How do I reproduce this:

[timeless]

Hello again

Yet another question without actually contributing anything else to the forum. (I will once I know stuff!)

I'd like to try and reproduce this driftwood from Lion:


Or at least something close to it. I've got a table saw and my mate has a router I can use. I'm also the proud owner of a blowtorch. I was wondering if I just bought one of those bench-mounted rotating wire brush devices and a sander, plus some shabby-chic type paint, would all that be enough?

Would the instructions to produce something similar to that driftwood be (for example) to take some cheap bare wood pine moulding, router some profile into it, rough it up with the wire brush, blowtorch it and sand it, paint it and sand it back a little bit again? I've no idea. I've found a few posts on making driftwood, but thought I'd ask about this specific moulding.

Any guidance would be hugely appreciated as it's about ten quid a metre and I use loads of it.

Thanks for any advice.

Jon

[JFeig]

Start with rough sawn lumber vs milled lumber that way the rough surface will already be there.

[Not your average framer]

I think that is probably the same moulding as the larger profile in the Simons Minnesota range. I'm not convinced to copying the moulding using a table saw and a router is going to be all that easy to do. By the time you have bought the wood and the router cutters and reproduced the driftwood finish, I can't see this being economic sense when you can buy the finished moulding from Simons. I've used the Simons version of this moulding myself and unless you are using large quantities of this moulding, the quantity of left over off cuts is not enough to be much use for things like ready made frames, with wider mouldings like this a lot of off cuts are just too short to do anything useful with.

If push comes to shove, then the easier way of doing this could be to stack three mouldings together, after a quick browse through a few moulding catalogues, I am confident this could be made to work well. However, assuming that the Simons Minnesota moulding is still avalable, the sensible option would be to buy it from Simons, as there is not any chance of getting even close to their prices doing it yourself. I make up stacked moulding combinations on a regular basis and it is something that I enjoy doing, but it is usually only a profitable thing to do when someone is paying to copy something that cannot be obtained any other way, or when making up larger that normal profile from economically prices smaller profiles.

To my way of thinking driftwood finishes work best if produced by rotary wire brushes, rough sawn finishes are a different effect. Not that rough sawn finishes are not worth doing, they just are different from wire brushed finishes and maybe your customers will be just as happy with either finish. Perhaps Prosperro is waiting in the wings to bring out one of his distressed frames made out of some nice 200 year old wood, I eagerly wait with bated breath.

[prospero]

What you need is some rough-sawn constructional timber. Heave a look down your local DIY shed. The stuff that is
treated with green stuff is good, but any will do. It does tend to have a lot of knots in which can weaken it, but it's
cheap enough to cut out a lot of the more ratty bits. Don't overthink the distressing. You don't need a blowtorch. Just
smooth off the more obvious splinters.
A coat of Clear shellac will consolidate the surface. Raw shellac will impart a strong golden brown tone.
Then all you need to do is give it a coat of dilute paint of a pale colour, let dry an sand back. Add a touch of wax and
buff it slightly.

The moulding on the inner and outer could be done with a router, but I would tend to add on small pine mouldings either side.
The middle part is likely to be a bit iffy when it comes to forming a rebate so a better quality pine moulding added on the inside
will do a better job and add stability.

Another way is to get some thin, rough timber such as fencing slats and glue them onto a more robust carcass.

It's quite good fun.

[timeless]

Thanks for the replies Jerome, Mark & Prospero

Yes, it looks the same as that moulding from Simons. I can't see the price though as I don't have an account, but I'd imagine it's still around a tenner / m?

I guess I don't need to reproduce the moulding exactly - it's just that it kind of suits the stuff I frame up (antiquities and fossils) and it allows me to get away with murder with my dodgy framing skills. When I make a mistake, I've just been mixing wood filler with paint and slapping it on (where I've made a bad joint for example), then wire-wooling it a bit and you can hardly see the mistake. In fact, it sort of adds to the distressed nature.

It's true that there are a lot of short offcuts left over with this moulding, but I've been using it to frame up small fossil fish without glass. They sell quite well!




https://www.timeless.gallery/product-pa ... -display-6

Thanks again for the instructions. I'll have a play around over the next few weeks. I was also wondering if I could buy discontinued bare wood stock super-cheap and just 'driftwood' it up. Then at least the rebate etc would be there. I think that outer moulding in the pic was discontinued stock at 40p/m

Cheers

Jon

[Steve N]

The Minnesota range, this one only has the milled detail on the inner edge is £5.58 per metre
https://www.djsimons.co.uk/index.php?ro ... gory_id=59

Depends on how may you want to make, if it's one, then it's a no-brainer, buy a length from Simons

[poliopete]

In your opening post you say you "use loads of it". In that case, i would be looking at, as you say, buying discontinude bare wood super chaep and "driftwooding" it up using some of the methods suggested especially the quicker methods.

I'm not sure if prices should be quoted here but have a look at Frintons sale mouldings up to 70% off. There are some that your finish could be achieved with a palm sander and minimum effort. When hand finishing speed is a very important factor.

These days I am not to proud to haggle with a supplier over the price if I am in a position to "clear" up the remaining stock.

[Ed209]

Come and get my neighbours decking now he has just jet washed it with a rather powerful industrial hot water jet washer [emoji3]


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[GeoSpectrum]

Rose and Hollis sell an unfinished rough sawn moulding, its 48mm flat I think and with a shallow rebate but it might be of use to you.

[Not your average framer]

There are two profiles in the Simons Minnesota range, a smaller one (already shown) and a larger one. The larger one looks like this:

https://www.djsimons.co.uk/index.php?ro ... =minnesota