BRIEF FROM A TALK BY PAUL GREGSON TO WOODWORKERS GROUP 19th June 2006

You visit a garage sale of a previous buyer of one of your creations. You remember it well. There was the planning of the shape, careful selection of the lumber, the excising of the composite joints and the convoluted but intricate assembly and subsequent sculpturing after holding it together with the best 'rock hard' adhesive that will, in its solid form, have all the promises of lasting decades if not centuries. You then remember the endless and faultless smoothing and the laying of a finish that was rubbed and smoothed to a silken feel.

BUT at the garage sale, you find your creation discarded - up for sale - one or two members fractured and with loose joints and its surface showing the damage of domestic usage - almost embarrassing - certainly! Shocking and indeed, thought provoking - How could this happen?

So you buy it cheaply and anonymously and retreat back to the workshop to refurbish the item (for resale perhaps). It is here that you find that some of the joints need dismantling to repair properly - but you used the super dooper extra hard adhesive and quite can't see how the complex joint can come apart easily. The finish - badly marked would have to be completely removed as any new coats will not mechanically bond with the old surface and any colour patches due to repairs will show up paler than the adjacent surfaces.

I am not here to talk about my work (the care and conservation of items from the last 3-4 hundred years and the making of wooden and mixed media items) but to convey my experiences and philosophies that my work has taught me.

I ask you all - how long do you want your pieces to last and in what condition?

From a preservation point of view, in my opinion, it should be able to be serviced (repaired) and enhanced if it is worth it, monetarily or culturally and if there is acknowledgement that the best timber resources are in short supply, then perhaps that itself should engender some thought to the creation's future and future use.

So - of all the best items I have handled, the reversibility /repairability are obviously the used (choice of material, engineering, design, the item are also other factors).

two areas of expertise that allow glue used and the surface coating form and mobility of the wood or

The glue that I use in all antique and new items is protein or animal glue.
(PVA may be seldom used where appropriate ). Some of you will already use it, some will think about it but most of you will be frightened of it - unfortunately. May I suggest that the group comprised of the latter and those who want to see their work survive do some research, ask questions and practise - it is easy. I have written articles over the years in "The Australian Woodworker" on the subject but other sources of information obviously exist - BUT BEWARE - some internet sourced info is not necessarily 'gospel' truth. The only way to learn its use is to ask questions and practise the answers and see it demonstrated. Please feel free to write to me directly or through The Australian Woodworker.

Surface Coating
Most of the historic finishes I am familiar with on wooden objects are quite
organic in origin, not chemically synthesised and outlast coatings of the 20th Century. The finishes that have outlasted all others are those based on shellac, lac (urushi), oil varnishes and polymerised 'vegetable' oil.

By far the easiest for both amateur and professional woodworkers to use is shellac (in its various forms and proportions).

It can be: (a) brushed (using best quality varnish brushes) (brushed, cut and polished
(c) levelled with a pad (rubber) in the French method
(devised by MARTIN family in l8thC.) and

The stagnant mindset with most woodworking is that no matter what the choice of (solid or manufactured) wood products, they must be clear finished. And so it is that some very ordinary material can look very 'ordinary' with a 'natural' finish.

WOOD IS A MEDIUM FOR GETTING A SHAPE - the choice of material should reflect the attention to enhancement.

SOME TIMBER SURFACE ENHANOEMENTS

Colours Example

Vegetable solids in oil e.g. Alkanetroot

Vegetable solids in spirits e.g. Dragon blood, gum acroides

Vegetable base in H20 Walnut crystals, coffee

Mineral based in turpentine Asphaltum

Dye in spirits Anilines

Colours in oils Oxides, crushed earths

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Reactants

Fuming Ammonia

Weak acids Nitric, oxalic

Oxidants Potassium dichromate or permanganate

Solid Colours
Paint (casein, acrylic) Single colour, graining, spattering, faux/marbling fantasy etc.

Gilding Gold/silver leaf Brass leaf

Metals
Complex inlays or lines

Finishes

Best clear or solid Japanese urushi

Shellac In many of its forms and applications from 'white' to 'brown'

Oils Cold pressed, adjusted or synthetic Tung - blended

Spirit varnishes (other than shellac) 'Violin varnish'

'Carriage' varnish Long oil

Waxes_ Variable quality - most poorly used

The above is a mere summary of some of the products applied to wooden goods
And most are still available. The practitioners must exhaust all avenues to correctly
enhance their surfaces.

Paul Gregson can be contacted at 14 Railway Parade, Thornleigh NSW 2120 or Australian Woodworker, PO Box 514, Hazelbrook NSW 2779.