To you builders who practice the art of engraving.

[Bullit]

I think this is something that should be taken up while a young man or woman. The eyes are good, the hands steady and time is on your side. I've noticed that doing leatherwork, which I have done since my youth, that the biggest obstacle in my advancing years is vision. Whereas I used to get blue ribbons for my work, I don't think I'd even place today.

 

[Nick_of_time]

It's been about 6 month of on-and-off practicing since I started engraving. Some thoughts:

• 1+ on Shippler's book. I have copy of Meek that I've been looking at for many years and it glosses over a couple of very important points. Shippler is written for the beginner. Also Shippler's book is directed at the kind of engraving you want to do.
• Speaking of the beginning - a previous poster was right about sharpening. For that reason i recommend the Air Graver (Steve Lindsay) sharpening templates. They take most of the guesswork out of it, which puts you ahead of the game.
• One thing about using Lindsay gravers (once sharpened) with Shippler's book is that you need to find a way to hold the cutter while you hit it with the hammer. I just drilled a hole in some 3/8" drill rod for the graver, added a set screw to keep it tight, and started whacking away. That's a cheap and cheerful way to get going to see if it's something you want to do. One of my tools is pictured below
• And back to sharpening one more time - both Meek and Shippler emphasize the importance of the "heel" you add to each cutting face. The length of that heel is very important. The smaller the heel you create, the tighter curves you can make. The longer the heel, the better the cutter will follow a straight line. I now keep two handy, one with a shorter (1/64") heel, and one longer (3/64"). Wish I'd realized that about 3 months ago...
• Use brass and steel practice plates - to my surprise take about the same effort engrave.
• Your practice plates are usually flat. Some gun parts are not. You'll need to find a way to practice on the same curve that, say, the top of the buttplate has.
• It won't be long before you're looking at every flat, unadorned part of a gun, and thinking "a couple of scrolls would look nice there"
• Also pictured are my first practice plate, and my latest one. I can't draw and my handwriting is really bad, but I'm making progress

 

[waarp8nt]

Gentleman, just a heads up; Schipper’s book on Engraving Historic Firearms is on sale at the Nation Muzzleloading Rifle Association Store website. $69 instead of $129

 

[ronaldrothb49]

Hi,
Meek's book is not very helpful. The best book to have is John Schippers "Engraving Historical Firearms" . Meeks book provides nice examples of drawings and letters but is not very useful for learning to engrave. Likewise, none of the gravers you bought will be very useful. Don't try to start engraving trying to hand push the cutter. Use hammer and chisel gravers. You only need 3 gravers to do virtually all engraving found on American long rifles, small and larger square gravers and a small flat. Go to Airgraver.com and search for their hand chisels and get 3 square HSS graver blanks and chisel handles. Then go to their sharpening section and buy the stones and templates for sharpening. I recommend the 90 degree detail template and the flat template. Get a good chasing hammer as well. You need good lighting, magnification and a vise system that can hold the work and preferably spin so you can cut around curves smoothly. This thread will also help.
Some thoughts about learning to engrave

I think Jack Brooks may have a cd on engraving that might help.

dave

I learned to engrave from John Schippers. I had many opportunities to watch John work, He was a master at engraving and carving. Most engraving on guns is done with a hand held graver and a hammer. you not trying to drive a nail so instead of one hard hit you will be doing many light taps. Practice is how you will really learn

 

[dave_person]

It's been about 6 month of on-and-off practicing since I started engraving. Some thoughts:

• 1+ on Shippler's book. I have copy of Meek that I've been looking at for many years and it glosses over a couple of very important points. Shippler is written for the beginner. Also Shippler's book is directed at the kind of engraving you want to do.
• Speaking of the beginning - a previous poster was right about sharpening. For that reason i recommend the Air Graver (Steve Lindsay) sharpening templates. They take most of the guesswork out of it, which puts you ahead of the game.
• One thing about using Lindsay gravers (once sharpened) with Shippler's book is that you need to find a way to hold the cutter while you hit it with the hammer. I just drilled a hole in some 3/8" drill rod for the graver, added a set screw to keep it tight, and started whacking away. That's a cheap and cheerful way to get going to see if it's something you want to do. One of my tools is pictured below
• And back to sharpening one more time - both Meek and Shippler emphasize the importance of the "heel" you add to each cutting face. The length of that heel is very important. The smaller the heel you create, the tighter curves you can make. The longer the heel, the better the cutter will follow a straight line. I now keep two handy, one with a shorter (1/64") heel, and one longer (3/64"). Wish I'd realized that about 3 months ago...
• Use brass and steel practice plates - to my surprise take about the same effort engrave.
• Your practice plates are usually flat. Some gun parts are not. You'll need to find a way to practice on the same curve that, say, the top of the buttplate has.
• It won't be long before you're looking at every flat, unadorned part of a gun, and thinking "a couple of scrolls would look nice there"
• Also pictured are my first practice plate, and my latest one. I can't draw and my handwriting is really bad, but I'm making progress

Hi,
You are doing pretty well, but your curves are rough and your line depths are uneven. It looks like your heel is dragging around the curves producing a step like roughness. Try keeping the heel very small. The Lindsay templates make it easy to form the heel but the gravers only need 5-6 strokes on each side on the finest stone to make the heel. Are you able to spin the work? That helps a lot. I urge you to practice straight lines a lot more. You need to keep them even and cutting parallel lines is the best practice of all, much more effective than cutting scrolls. Spend more time learning the basics before trying to do scrolls and complicated designs. Schipper's book (it is Schipper not Schippler) is great for learning how to make your gravers and do the basic cuts. You appear to be copying his designs, which is fine but realize they are his modern work and not necessarily representative of original guns. Again, I urge you to spend much more time cutting straight even parallel lines.

dave