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Jim Blume pattern - 1/8" BBPLY - 02 spiral blade - No finish right off the saw

I think this is the first scroll saw item that I have used Oak for. 1/2" thick, about 6"x8". Still need to do a little sanding and decide on a backer. Used a 2/0 spiral on the whole piece. While on the bottom part, around his chin a wasp decided to play "lets scare the hell out of the person concentrating on trying to cut a straight line" and I got off the line a bit. I can sand it back smooth though. The first pic, it is just laying on a table. The second pic I was walking by the outdoor flag and lean the piece up against the flag and took a pic... kind of eerie looking. Reminds me of his song, The Ragged Ole Flag.

Last year a young fireman bought some plywood pieces that I put on OfferUp for sale. He was interested in my work back then. Last week he called me and asked for something for his girlfriend. He said she likes the Miami Dolphins. We decided on a wall plaque. It's 1/4" BBply, about 15"x15''. It is actually a bit more green in person than the pic shows.

My wife saw this somewhere online, asked me if I could make on for her. I couldn't remember where I saw the pattern, so a quick post here and Wayne Mahler pointed me to where I could find it. Her only request was to change the tail position, she's a show dog person, Springer Spaniel. I used Ash and Butternut. Took less time than I thought. I gotta say I'm really loving the King SS I picked up last year. Chris

H. Botas pattern

Pattern from Sheila Landry maybe hard to tell but it is a Cardinal

Found this pattern for papercutting and made is from birch plywood - hope you enjoy!

Trivet #1 and Trivet #2 of a set of 8 designed by Sue Mey and finally finished. The Trivet #1 wood is 1/2" Walnut 8" square. The Trivet #2 wood is 1/2" Cherry 8" square. Cut on the Pegas scroll saw using Pegas #3R MGT blades. After sanding, dipped in BLO, dried for a day, sanded again, dipped in BLO again, final sanding and then a light rubbing with paste wax. Comments welcome.

Facebook shows that he was last online about 4:00PM EST today.

I have never used Baltic Birch as it is not available where I live and probably not available in Australia. I use Hoop Pine, Locally produced and AA grade, no viods with a nice thick facer veneers which makes sanding easy and low risk. I would agree with @spirithorse100% Luan is absolutely crap, only reasonable use is cabinet backs. Perhaps the thicker sizes for work bench tops.

The Winfield Collection magazine always advertises FINNISH ply and LUAN. The ad for Finnish ply says, "Not to be confused with lower grade Baltic Birch". It appears the largest panels are 24" x 24" at $13.99 for small orders and a small discount for larger orders. I've never used this product but, thought it worth mentioning for scrollers looking for options. I have also seen 1/8" and 1/4" plywood at Hobby Lobby but, did not investigate it any further because I could get the larger sheets of Baltic Birch at a reasonable price and was not considering getting small sized cut-offs and giving more money in the long run. Winfield also sells 1/8", 1/4", and 1/2" Hardwood boards. I have not used those either; just passing along options. When I first began scrolling and knew very little about the thin plywoods, I tried Luan and was very quickly dismayed with the quality of that. God Bless! Spirithorse

Hi, i just tried to scroll/sand some wood rings, does anyone else do it, any tips on making them better and any special finishing technique.?

I had a look online and it seems there are a couple of suppliers of "Baltic" Birch in the Eastern States however their price is $41.00 per sq metre, and that's before it is shipped a few thousand K's. When I 1st started scrolling it was not available at all here, seems like things are going full circle

Like you I make and sell ornaments cut from BB and other woods. A couple years back I purchased a finishing sprayer from Rockler. This is the one, but I paid under $120 on sale. Rockler HVLP Finishing Sprayer | Rockler Woodworking and Hardware Anyway, I spray with a water-based poly, either satin or semi-gloss. Cleanup is quick and easy with warm water IF you clean up immediately after you are done. I do strongly recommend getting a spare spray cup so you can fill it with warm water and run it through the sprayer immediately after spraying your finish. Yes water-based does raise the grain some but on ornaments it is hardly noticeable.

Yeah the ply is consistent for laser work as opposed to solid lumber etc.. I have orders for this year Christmas ornaments for laser work.. I have enough on hand for said orders but.. torn if I want to go grab 10 sheets or so for other possible laser ornament works.. I can scroll ornaments from any hardwood or most any plywood.. laser not so much.. Good thing about laser is.. I can switch up what I use it for.. acrylic, slate stone coasters, cork and many other things that might help take the load off of buying BB ply.

While I don't have a laser, I do know a few people who do, and their choice of wood is often Baltic Birch. I know several professional custom cabinet makers and BB is there wood of choice for cabinet casings. BB is also used by many woodworkers for shop jigs because of the lack of voids and the extra stability that the multiple layers provide. Bottom line it will be affecting lots of people.

I just called my local source for 1/8" 5 x 5 sheets.. quantity discounts of more than 10 sheets is priced at $39.89 per sheet.. last time I purchased it was $13.. He said once it's gone it's gone because as has been mentioned.. we aren't importing anything from Russia.. OH forgot to mention.. this is the price of only one good side and football patches on the other side..

When I have run out of BB, I have bought sheets of 1/8 and 1/4" from Menards, and have been fortunate to not run into voids that ruined a project. But, when you look at the thickness of the layers of ply, notice that in Baltic Birch, the layers are thicker and not just an "onion skin like" veneer. With BB, there will be less chances of chipping the veneer as you cut. Also, in using the thin veneer plywood, you might consider NOT using blades which have any reverse teeth. For example, my go to blades for almost everything is the Ultra Reverse where every third tooth is reverse. While that style of blade almost reduces all need for sanding, when cutting really thin veneers it may lift the veneer. Additionally in most plywoods, you will have no idea of what the inner layers are made of. With BB, all layers are baltic birch.

I use Luan for backers when I can get it cheap. And yes, you are correct as to it's suitability for scrolling. It can splinter easily and unless you are lucky, most times a project made out of Luan will end up in the bin.

My sister mentioned these last year, so whe Steve Good posted the pattern, I knew I had to make it for her. Will mail this to her this week. Wood, for the background is balck ash, from a friend. Figures are maple. Also from the same friend. Just a clearcoat finish. Done at 80% to save on size for shipping!! .

Here’s a parrot, pattern by Garnet Hall. Painting the pieces requires quite a bit more time to complete the project. After completing this, I prefer simply using different types of wood for color contrasts. Of course, given the colors in this project, it had to be painted.

Hello, my name is Peter, I am 64 years old and retired. I've been scrolling for about 4 years, since last year with a Hegner Multicut 1 - preferably mandalas and other fretwork. I usually use 4 mm birch plywood for my work and Niqua blades. Hope to find here interesting people and many new ideas for my hobby!

Baltic Birch has been the choice of many scrollers because of the quality and lack of voids. It is actually done in metric scale for thickness so 1/4" would actually be 6mm 1/8 3mm and so forth. Russia is the larger exporter of this but with the sanctions going into place it may become very scarce and pricey. Other ply's have been used but it really bites when you are finishing a project and that void shows up or it delaminates as you are cutting it.

Hi my name is Jack, Jack Jay Jones to be exact. I have been scrolling and wood working for many years and came upon this forum recently. Everything I’ve read here is very informative and you all sound like a very helpful group. So I’d like to thank Travis for building this platform and allowing me to join. Cheers

Thanks,, appreciate you posting it. Did you use that website you mention a month or so ago to convert the picture? I can't think of the name of it right now. I was messing around with it and couldn't even come close to getting something scrollable.

Thanks for the tip..

Americana 15

I would add Keith Richards to that craggy look,

Well done. And did you say you used a 2/0 blade on 1/2" oak? I'm amazed a 2/0 could even cut through that. LOL

Spring is coming soon.

The right airbrush will work well for ornaments. I use Badger Anthem 155, and Patriot 105 airbrushes to spray everything from shellac to acrylic house paint.

Thank your all for your nice comments...i did it for my granddaughter...now she is my greatest Fan!

Great work and great pattern from Jim - excelent!

Nice cutting. That's from the Americana series I believe. One of my future projects.

That looks amazing, well done. Marg

Looks fabulous. Marg

Lots of ideas. I will probably try the cheap Harbor freight spray gun. With the rattle can I just layed the ornaments out on a 4x8 sheet of 1/4 plywood i had laying around and sprayed one side. Let them dry to touch and moved them to a clean dry sheet of plywood. When dry I flipped them and repeated the process. I could spray about 50 at a time roughly. Thank you, guys and girls, for all the input.

I love it! Thanks for sharing and God Bless! Spirithorse

So no other ply will be as good? I have not done very much scroll sawing, just curious.

Hanging ornaments from string will let them blow around when you hit them with the sprayed finish. They need to be secured such that they don't swing and spin while they are being sprayed. I built a contraption that I used for this purpose. I only get 3 on it at a time, but I only use it for 3 dimensional ornaments that are too hard to spray lying down flat. Essentially it's a cross bar, mounted to a piece of plywood. Have hooks along the top bar and in the base. Use bent paper clips and rubber bands I attach the ornaments at the top & bottom. They are held fairly securely, such that I can spray without them blowing all around. The elasticity of the rubber band makes it easy to hook and un-hook them. I put the whole contraption on a lazy susan platform, which I can then spin around to get all sides.

I made rings for my daughter and wife several years ago.. I made a inlay peace sign pendant for my daughter back a few years ago when the symbol made another "in style" comeback for a couple short lived years, LOL The rings I made was actually a template from Steve Good I think.. He has patterns for estimated ring sizes etc.. I did a glue up of walnut and maple.. then basically just cut it out and did all the shaping by sanding it. Quite a lot of work this way but the rings came out awesome.. I used clear Lacquer for the finish.. held up pretty good but after a couple years there is some wear showing on the finish. Could always just top coat again I suppose. Used to be a guy I followed on instagram that made rings and sold them on etsy.. his method was to cut strips of thin laminate material and super glue. he had different size dowels for doing his glue ups.. He would apply some glue and roll the laminate up and just kept gluing / rolling.. then sand and shape it.. His finish was actually the CA glue ( super glue ).. He made some beautiful rings.. weren't cheap either at a couple hundred each. He's probably still on instagram and etsy.. I just don't get on and follow the people like I once did.. He had quite a few sales and seemed to do really well with it.

Very fine project Barbara....Looks good and your sister will BE Happy with IT!

I understand that a small amount of Baltic Birch comes from Finland. There are, of course, many countries other that Russia and Finland on the Baltic, but I have not heard that any of the others manufacture this type of plywood. Canada certainly has vast regions of same type of Boreal Forrest where the Birch is obtained, but I have not found (and I have looked) any Canadian manufacturer of Birch Plywood. It's not just the lack of voids that appeals to me, the characteristics and quality of the Birch wood make it good for scrolling.

Tom brings up some good points about atomizing with spray guns and also about nozzle sizes.. My opinion is.. with finishing wood you don't need a top dollar gun like you do with spraying cars.. Wood absorbs a lot of what is sprayed on it.. a car finish does very little of that.. spraying a large flat area ( say a car hood, roof or trunk lid ) you need a good gun to lay out a nice smooth finish.. need a person with a very good eye and spraying skills too.. but we'll put that aside for a different topic as it's irrelevant with wood finishing.. I have some of the top of the line spray equipment ( maybe not in todays standards as much of my equipment is from pre 2000's ). I've sprayed with cheap junk guns that atomizing was pretty poor, however having good eye for the spray laying out onto the object and knowing how to cover it and still getting good results comes with experience with laying out a finish.. with auto paints when you start getting a lot of orange peel look.. it can be corrected just simply spraying a flash of nothing but paint reducer ( no paint or very little paint ).. orange peel can also come from using the wrong temp grade of reducers and activators.. this is all with auto paints and really doesn't pertain to spraying a few handfuls of ornament at a time. Spraying outside in the back yard can get tricky because the temp of the car metal can and will vary greatly from the side the sun it hitting it from the side that is more shaded.. While spray cans have greatly improved from the years past.. they still are no comparison to spraying with a cheap spray gun.. Spray cans mostly at best give you a good 2-3 inch spray pattern.. perfect for spraying small objects.. not so much for spraying that large flat ( car hood ) area.. Most cheap spray guns will atomize the paint as well as a spray can and you really don't need a 6-12 inch spray pattern for ornaments.. so I say a cheap gun for spraying wood ornaments is probably going to do the job just fine.. since you're satisfied with the current method of spray cans and you're spraying just some small items.. Now.. if you're planning to spray some cabinets or a large table top.. you might consider buying a better gun.. but when spraying small items.. I believe you'll do just fine with a cheap harbor freight spray gun.. Just my opinion..

I am with Kevin. I use the mailing peel and stick labels. Actually been much cheaper for me and a lot less mess. No clogged spray tips or over spray. Ebay is a good place to shop for these. If you don't need a 1000 they have 500 for a pretty good price and free shipping. I bought a 1000 a couple years ago and am now ready for another 1000. You might want to buy a 100 pack just to try to see if you like them. If you get back up to visit Scrappile I will give you a few sheets to try.

I can understand the need for copy right regulations and I respect a scroll saw pattern maker not wanting me to resell their pattern as my own but restricting someone to reuse an old calendar picture is stupid copy-rite legislation.

Google public domain photos.

Welcome to the village. Lots of helpful people and great information on this site. Looking forward to seeing some of your work.

Gary, Thanks for the updates...Alex also had a facebook post today..I have and will continue to purchase his excellent patterns...Hoping he and his will stay safe.

Forgot to mention that I hate the sticky spray glue all over my fingers.. Peel and stick labels don't do that to my fingers.. Not an issue anymore since my new cell phone doesn't have the fingerprint reader to unlock the phone.. Whenever I used the spray glue my phone wouldn't unlock for a week.. LOL At least that is my excuse when I don't answer it,