Making a soup spoon
My wife prefers wooden utensils, and we both love hand made stuff – so I grabbed a piece of birch that I saved from a small tree I cut down a couple of years ago. Back then I cut a couple of blanks intended for just such a project. I planed the surfaces and left the blanks on the shelf where they dried nicely without cracking. I did cut the tree in the middle of the winter, which helps since the trees have the least amount of moisture in them at that time of year.
The scope here is not to produce a perfectly shaped spoon that looks machined. I want it to have a more utilitarian vibe – tool marks, imperfections, nicks and even some crookedness if that happens. Imagine being a farmer back in the 1400’s, asked by his wife to make a soup spoon. It’s git’r done time!
I started using the scorp, realized that it was too big a tool for the spoon, and ended up using the hook knives. The scoop was formed within 10 minutes. 10 minutes of whittling, which is cheap therapy! I love doing that.
For this small baking spoon, the 164 hook knife worked extremely well. It is easy to control the cut, and I can rest the hook on the bottom while using different part of the hook to do work. I am not comfortable enough with the tool yet, so I do not use my thumb to steady the cut just yet – I therefore fasten the work piece in the vise. I might fashion a leather guard for my thumb; I do not want to cut myself! As a musician playing piano / keyboards, I am terrified of injuries to my hands! So I play the safe game here.
After hollowing out the scoop of the spoon, I drew a handle and rough-cut the spoon on the band saw.
An annoying knot, but it should not be a problem…
Using the whittling knife and a spokeshave, I roughed out the shape of the handle and the spoon. To give the spoon its final shape, I resorted to rasps and files, then some sand paper to finalize the shape.
I put the spoon in the vise and went to town on it using my cabinet rasp. I really ought to get at hand-stitched rasp, but boy are they pricey! A machine stitched rasp often render the surface looking like a sand dune in places. When that happens, change angle of attack.
After giving the handle a rough-cut shape, I used a gooseneck card scraper to refine the shape and make it more round. Not perfectly round – I could use the lathe for that, but then we would end up in machine made world…
Here’s how I refined the outside of the spoon – I laid the rasp flat on the bench and made swooping motions while rotating the spoon. This made the shape uniform and without facets.
I then mounted my Mirka sanding block in the vise, added the foam cushion attachment and 120 grit Abranet.
This is a HIGHLY effective way to smooth the tool marks from the rasp! The built-in dust collection in the sanding block is really effective! As you can see: no clogging of the sand paper!
I then switched to 240 grit and gave the spoon the final sanding. I also sanded the inside of the spoon and rounded over the tip of the handle.
And here it is – a finished spoon made from birch wood I got from a tree in the forest.
I dunked the spoon in walnut oil – and this is the only useful thing from IKEA you’ll find in my shop: the ziplock plastic bag. I put the spoon in the bag and some walnut oil, sealed the bag while squeezing out the air and left the spoon soaking for a couple of hours.
After soaking, I dried off the excess oil. The grain in the birch really pops here!
Here’s the final product. If the wood grain “rises” a bit after using it, I’ll sand it again with some 240 grit paper and wipe it with some oil.
To me, this kind of project is incredibly satisfying! Whittling a useful object, using the wonderful knives from Morakniv – that’s therapy! And it is less plastic in the household, which is a Good ThingTM!
I give my full endorsement to the knives from Morakniv – the quality is absolutely top notch, and they are very comfortable to use. Their usefulness in the shop will certainly be demonstrated in later projects.
The whittling knife I bought has proven its value already. I’ll let the following image make my POINT:
