How To: C15a Wire-3 restoration

[Jordan Baker]

Finally after many weeks of trial and error I managed to successfully teach myself the art of steam bending oak. I want to try and make the hip ring spacer as close to the originals as possible. I ended up making it from 4 pieces of 1/4" thick strips laminated together. What a learning curve but Im glad I stuck with it.

For my steaming power I used my 1943 2 gallon petrol burner unit, 20lbs empty propane tank (full of water), some black pipe and a steam box made from 4" PVC pipe with end caps.

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The form was made up for the 24" inside diameter of the ring. This let me clamp and glue the wood strips as I built it up to the proper thickness.

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Here I have successfully curved and laminated two of the strips together. The ring is very strong and fit the hip ring very well.

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Lastly I cut the taper on the ring to fit the slope of the roof.

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Now it is just drilling all 16 holes and figuring out the lengths of all countersunk screws. I am extremely pleased about how well it ended up working. My plan is to paint on a few coats of POR letting it soak into the wood. This should seal the wood for life.

[Phil Waterman]

Hi Jordan

Excellent work, couple of questions:
How thick were your oak strips?
What glue did you use?
Did you form and glue in one step, or did bend them first then put glue on and clamp?

Last when you cut the roof taper did it give you a second spacer?

Your pictures and discription has added to the CMP knowledge base, now how to make the hip ring spacer is there to be followed by others.

Strange you should post this now, last week had a bunch of 1 inch wide 12 inch long 1/8th thick oak strip left over from a project. So I decided to try a compound bend just wetting then glueing with Gorilla Glue. Was surprised how sharp and strong the bends were once the glue was dried.

Cheers Phil

[Jordan Baker]

Oak strips were 1/4" thick. I had a nearby lumber mill cut and them to my required size. For glue I used the Gorilla foaming urethane glue. It gave me lots of time to get the wood lined up and clamped together. I formed the wood first then once dry did a final cut to size for diameter. Applied the glue and then clamped to the previous layer. One thing is that these are very labour intensive to make due to the hours involved.

Yes ive got a second spacer and possibly a third and forth. Ill be putting more details about them in the for sale section.

[Alex van de Wetering]

Lovely work Jordan! It's always great to see what creative ideas one comes up with to get stuff to look the way that it should.

Alex

[Bob Carriere]

Most hard wood will bend once steamed but some are better than others for ease of bending and strength.

The best is Black Ash or Brown Ash which grows in wet ground areas. Used extensively in basket making. Brown ash was also used as a poor man oak in the early 1900 when Oak was harder to come buy.

White Ash would come as a close second as well as White Oak.

The reason the above wood bends easier is in the physical structure of the growth rings. Looking at a close up of the growth rings one will see a very dense ring followed by a more open ring structure reflecting the wet early growth compared to late Summer. These kind of woods are referred to as open grain compared to maple, which will also bend but not as easy, which is a very tight grained wood.

The different layers in the growth rings allows the wood to stretch and give to some extent as long as it is wet.

For example Brown ash, absolutely knot free, as to be worked green for best results. That means a fresh cut log as to to be kept soaking wet until worked. A long plastic sewer pipe is ideal. Having the wood cut as "quarter sawn" allows the grain to be all flat and parallel to the bend. Adding a cup of Fleecy or Bounce to the soaking water will increase the wetness of the water and facilitate deeper penetration.

Wet Quarter sawn Brown ash, in one inch wide boards, are beaten with a two pound hammer over a log..... as the ash is beaten, the water logged wood squeezes the water with such force that every single growth ring will separate from one another giving you one inch wide splints for basket weaving.

The only other wood similar is the sassafras.

Once dried any of the above wood will retain its curved shape and can be glued in layers for greater strength.

........ my wife learned to be a basket weaver from native Canadian indians and most of these tricks were passed on to her by helders from Cape Breton Island.

Cheers

[JoãoBoscoBarbosa]

Hi Jordan,

Good work and I need reproduction this piece, then I need a information about the job.

How many the dimension of Oak strips: Width, lenght and tickness?

You use the vapor or only water? if vapor how many the temperature and time?

How many the dimension after cut the taper on the ring to fit the slope of the roof?

[Jordan Baker]

Both doors are now finished and installed. They got NOS bakelight knobs for the release handles. Ive also installed NOS mirror arms and mirrors.

Hopefully tomorrow Fastenal calls to let me know my latest order arrived. Then I can get the roof hip ring installed.

The last picture is showing a simple copper backer for welding up some of the rust holes. The larger purpose made one I have from Harbour Freight didn't fit. This one was made from simple 1/2" copper tube flattened out and bent to shape.

Im really happy with how much I managed to get done this season.