Wood bending for canes?

check with folks that are building Sheperd sticks the link attached is someone that I know has worked on problems like what you mention because he wants that strength.

there are a lot of other links on a google too. Brian

Bending canes is not unlike bending anything. Same process, and in fact, a little simpler than most. It helps to have a drying fixture(s). You only have to steam the tips, the rest act as a lever for bending.

Some woods bend better than others. "The Wood Bending Handbook" is out of print, but available used, see:

*listing*title Dan

thanks, Brian.. but it seems like George's sticks all have the heads attached, not bent out of the cane stock itself??

I'm trying to avoid building a steam chamber, but yak never know...

mac

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Willow.

A steam chamber is as simple as a kettle and a piece of stovepipe.

At school we had a setup for snowshoes between the heating pipes where we'd stripped away the (asbestos?) insulation to put the pipe. Guess I'm gonna die....

====>Well, Mac! You plant a sapling of whatever type of wood you want and as it grows you start bending the tip over, eventually hanging a weight on it. Depending on the wood, in five to ten years you'll have a bent cane handle. It is sorta like Xmas tree farming, ya gotta wait awhile before it pays off! ( Well, you did say "any" info appreciated, and idea, hits, tips, etc!)*G*

Leif

SNIP........

========================= Mac, Not all shafts with separate handles are weak and awkward. I made a mesquite cane for my Dad for his 80th birthday. The shaft was a reasonably straight (there is no such thing as STRAIGHT mesquite) sapling, about 7/8 inch on the bottom up to about 1-1/4 at the handle end. The handle was larger, about

1-3/4 cut near a fork, so the cut revealed the usual maroon of the mesquite heartwood. I made a ball on the end of the shaft and a socket in the handle to receive it. There was a slight taper on the mating surfaces of the shaft and handle to maximize the mating surfaces. After every thing fit like I wanted it to, I filled the socket hole in the handle with epoxy and fitted the shaft into it to set up. I was worried that the setting process of the epoxy would cause the handle to split, but it did OK. I engraved his name on one side of the handle and his birth date on the other side, as well as carving reliefs on the handle for finger grips. Then the whole thing was finished with clear poly.

SInce my Dad had been a life long woodworker, I knew he would test it for strength, and he did. He put his full weight ( about 175#) on it, but I knew it would hold because I'd put my 300# on it before I gave it to him. So the separate shaft/ handle configuration can be a viable option. I brought the cane home after his death, so if you're interested, I could try to post pictures or e-mail them to you.

Ken Moon Webberville, TX.

That book is available from my local library. Call # 674.8

Tom

*listing*title > > Dan

thanks, Dan... that looks like a great start.. My wife thought that she could do better on the price, so it's her assignment now.. *g*

mac

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I was actually thinking of using the hot tub.. 300 gallons of 101 degree water... that, or soaking in water and using the heat gun..

I used to install furnace insulation back in the 70's... got out of it when the

2nd or 3rd one of the older guys got black spots on their lungs.. nasty stuff..

mac

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thanks a bunch, leif... in 5 or 10 years I'll probably NEED a cane..

mac

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I'd love to see the pictures, Ken.. either email or ABPW...

mac

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It just ocurred to me that during one of my fits of ebayery I had purchased a book on cane making. Here are the specs:

'Walking and Working Sticks' by Theo Fossel ISBN 1 869988 0 Hardback ISBN 1 869988 9 Paprback

It's a small book - 5x8 or so and 125 pages - but crammed with information. Types of wood to use, straightening, a few pages on bending handles, antler, horn, and other types of handles, finishes, shepherd's crooks .... It is well worth getting.

If you are really interested in doing canes and can't find the book, give me a shout and I'll loan it to you for a while. I tend to squirrel stuff away for rainy days and we're get some sunshine here in the upper left.

e-mail: lobby dot dosser at verizon dot net

LD

Mac, 101° isn't hot enough for bending. Steam - actually hot water vapor at about 200° - is barely hot enough. What steam bending does is soften the lignin, the natural binder that holds the wood fibers together, so the fibers can slide past each other. When cooled, it hardens and binds the fibers once more.

Pounding the pulpit in news: snipped-for-privacy@corp.supernews.com, Leif Thorvaldson did expound thusly:

There was an article on in a local mag some time back on an "artist" who actually does very similar for making custom walking sticks! They were lovely spiralled jobs with highly detailed carving, much like the traditional Scots blackthorn sticks; from memory he only turns out one a week or fortnight or so.

I forget the name of the tree, but 'tis one of those English trees that grows in coppices, and generates a lot of suckers every year. He wraps 'em around lengths of reo-rod as they grow, there was some reason he didn't steam 'em but unless I can find the magazine....

thanks, Dan... we were wondering how much heat it would need... the plans on the web for the pvc pipe/coleman stove talk about maintaining about

220 degrees..

Might try the wife's idea: bring a big pot of water to a boil on the bbq side burner and soak the end we want to bend in it... lay out the clamping form on the deck next to it... "redneck wood bending"... *g*

mac

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LOL! Water boils at 212° at sea level. Boiling temperature increases with pressure. To get to water to 220° it would have to be under a few pounds of pressure. I don't know of any steam box that is pressurized.

I don't know of any advantage to soaking the wood. Disadvantages are it will take longer to cool and dry. And, you may get water stains on your work piece. Just steam it .

Keep in mind that your 'deck' could be the clamping form. Just screw your blocking to the deck. ;)

Dan

Do Americans use wallpaper ? If so, how do you remove the old wallpaper when re-decorating ?

My steam chamber is a long box powered by a steam wallpaper stripper. These are cheap (£20 - about the same as a kettle), commonplace and come with hose connectors ready attached. They also contain 45 minutes worth of water. Power is that of a small kettle (2.4kW) not a large (3.1kW) kettle, but you can always pipe two into a box.

that's a damn good idea! I've been looking at that 5 gallon can of deck stain and thinking that there MUST be a reason not to restain the deck right away..

mac

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Hi Mac

How's your cane bending coming, sorry I'm a little late, became Opa (grandpa) for the 5th time and helped my youngest son move his belongings, he needs more room now that he has a new addition to his family. If you look at Lee Valley's web site under "steam bending" you can see some of the tools used for steam bending, I have not much practical experience in steam bending, but I do have a tip, you have to get the wood as hot as you can with steam, and clamp the wood in such a way that when you bend the wood that the wood does not get stretched, or it will break, wen bending it should be compressed, and for that you need the heat so that the wood fibers will slide alongside each other. That's all I have for you

Have fun and take care Leo Van Der Loo

mac davis wrote: