# pyrography.....wood burning



## grannieannie (Sep 1, 2011)

Is anyone into pyrography....wood burning ?? I've just started, got a cheap kit and am loving it. It's quiet, clean and you can start with really basic stuff. It's something I can sit quietly at a desk or table and spend as little or long time as I like. But you have to be careful not to burn yourself, I don't think it's a hobby for kids, I've burned myself several times. What you do is limited purely by your imagination. You can get proper patterns, or ideas out of kids drawing books. Doing snakes or other reptiles or animals would be fun.

My sister has been doing it for a couple of years and her stuff is magnificent.


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## Firedrake (Sep 1, 2011)

I found it relaxing to do, made some really nice artwork to hang up on the walls. Pays to get really nice wood too, where did you get your set from? I'd love to get back into it.


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## Defective (Sep 1, 2011)

at my volunteer work they do it on craft days, not that popular but i love the smell so i tend to drift over and have a nosy


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## Tassie97 (Sep 1, 2011)

Pics ???????


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## grannieannie (Sep 1, 2011)

I don't have any.... pics..LOL yet  I got my kit from Bunnings, cost $28 last week. But next week we're going to a place called Carbatec in Balcatta (northern Perth suburb) Might look at something for about $50, but you can get them from England and USA on line too. I've seen a couple of English ones, not too expensive I like the look of. I'm just using pine to practice on, just went to the local wood salvage shop and they more or less gave me a couple of pieces. While I'm just learning I don't want to spend much money. I'm only doing very small pieces at the moment. I don't have a sense of smell, so that part doesn't bother me. Hubby says it smells like dog poo !!


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## Renenet (Sep 1, 2011)

Very curious... would love to see some pics.


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## briiiziii (Sep 1, 2011)

This is about as far as I have gotten with my pyrography haha
While I was soldering holes in my Jungle's click clack a while ago, I ended up putting her name into the wooden dowel! Haha
It's now her feeding box  I thought it was a nice touch


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## grannieannie (Sep 1, 2011)

I'll take some pics and see if I can figure out how to upload them.  But you'll have to keep in mind that I've only been doing it for a week.

Ok, I've taken a pic of the 3 pieces I've done....now can someone please tell me how to put them here. 



briiiziii said:


> This is about as far as I have gotten with my pyrography haha
> While I was soldering holes in my Jungle's click clack a while ago, I ended up putting her name into the wooden dowel! Haha
> It's now her feeding box  I thought it was a nice touch
> 
> View attachment 216102




I think it's a great idea to put your snakes name on the rod.....


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## Banjo (Sep 2, 2011)

Here is some pyrography above the bar at my parents house.


View attachment 216242


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## grannieannie (Sep 5, 2011)

Banjo said:


> Here is some pyrography above the bar at my parents house.
> 
> 
> View attachment 216242



I tried to look at it, but it wouldn't allow me to follow your link/attachment. sorry !!


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## Jen (Sep 5, 2011)

A friend of mine just started doing pyrography, she uses a soldering iron and her stuff is totally amazing. I won;t post pics as they aren't mine to share, but suffice to say I am ordering several 'plates' to have on my own walls - she has done several spiders including a funnel web and I personally think she should be selling it.


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## Firedrake (Sep 5, 2011)

It only smells that bad if you're using MDF particle board as it's the glue burning. If it's proper wood it should just smell like a fire, I love using jarrah and blackbutt (yes that's what it's called) they smell like a bush fire, very homely.


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## Tristan (Sep 5, 2011)

hmmi could be interested in trying that i have a dremil and i was thinking of starting some to try out some carving etc with that but i do love the smell of burning wood


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## Trouble (Sep 5, 2011)

I did this in yr 9 and I had a ball! I made my dad a storage box. 
I would love to get back in to it.


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## grannieannie (Sep 5, 2011)

Firedrake said:


> It only smells that bad if you're using MDF particle board as it's the glue burning. If it's proper wood it should just smell like a fire, I love using jarrah and blackbutt (yes that's what it's called) they smell like a bush fire, very homely.



We don't use MDF...I've only used untreated pine so far, but my sister who has been doing it for a couple of years, uses all sorts of wood. How long have you been doing it. ??? I'm having a ball doing it.



Jen said:


> A friend of mine just started doing pyrography, she uses a soldering iron and her stuff is totally amazing. I won;t post pics as they aren't mine to share, but suffice to say I am ordering several 'plates' to have on my own walls - she has done several spiders including a funnel web and I personally think she should be selling it.



I believe soldering irons are good too...and I have a little hand held blow torch which I've played with and it makes nice rustic looking backgrounds. I did a barn owl and the background looked very ... nothing ....so I played with the torch a bit and it looks pretty good, even if I say so myself.

I've been looking on the net tonight for free colouring in patterns...found lots, kids ones mostly and all other sorts. The kids ones tend to be nice and simple. With Christmas not too far away I'm thinking of making some Christmas ones. My church as a bookshop and I thought I might give some to them if they're interested. A lady I met today said she'd love one of snugglepot and cuddlepie, and I found a nice drawing of them, so I'll make her one soon. I'm getting quite addicted to it, and hubby is really pleased. He sands down the wood for me and is going to varnish them for me when I finish.


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## SteveNT (Sep 5, 2011)

Off topic ish

I know most of the trees up here and their burning qualities. Our campfires are artworks of flames every colour of the rainbow.

My favourite is cypress pine (callitris intratropica), it burns with stunning blues and purples and no mozzie will come within 2 meters of the smoke. 

And we dont have bonfires.


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## grannieannie (Sep 6, 2011)

That's interesting Steve...up in the NT...you may not have mozzies LOL..but you have nasty little biting midgie things which hurt like hell...and you have those other things, what are they called....oh yeah....CROCODILES..LOL !!
I'm hoping to go to Bunnings today to check out some different types of wood. I really know very little about wood, so I'd like to learn more.


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## SteveNT (Sep 6, 2011)

Hi Annie, midgies wont come within cooee of cyprus pine smoke either. I'm immune to them anyway after 30 years of hanging around in mangroves and swamps. Crocs dont care about smoke!

We do have mozzies, some of them are huge, back in WW2 the troops reckoned you could hear them changing gears as they approached!

We have some camps a bit TOO close to water so I set a really loose tarp over our camp which flaps in the slightest breeze. Salties are really careful and dont like the random movement of the tarp (so far so good anyway, ha ha.)

Have you seen the pyrography the Centralian aboriginals do? It's simple but effective.

Try googling "fish smoking" you can buy shavings from all sorts of timbers to give different flavour to smoked fish. Also I dont know how close you live to the beach but driftwood would be good to practice your art on.

cheers
SteveNT


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## Banjo (Sep 6, 2011)

grannieannie said:


> I tried to look at it, but it wouldn't allow me to follow your link/attachment. sorry !!



Sorry it took so long to get back, here is the attachment, just lately I been having trouble uploading photos, but I seem to have it sorted now.


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## grannieannie (Sep 7, 2011)

Banjo said:


> Sorry it took so long to get back, here is the attachment, just lately I been having trouble uploading photos, but I seem to have it sorted now.
> 
> View attachment 216830


Wow, that's amazing, must have taken ages to do.



SteveNT said:


> Hi Annie, midgies wont come within cooee of cyprus pine smoke either. I'm immune to them anyway after 30 years of hanging around in mangroves and swamps. Crocs dont care about smoke!
> 
> We do have mozzies, some of them are huge, back in WW2 the troops reckoned you could hear them changing gears as they approached!
> 
> ...



Hi again Steve,
No, I haven't seen the stuff the aborigines do....but I love Aboriginal art, I think it's amazing. 

Today I bought some balsa wood, just a couple of small pieces, don't know how it will go, but I wanted to try and I bought another nice long piece of pine.....and a new pyrography kit from Bunnings, that's my second in as many weeks. This one is made by Weller and has 15 nibs, and it heats up...very quickly. I've downloaded.... dozens ....of drawings I want to try, everything from animals and flowers to faries and angels...can't wait to do more of it. It's quite an obsession with me at the moment. That's a good idea about going to the beach, I'm only 5 minutes drive from it.

My pyrography is very simple and I'm keeping it like that till I get more experienced and find the right tools.

I was in Darwin at the end of June visiting my daughter, her husband is in the Army, first time I'd been there and I felt the nasty sting of the midgie things then, hurt like hell. Funny what the WW2 blokes said about the mozzies changing gear as they got close to you. LOL. Son-in-law is being transferred to Adelaide in December, so I won't be going north again, but I enjoyed my 9 days there. Unfortunately....if that's the right thing to say....I didn't do much sight seeing as the trip was really to be with the family who I hadn't seen for 3 yrs. I would have liked to have seen more, but we went to Litchfield Nationl Park, that was nice and I loved the city (town) the thing I noticed most about Darwin was how clean it was....and the people were very used to tourists and it was just great. My daughter lives on a base at Berrimah...all very secure with guards on the gate etc.


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## SteveNT (Sep 20, 2011)

grannieannie said:


> Wow, that's amazing, must have taken ages to do.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Wow Annie, I'm sorry. I didn'i check the thread for ages and just saw your post. Thanks! 

I'm sorry we missed you when you were here and that you're not coming back (bullshit I reckon) so if you do we'd love to show you some country. 

Countrymen look for a piece of wood that is already telling half the story, then fill in the gaps.


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## Jen (Sep 20, 2011)

Annie - my friend uses 3 ply, but is very careful not to burn through the top layer as the glue is toxic.


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## grannieannie (Sep 21, 2011)

Jen said:


> Annie - my friend uses 3 ply, but is very careful not to burn through the top layer as the glue is toxic.



I've recently bought some 3 ply....not MDF....and I should start using it in the next week. My husband has shown me various types and thicknesses of 3 ply, some can be very thin and some can be quite thick, it depends of the width of the between layers. I'm learning all sorts of things about wood and saws....I now know the difference between a band saw, a circular saw and a fret saw......I'm learning fast and enjoying every moment of it.


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## Tinky (Sep 21, 2011)

MDF is BIG NO NO

http://www.cfmeu-construction-nsw.com.au/pdf/swpMDF.pdf


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