Carving HDU

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Posted by Raymond Chapman on June 14, 2004

Recently I have been doing some carving in 30# HDU and have found that I am constantly having to stop and resharpen my chisels...more than carving in wood. Is this common to the material or am I doing something wrong? Could it be that I have overheated my chisels while buffing and they have lost their temper?

Mike Jackson

HI Raymond,
I think it is the nature of the beast (HDU). We had to sharpen our chisels a lot more often, too. It dulls router bits faster, but that wasn't quite the problem as trying to keep a chisel razor sharp.

Is it hot down there yet? Turning beautiful up here now.

Mike

Raymond Chapman

Thanks Mike. Yes, I have noticed the difference on router bits. And I'm sure that the dust kicked up by HDU is not especially good for the motors on routers, saws, and such. I've not done a lot of carving in HDU until just recently and now it seems that it is wanted more and more.

I do think that I have ruined some chisels by getting them too hot.

No, it's not hot down here yet. What would give you that idea! It doesn't get hot until August. Right now the temperatures are still only in the upper 90's.

Jeanne and I were in Rhode Island last week and actually had to put on jackets in the evenings. Now, that's weird! And there are trees everywhere there - you can't see anything.

The streams must be getting just about right for fishing by now. Don't you feel guilty running off and leaving Darla at home to do all the work?

Kent Smith

When I worked with SignFoam when they first came on the market, that was one of the issues they publisized. They were having to buff out their slitting knives which they use to cut the bun into sheets, every 20 passes or so. Oddly, the lighter the density, the more often the blades had to be dressed. The engineers at the plant explained this as when the blade jumps through the open porousity, it hits solid material again, and a slight dulling occurs.

Dusty corrected my buffing once by having me not apply pressure but just barely touch the wheel. This helps to reduce friction and heat. It can be best accomplished if the wheel is turning away from you. I have an old mandrel which I set up to turn in the reverse of most commercial buffers and it works much better. I almost stabbed myself though a few weeks ago at Gary Rhodes since his turns in the conventional way.

Hot? It was only 97 here yesterday and should be the same today. We had a brief thunderstorm last night so the humidity is high, almost 35%. Very dry though overall, no fires near us but the one south of Denver has not had real relief.

Rick Sacks

That almost an accident I remember from Jackson's shop. His buffer is turning backwards, but I assumed it was just a left handed thing.