Wood carving with a jigsaw: the tool and its possibilities

One of the tools used to make highly artistic products from wood is a jigsaw. The cutting part of the jigsaw is represented by a narrow and thin blade with teeth - a saw. Such a jigsaw allows you to perform cuts of extremely small width on a relatively thin board along an arbitrarily complex trajectory. The art of wood carving jigsaws has been known for quite a long time and nowadays it is popular, among many craftsmen.

Jigsaw design and practical application

Nowadays there are jigsaws manual and electric jigsaws. An ordinary hand jigsaw looks like a U-shaped frame with a handle and clamps at the ends between which the saw blade is stretched. Due to the fact that the saw blade is narrow, changing the sawing direction is not difficult and complex ornaments can be cut out. The advantage of the jigsaw is that it is possible to cut an openwork pattern without violating the integrity of the outer contour of the part. Disadvantages that you have to put up with: the fragility of the saw and the limitation of the processed part to the size of the frame. To save effort and speed up the process, electric hand and bench-mounted jigsaws. Modern electric jigsaws have great power and allow you to work effectively with any wood of any thickness. Saw blades of such a jigsaw is relatively wide and are fixed in the clamping shank, located at one end of the saw. For domestic needs, a manual electric jigsaw is the most suitable.

With the help of a jigsaw you can make a variety of wood products, structural and decorative elements of furniture, household items, crafts toys and much more.

How the jigsaw works

The jigsaw is a kind of saw: the toothed blade "chews out" the material to be cut with a reciprocating motion. The jigsaw blade moves vertically. A manual jigsaw requires the application of muscle power to drive the jigsaw with the entire frame. An electric jigsaw blade is driven by an electric motor. When working with an electric tool, you only need to hold and guide it. Hold the jigsaw firmly and make sure that your fingers are not in front of the jigsaw: a fast moving jigsaw can cause serious injury.

There are several techniques for carving wood with the jigsaw: slotted, openwork, volumetric, and house carving. While the general principle of jigsaw work is the same, the techniques differ in a number of distinctive features and techniques.

Jigsaw carving procedure

The entire process can be divided into several steps:

• Selection and preparation of the material from which the product will be made

For decorative carving with a jigsaw, plywood is best suited. On the prepared plywood, the marking of the part or the scheme of the ornament to be cut out. You can use ready-made drawings and diagrams, distributed in the form of albums or via the Internet. To transfer the drawing to the material most often used tracing paper (tracing paper). If you are confident in your drawing abilities, a pencil will suffice. If the scheme involves cutting inside the part without violating the integrity of the contour, it is necessary to pre-drill a hole, in which the saw will be introduced before starting the cutting.

• Choice and installation of the saw

Basic rule: do not use metal saws. It is necessary to stock up on wood saws in advance, as they are prone to fracture and quickly work out. Keep in mind that the narrower the saw, the harder it is to cut along the marking, but the more accurate you get complex shapes. The quality of the cut and the durability of a hand jigsaw depends on proper saw blade tensioning during installation. Do not use saws that have a kink in the blade. Electric jigsaws are only clamped at one end, but even a slight bend in the saw blade will severely compromise the quality of the cut or make it impossible to cut at all.

• Direct carving

The technique of carving with the jigsaw is simple, but it requires practice and consideration of some nuances. For example, if the saw is stuck in the material, you should not apply great force to pull it out: this can damage the workpiece and even break the saw. Pull out the jammed saw gradually by rocking. To comprehend the skill of carving, you can read the relevant methodical and video materials, and enrich your own experience with practice.