after the glue sets

After The Glue Sets

        So what I am going to do today is to grind off the excess glue around where I glued the joint. The tail appears to be firmly attached and seems to be aligned pretty well, despite how I put it together. In fact I would say it is better than original and not very apt to break at the same spot again. I began grinding off the old paint and taking everything I could get to back to the original wood. It is amazing how well this piece was preserved and this latest work will perpetuate it well into the future.

       Even the base is in pretty good shape. This has set directly on the wet ground for quite a few years. And I am guessing but somewhere around 7 or 8 years now.

     Next up is refilling and smoothing out the major cracks and then some minor ones , then I will finish sanding before reapplying finish. This is all done in real time, this requires me daily to keep moving on the project, and you are seeing it as I finish daily.

      I also had time to work on a couple of other bears applying a burn finish and wire brushing the ash residue to even out the burn effect and to create hair elusion. I just use a regular wire brush to do this. Below is a look at the tools of the trade for today. Most sanding is done with the 4 inch grinder with a sanding flap disk sander attachment. This can be bought at Harbor Freight complete with flapsand discs for 30 dollars max. Second is a triangular sander with triangular quick attaching pads for around 2o dollars. Third is a mini sculptor for round 80 dollars, and is used hardly at all but does give me better reach into some places. Fourth is the drill with a wire brush attachment that allows me to get into even smaller places. Most of the time the grinder does most of what I have to do. If you are planning on doing your own carving remember that finishing a carving is sixty percent of how well a carving looks. But you really don’t need to spin a fortune to get good results.  A lot of it is technique that makes your work stand out from others and it does show when you sit two carvings side by side. It is in some ways like the old adage, you get what you pay for. If you want a cheap bear, there are plenty of them out there, but you had better be prepared to watch it go to pieces quickly because there is usually very little done to them except carve them. At least now prepared with the information I am providing you, you can now apply a great finish to your new cheap carving and begin to keep it looking like a million bucks.

    Some additional pics from today.