I'm Out of Ideas

hey this is cam with black tail studio and that was a couple clips from this week's video where i take this chunk of ponderosa pine and turn it into something pretty unusual and it all starts right here with this dangerously underpowered chainsaw it is battery powered so i don't know what i should expect but all i'm really trying to do is kind of imitate one of those swedish fire logs that they use to heat up pots or warm your hands around the campfire and you'll probably notice it looks really nice out and oregon is not that cold but it's also not this nice and this was actually taken last summer at my old house and in the midst of this project we bought a new house moved shop so this project kind of got put on the back burner so you'll notice the first part of this project is in this gravel pit and then the second part of the project is in my new shop you'll notice this is definitely not a video on how to make a swedish fire torch or swedish fire log whatever you call it i found that alcohol is often the answer to most problems and it turned out it worked pretty well here too but i did leave it for a little bit too long and it got away from me this is not the look i was going for but in the end i figured i could make it work i do get a lot of comments from people about wearing flip flops in the shop all summer long and my plan is basically to keep wearing flip-flops until i lose that first toe i feel like i could lead a pretty happy life with nine toes and if i end up losing like a bunch of toes at once then i will really wish i listened to everybody but for now i'm gonna keep wearing the flip-flops in the summer until i lose that first toe and you can see here i got my little stump flattening jig that i've made and it's just a pretty simple cube that i made out of aluminum extrusion and it's a little light duty it does start to sag a little bit in the middle so i have to kind of take that weight off of it but other than that it actually works really really well i actually really don't like the router that i use in this setup but i really like the router bit it's an amana one and a half inch insert style bit with those replaceable rotatable blades and it's not a sponsored post or anything it's just a tool that i really like and i use all the time and speaking of tools that i really like and use all the time is this week's video sponsor cutsall and no i'm not about to cut away to an ad read because this week the video is the sponsor and the sponsor is the video because i know some of you guys cannot stand it when i do an ad read that is completely unrelated to the video so this video is dedicated to you guys these are the cutsall xtreme carving burrs they have a whole carving tool line they are all made from tungsten carbide bonded to steel handmade right here in the usa they essentially never get dull i learned in the process of making this table that this pattern is an actual phobia it's called like trypophobia and i'm sure i'm saying that wrong but if you think that you've had people that just didn't like your work before you should see people that have a genuine phobia disgust of your work because there are some people that hate this so much that i would be willing to bet if you have it you have not made it this far in the video because they are completely grossed out by this particular pattern i've never actually met an armchair fire marshal in real life but there are a ton of them in youtube comments so i wanted to make sure everybody was completely satisfied with my process for burning this log so i made sure to wet down the gravel keep that propane bottle a long ways away from my weed burner propane torch and then i just started burning it and this wasn't really something i had planned i didn't know how much it was going to burn i didn't know how deep i was gonna burn it and as i started getting into it i just liked the look and kept burning it and it was a lot of fun actually because it burns really quick and it takes care of a lot of the sanding you have to do with that extreme burr because if you wanted to get a little bit finer pattern you could go to one of those fine sanding burrs but i ended up only using that extreme bur and the burning essentially took care of all the sanding for me if you think this project is weird right now it is going to keep getting weirder i go with the bruce aryan's no risk it no biscuit mentality when it comes to some of the style choices i make later on so do me a favor if you've enjoyed what you've seen up to this point hit the like button right now if you think you'd enjoy being subscribed to my channel hit the subscribe button right now before you change your mind if you decide to tackle a similar project do yourself a favor and don't let it burn past the sides on the top where those little v shapes are they made my life a lot more difficult and you'll see why here in just a little bit but i was sure to put it out with water i obviously didn't want any of that water interfering with the next step so i made sure to let it dry probably for a good week or so before moving on to the next step and the next step is adding epoxy my wife says give the people what they want they want to see more epoxy projects give them epoxy so i'm working epoxy into this charred stump and what i'm doing is kind of a mix of the japanese shotsugiban or the yakasugi if you want to use the correct word for it but what i'm using is this liquid glass deep pore epoxy and the reason i am using the deep pore epoxy is because it is very slow curing and traditionally the shosuke bond they'll use like a linseed oil or a tongue oil to kind of harden up that charred wood and i'm essentially doing the same thing with this liquid glass epoxy it's going to not cure for about three days so you won't get any bubbles if you used a fast drying epoxy you'd get a ton of bubbles and this is going to soak in and really stabilize and harden up that charred wood and if you haven't figured out exactly what i'm doing yet is i'm gonna fill this entire void with crystal clear epoxy and i've never seen anything like this done before i don't know how it's gonna turn out but i think it could be cool so we're gonna do it and what i was doing is doing shallow pours about two or three inches per and it wasn't a lot of volume but it was a lot of inches and if you pour too thick you can get the to overheat and cause it to crack so i just took my time and each layer i kind of just basted that wood so by the time i got up to the top all the wood was completely saturated very cured completely hard no loose charcoal that's going to cause a lot of bubbles and what i did was i just waited till it was just soft kind of starting to set up like this and then i'd pour my next layer and that was usually about 16 18 hours in between pours and if i waited 24 it wasn't a big deal or even 36 just didn't want it to cure all the way if i could help it every week i try to make a point to thank you guys for all the support you've given me because i know all of my success is due to everything that you guys do whether it's commenting liking sharing or even those trolls that leave the comments that i post at the end of the videos so if you do get tired of this video make sure to at least skip to the end first because i have a new segment that i'm going to try to roll out each week where i try to bring up some new younger youtubers because so much of the success on youtube is just getting that first big break because if you have amazing work it's not going to matter unless anybody sees it so i'm going to try a new segment where i bring up some really cool really talented young youtubers and hopefully get them their first couple thousand subscribers and then they can maybe launch their own career and quit their job like i did one of the most common problems i hear about with people on their epoxy projects is something that nobody really talks about i don't even know if i've addressed it in a video before but people tend to finish these epoxy projects too fast they say this epoxy cures in 72 hours and that's kind of true but i actually let my tables cure for like three weeks to a month before finishing them because what can happen is that epoxy continues to cure and shrink slightly and it can give you a kind of a slightly wrinkly finish if you do it too soon so give it a good couple weeks not less than a week at least depending on the temperature but that will save you a lot of problems and that's something that nobody really talks about i just learned about this really cool trick that guitar makers use and that is spritzing the area down with water and don't get on your cast iron otherwise you'll end up with a very rusty tool the next morning but what that does is any dust in the air will settle on that damp surface and not get blown back up into your finish and the finish that i'm using is the liquid glass tabletop epoxy and you can see that i have it labeled clearly because it's a different epoxy you don't want to mix these with your deep pore epoxy the great thing about this tabletop epoxy is it is self-leveling whereas that deep pour is kind of wrinkly and it shrinks this will finish just like glass but you'll notice i did a really bad job mixing and what i did was i folded it in like cake batter whereas apparently what you want to do is you want to stir it like a teacup and i learned this from the guys at liquid glass so what i had to do is kind of stay on this for about 10 or 15 minutes and kept popping those bubbles with the torch as they continued to rise so it was kind of a pain and the next round i did a much better job but you can see just how clear and like that tabletop epoxy is it is completely self-leveling you can see it has a perfect reflection there so all in all pretty good just have one more pour to do i have always struggled with this tabletop type epoxy and i had different ways of spreading it i tried those kind of notched trowels like used for grout and it turns out the hot ticket is doing this spaghetti sauce method this is something i learned from the guys at liquid glass you just start in the middle and spread it out and let it self level and it does help if the epoxy is warmed up a little bit to about like 80 degrees or so you don't want to get it too hot and then you do need to pop the bubbles with the torch unlike the deep pore epoxy and after that it really is that easy all you have to deal with is any little dust nibs and i'll show you how to deal with that here in just a little bit but if you're thinking this project is cool and you don't want me to screw it up i got one more treat for you and one more way i can potentially lose a good portion of these viewers with some more die grinding when i was doing all those pores i had a number of drips that ran down the side and i knew that i was going to have to address them one way or another i just wasn't exactly sure how so i got my brand new electric die grinder and i put in a cut saw fine sphere and i started carving out the drips and i looked down and i thought that it actually looked kind of cool so i just ran with it and i think this is going to be one of those really really divisive design aspects because i think it's going to be similar to the fire table how i had the one spot that kind of burned through and left the natural wood on the charred table and i swear to god half the people absolutely loved it and half the people despised it so i think this is gonna be a similar thing so by the time this video is done let me know in the comments whether you like this or not because my wife looked at it and she actually really liked this table up to this point and she said those are gonna be black again right and i go no they're gonna stay like this and she just goes oh and i think we all know what the o means is the o means i hate that but i think it looks cool i think some of you will think it looks cool but i also think some of you guys are going to hate it so let me know in the comments what you think of leaving the contrasting colors i got a lot of questions on social media instagram and even tick tock yes i am pushing 40 years old and i am on tick tock but a lot of people wanted to know about that stump flattening jig and it's just something i rigged up from extrusion i think once i get a little bit better version i might make a blog post about it if you don't know i do have a blog that has a ton of information basically everything i make a video on i try to do a blog also because some people like to have something to read to reference to and other people just like to watch the video and kind of zone out so i'll include the links to my blog and really everything in this video in the video description below and you might be surprised to hear there is not a lot of literature out there on how to finish a stump that is carved with a trypophobia pattern then burned then filled with epoxy and then carved with more tripophobia so what i am doing is just kind of winging it and i'm using this rubio monaco and it's a finish that i really like i use it a lot it's really durable although i'm not that worried about the sides of this table facing a lot of water damage and it stays pretty matte just kind of a nice matte to satin finish so i decided to go with that for the finish on the side of this stump if you have carved a stump and texture to stump and burned it and have a better finish i would love for you to comment and let me know what is the perfect finish for this project though i don't just read and respond all the youtube comments i actually really learned something from a lot of them and one of the things i learned from that fire table video was how to properly buff a high gloss finish because i really didn't know what i was doing in that table and i said as much in the video but i had a lot of automotive guys that were really helpful and they told me that this trisac by 3m is the absolute hot ticket for buffing to a very very perfect high luster high gloss and there's always some dust nibs which is why i'm having to do this sanding here this is a 1 500 grit and this trizact is actually some pretty legit sandpaper did an amazing job of buffing this to a mirror finish and you'll see here what a guy with no real experience doing a buff job like this can get but overall it was very simple and it worked really well so thanks to everybody that commented on that video and actually told me the proper steps to buffing to a high gloss which if you're curious is i used the trizact 1500 and then used the traject 3000 with just a little spritz of water and some of the guys said to add a little bit of soap to it i didn't actually add any soap to this here but that is the process and after this then i just buff it with the 3m perfected kit and this i still am not an expert on and just kind of smear a bunch of paste on there and buff it some of the automotive guys said that i shouldn't be using a wool pad so don't copy me here there is probably a better resource for getting this high gloss but in the end it actually worked pretty well for me 3m does give the steps on their website which were a little bit different than what some of the automotive guys and for some reason i tend to trust the people in the field versus the actual companies that manufactured this which probably isn't the smartest thing but for me i always tend to trust people to actually do it every day versus the people that just make it so i buffed it with step one went to step two with a different pad and you can see there the reflection is starting to get really nice and there is a step three that's kind of a really fine machine polish and by the end i was pretty proud of myself because this is the first time that i ever got this really mirror finish and what the automotive guy said is the difference is in that trizact going all the way up to the 3000 before you start this 3m perfected kit so i will give a couple glamour shots you can see my high-tech recording equipment which is an iphone and a couple photography lights and a tripod but that's a pretty good sheen for a guy that doesn't really know what he's doing and i ended up adding a little bit of turtle wax just a regular old paste wax like for your car just for a little bit of added protection and maybe take out some little spider scratches that can happen and that is it that's pretty good sheen and i do have a couple more surprises even still to come in this table i ended up finding these legs on etsy actually there's a shop in the uk and i think they are really cool they are solid brass very high quality i was actually a little bit nervous about ordering these because they were like 125 bucks and i didn't want to spend a bunch of money on a project that i didn't really have any money into but i thought they were cool i thought they would complete the look so i added some threaded inserts i added some regular old furniture bolts and they came in a set of four but i only needed three for this one and i thought they really completed the look this table was pretty far out there so i thought the brass was a nice touch and here is the final surprise this is a light that is on a remote and i got this six pack of lights on amazon i made this simple little steel strap to hold it in there and they're powered by remote and you can change the color you can change the temperature so i thought that it was a pretty cool idea in the end i wasn't quite as happy with it because you'll see here apparently these things are complete garbage so you saw that the puck worked initially with remote and then as soon as i put it in there it didn't work so not too impressed with these puck lights but you are able to turn them on just by pushing them underneath try the remote some more got more frustrated didn't work so probably wouldn't recommend these puck lights however i thought it was kind of interesting it's not going to light up a whole room but it will make kind of an interesting nightlight feature for maybe a corner a little end table part of the room i have to admit this project did not end up how i thought it was going to end up but overall i think it is interesting it's one of those pieces like i don't know that i would put it in my house but it's kind of cool it is a lot harder to see down into the charred wood so that was a little bit disappointing it looks mostly just black if you really get close and really with a lot of light you can see down into it but for the most part it just looks like a glossy top i do think the sides are kind of interesting i wouldn't be opposed to maybe trying some wall panels or something with a similar pattern a lot of people ask me if the charred wood still smells or if you can if it rubs off in your hands and no once it's sealed it is just like plastic it's completely sealed it's completely hard so no issues with that the top was pretty cool it's a fun learning experience with that high gloss aspect so all in all i think it was a pretty fun project all right this part i am really excited about this is what i was referring to earlier in the video every week i want to have a maker spotlight where i highlight a new young up and coming youtuber that just doesn't quite have the subscribers yet and i want to talk about matt's woodworks this week he is an incredibly talented maker he works out of his garage down in southern california and he does all kinds of stuff he made this copper pattern just from a copper sheet he welds he does all kinds of stuff that i cannot do he does some amazing work with veneers so many cool things but he only has like a thousand subscribers so he doesn't have a lot of videos up yet which is why i think he's not quite there so head over to his page be in on the ground floor of match woodworks because he is going to have a huge page eventually i am sure of it all right this week start your question or comment with the emoji that you think best describes this week's project and i promise you cannot offend me so start your question or comment with the emoji that you think best fits that burnt stump and that way i'll know you made it all the way to the end of the video and i promise i will answer all of your questions or comments first as always thank you so much for watching please subscribe for more videos just like this one

Channel: Blacktail Studio

Views: 841,728

Keywords: shou sugi ban, stump table, log furniture, power carving, charred wood, Japanese burnt wood, shousugibon, shou sugi ban pine, sugi ban, japanese wood burning techniques, woodworking projects, diy projects, scrap wood projects, easy wood projects, cabin furniture, amazing woodworking, epoxy end table, epoxy table, river table, resin table, liquid glass epoxy, ecopoxy, fire table, epoxy fire table, wood texture, carved wood table

Id: cL4Q4pYYKYs

Length: 17min 42sec (1062 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 28 2021