Techniques

Personal Safety

Joe uses an assortment of safety equipment including: safety glasses, a face shield and a Trend Airshield Pro (a devise that does it all). The Airshield has a face shield to provide face protection; a filter to extract dust from the air; and, fan which blows filtered air to prevent the shield from fogging up.

Air Filtration

Joe uses an Canwood ceiling-mounted air filter to keep the air in his shop clean. In the background, you can see his spray booth which he lowers into to place when applying a lacquer finish to his pieces. The booth is equipped with an extraction fan which removes most of the fumes from the lacquer.

Wood Lathe & Gouges

Joe uses a Vicmark VL 300 wood lathe to turn his pieces. He also has a vacuum pump attached to the lathe which he uses to turn off-centre work or pieces which are too delicate to be held in a conventional chuck.

Above the vacuum pump is a series of commercial and home-made gouges.

Sharpening Equipment

Joe uses a a series of grinders and buffing wheels to keep his tools sharp. He does most of his sharpening using a General 1800 rpm (low speed) grinder. Note: 1800 rpm is about half the speed of regular grinders.

Recently, Joe upgraded his stone wheel to a Cubic Boron Nitride (CBN) wheel. CBN wheels hold their shape, don’t emit dust and remain cool when grinding. These wheels are expensive but provide an excellent return on investment when you consider that they’ll outlast a stone wheel many times over.

Sanding Tools & Equipment

Joe uses a variety of sanding tools and sandpaper. He prefers to power-sand whenever possible. Many of his pieces contain bark inclusions, natural defects and other unique features which require him to sand the piece by hand. Yikes!

Carving Tools

For carving and basic shaping, Joe uses a SR Fordome tool which has several attachments including a power carver. He uses the power carver when he wants to remove a large amount of material quickly. He also use different dye grinders when needed.

Shaping Tools

For more intricate shaping, Joe uses a collection of small grinding tools, burrs and stones in combination with the Foredom tool, dye grinders and/or dremmel tool. He also has a set of diamond files for his most delicate work.

Dyes

To colour his work, Joe prefers to dyes. His favourite dyes include: Transtint, Artisan and NGR (which he purchases locally). To achieve the desired effect, he dilutes the dyes with denatured alcohol.

Acrylics

Although dyes are Joe’s preferred method for colouring his work, occasionally he uses acrylic paints. His two favourite brands of paint are Delta and Americana. He has also been know to pastel colouring pencils at times.

Airbrushing

For airbrushing, Joe uses a a Paashe double-action airbrush and a Paashe D500 air compressor. He prefers Golden and Auto Air brand paints.

Piercing

For piercing thin walled vessels and platters, Joe use two Starflight dental drills and dental bits. Most of his drill bits are ‘retired’ bits supplied by his dentist. The dental drill is powered by a Husky 60 gallon 7 horsepower air compressor.

Wood Burning

For embellishing his work with pyrography, Joe uses a Razertip Pyrography Burner. He uses a combination of commercially-available pens/tips as well as homemade ones. (Pens/tips can be made at home for just a few dollars, whereas commercial tips cost $25 or more each.)