All about wood carved chess

A game of chess is a popular board logic game between two rivals. And if you want to surprise a chess lover with an unusual gift, you can give handmade pieces. In the article we will talk about wood carved chess.

To play, you need a board of 64 cells of light and dark colors and special pieces that players move around the field. Figures for the game are also divided into light and dark. There are 32 of them, a set for one player consists of 16 pieces: pawns (8 pieces), horse (2 pieces), elephant (2 pieces), rook (2 pieces), queen (1 piece), king (1 piece). Various materials are used to make the figures, it can be wood, plastic, marble, metal, ivory, onyx and polystone. Carved chess made of wood, which is also suitable as a gift, was widely used among players.

Such chess will appeal to any person with its originality, because painstaking work is needed to create it. Handwork cannot be compared with factory production, each master puts a piece of his soul in each figure. Such products can be manufactured up to several months. Wooden chess can become not only an adornment of collector’s houses, but also serve as a game.

To start cutting wood, the master needs a certain set of tools - these are various chisels and materials for polishing and creating decor for future figures. Chisels are indispensable tools in processing and creating wood decor, in addition, professional carvers can also make special curly cutters specially for themselves. Between themselves, the chisels differ in the shape of the cutting surface.

• Straight. The tool is focused on the initial finishing of wooden workpieces and the creation of simple recesses on them. The name speaks for itself - a direct working blade.
• The chisel is slanting. The blade of this tool is cut obliquely at an angle of 45 degrees. It also serves for primary wood finishing and the formation of longitudinal lines.
• For V-grooves corner chisel, has the form of two paired cutting surfaces that are practically closed together.
• Semicircular - the most famous and common type. They are necessary for applying serifs and patterns, which can be of any complexity.
• Klukarza - its shape is similar to a semicircular chisel, only its working blade is rounded not only at one end, but also along the shaft itself.
• Caesarics - the same klukarza, but with a very small blade (only 2 - 4 millimeters).
• Shtiheli with oblique incisor - needed to create small recesses.
• Chisels of the opposite type or, in simple terms, Tatyana - have a convex notch and serve to create a relief that protrudes above the canvas itself.
• Rivets - Chisels are very small in size, with the same small and thin blade. Need to give the ornament a clearer contours.

To sand products, you need sandpaper (sandpaper). Depending on the grain size, only 3 types of skins are distinguished.

• Coarse grained - needed to remove old coatings, such as paint or varnish.
• Medium grained - her help is needed during the intermediate stages of work, levels the surface.
• Fine-grained - final grinding work is carried out with it, all irregularities from previous sanding are removed.

For the manufacture of chess there is no special breed of wood, the carver himself chooses it, based on the complexity and amount of work. For low-cost models, pine, birch, aspen or linden are used. For premium products - oak, beech or walnut. In order to develop the execution technology and begin to manufacture chess, a sketch should be prepared. He is needed so that later the figures do not differ and are the same size. The drawing begins with the choice of the height of the future figure and the outline of the base.

Draw the desired stand, already at this stage create the edges and bends of the pedestal. Next, outline the center and draw a vertical axis. This is done so that the figure is even and symmetrical. Then draw the top (head, hat, face and so on). It all depends on the imagination of the master, because it is he who designs the body parts, cloak, shield, sword, various patterns, etc. The next step is to draw the template itself for the workpiece. To do this, around the main drawing-sketch, a kind of "allowance" is made.

The blanks are cut from wooden blocks with a square cross section. Since 32 pieces are needed for the game, there will be as many blanks. A ready-made stencil is transferred to each face (for a horse, two drawings are needed - one on the side and the second on the front). Then the shapes are cut out according to the profile of the transferred sketch. Having cut the figure on one side, the workpiece is turned over and the next facet is cut. The preparatory work is completed, the approximate outlines of future chess are already visible, now the most creative moment has come - carving.

The most popular do-it-yourself chess technology for beginners has become the technique of turning out plywood. To do this, ready-made sketches are transferred using a pencil to a prepared piece of plywood, its desired thickness of 3 millimeters. Then, using a jigsaw, the blanks and holes are carefully cut along the contour - they can be made using a thin drill or drill. It will also be necessary to make 32 round pieces resembling checkers - they will serve as stands for chess.

After all the figures are cut, grinding begins - it is needed in order to remove excess pieces of wood, notches from the edges.The next stage is the assembly, the finished parts are connected to the base - you can fasten it with glue. The figures are divided in half, 16 pieces must be painted in a dark color, for example with acrylic paint. After the paint has dried, all chess, including white, is varnished.

Chess is ready, it remains to make a field for the game - a chessboard. The polished square piece of plywood is pre-varnished, this is done immediately, because on an unvarnished surface the paint will begin to creep between the fibers of the tree, and clear beautiful squares will no longer work. Then a stencil is applied - you can use masking tape. Having pasted it onto the future chess field, 64 identical squares are drawn and with the help of a clerical knife, excess pieces are carefully cut out.

Now, like figures, a chessboard can be painted with acrylic paint. After it has dried, remove the stencil from the remnants of adhesive tape and again varnish. The edges of the board can be decorated with window glazing, its price is not high. To do this, on four sides, also using glue, the glazing bead is fixed in the form of a frame.

The accelerated chess carving course is presented below.