Bending wood for rocking horse restoration

[dilby]

Hi everyone - I’m planning to restore this old rocking horse for my little girl and realising that re-bending this back rail might be trickier than expected. Any tips from anyone would be appreciated. I don’t know what kind of wood it is and haven’t bent wood before. Doing some research, most examples seem to involve steaming plies and building them up - but of course this is quite thick and I can’t afford for it to snap.

I can also see that some don’t steam but soak, but I’ve seen mixed results and no one bending anything this thick.

Thanks so much

 

[Yojevol]

Laminating is probably the safest method. It looks abut 25mm thick. I would use 5 x 5mm laminas. God quality straight grain timber is required. Ash would be a good choice. You need to make a former to bend it round and devise a method of clamping them in place. The original was probably made of green wood, steam bent and then left to season whilst held in its required shape.
Brian

 

[dilby]

Laminating is probably the safest method. It looks abut 25mm thick. I would use 5 x 5mm laminas. God quality straight grain timber is required. Ash would be a good choice. You need to make a former to bend it round and devise a method of clamping them in place. The original was probably made of green wood, steam bent and then left to season whilst held in its required shape.
Brian

Thanks so much - so you'd rule out trying to bend this existing piece?

 

[Yojevol]

Thanks so much - so you'd rule out trying to bend this existing piece?

I doubt whether it would be successful especially with those dowel holes making weak spots. The original method was not successful over the long term. Do you know how old it is?
Brian

 

[Adam W.]

Thanks so much - so you'd rule out trying to bend this existing piece?

You'd need to steam it again if you want to bend it, but it might break anyway. You could always laminate some nice looking ply around a former, that works well if you use thin ply and keep building it up to the size you require, It takes a few clamps to work though.

This mockup of a model is all made of 3mm ply strips laminated around a form made out of pins.

 

[rogxwhit]

To steam you'd have the business of making a steam box and fuelling it, just for the one job. To re-bend the existing, I note that it has bores in it, which woud normally be done after the bending, not before, and there's a distinct risk of breakage near the bores. You'd have to steam for an hour or so to heat the piece through. Essentially it's heat that softens the lignin that's the binder in wood. Steam is just the medium.

Laminating should be risk-free.

 

[stuckinthemud]

You don’t need a steam box, you can steam in a plastic bag, especially if using green or pre-soaked timber. You could try re -using the timber as what have you got to lose? I would be tempted to look on it as a practice run. Put the timber under water a few days, put it in a steam contraption (heavy duty plastic bag rolled up/ box made of insulation foam/ pukka ply wood steam box) steam for an hour or two and see what happens. Best thing about boil in the bag is you can steam on a former and gradually tighten the bend as the wood becomes plastic and it doesn’t go cold as you work, instead of rushing out of the box and into the bend before it cools where even 30 seconds can be too long

 

[okeydokey]

I would go for boil in the bag steaming look at a few YouTubes. Wallpaper steamer for the steam but it may not be successful as the final fixing is on the dowels and it may spring out again.
If you laminate, it will look different but does that matter.
Or radical idea
Assuming the existing curved portion will fit onto the dowels then make the sides from straight/plane shaped wood with glued and pinned lap joints that you can plane around the outside of the joint to take off the harshness. Maybe you could also cut curved sides from a wide board.
I guess it needs to be functional not a future antique!
Worth considering?

 

[Tris]

I'd make a suitable former, strip the finish off the piece you've got and try steaming that. I use an old wallpaper stripper for the steam supply. No harm in trying it and you've got the former ready for laminating if the original fails

 

[Jacob]

If you have a bandsaw you could saw it from flat board and laminate it horizontally. Maybe segmented in smaller pieces.
Windsor "captain" chair backs are done in three segments. No bending. Needn't be quite this fancy;

Bending and laminating is relatively easy if you make a jig. Tight curve - maybe 4 to 5mm laminations in hardwood, ash or something
Steaming looks problematic - something you'd have to experiment with and a lot of kit to set up.

 

[Tris]

Building a simple ply steam box would take very little time, a steam supply could be had for less than £20, and it's a simple process. Be organised so you can work quickly with the clamps and make sure you use straight grained timber

 

[Simon89]

Could the dowel holes be plugged whilst steaming to reduce risk of breakage around that area?

 

[dilby]

Bloody hell thanks so much everyone for the replies; for some reason I didn't have any future notifications so wasn't aware of all the help everyone has given. I had assumed it would be really hard and had planned to just cut a horseshoe shape out of flat timber and not go down the bending route - it's a shame but i was being pragmatic. But reading these replies I'm tempted to give it a go; as has been said what have i got to lose? I will report the results!