Stage One
The hand carved products are brought to
a solar oven, where they're brought down
to below 30% MC (moisture content) as
measured with non-invasive and invasive
Delmhorst wood lumber meters.
Stage Two
In Stage Two, the items are put into
propane fired kilns where they're
brought down in stages at varying
temperatures to 20% MC and then again to
below 10% MC.
After this, we continue with Stage
Two by raising the temperature high
enough (80°-90°C or 176°-194°F) to
insure that there are no parasites in
the wood. Because most hand carved wood
products are varying wall thicknesses
which makes drying difficult, we “lose”
a percentage of products in the
process. However, we're willing to do
this to ensure a perfectly clean and
sanitary wood piece, and we also use the
"lost" wood for repairs so as not to
waste anything.
Stage
Three
During Stage Three, we sand the
product to smooth the rough carving into
the desired shape. This is all done by
eye so every piece is unique, sizes are
not exact, and products are not
perfectly square. The beauty of the
completely unique piece can be seen at
this time!
Stage
Four
Fourth stage is repairing the
checking (cracks) that have been
uncovered by the sanding or caused by
the drying process. We use teak sawdust
and hot glue to seal the cracks and
smooth the surface.
Stage
Five
Stage Five is where we complete the
finishing process and put each piece
through a complete Quality Control
check. |
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Fresh cut Monkey Pod tree limbs
ready to be rough cut by chain
saw for use in carving.
Carvers work with simple tools
by eye and are trained by each
other.
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