees time-shortened and high-quality drying of hardwood and fruit trees.

5. If you don’t have a moisture meter at hand

At a distance of 2.5–3 cm from the end of the board, a block is sawed across the grain, which is cut from the sides to 15 cm. The block is carefully weighed and then dried in an oven or oven at a temperature of approximately 100 degrees for 4–5 hours or on a central radiator heating for 48 hours.

The dried block is weighed again. The resulting difference is divided by the dry weight of the wood and multiplied by 100 to give the percentage moisture content.

For example, it had a mass of 200 g, after drying - 150 g, the difference is 50 g. Dividing 50 by 150 and multiplying the result by 100, we get: (50/150) x 100 = 33% humidity.

To prevent the product from warping, the moisture content of the wood must correspond to the humidity of the surrounding atmosphere. Therefore, for interior crafts, in particular furniture, it is recommended to take wood with a moisture content of 6-12%, and for external work - even up to 25%.

Affordable and versatile material. It is often used for construction and interior decoration. But without special preparation, wood will not last you very long. is one of the main stages of preparing wood for use.

An interesting and popular method of drying wood is drying wood by boiling it in salt. Let's look at this method in more detail:

Drying wood by boiling in salt - how does it work?

The tree is natural material With high humidity, in the tree trunk there are capillaries that contain liquid. The tree absorbs this liquid from the soil and from environment. This liquid contains nutrients in addition to water.

Cannot be used in production. Such wood is difficult to process, does not adhere, and during use can change its shape, which will lead to cracking and the appearance of cracks in the product. The wood must be thoroughly dried before use. The ideal humidity for a material such as wood is considered to be no higher than 10-12%. In principle, wood dries perfectly in natural conditions and does not require any additional effort. It is enough to place the wood in a well-ventilated room and forget about it for a while. But this causes a number of inconveniences: firstly, it takes a long time, and secondly, you need to have a room with enough space for drying required quantity material. How can you facilitate and speed up the process of drying wood?

One of the most accessible methods is wood boiling. You can boil wood in ordinary fresh water, but boiling wood in salt water has a greater effect.

Drying wood boiling in salt speeds up the drying process and improves the quality of the wood. The fact is that boiling wood in salt water speeds up the process of removing the juice contained in the wood cells, which in turn reduces the total time required to dry the wood. Boiling wood in salt makes it soft, it dries faster, which helps prevent cracking and changing the shape of the material during further drying. Also, boiling wood in salt helps improve appearance tree.

Boiling wood in salt at home

Drying wood by boiling it in salt is one of the methods that can easily be used at home.

Wood is boiled in salt using a 25% saline solution. The wood must be placed in a container filled with saline solution and cooked over medium heat for two to three hours. The time may vary depending on the amount of wood.

Small pieces of wood wooden parts or the workpieces can be boiled using a large saucepan and a regular household stove. We make the solution in the following proportion: for one liter of water, about five tablespoons of salt.

For large quantity wood, specially equipped baths are usually used. Craftsmen who use this method of drying wood often make their own bathtubs with built-in heating elements.

A fire is also suitable for warming up the container with the material.

For more information about boiling wood in salt water, watch the video. Enjoy watching!

Irina Zheleznyak, Staff correspondent for the online publication "AtmWood. Wood-Industrial Bulletin"

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Boiling in fresh water removes “Forest Moisture” from the soft wood of linden, pine, alder and other trees. Simultaneously with the release of capillary moisture, the wood becomes much softer than in the dried state. Taking this into account, woodworkers carved spoons and ladles from steamed wood immediately after removing it from hot water.

Spoons and various thin-walled utensils cut from boiled wood dry out so quickly that cracks do not have time to appear.

2 boiling in salt water.
Boiling wood in salt water also prevents it from cracking. In addition, salt reliably protects wood from the penetration of putrefactive microbes into it. Products made from linden, aspen and willow are boiled in a 25% solution of table salt.
Small pieces of hard and soft wood can be processed at home. Raw wood Place in a deep saucepan and fill to the top with salted water at the rate of 4-5 tablespoons of table salt per liter of water. The wood is simmered for two to three hours, then removed from the salt water and dried at room temperature.
3 soaking in water.
Soaking wood in water reduces the appearance of cracks during subsequent drying. Logs were stored in water, which protected the wood of freshly cut trees from rotting during the season. Often, oak logs were immersed in the bottom of a stream or river (the water needed to be running). To prevent them from floating, a weight was tied to them.
Having lain in water for dozens or even hundreds of years, the bog oak was hard as stone, and when dry it did not become covered with cracks.
4 boiling in oil and drying oil.
Boiling small pieces of hardwood in oil and drying oil not only prevents the appearance of cracks, but also enhances the decorative expressiveness of the material. Blanks for small carved items from apple, boxwood, pear and oak are boiled in natural drying oil, flaxseed, cottonseed, wood (olive) oil. During cooking, oil displaces moisture from the wood into the air, filling the intercellular spaces. The wood boiled in oil or drying oil is then dried at room temperature. Well-dried wood acquires additional strength and moisture resistance, and is perfectly sanded and polished.
5 decorated soot finish.
Soot, or soot, is the smallest particles of smoke that have settled on any surface.
Smoking - simple but quite effective way decoration of wood, which is often used modern masters. Its essence is as follows.
We will assume that we need to decorate a wooden button in this way. Prick a button made from linden, aspen or birch wood onto the tip of an awl from the wrong side and place it over the flame of a burning candle. Either bringing the wood closer to the smoky flame, or moving away from it, you can paint with soot like a brush, getting “strokes” of any tone - from light gray to black. The soot pattern adheres to the wood very weakly. To secure it, dip the button in liquid clear polish. After the first layer of varnish has dried, apply two more layers in succession using the same method. Under varnish, the wood treated with soot acquires a warm shade, and soft “strokes” with smooth transitions resemble the color of a horny tortoise shell. Therefore, this method of decorating wood among folk craftsmen is called “Turtle-like.”
Using a stencil using the smoking method, you can apply ornamental and plot designs to wooden surfaces. It is advisable to cut the stencil out of paper with foil glued on one side, for example, from a tea package. Using a stencil you can only apply silhouette images. Where the foil remains intact, the wood after smoking will be light, and opposite the slots will be dark. Only if the stencil is applied to a cylindrical or conical surface is it secured with threads or thin soft wire. On flat surface The stencil in the corners is lightly grabbed with glue. In the event that at the edges wooden blank allowances are left, which will be trimmed later, then the stencil is secured with buttons or small nails. The product or workpiece covered with soot should be above eye level. Using a smoke candle, apply soot evenly to the stencil and to the surface of the wood in the slots. When finished smoking, carefully remove the stencil from wooden surface. A clear silhouette pattern will remain on it. It needs to be secured. If the object to be decorated is large and the dipping method cannot be used, apply several thin transparent layers of varnish using a spray bottle. One stencil can be used many times, after first removing any soot that has settled on the foil with a soft cloth.
6 decorated firing treatment.
Using open directed fire gas burner or blowtorch you can not only enhance the expressiveness of the wood texture of coniferous trees, but also apply it to wood deciduous trees plot and ornamental drawings.
To make the wood texture more expressive coniferous species, it is enough to scorch its surface evenly. Softer summer areas annual layers are scorched much faster and easier than dense autumn layers. The wood should be burned evenly, lightly touching the surface with the flame. Uneven movement of the burner can lead to dark spots, making the work sloppy. Don't try to get the final tone you have in mind right away. It must be achieved gradually. For example, to get a dark brown tan color, first scorch the wood to a light golden hue. After the second pass, the surface of the wood will become even darker. You need to do this until you get the desired tone. The scorch sticks to the wood quite firmly, but if desired, it can be coated with a clear varnish. Any method of applying varnish is suitable: by dipping, using a spray bottle or a swab.
In the event that a flat surface is placed on the wood surface to be fired in advance. metal object, then after firing a clear light silhouette will remain on it. On this basis you can create interesting compositions, using them for decorative design interior of a school workshop, technical club premises, physics, mathematics and drawing classroom.
Quite complex compositions can be obtained in a matter of minutes, of course, if you have at hand required material. Place several on a board or tablet metal parts to create a balanced composition. Then scorch open areas wood, achieving the intended tonality. After finishing firing, do not rush to remove parts from the surface of the wood. When in contact with the burner flame, the parts become very hot. Therefore, remove them after they have completely cooled down. A clear silhouette pattern will appear on the surface of the wood. To enhance the expressiveness of its individual parts, the silhouettes in some places can be worked on with an electric burning device.
A composition with a complex multi-tone pattern can be easily obtained by changing the position of flat parts directly during the burning process of wood, at its different stages. Silhouettes with a double contour are obtained by shifting the parts after the initial firing, and silhouettes of objects located one on top of the other are obtained by superimposing one part on an already obtained light silhouette from another part.
Along with ready-made parts as a stencil, artists also use silhouette images that are cut out from sheet metal(for example, letters, numbers, geometric shapes, images of humans, animals, etc. 7 wood, clay and fire.
If certain areas of wood on a tablet are shielded from direct exposure to fire not by metal, but by clay, then due to the high plasticity of the clay, it becomes possible to create decorative designs of any complexity.
Any clay that is thoroughly cleaned of foreign impurities - sand, pebbles and dried grass residues - is suitable for work. This is how you can clean clay. Fill the bucket with crude clay to about one third of its volume and pour clean water. Stir the clay thoroughly until completely dissolved in water. Then let the solution sit. Chips and blades of grass will float, and sand and pebbles will settle to the bottom. Once the water is clear enough, carefully drain it. Any floating debris will be removed along with the water. Carefully scoop out the liquid clay remaining in the bucket into the prepared clean container. In this case, there is no need to touch the bottom layer, which contains settled sand and pebbles. Let the liquid clay poured into the vessel settle again and drain excess water. If necessary, elutriation can be repeated in the same sequence. The exhausted clay needs to be slightly dried. The most convenient clay to work with is one that has the thickness (consistency) of Vaseline or toothpaste.
Using clay on the surface of wood, you can burn a dark design on a light background or, conversely, a light one on a dark one.
*Dark drawing on a light background*.
Apply a layer of clay about 5 mm thick to the surface of the wood. The clay must be allowed to dry enough that it can be easily cut with a knife without sticking to it. You need to cut out the design on clay in stacks - loops. They are easy to make with your own hands. Bend steel wire or springs from an old clock into brackets various shapes and magnitude. Then screw them with soft copper wire to the wooden cuttings. The free end of one of the cuttings must be sharpened and used as a scribe when applying an auxiliary design to the clay. Using the lines of the drawing as a guide, cut deep grooves in the applied layer of clay. Wood should be exposed at the bottom of each groove. Without waiting for the clay to dry, burn the areas of wood that have been cleaned with the stack. After finishing firing, remove the clay with a wooden scraper and rinse the wood with clean water.
* Light drawing on a dark background *.
If clay is applied to the surface of wood not in a continuous layer, but in narrow rolls, then after firing and removal of the clay, a light contour pattern will clearly appear on the dark scorched background. To apply clay to wood, use a rubber bulb or an elastic plastic bottle. Since the clay used in working condition should not have great fluidity, it is quite difficult to get it into the bulb through the tip. To make this task easier, cut into a pear round hole, which, after filling it with clay, must be plugged with a suitable size plug. Drill a hole in the lid of the plastic bottle and insert a metal tube into it. After unscrewing the stopper, fill the bottle with liquid clay.
Squeezing clay from a bottle or pear, apply the intended design to the surface of the wood. By changing the pressure on the walls of the bulb or bottle, you can apply rollers of various widths. By moving them at different speeds, the thickness of the applied clay layer is adjusted.
After applying the clay, begin firing immediately. By firing the wood, you will simultaneously dry the clay. You need to burn it very carefully, barely touching the flame of the burner to the wood. The clay will serve as a kind of indicator. Thus, if you want to get a clear pattern, firing must be stopped without waiting for the clay to dry completely. If, according to the plan, the design should not be too contrasting, increase the firing time until the clay is completely dry. The clay at the edges will become slightly hot and scorch the edges of the picture, destroying the sharp transitions from light tone to the dark. But at the same time, you need to remember that if fired for too long, the clay can become hot and the areas of wood located under it will become charred, nullifying all the work.
When firing is complete, the dried clay will peel off easily from the wood. Only if, after removing the clay, dirty clay stains remain on the wood, it must be washed with clean water and wiped dry with a soft cloth.
8 obtaining texture relief.
Textural relief is especially appropriate in cases where it enhances the expressiveness of a chiseled or carved item or emphasizes some features of the depicted object. For example, in a conventionally decorative manner, it can convey the plumage of a bird, the scales of a fish, or the fur of an animal. A carved or chiseled sculpture must be made in such a way that the annual layers emphasize the shape as successfully as possible. Success largely depends on the correctly selected harvest, and above all on the location of the annual layers in it. You should not cut out small parts that can simply burn out during firing. The forms of sculpture, relief or any utilitarian thing should be generalized, simple and compact.
Sculpture or other wooden product place on a brick and burn evenly on all sides. At the first stage of firing, the loose part of the annual layers will be only slightly charred. During subsequent firing, the charred wood will become completely black. From time to time it will light up in certain places. Having extinguished the flame, continue to burn, but not in the place where the fire broke out, but nearby. Burning wood should be stopped after the top thin layer of the product is charred evenly in all areas.
It is advisable to remove burnt wood from the product at fresh air, somewhere in the corner of the yard or garden. Putting mittens on your hands, first remove the top charred layer with a steel carving brush. Then brush the wood, trying to guide it along the grain. The burnt out early part of the wood layers will be easily removed, and in its place relatively deep depressions will form. Late wood will appear in relief on the surface of the product.
Processing the product with a carving brush can be stopped at the stage when the early wood becomes golden ocher and the ridges of the textured relief retain a dark brown or almost black color. At this stage there will be no sharp contrast between the late and early wood of the annual growth layers, and the tree will give the impression of being old. If, according to the creative plan, it is necessary to achieve a contrast between the early and late parts of the annual layers, then processing the wood with a carcass brush must be continued.