Wood’n Bits Workshop

Many miniaturists own a scroll saw.  Often it’s the only major power tool that they own beyond a Dremel tool and they use it in their miniatures work.  It seems like I’ve had one in my shop forever and for most of that time, like others, I used it in my modeling and never gave thought to other uses.

But one day, for reasons I can’t remember, I bought a copy of Fox Chapel Publishing’s Scroll Saw Woodworking and Crafts magazine.  It was probably the picture on the cover or some project that caught my eye.  Whatever the reason, it began an adventure of sorts for me.  Unlike most new things in my woodworking life, this one cost me nothing as I didn’t have to buy new tools – I already my scroll saw.  These days, I use that saw to make all sorts of “stuff”, sometimes for our house, sometimes as gifts, and sometimes just because it’s fun.

I thought I’d present a bit of my adventure in the form of a series of photos of the FIRST project of a particular type that I did with my scroll saw.  I emphasize “first” as I want you to understand that if you know how to use a scroll saw, you don’t have to spend forever learning a technique to produce “stuff” that is presentable and gratifying.   I’ve tried to cover the basic forms that scroll saw “stuff” takes but I was  limited by my photo collection and so if I didn’t have a photo of my first project of a type, I skipped that type in the discussion.  So, here we go:

Stand alone lettering

This one is somewhat embarrassing as it’s a bit ragged.  You can, however, make out my name and get the idea of cutting out stand-alone letters and/or words.  It’s a simple matter of printing a template, slapping it on some wood, and cutting around the letters.

Interior Letter Cutting

I tired of my magazine subscriptions being wadded up and shoved into my mailbox so I built this large mailbox from hard maple.  To spiff it up a bit I took a piece of 1/2″ walnut and used the scroll saw to cut an oval.  I printed text of proper size and cut on the inside of the lines, creating the French word for mail.  I think it came out pretty nice and my Quebec mail man now knows where to put the mail.

Garden Decorations

This was a simple project, starting with a piece of pine.  I just drew the outlines for the body and two wings directly on the pine and cut them  out.  A bit of glue and a hole drilled in the bottom for his 1/2″ dowel “legs” and it was ready for a simple acrylic paint job, covered with a couple coats of UV-resistant polyurethane.

3D Dolphin

Not long ago I showed you how to do 3D cuttings, demonstrating how to cut a cabriole leg.  You can use the same techniques to create sculpures.  Here is a small dolphin I created.  Once the cutting was done I simply rounded and shaped it a bit using sandpaper.

Portrait/Art

This is a very popular form in the scroll saw world.  Patterns for virtually anything can be found on the various scroll saw sites and some seem to enjoy creating the patterns as much or more than the actual cutting.  My first portrait was cut from 1/8″ baltic birch plywood with a black backing board.  To do this form of scrolling one needs a saw where it is easy to change unpinned blades as you have to feed the blade through small holes drilled in the wood for each of the segments of the portrait.  I find this form particularly relaxing.

Intarsia

Intarsia is a bit more complicated than other forms of scrolling but not as much as it seems at first glance.  You have to cut more pieces and you have to cut precisely enough that the parts fit together but otherwise it’s just a matter of cutting on the lines.  There are two approaches to coloring.  Many prefer to use natural wood colors (like the walnut and maple in my simple whale project) while others use thinned oils, acrylics or dyes to achieve different colors.  Assembly of an intarsia piece involves rounding the edges and thinning some pieces while raising others to generate 3D effects.

Bookmarks

While not a particular form of scroll saw work, I’ve included this as an example of how simple a gratifying project can be.  Here I took some Midwest 1/16″ cherry sheet and cut a couple rectangles from it.  I drew simple graphics directly on the wood and cut them out.  Waving some sandpaper around, followed by a couple coats of thin shellac and I had bookmarks to give to my wife and daughter.

So, consider picking up your own copy of Scroll Saw Woodworking and Crafts and maybe some interesting doors will open for you as well.

Cheers — Larry

larry@woodnbits.com

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Tags: Imagination, Power Tools, Scroll Saw

This entry was posted by Larry on Sunday, July 26th, 2009 at 8:11 am and is filed under Tools, Woodworking. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.