Chris Pye: Woodcarving

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You've read the book, but something is not clear? Or you've got a question, perhaps a suggestion or comment?
Send here using the 'Connect' form, to this page of Frequently Asked Questions for a reply.
Arranged by book title...

Woodcarving Tools, Materials & Equipment (all volumes)
Carving on Turning
Lettercarving in Wood - A Practical Course
Relief Carving - A Practical Introduction
Elements of Woodcarving


		"I'm having problems getting the tallow which you use for dressing the strop along with the abrasive. Where do you get it from?"

		Tallow is just rendered and refined hard, white animal fat, beef and mutton in particular, and was once extensively used to make candles or soap. Tallow is only a medium to hold the fine abrasive to the strop. Other than the suet, I've yet to find anything else as pliable and tacky (for the abrasive), or cheap; but anything which will hold the abrasive as well will do. I found mine in a plumber's store where it still had a use, apparently in sweating old early joints. However tallow is also used in stained glass work, again something to do with the lead soldering, so a stained-glass (hobby) supplier is another avenue to try. Before you spend time searching though, I have tried - successfully - using suet, which seems to be a very similar product - and easily available for cooking. Render it into tallow by boiling for some time. Blocks of buffing compound dry too hard and flake off the leather.
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		"What about the abrasive for the strop?"

		In the same way as tallow, in itself, isn't magic, neither is the abrasive. Any abrasive will do which is 1000 grit and finer - as long as it adheres to the strop. I'd try experimenting - you only need a little, and once you light on something you may never need to change. Valve grinding paste is excellent; auto repair shops? Blocks of buffing compound can be rendered soft by meltding with tallow or suet.
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		"Can you use the honing or buffing machine compounds instead?"

		These compounds are designed to melt at a relatively high temperature and are hard and brittle when cold. I have found they just crumble off the leather. You could try mixing them with tallow or suet - melt in a tin sitting in a basin of warm water and stir in. You'll have to play around as there are many different types
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		"What about machine honing - why are you so anti it, do you think it "wrong"?"

		I'm not anti honing machines as such; I do a lot of my sharppening a modified machine and it saves me hours. People often don't listen to what I actually say! Read my comments on page 191. This is not a 'right' or 'wrong' issue, more one of 'can you achieve exactly what you want'. I don't teach machine honing to beginners because I want them to really understand the importance of a flat bevel, straight edge, and keeping the corners -so easily lost on these fast and fairly crude devices, and how to sharpen exactly so. Then, when they really have a grasp of the fundamentals, done at slow speed, they can choose to introduce a machine - and be able to judge whether they are being helped, or not. And then there certain shapes (and particularly small) tools which these machines cannot handle.
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		"Please tell me where I can find a nice woodcarvers' tool chest like the one illustrated in 'Woodcarving Tools, Materials etc' p257 Fig 6.9."

		It's actually a metal drawer file, pretty standard, used in offices. There are 15 drawers (each about 2" high, taking an A3 sheet) in the unit. I lined the bottom and front of each drawer with self-adhesive cork tiles to protect the tool edges. There's a space on the front of each drawer for a label. Just right! In fact, so right, I have several…
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		"So I should learn woodturning then, and get a lathe?"

		Only if you are interested and want to.. You will have no problem learning to turn, it's much easier than carving - although excellence still takes intelligent, hard work. There are many marketable products you can make which combine turning and carving, from 4posters to table legs and lettered bowls, but for this you only need to know someone who can turn wood to your quality and specifications. Setting up for turning can be quite a an expense of time and energy.
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		"I have tried lettering a bowl, but the grain direction keeps changing as i work around the edge, tearing out. What can I do?"

		Bear in mind what I say on page 3: the carving skills - such as lettering - you learn in this book are just basic carving skills, applied to turning. They could equally have been applied to garden furniture or wooden jewelry. You could have a similar problem with difficult grain eleswhere. More than anything else you need very sharp tools and a slicing cut. This book only can give a quick overview of the subject; my Lettercarving in Wood is a thorough course, dealing with many different problems such as this.
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		"Is there anything wrong with using computer-generated lettering?"

		It isn't a moral issue; a question of 'right' or 'wrong'. It's more: want do you want to achieve and how much you are able, how much do you want to, put in achieving it. Computer and other manufactured lettering is a 'quick fix' but can good work. You miss out on a lot of absorbing aesthetics, the joy of being the full master, and are relying on someone else's design. Then again large workshops in the past, the shop draughtsman gave exact drawings for a carver to execute - is there really any difference?
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		"No-one seems to sell wide enough chisels for big incised lettering.?"

		In the UK Henry Taylor (Tools) Ltd will make you any size you like. Whether they are prepared to ship to the USA or elsewhere, you have to ask. Check out wide 'firmer' chisels (with square sides rather than the bevelled 'paring' chisels) and add a new bevel to the flat face. Very wide ones can be found in old tool shops. If you have to use narrower chisels than you really need, then you will have to merge your cuts along the length. Take less of the trench width than you would normally and leave the final merging as in 'Tidying by Hand: p49.
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		"What's wrong with using single bevel carpentry chisels, flat face down, after all this will give a dead flat face to the letter walls?"

		These tools are meant to self-jig: the blade sits on and follows the facet that it initially cuts in the wood, dictating the direction and thus paring dead flat joints etc. In woodcarving - including lettering - we want a more freedom. Nothing has to be dead flat, only appear so. Even the letter walls are probably slightly hollow if you examine them closely, because of the rocking on the heel. You can use them but if you start incised cuts at too high an angle then you will find it far more difficult to correct with a carpenter's chisel than a carver's - especially if you have had little practice.
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		"You show stone lettering in your book. Is it worth learning?"

		Yes! But not necessarily to help wood lettering. The method is one of 'chasing' rather than the true cutting method I teach - because the waste comes away as 'spoil' rather than shavings. However it is a purer form of lettering as the forms depend totally on the keenness of your eye; you can't use the self-jigging quality of sweeps. It's why I find the examples in the book by Tom Perkins so breath taking.If your interest is strongly in letter design and wood, as such, is unimportant, I would strongly recommend stone as your medium. Otherwise - it's fun! The tools are much fewer, simpler and are inexpensive; you know a lot about layout already...
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		"I don't understand why you don't just copy your drawings onto your wood using tracing, carbon or graphite paper, rather than squaring across and re-drawing as you often seem to. Surely carbon paper would say a lot of time?

		This method can be useful, certainly. But it's not just the time, it's the accuracy: By partially drawing the second time I get to position and shape the lines 'just so'; I have a second chance to adjust the spacing and take the grain into account; and I really get the feel of the wood that I'll be carving. All this gives me confidence; I feel more in control. And, once I have the layout comfortably on paper, it doesn't seem to take long to transfe. I'm happier, and I know my results are better. too.
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		"My Gothic lettering doesn't seem to look quite the same as yours (p.187) - I'm not quite sure what's going on in the alphabet grid drawings. Is there a 'crunch' feature?"

		I agree that the grids could have been better placed on these drawings - I'll try to get that fixed for the next reprint. Look at fig 10.34 on page 188 - this is the essence of all the Gothic letters, giving proportions of upright and width to height. Note in particular that the height of the angled link connecting the side uprights differs between top (2 units) and bottom (1 unit). This makes a different sense of skew when the thick angled lines meet the thin at the points. Practically all the other letters are based on this one, so sort this one out for your text first, and originate the others from it.
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		"How important is perspective in relief carving"

		Certainly this is a useful tool; it gives you more design options. However, 2 points: Firstly a little perspective goes a long way - these are woodcarvings, not real life. Secondly be wary of using perspective to move the 'action' into and out of the picture. If you look at the classic Egyptian and Greek carvings you will see that the action, no matter how vigorous, takes place within and along the two boundary planes: the back plane (background) of the carving and, crucially, the front, virtual, plane which was the original surface of the wood (or stone). This gives a sense of a wonderful self-contained world, in limbo and silent, despite the action. I think this is a very important and - to me - desirable idea in relief carvings. Subjects (such as horses coming out of waves at the viewer) breaking these planes (particularly the front) lead to a feeling of restlessness and breaking out of this 'natural' relief world. It's the carver/designer's choice of course, but a matter to think on.
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		Feel free to ask...


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