Despite it not being proven (yet), the Loch Ness Monster has its fair share of cult followers; not all of whom are as crazy as you think. Some just like the idea of a giant sea creature guarding the waters of Scotland, so much so that they want to make a giant wooden egg in place of the real deal.
YouTube channel Etienne Morin Woodturning has taken a Cherrywood burl and turned it into an egg Nessie would be proud to nurture:
After chipping off the bark, he readies the resin and pours it into the burl’s many holes, cracks, and crevices. Most of the resin mixture goes into a giant hole on one side, filling it up to create a more egg-like shape for woodturning.
Since he doesn’t have a pressure pot, he has to put borders around the resin and wait for it to harden the old fashioned way. Once the mixture is relatively hard, he can work on fissures located on other sides of the burl.
With the resin dried, he can finally get to woodturning. Chipping rough wood into a smooth egg takes a lot of time and patience but with enough of it, a mythical being’s egg starts to emerge. And the best part: this one is real.
As more of the burl gets chipped away, bad wood is removed and cracks are filled with white epoxy. These are simple matters to attend to, but he has to make sure to take a pause now and then to look out for them.
Once he gets the burl down to its final egg shape, he cuts off the top portion and starts sanding it down (first with an electric sander and then manually with sandpaper) to make everything smooth.
He then applies some Yorkshire grit and high gloss Hampshire sheen to give some shine to the egg’s surface. To cap it all off, he buffers the entire egg until it’s as shiny as the surface of the water Nessie resides in.
The bottom portion of the egg is cut off-screen, but you can be sure it went through the same sanding and polishing process as the rest of the faux egg. The end result is a very shiny, very real wooden egg for a yet unproven species.
You can find more woodturning goodness over at the Etienne Morin Woodturning YouTube channel.
