[Woodcarver] Burnishing

[Bill Judt]

Hi all:

I'll jump in on the "burnishing" discussion and offer a few comments.

First, I often use burnishing in my carvings, especially on facial  
areas, hands and the like. It is useful for producing a hard-shiny  
surface on antlers, hooves, finger nails, and hundreds of other  
surfaces, including raise lettering.

The results are more than satisfying.

I use a piece of hardwood - maple in preferred. I've also used  
discarded drum sticks of late. They come to me free, and can be  
shaped on a belt sander to fit most any purpose.

About Ivan's comment that a person should carve for 500 years... I  
greatly respect him as a carver and artist, but it seems to me that  
any carving that reaches 500 years will face much greater challenges  
from air, light, dirt, insects, humidity, oxidation, handling and  
misapplied finishes than any burnishing that was originally applied  
to its surfaces.

Burnishing will serve its purpose as a valid technique for texturing  
wood long after my great grandkids (God willing) are gone, and anyone  
who happens upon one of my carvings will be less concerned about the  
surface burnishing than they will be about the fact that the carving  
survived that long in the first place.


So my suggestion is "go ahead and burnish". But use hardwood like  
maple to do this, instead of using a metal burnisher.

Bill
List Owner

My books are for sale at: http://wwwoodcarver.com/Books/Books.html
W.F. Judt,
46 Harvard Cres,
Saskatoon, Saskatchewan,
S7H3R1
PH: 306-373-6649
Email: bjudt at sasktel.net
Website: http://www.wwwoodcarver.com


On 3-Dec-05, at 5:18 PM, GlendaKAllen at aol.com wrote:


> I haven't seen any reference to burnishing wood using just the  

> handle of a

> chisel or other smooth hard wood. that is an old trick and simple.

> At 09:41 PM 02/12/2005 -0800, you wrote:

>

> Well its still news to me and a waste of time and glad i got the info.

> Glenda(Allen) Crisp

>

> Glenda Allen