Making Wheel Horse Ornaments Tutorial

[mowerman1193 42]

I have had a lot of PM's and Emails asking if I am laser cutting my work and lots of other questions. Glen asked me if I could post a few pictures of the process. Well to get real tech about it I needed a lot of pictures so I am going to put up a basic thing here on this post. To see more though you will have to go through my photobucket pictures. Click on the pictures and I put in a small description on some of them.

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Ok so the first thing I do is print off my pattern from my computer. That's if I have it ready made. (Making patterns gets to technical for me to explain right now and most probably are not too interested anyway.)

I then cut out the patterns and find the placement on the board that will look best with the grain of the wood..

I then put a layer of either painters tape or packing tape to the boards surface to prevent glue getting all over my nice project. I used packing tape today for this project. If I have the lumber I will use 2-3 boards and tape them together with packing tape so I can cut out 2-3 at a time to save time. The saw will cut up to 2" thick BUT, anything more than 1/2" really slows your cutting time down so with 1/4" wood I usually cut 2-3 at a time etc.

I then spray the patterns with 3M super 77 spray adhesive and stick them on the taped board. If the board has left over area ( waste areas ) I will try to find other patterns etc to cut so I am not throwing good wood away. Some of the thin exotic woods like 1/32" and 1/16" are very expensive. This picture shows the patterns of the ornaments and in the waste areas I am making breast cancer awareness ribbons.

Next I go to the drill press and drill out all the starting holes for the inside cuts ( called frets )

Then I sand off the burs on the back side of the wood so the board will sit nice and flat on my saw table. Plus it helps to keep a smooth surface so the board will spin easy while cutting.

Now I am ready to go the saw and feed the tiny blade through each of the holes to be cut out..

This last picture shows the cutouts I just did with the tape and pattern removed. This took about 40 minutes from start to finish to this point. When I get the rest of these cut out I will sand them down starting with 80 grit, 120 grit, and then 240 grit. I then clean them up and dip most in a oil type finish. The oil finish will stay on the dring rack for 24-36 hours..That's when I finish them up with putting a ribbon in them and taking the pictures..

There is 32 pictures of various stages of the process here in my album. I didn't want to overload the post with pictures. Also a picture of my main working Horse..

http://s619.photobucket.com/albums/tt280/m...ial%20pictures/

Hope this clears up some of the questions that people have been asking me..Oh and these ornaments will be posted probably mid week for sale. Made out of Walnut.. Here is one last shot from a couple hours of work last night...I do much more than just Wheel Horse stuff.. If you have not done so you should check out the link in my signature of my online shop..I am always adding new stuff a couple times a week so it will have different stuff all the time..

Kevin

[JimD 3,347]

Nice work Kevin! :thumbs:

[Roger from southern Iowa 1]

I'm impressed!

Very pretty. :thumbs:

[perry 82]

looks great :thumbs:

[Coadster32 793]

Awesome!! Thanks for sharing that. Now I'm pumped about getting mine! :thumbs:

[Brrly1 1,146]

Kevin, very nice work. I love my clock that I got from you at Charlotte, Mich. Are you going to make any more of the Wheel Horse ornaments? Out of curiousity?

See Ya, Bye Burly

:)

[mowerman1193 42]

Thanks everyone for the nice comments.

Chris, yours is on its way, and I hope that you like it.

Burly, I am glad you like the clock.. Yes I am going to make more of the ornaments from time to time until Christmas when time permits that is. I did get all my work cut today and had time to cut these 6 ornaments out that I used for my tutorial post here. They will be posted in the classifieds probably Monday, or Tuesday. I will be spending my day tomorrow sanding the last couple days work and putting the finish on it. Then it will be in the drying process..

Thanks everyone for your interest in my woodworking,

Kevin