Est. 1998 — 27 years of woodworking knowledge
Turning ebony drawer pulls?
Ron Berlier, Sacramento, CA
>Hello all!
I'm interested in turning a few drawer pulls and making them from ebony, the expensive stuff )-:
I would like to know if this a difficult wood to work with, what would be a good turning speed and what might the special problems, if any, be turning/working with ebony.
TIA, from a VERY inexperienced turner -
Ron
Re: Turning ebony drawer pulls?
Richard Allen
>Hi Ron
Your biggest problem with ebony is that you are going to love the way it turns, sands and finishes.
BTW you can wet sand (with water) ebony.
Thanks
Richard
Oh yea, ebony likes to crack so make sure you don't over heat the wood when sanding and put a finish on it.
Re: Turning ebony drawer pulls?
Brad Vietje
>Ebony is pretty brittle, but turns very nicely. Richard's advice about sanding is spot on -- sand lightly with fresh abrasives, and be careful not to overheat.
Due to the cost of the wood, pick up some good rock maple to practice on first.
Safe spinning,
Brad Vietje
Thetford, VT
Re: Turning ebony drawer pulls?
e
>the hardest part for me was prototyping the shape --- i used some scrap ipe, which has very similar properties to ebony.
in fact, i liked the ipe so much that i used it for knobs on another project.
Re: Turning ebony drawer pulls?
John Lucas
>Others have echoed my experience with ebony. I'll add one more thing. My usual lacquer finish didn't look as good for me. The reason was it was too plastic looking. I knocked it down with some 4/0 wool and liked it better. It looked more like wood.
Re: Turning ebony drawer pulls?
RonZ
>I can't add much to what has been written below except that you might want to use either blackwood with sap wood or magasscar [sp?] for a more wood like finish. I made some checkers for the kids of ebony and pink ivory. While they might look plastic like, the kids enjoy them.
Oh, BTW, the ebony might be dust but a dream to work on especially with a skew.
Re: Turning ebony drawer pulls? *LINK*
RevDoug
>Also, watch the dust on your skin and in your lungs. Many folks are allergic. One friend of my is so allergic to ebony that he gave me all of it he had just ordered and will not come by if I've been cutting or turning it in the past week.
Turn 'em round,
RevDoug
Wood Spun Round
Re: Turning ebony drawer pulls?
Barry Turner
>My experience with Ebony is limited mostly to Gaboon Ebony, although I just turned a small lidded bowl from Macassar Ebony. The Macassar is absolutely beautiful and is reminescent of tortoiseshell. Ebony is very hard and brittle. It is very difficult to drill and turn. It takes a very high polish and is beautiful when finished with a friction finish like Myland's or Crystal Coat. Good luck.
Barry
Re: Turning ebony drawer pulls?
Scott Thorburn
>Ron The comments that others have mentioned are correct especially about the cracking and heat.
I also agree that Ebony is normally expensive, but I have a couple of skids of ebony dowels from a pool que manufacture that couldn't compete with offshore manufacturing. If your interested Give me an email and we can discuss price etc.