I've now started the large deck plank puzzle. All the planks in the panels are individual planks. I discovered this when I opened the packaging, as many fell out. Getting everything back in place was a puzzle in itself. Now I've glued the panels with the points to a large plank so I can pick them out individually with a palette knife.
This allows me to remove the soot from each one and carefully round off the edges a bit for a realistic effect. Then I'll glue them together.
This allows me to adjust them later and then finish them with alcohol ink.
I've removed all the soot from a few planks; now it's time to glue them together.
I'm using a steel ruler for this, which I'm securing to my worktable with a few clamps.
This ensures a nice, straight edge.
Next, I use a small amount of glue to attach the first plank to my workbench. I then glue the planks together one by one. The rest of the glue on the underside also helps the planks adhere to the workbench, creating a nice, solid finish that allows me to work on the rest of the piece.
After gluing them all together, I scrape the planks. Personally, I find scraping works better than sanding. Finally, I carefully go over the whole thing again with a brass brush. This doesn't damage the wood, but it cleans the seams and removes any glue residue left behind by cleaning the seams with a scraper.
After that, I can carefully loosen the whole thing with my scraper.
I clean the workspace again, and we can move on to the next piece.
This allows me to remove the soot from each one and carefully round off the edges a bit for a realistic effect. Then I'll glue them together.
This allows me to adjust them later and then finish them with alcohol ink.
I've removed all the soot from a few planks; now it's time to glue them together.
I'm using a steel ruler for this, which I'm securing to my worktable with a few clamps.
This ensures a nice, straight edge.
Next, I use a small amount of glue to attach the first plank to my workbench. I then glue the planks together one by one. The rest of the glue on the underside also helps the planks adhere to the workbench, creating a nice, solid finish that allows me to work on the rest of the piece.
After gluing them all together, I scrape the planks. Personally, I find scraping works better than sanding. Finally, I carefully go over the whole thing again with a brass brush. This doesn't damage the wood, but it cleans the seams and removes any glue residue left behind by cleaning the seams with a scraper.
After that, I can carefully loosen the whole thing with my scraper.
I clean the workspace again, and we can move on to the next piece.