Mike_Morgan
Elite Cafe Member
So let me tug on your coat for a couple of minutes here, and do a sort of semi-intelligible emotional rant about the hardship of learning how to engrave at the ripe old age of 59....
I love engraving... I really enjoy looking at a finished piece (not that I have actually finished any, mind you) and I just love the look of it, it enhances objects that are already wonderful and takes them to the next level.
And I'm a pretty handy guy with pretty good hand skills, though I've never been much of an illustrator. I can draw a little, as needed, I can hold my own in pictionary, so I've got that going for me.
So I decide to try my hand at engraving... I managed to get some pretty good tools, pro-level stuff... And I took some copper plates and damaged them badly forcing my artistic will upon them and rendering them into childish scrawl... But man, this is hard!
My stuff looks childish... and of course the answer is... "But Mike, you have to learn how to DRAW first"... great... it's not enough to have to learn graver technique... I have to DRAW, TOO? So I practice drawing scrolls and leaves, and Asian art (such as it is) and I'm feeling pretty good about that, until I realize it's hard to get that drawing ONTO the metal so I can cut some lines...
FINE... I'll draw right on the metal over Chinese White... Got it... yet another thing I had to learn.
So, it's cutting time... And I watched 200 YouTube videos and noticed the tools that pros use seem to cut cleaner and deeper than mine... I ask for advice and of course...
"MIKE... You have to learn how to SHARPEN the tools"....
Sigh... I have a Crocker Fixture, I'm sure it's great. People have used them for a century, I guess... It's useless in my unskilled hands.
Oooooooh..... what have we here? The Steve Lindsay engraver sharpening templates... Wait WHAT? Those two little pieces of plastic cost HOW MUCH? You must be joking... If those work, sure, it would be worth it... but.... Yeah... that's a lot of dough for a couple pieces of plexi... YES I KNOW I'm paying for "the design" and the "function" but jeepers... it's a couple bucks worth of... right... I get it, I'll quit complaining.
SO I GET these "mystical marvels of Steve Lindsay prowess" and I took a 3/32" HSS engraver blank and set forth to make some universal whatever bit, and it was SO EASY! The complaints about the price are over and done with, this is actually working to hog-out a graver with more facets than the Hope Diamond and heels and you-name-it.... and well, I went from 200 up to 2000 on the diamond stones, rubbed it across my black Arkansas stone... then hit the strop... and chucked the bit into my Airgraver Classic.
SO let's step back a bit and mention that I am a creature of habit... and I tend to "wipe" my cutting tools before starting a cut to make sure there is no debris, etcetera on the cutting edge.... And JUST before starting my engraving, I "wiped" my newly minted graver bit... and it was at THAT MOMENT that I saw the value of the Lindsay templates... because that sucker is RAZOR SHARP and I SLICED my left-hand middle finger open with absolutely NO resistance whatsoever. I mean... 1.5" of sliced open hand wound that I did not even FEEL until it was too late.
Yeah... these templates work. Tool = SHARP.
One of these day's I'm going to cut some metal instead of myself.
I love engraving... I really enjoy looking at a finished piece (not that I have actually finished any, mind you) and I just love the look of it, it enhances objects that are already wonderful and takes them to the next level.
And I'm a pretty handy guy with pretty good hand skills, though I've never been much of an illustrator. I can draw a little, as needed, I can hold my own in pictionary, so I've got that going for me.
So I decide to try my hand at engraving... I managed to get some pretty good tools, pro-level stuff... And I took some copper plates and damaged them badly forcing my artistic will upon them and rendering them into childish scrawl... But man, this is hard!
My stuff looks childish... and of course the answer is... "But Mike, you have to learn how to DRAW first"... great... it's not enough to have to learn graver technique... I have to DRAW, TOO? So I practice drawing scrolls and leaves, and Asian art (such as it is) and I'm feeling pretty good about that, until I realize it's hard to get that drawing ONTO the metal so I can cut some lines...
FINE... I'll draw right on the metal over Chinese White... Got it... yet another thing I had to learn.
So, it's cutting time... And I watched 200 YouTube videos and noticed the tools that pros use seem to cut cleaner and deeper than mine... I ask for advice and of course...
"MIKE... You have to learn how to SHARPEN the tools"....
Sigh... I have a Crocker Fixture, I'm sure it's great. People have used them for a century, I guess... It's useless in my unskilled hands.
Oooooooh..... what have we here? The Steve Lindsay engraver sharpening templates... Wait WHAT? Those two little pieces of plastic cost HOW MUCH? You must be joking... If those work, sure, it would be worth it... but.... Yeah... that's a lot of dough for a couple pieces of plexi... YES I KNOW I'm paying for "the design" and the "function" but jeepers... it's a couple bucks worth of... right... I get it, I'll quit complaining.
SO I GET these "mystical marvels of Steve Lindsay prowess" and I took a 3/32" HSS engraver blank and set forth to make some universal whatever bit, and it was SO EASY! The complaints about the price are over and done with, this is actually working to hog-out a graver with more facets than the Hope Diamond and heels and you-name-it.... and well, I went from 200 up to 2000 on the diamond stones, rubbed it across my black Arkansas stone... then hit the strop... and chucked the bit into my Airgraver Classic.
SO let's step back a bit and mention that I am a creature of habit... and I tend to "wipe" my cutting tools before starting a cut to make sure there is no debris, etcetera on the cutting edge.... And JUST before starting my engraving, I "wiped" my newly minted graver bit... and it was at THAT MOMENT that I saw the value of the Lindsay templates... because that sucker is RAZOR SHARP and I SLICED my left-hand middle finger open with absolutely NO resistance whatsoever. I mean... 1.5" of sliced open hand wound that I did not even FEEL until it was too late.
Yeah... these templates work. Tool = SHARP.
One of these day's I'm going to cut some metal instead of myself.
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