John and June are my wifes grandparents and somewhat of an inspiration as they have been happily married for fourty years. I was asked to see if I could make them a simply piece of word art that could be signed by everybody in the family but had limited time to do so.
I’d seen bits in shops like this but who wants to buy something like this when they can make their own!
We had plenty of spare 18mm MDF left over from a recent project but I wanted something a bit more solid. The answer of course two pieces of MDF glued together to a make a nice solid 36mm sheet.
The template was stuck on with spray adhesive and left for a few hours to dry.
Scrollsawing the MDF to the template was simple enough and some light sanding on the bench sander smoothed the edges nicely. Care was of course taken during the cutting and sanding process as MDF contains some pretty nasty chemicals that don’t want to be breathed in. In hindsight while the scrollsaw worked, it might have been better done on the bandsaw.
Although the scrollsaw was fantastic for the the smaller more intricate inner cuts
Before painting the item I primed it with a water/PVA mix as MDF soaks up paint and would leave a rough surface. This worked well as it only took a single coat of white furniture paint to obtain an acceptable finish however I’d had felt better if I had time to do another.
I used some of the offcuts from the scrollsaw to make some test pieces to see how it would like once painted and drawn on.
The finished item was signed by all the family and presented to John and June on their 40th anniversary with much delight!
If I had more time I would have liked to have taken the item away to have it spray varnish to protect the work but now it sits happily on their mantle.
*Update*
John and June sadly passed away since this post was made but this scrollsaw piece was burried with them. I feel privileged to have known them, be part of their family and to have had the chance to make something so personal for them.
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