Events Calendar
Bent Wood Laminations
Saturday 18 February 2006, 08:00am - 09:30am
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A lot of woodworkers expend a lot of time, energy and money trying to make or keep things straight. Well, today's class by Ron Brown was about the non-straight - creating shaped surfaces using bent wood laminations. As Ron noted the process is relatively simple. Sometimes the implementation takes a good bit of effort.
There are alternatives to bent wood laminations such as bending plywood, steam bending, and scarf joint glued up pieces. But, there are times when you need a curved part that looks like it was solid wood and you don't have the option to mill it from larger solid blocks. That's where bent wood laminations come in handy.
Bending glued laminations requires a bending form, lots of clamps, and glue. It doesn't require steam or a specific type of glue. The biggest issue with bending laminated wood is the 'spring back' affect. No matter what wood, glue, clamps or forms you use your bent lamination is going to have some amount of spring back from whatever shape you set with the form. For that reason you have to anticipate the spring back and design the size and shape of your forms to compensate.
Don't get bent out of shape trying to create bent wood laminations. Understand you might have to do multiple iterations. Remember that you have to start with about twice as much wood as you need because of the resawing necessary to make the thinner strips. Always try dry clamping your project to make sure you have the right clamps, that your forms work as anticipated, that you can get the glue applied and the piece clamped in plenty of time and anticipate some spring back.
Thanks Ron for an interesting and informative class.
Paul Proffitt - President
There are alternatives to bent wood laminations such as bending plywood, steam bending, and scarf joint glued up pieces. But, there are times when you need a curved part that looks like it was solid wood and you don't have the option to mill it from larger solid blocks. That's where bent wood laminations come in handy.
Bending glued laminations requires a bending form, lots of clamps, and glue. It doesn't require steam or a specific type of glue. The biggest issue with bending laminated wood is the 'spring back' affect. No matter what wood, glue, clamps or forms you use your bent lamination is going to have some amount of spring back from whatever shape you set with the form. For that reason you have to anticipate the spring back and design the size and shape of your forms to compensate.
Don't get bent out of shape trying to create bent wood laminations. Understand you might have to do multiple iterations. Remember that you have to start with about twice as much wood as you need because of the resawing necessary to make the thinner strips. Always try dry clamping your project to make sure you have the right clamps, that your forms work as anticipated, that you can get the glue applied and the piece clamped in plenty of time and anticipate some spring back.
Thanks Ron for an interesting and informative class.
Paul Proffitt - President
Location Stone Mountain Power Tool Corporation / Kentec, Lilburn, GA