Author Topic: What is the best way to cut, drill and polish antler?  (Read 15733 times)

Offline Barefoot-Leather

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What is the best way to cut, drill and polish antler?
« on: October 10, 2010, 04:49:41 AM »
Has anyone got any experience (and advice to offer) as I have a need to cut, drill and polish some chunky red deer antler 'beads' to use as closures on leather pouches and to make some 'buttons' for hand knitted woollens. What machines would do the job best?

All suggestions gratefully received!

Thanks,

Ray
Some mornings, it's just not worth chewing through the leather straps.

Offline Bogstandard

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Re: What is the best way to cut, drill and polish antler?
« Reply #1 on: October 10, 2010, 08:10:06 AM »
Because I expect you will be requiring to show off the original outer surface, I don't think lathe and milling machines would be much use.

But I am sure you will be able to achieve almost everything with either a band saw or scroll saw to cut into discs, and to shape items, then a drill press for putting holes thru. A belt sander with some very fine finish belts could take care of surface roughness caused by sawing, followed by a small buffing machine to get the shine back.

I would treat the material as though it were a very hard wood or plastic. For buffing, you can buy compounds specifically for hard plastics, and it works very well.

If you would like to try it out, next time Stew comes across to visit you, I can send a lump of the soap for you to try out first, before investing in any. You would have to buy your own loose leaf buffing wheel though.

If you can mount and electric drill to your bench, I think that would take care of your turning and buffing problems until you wanted to go deeper into it.


Bogs


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Offline cidrontmg

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Re: What is the best way to cut, drill and polish antler?
« Reply #2 on: October 10, 2010, 09:00:40 AM »
My experience with horn material is from some knife handles, and reindeer antlers. Just like Bogs said, all the same methods that apply to hard wood or plastic work for horn as well. I used rouge with a flap wheel for polishing, I didn´t have anything else at the moment. Worked quite OK.  A nuisance was getting big enough flat pieces for the handles without cracks. Unlike plastic or wood, horn (reindeer at least) can have cracks inside the material. But I think that doesn´t apply to what you´re doing, buttons and beads would seem rather small in comparison to knife handles. Another big nuisance is the nasty smell, especially when sanding. Quite nauseating... I guess you just have to tolerate it, for a good cause...   :thumbup:
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Olli
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Offline Barefoot-Leather

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Re: What is the best way to cut, drill and polish antler?
« Reply #3 on: October 10, 2010, 02:49:18 PM »
Thanks for the advice guys. I already have a small pillar drill and a belt sander - albeit both are somewhat primitive - and hope to acquire a bandsaw sometime soon so it looks like I'm all set.

Bogs, many thanks for the offer of some polishing soap, I may well take you up on that! However, I already have compounds for polishing silver - red (jeweller's rouge?) - plus some green and some blue stuff that I use to get a shine on brass buckles. As you can tell, I'm not exactly au fait with polishing LOL - Would any of those compounds do or do I need something entirely different? Any idea where i might get it from? Sorry to ask so many daft questions but I'm completely out of my depth here.

I do have a polishing machine fitted with two stitched cotton buffing wheels. I was hoping this might be suitable. Any thoughts as it doesn't have an adjustable speed control.

Cheers,

Ray
Some mornings, it's just not worth chewing through the leather straps.

Offline cidrontmg

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Re: What is the best way to cut, drill and polish antler?
« Reply #4 on: October 10, 2010, 07:47:55 PM »
I´m not much into polishing, but I do have some stuff for it. Sisal, felt and cotton flap wheels, and four sorts of sticks to do the trick. I think the recommendation is, Red is for "coloured" soft metals, brass, bronze, copper, silver and gold (the last two haven´t appeared in the shop lately in significant numbers, I´m afraid). The Green stick is for "hard" metals, chrome plated, stainless, hardened steel, nickel, platinum, etc. The blue and white sticks are for anything else. I usually try what works best, and use that, disregarding what they´re actually intended for...   The white stick is often best with aluminium, but not always, there are different grades of ali, also cast and drawn pieces behave differently, etc. Blue is often best for cast iron.
I seem to work with red rouge by far most often, the green stick I´ve used for a few cm´s while I´ve bought 3 sticks of rouge. Or it might be because the red stick is softer? I do a lot of my stuff in brass, so that might also explain it. And rouge seems to polish just about anything pretty good. Even wood.
There are special polishing compounds available for horn material, but I´d first try the metal polishes. They work usually just fine, with non-metals also.
So, what you might do is to try what works best. The green stick I´d probably skip, horn is far too soft for it. When buffing, use very little of the compound only and don´t overheat the workpiece (don´t  press too hard!). Polishing horn should not be smelly - if it is, you´re slightly burning it.   
And of course, before you even try polishing, the surface must be smooth and without scratches - the usual wet´n dry emery paper routine, 100, 280, 400, 800, 1200, as you know. That´s the smelly work...
And, when you try what works best, wash the workpiece between each trial, so there´s nothing left of the previous compound!
I wouldn´t worry about speed control, as long as the wheels are of "normal" sizes (15-20 cm dia.). If the wheels are a lot bigger, and they turn really fast, they will start to disintegrate, throwing lint everywhere, and easily catching the workpiece, throwing it into the worst accessible corner of your shop... Then it would be a good idea to slow the machine down.
Hope this helps, although it is mostly about polishing metals. Good luck with the antlers!
 :wave:
Olli
Penafiel
Portugal

Offline Bogstandard

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Re: What is the best way to cut, drill and polish antler?
« Reply #5 on: October 10, 2010, 11:10:51 PM »
Ray,

This is the compound I use. The very last one on this page.

http://www.caswelleurope.co.uk/bufwheel.htm

Up the page a little, and the loose cotton or the Canton flannel wheels are about the softest buffs you can get

This combination imparts a glass like surface finish with no residue left on the part, as can be seen on the base of this little engine.

http://madmodder.net/index.php?topic=1492.msg14267#msg14267

I actually bought a special plastic buff wheel that is made from strands of cotton rather than discs, but at this time, I can't remember where I obtained it from.


Bogs





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Location - Crewe, Cheshire

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Offline Barefoot-Leather

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Re: What is the best way to cut, drill and polish antler?
« Reply #6 on: October 11, 2010, 02:09:47 AM »
Thanks muchly for all the help, guys. I'm itching to get into the workshop and get on with it now! I'll be ordering a Canton wheel later today...

BTW: That really is a great little engine, Bogs. I watched the video three times!

Cheers, :beer:

Ray
Some mornings, it's just not worth chewing through the leather straps.

Offline steamboatmodel

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Re: What is the best way to cut, drill and polish antler?
« Reply #7 on: October 11, 2010, 12:24:16 PM »
Ray,
Set up a board outside that you can flood with water and use wet and dry papers. Work your way up from rough grits up to ultra fine then polish. For cutting I used hacksaws.
Regards,
Gerald.
Be wary of strong drink. It can make you shoot at tax collectors--and miss. Lazarus Long

Offline Gerhard Olivier

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Re: What is the best way to cut, drill and polish antler?
« Reply #8 on: October 11, 2010, 05:39:47 PM »
I would use these for final polish -with lots of water
Soft Touch Pads for Sanding and Polishing by Micro-Mesh
Can be purchased from Ebay or from most pen making supplies
Takes a bit of time but get a very high gloss

Gerhard
Guernsey
Channel Islands