Stencils for wood carving. How to cut a circle in plywood: selection of tools, shape cutting technologies with a jigsaw, milling cutter and improvised means Using a gas cutter

A jigsaw is a very useful power tool. Using the right file, a little experience and confidence, and most importantly - correct position body, you can do everything with it. You can do many things that cannot be done with other instruments. The machine is used for cutting straight lines, curves, profiles and circle trimming. Great for cutting wood, metal and plastic.

The master showed how to cut a perfect circle with a jigsaw. He made a device out of wood. Its design is simple, and the device itself is easy to manufacture. To get an idea of this, see this image.

Material used:

12 mm plywood sheet. Wooden strip. Nails.

How to do

First of all, measure the size of the jigsaw machine's base plate. The next step is cutting plywood sheet in an L shape as shown in the image.

After cutting the sheet of plywood to the exact size, the next step is to cut a strip of wood to attach the sheet with nails. This strip is used to hold the jigsaw in its position.

Make sure that there should not be any type of opening between the strip and the base plate of the jigsaw.

The next step is to drill small holes on the sheet. The distance between these holes is, for example, 1° cm. These holes are used for cutting different diameters circle.

After that I painted it so that it looked good. It is now ready to be used to cut a perfect clamp circle.

Advantages:

It's very easy to do.

Easy to use.

Less costs.

Used for cutting round discs of various diameters.

For better understanding, watch the video below.

Hand tools
Jigsaw
Preparing the stencil
Sawing process technology
Defects in work

Wood carving with a jigsaw is rapidly gaining popularity: many people want to purchase interesting subject decor for decorating your home, furniture and even clothes! Carved objects of various thicknesses fit organically into any interior style; people often purchase photo frames for photographs with ornaments, cut-out words and letters, or order intricate shelves and other interesting products. Few people know that artistic sawing using a plywood jigsaw is a task accessible to anyone, even the untrained and inexperienced. You just need to understand how to work with the tool.

What is a jigsaw: general description

A jigsaw is a tool designed for cutting various contours from plywood, including curved ones. It is equipped with a blade with fine teeth that can make an even cut of plywood without the formation of significant burrs.

Hand tools

The ancestor of this type of tool is a manual jigsaw. It consists of a metal arc in the shape of the letter “U”, between the ends of which a sawing blade is stretched and attached to clamps. They securely hold the file during operation and allow you to adjust its tension. On one side of the frame there is a handle.

The clamps on the tool can rotate, creating different planes for sawing, thereby providing the opportunity for wood carving of varying complexity.

When cutting out plywood with a hand jigsaw, you need to be careful: its design is quite fragile, and during intensive work, the blade often breaks from force and heat, so it has to be replaced. To do this, each master must have several dozen spare files.

When working with a jigsaw to carve internal contours, it is convenient to use such an auxiliary board as in the photo: it will help both protect the table and solve the problem of convenient placement of the workpiece.

Jigsaw

The tool runs on electrical network. It is a housing in which the working mechanisms are located, and there is also a handle for control on it. The sawing organ is located in the lower front part. The blade is often protected by a foot, which allows you to cut the contour exactly along the line without deviation. Advanced and professional jigsaw models have various attachments that facilitate the cutting process and straighten the edges of plywood.

Blades can have different teeth in shape and size. It is necessary to select saw blades that are appropriate for the material being processed so that damage and damage to the plywood sheet does not occur during operation of the mechanism.

Classification of jigsaws by power and application:

The instructions on how to use a jigsaw, or the technical data sheet, should describe the main parameters of the tool that must be taken into account when using the mechanism.

Wood carving tools

Sawing with a jigsaw is a creative process, but it requires preparation and additional equipment. What you will need for work:

Preparing the stencil

Drawings for cutting with a jigsaw can be different sizes, depending on the scale of the product being manufactured. To create a diagram of a shelf, a piece of furniture or a composite three-dimensional toy, you can take a large sheet of whatman paper A1 or A0, the wallpaper left after the renovation will also work, for small figures take regular A4 paper or another suitable format.

On the surface bright pencil or use a marker to draw the outline of the future product, following the dimensions. This could be an element for assembling furniture, a shelf or another large product.

There are such a wide variety of templates for cutting with a jigsaw that it can be difficult to choose the right one. It is much easier to come up with your own cutting patterns and transfer them to paper.

Transferring an image to the surface of plywood or boards

Before you start cutting with a jigsaw, you need to transfer the image from the stencil to a piece of wood or plywood. To do this, cut out a shape from a sheet, apply it to the surface of the plywood and carefully trace it. It is desirable that the line be smooth and accurate. We use a simple pencil so that, if necessary, we can correct the line by erasing it with an eraser.

We apply the contour with back side to finished product no remnants of the lines were visible. The internal area can be shaded so as not to cut off excess and to mark untouchable areas.

It is important to transfer the design in such a way as to minimize cutting along the grain with a jigsaw - it is so difficult to get an even line.

Sawing process technology

Many people have probably heard how to use a jigsaw. Working with the tool will not cause difficulties if you prepare for it correctly.

Plywood carving begins with the inner contours of the design. To do this, you need to make slots for inserting the tool blade:

The plywood is often taken thin, and when cutting a large contour there will be no problems, but tension may arise in a small remainder. Sawing with a jigsaw inside can damage the product - chips, burrs, cuts;
It’s easier to work this way: you always have something to hold the workpiece by. WITH large sheet much easier to handle than trying to hold a small sawn piece while shaping its interior.

How to saw with a jigsaw:

Working with a jigsaw is much easier than hand tools, there is no need to make physical efforts and the process goes faster.

How to saw with a jigsaw:

As you can see, there is nothing complicated in this process.

Defects in work

If you did not follow the technology or hold the tool incorrectly, the saw may simply move off the line. Why does a jigsaw cut crookedly:

tilted the tool while working;
the tension of the file has weakened;
With an electric saw, the fastening of the saw may become loose.

To avoid such problems, before starting sawing, be sure to check the tension of the saw and the fastening of all working elements. If the blade is beveled and stuck, it is better to start over and make a line parallel to the defective one.

A little about safety

Safety precautions when working with a jigsaw for cutting plywood and wood are simple:

Use protective equipment- glasses, gloves, robe. These things will protect you from dust and small chips.
Sawing with a hand jigsaw should be done carefully so as not to damage your fingers with the file. Maintain a distance between your body and the tool.
If you are a beginner, carefully read the instructions on how to use a jigsaw and the main characteristics of the tool. This information will help avoid accidental injury and unit breakdown.

Wood carving with a jigsaw requires care and attention. Both your health and the integrity of the finished product depend on these qualities.

What can be made from plywood: interesting ideas and drawings

Sawing wood with a jigsaw or hand tools is a creative process. You can create many decorative products of different directions:

Drawings of plywood crafts do not have to be made in exact dimensions. Even taking an example from the Internet and changing its proportions, you will get a unique product that no one else has in this form.

DIY plywood crafts can be painted or left in a natural color; you can glue buttons, beads, ribbons and other decor onto them to liven up the product. To do this, it is worth involving children in the work; their imagination is a bottomless well of interesting ideas.

We offer you diagrams with photos for cutting out of plywood with a jigsaw.

You can come up with your own idea of what you can cut using a hand or electric tool, make your own sketch and transfer it to paper, then to a piece of wood or plywood.

Carving plywood with a jigsaw requires certain knowledge and skills. If you don't have them, consider the following rules:

Plywood, unlike other sheet materials, due to its dense and not loose structure, can be easily sawed out and obtained from it into various decorative complex shapes. With a standard set of tools, everyone home handyman able to cut any desired, and even complex, elements from this material. However, in order for the blanks to have a marketable appearance and not interfere with the intended decorative element, you need to take into account some nuances when working with plywood. How to cut smooth circle from plywood?

Many people cut parts out of plywood more than once, but mostly they had to make straight cutting lines. It is not often necessary to cut out round or wavy parts; few people dare to make a circle out of plywood. Therefore, this task at first glance may seem impossible. For figure cutting you will need the following tools:

An ordinary jigsaw. A tool often used for DIY sawing of thin sheet materials. However, thick thicknesses are beyond his strength;
Jigsaw. Such power tools are divided into two types of devices: conventional, in which the file is located vertically, and for artwork, in which the working element is a steel sheet, as can be seen in the photo. A regular jigsaw is suitable for working with thick plywood, but you won’t be able to use it to make an even circle of plywood. But curved elements, such as letters, can be cut out artistic jigsaw, which is equipped band saw. Thus, for high-quality execution various types work, the appropriate device is selected.
With more complex equipment, such as a router, a circle of plywood can be cut very smoothly. It is of course more difficult to control, but it can be used to cut a circle of plywood from sheets of sufficiently large thickness. The quality of work on such a machine is superior to other cutting methods, and the cut of the wheel is smooth.

Templates for drawings should be placed on the workpiece sheet so that areas with damage and flaws then go to waste, and clean areas are located under the drawing, that is, they later become a finished product;
Before cutting a circle from plywood with a jigsaw, you need to make sure that the material is completely dry. Since humidity increases the resistance of plywood, and as a result, either the veneer may delaminate or the tool may break;
To ensure that the edges of the cut are free of nicks and burrs, you need to cut it with a jigsaw along the grain of the veneer. Hand jigsaw, on the contrary, it is necessary to saw across the veneer fibers, although chips may form, but there is no risk that the file will deviate from the cutting line;
As soon as it becomes noticeable that the cutting teeth have become dull, you immediately need to change the working blade or saw.

Curly cutting methods

When starting to cut out with a jigsaw, a sketch of the design is first applied to the sheet using carbon paper. The initial holes are drilled with a drill. A file or working element of a jigsaw is inserted into it and the free edge of the file is fixed using a clamp or screw. Next, sawing is done according to the template transferred to the plywood. Then they clean up necessary elements, and the workpiece is sanded along the edges with sandpaper or processed with a file. The video shows this process.

A furniture router is not suitable for cutting out complex shapes, but cutting a circle out of plywood evenly is very easy. A standard ruler is fixed in the center of the circle of this machine using a self-tapping screw. When the cutter begins to rotate along a given radius, a completely even circle is cut out. To correctly calculate the diameter of the circle, it is necessary to take into account the dimensions of the cutting cutter. You can correctly navigate this issue by first studying the instructions for the equipment.

How to make shaped blanks using various tools and machines is described above, and if you don’t have anything on hand, how to cut a circle from plywood without a jigsaw.

Here simplest technology cutting a circle from a slab of plywood, having a few simple items available:

Take a wooden plank and two nails. The first nail is driven into the center of the intended circle through the bar. The second nail is driven into the bar so that its sharp edge extends five to ten millimeters beyond the bar;
The distance between the fixed nails will be the radius for the required circle;
By making rotational movements, a line is made on the plywood. By wrapping the bar many times, the furrow is made deeper and deeper.
The sharper the nail is chosen, the sooner the drawn line will receive a recess;
The bar is easily replaced with a cord; the following cutting steps remain unchanged.

The above method is one of the least effective, but also has a right to exist. And if you have a jigsaw, cutting out a circle with your own hands will not be difficult.

Any design, whether in your home or in production, involves working with metal.

Often, during the operation of this material, the question may arise: how to cut a circle in?

It deserves attention because of the choice the right tool and technology directly depends on the complexity of the process of performing work and the quality of its result.

Metal can be thin or thick and durable, so a variety of tools are used to cut it.

The choice of materials and cutting technology also depends on what diameter the circle is needed and how even it should be.

Using a jigsaw

If you need a perfectly even circle, you can use an electric one to cut it out.

The work is carried out in several stages:

First, the thickness of the metal is determined and the appropriate saw blade for the electric jigsaw is selected.
Before cutting a circle in metal with a jigsaw, mark the outline of the circle that will be cut on the working plane.
Using a drill and a drill (with a diameter of eight to ten millimeters), a hole is cut out from which work will begin.
A jigsaw saw blade is placed in the resulting gap and cutting continues as planned.

Cutting using this tool does not take much time and effort. Moreover, using a jigsaw you can get a circle with perfect edges. But this tool is used only for working with metal of minimal or medium thickness (for example, 2 - 3 mm).

Using an angle grinder

The grinder is used when working with thin metal. Educate with this tool round hole you can by following these step-by-step tips:

Before cutting a circle in metal with a grinder, markings are made so that its contours are clearly visible.
Along the entire length of the intended drawing, short sections are cut with a grinder disk, which will eventually be connected.
The figure will look more like a polyhedron than a circle. Therefore, after cutting is completed, the product is processed and cleaned until the edges become sufficiently even and smooth. You can also use a grinder for processing. If the circle is wide, you can sharpen the contours with a large disk.

When processing a cut circle using a grinder, you should be careful that the disk is inside the hole and, at the same time, is located in the same plane with the work sheet.

Cutting a circle in thick metal

In order to outline the exact contours of the figure that will be cut out of metal, you should use a ruler, a marking compass and a marker.

First, using , the required width of the compass connector is set so that it matches the required diameter of the circle.

Then the center point of the circle is determined on the metal plane.

Contours are drawn from it using a compass.

To make them clearly visible during the work, they should be drawn with a marker.

Application of cutting torch

A circle in medium-thick metal can be cut using a gas cutter. The work takes place in several stages:

The outline of the circle is outlined.
The instrument burner lights up.
The combustion torch is adjustable.
Carefully and slowly the torch is drawn according to the drawn drawing.

Using this method, you can cut a hole in metal that is about four or five millimeters.

Application of welding machine

If you don’t have a gas cutter at home, you can use a welding machine.

It needs to be adjusted to the most high level current.

Then the burning arc is placed against the contour and held there until a hole is formed.

Then you just need to slowly move it along the drawing until you get an even circle.

But the most important thing is to correctly adjust the power of the tool.

For example, if metal about four millimeters thick is used, a device operating at about 150 amperes is needed. If the metal is thicker, the power of the tool will be greater.

To speed up the process, it is better to use thin electrodes. However, they burn out quickly and need to be replaced. Because of this, there will be a need for frequent heating of the metal, since during the replacement of the electrode it will have time to cool down.

How to cut an even circle from metal with a cutter is shown in the video:

Shape cutting technologies

Jigsaw

As we noted above, a jigsaw will come in handy if we are looking for how to cut a word out of plywood or make other parts of complex shapes:

We transfer pre-printed drawings or templates onto the workpiece using carbon paper.

If the structure has through sections, we make starting holes with a thin drill.
Insert a file or jigsaw blade into the hole. Secure the free end of the file with a fastening screw or clamp.
We make a cut along the intended line, pressing the workpiece to the workbench. The saw moves either automatically (for electric jigsaws) or manually.

After all the arc elements have been sawn, we remove unnecessary areas and process the finished part with a file or sandpaper.

Fraser

A furniture router is great for cutting out thick plywood. Of course, you can’t make a complex shape with it, but cutting an arc or circle is easy:

We fix the standard ruler included in the router in the center of the circle using a self-tapping screw.
If the length of the ruler is not enough, you can assemble a simple bracket from metal profile or wooden planks.
By rotating the cutter along a fixed radius, we select a groove along the circumference, resulting in an almost perfect hole.

Pay attention! When calculating the diameter of the circle, you should take into account the dimensions of the working cutter. The instructions for the device will tell you the exact numbers.

In this way, you can cut not only circles, but also individual arcs - for example, to make grooves for furniture brackets.

Using improvised means

For shaped elements, it is advisable to have special devices, but any craftsman may need to make a round hole in a slab of laminated veneer. Below we will tell you how to cut a circle from plywood when you have nothing at hand.
Well, almost nothing:

To cut plywood, use a wooden strip with two nails.
One nail is driven through the strip into the workpiece, exactly in the center of the hole being made.
We drive the second nail into the bar so that the point protrudes on the wrong side by at least 5-10 mm. The distance from the first nail should be equal to the radius of the hole being made.
Rotating the bar, use the tip to draw a groove on the plywood, deepening it with each turn.
Instead of a stick, you can use a strong cord. The operating principle remains unchanged.

The sharper the nail used, the faster the hole will be made.
It should be noted that although the price similar device is small, it should be used only when other methods are not available: the edges still turn out to be far from ideal.

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