Tree stump for dishing

BadFish · Post by **BadFish** » Wed Jun 19, 2002 10:22 am

OK, so i got a tree stump, whats the best way to make the dish in it for dishing?

schreiber · Post by **schreiber** » Wed Jun 19, 2002 10:41 am

Get an oxygen tank bottom and bolt it to the stump.

I've heard several different ideas, from burning a hole in it, to grinding a hole in it, to hammering a depression in it. If I were to use a stump, I'd probably hammer it. But I never had much luck with dishing until I welded a couple steel hemispheres to some pipe, in effect creating my own oxy tank bottoms.

HELMUT

Alcyoneus · Post by **Alcyoneus** » Wed Jun 19, 2002 12:48 pm

You could hammer a depression that you want, and then introduce it to sheet metal, or pound the metal until it forms a depression in the stump. You will want different areas for different parts. The curves on a thumb are different than the curves on a helmet.

Krag · Post by **Krag** » Wed Jun 19, 2002 5:03 pm

Olaf and I had a discussion over this. We concluded that a stump actually becomes a log after it's cut from the tree trunk. Thus, it would be more correct to refer to it as a dishing log. However, dishing stump still sounds better.

As for the hole, I get the best results using a hammered depression about 1/2" deep.

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Krag von Berghen
KragAxe Armoury

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Jacob · Post by **Jacob** » Wed Jun 19, 2002 5:06 pm

Carve as many various sized depressions as you have room for on either end. You can use brute force (hammer), wood chisels, grinders, blow torch, etc. I think it was Halberds who posted a cool chainsaw-like attachment for an angle grinder recently. I'm sure there are other ways as well.

Warning: The following is not recommended for safety reasons.

I very carefully used a circular saw.

Konstantin the Red · Post by **Konstantin the Red** » Wed Jun 19, 2002 7:31 pm

I very warily used a circular saw myself on a friend's stump. Not too bad, really. Used a compressed-air angle-grinder sort of tool to sand it smooth. Watch out for irregularities in the hardness of the wood; they will resist the sanding disc more than the wood around them and will make a bump.

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"The Minstrel Boy to the war is gone..."

losthelm · Post by **losthelm** » Wed Jun 19, 2002 11:31 pm

what type of stump do you have?
the method that works well will be dependant on the wood properties. IE trying to hammer in a dish in to black locust will not work.
also trying to cut it with much of anything can become tricky.

BadFish · Post by **BadFish** » Thu Jun 20, 2002 11:16 am

You know, i have no idea what kind of wood it is. It is very hard.

gargoyle · Post by **gargoyle** » Thu Jun 20, 2002 11:39 am

I used a chain saw on mine then smoothed it up. Works pretty well. BE CAREFUL

RalphS · Post by **RalphS** » Thu Jun 20, 2002 1:15 pm

Don't worry too much about somewhat uneven depressions, they'll smooth out with use. I have used chisel, blowtorch (actually hot dishing) and hammer all with good and similar results.

Ideval · Post by **Ideval** » Thu Jun 20, 2002 1:18 pm

Draw a six inch circle onto your stump, a four inch circle within, and a two in circle within that.

Mark a depth of 5/8 of an inch on your drill bit, and burrow several holes in the two inch circle. Now, mark 3/8 inch on your bit, and drill holes in the four inch circle. In the final ring, you can drill to depth by eye.

Now, use a wood chisel to remove the material gradually and smoothly. When the "dish" is roughed out, hammer the insides smooth with a large ball-pien or with the particular hammer you intend to use.

I have three "dishes" in my stump - of varying depth and diameter. I use the 1/2 inch by five inch most often, but even a simple elbow cop requires hammering in different dishes.

I also have a large pine stump that is soft and seemingly useless. However, I slipped an old shield boss inside and now I have a steel dishing form.
Good luck,

IdÃ«val

Mad Matt · Post by **Mad Matt** » Thu Jun 20, 2002 2:32 pm

Ideval: That's a brilliant idea. And hey I might just have a shield boss I could use.

Of course this also gives me a new shield boss marketing ploy.

I'd sorta thought about using a shield boss for a steel form but hadn't figured out a good method for making is sturdy enough since they're only 13 gauge. Of course welding them to a piece of pipe and filling the pipe with lead or something elce that's fairly solid would work too. Wonder if hard packed sand would work.

And of course I can make as many different radii as I want.

Now I just need some weighted rawhide hammers.

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The budding mid 14th century German Transitional guy.
Mad Matt's Armory

[This message has been edited by Mad Matt (edited 06-20-2002).]

Ideval · Post by **Ideval** » Thu Jun 20, 2002 3:48 pm

Not my idea, to be sure!
That technique was found at our very-own Archive a few years ago.

Another tip for the boss in the stump is, of course, to countersink whatever lag-style screws you use (unless the customer wants needlessly scratched up armour).

With a hard stump, the wood would hardly compress at all. I imagine that my soft stump, and pitiful 16g shield boss will compress and stretch after a few months.
But, as they say, make hay while the sun shines.

I might have to purchase one of your heavy bosses in the future.

IdÃ«val

justmagnus · Post by **justmagnus** » Thu Jun 20, 2002 4:08 pm

Or yuo could plan ahead and make a nice heavy one of your own before it gets too warped.

Rob

Benalishlancer · Post by **Benalishlancer** » Thu Jun 20, 2002 8:50 pm

I actually finished my dishing stump just a little while ago. What we (my father and I) did was mark a circle the diameter of the skill saw blade (seven and a quarter I believe)and used the saw to cut it out in stages. First we adjusted it so the blade would barely penetrate, made a semisphere by turnig it clockwise, let more of the blade down, and repeated. We did this till we got a nice large dish, however you could do it till you got the desired size. Just be very careful if you try this cause we screwed up the first attempt because the saw "ran off" and cut too far out and too deep. Thats my 2 cents anyway

BadFish · Post by **BadFish** » Fri Jul 05, 2002 5:48 pm

Thanks for the advise, i found a 5 foot long trunk, that i am going to cut into two stumps.

eoghan_mw · Post by **eoghan_mw** » Sat Jul 06, 2002 7:32 am

I used a chisel from the $ store, its round not flat. I then applied brute force with once of my "wal-mart specials" dishing hammers to carve out the shapes. To smooth it all out I then used beach sand and a nice round stone found at the lake and rubbed it out and then let the hammering do the rest of the work. I'm happy with it.

Draugen · Post by **Draugen** » Sun Jul 07, 2002 4:27 pm

I just finished one yesterday myself made out of 3ft tall cherry wood. A very hard wood that I can't imagine a hammer doing much of anything to. Even the hatchet I used did little to it in the beginning. I was going for a 6" by 2" deep bowl.

So I marked the center of my circle with a pencil, then marked 6" across in 4 directions, then 4 more. Then, tied some floss around the pencil and held it down in the center and made a circle with the marks as a guide.

I tried using the circular saw, but didn't really like it, so I ended up doing what I had originally intended to do.... I just started digging it out with a hatchet. Every now and then I'd lay a straight piece of wood across it and measure down from that into the bowl until I got to 2".

From there I took a cheap flat (a round gouge might have been better) wood chisel and a rubber faced hammer. Then I started fixing the mess made with the hatchet and shaping out the bowl.

After that and sometimes in between, I used a circular sandpaper attached to an electric drill to smooth it out (a dome shape would have been ideal). Also smoothing off the edges of the bowl. A plain sheet of course sandpaper would have done fine if not better. I only had some cheap sandpaper I used to finish up in the end.

I just used what I had available. It was done in 2 or 3 days.