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Adventures in Brush Making

Let me state for the record that I DO NOT have a “brush fetish” or even a “brush problem.”  I DO HAVE a strongly developed “brush interest.”  Just because I have at least a half dozen drawers filled with hundreds brushes of almost every size, type, and vintage you can imagine is no reason to jump to conclusions.  I must admit that on the aftermath of my becoming metabolically challenged my survivors will probably hold one of the oddest yard sales ever known to man.

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One of my favorite little books is a slim volume on the craft of making your own brushes.  Though I am by no means an art brush-making craftsman, the topic does fascinate me.  During my recent forays into conserving some tortoiseshell boxes I found myself increasingly frustrate by the glue brushes I had at my fingertips, especially the disposable acid brushes.  So, I made my own.

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Thanks to the generosity of my friend WilliamD from New Jersey I had some one-inch hanks of beautiful bristle that he was throwing out in the aftermath of some project or another a couple of years ago.  These were remnants from Chinese horse tail hair that a friend of his used for making and restoring violin bows.

The glue brushes I had been using were either inexpensive nylon bristle brushes or disposable bristle brushes, and neither was really performing as I wished.  What I wanted was a pair of round brushes, one about 1/4″ diameter and the other 1/8″ diameter, with bristle lengths of a couple inches so that they could hold plenty of glue for me to apply in tight spaces.

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I first pulled out a small group of bristles that were enough to build the 1/4″ brush, and trimmed and aligned them.

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Since I do not have a well equipped brushmaking kit (yet) I proceeded with the simplest technology I had in-hand, namely wrapping the bundle much like I made the polissoir prototypes and the Model 296 polissoir is still made.  I even used the same binding material, waxed lined thread.

I wrapped about four inches of the bristle bundle into a shaft, then tied it off.  I had already determined the perfect size for the brush based on a plastic sleek I had from a gross of tiny jewelers’ blades I use in cutting marquetry.  Since it seems like I almost never throw anything away I had several of these plastic sleeves in the drawer, and fitted the bound bundle to the one I wanted.

With gentle force I simply pressed the two elements — the bound bristles and the plastic sleeve handle —  together  until they were firmly joined with a solid pressure fit.  The pieces for the new brush were together but it was not yet finished.

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Pinching the end of the bristle together between my fingers I splayed the bristles to see if any were the wrong length.  Some were, and I trimmed them with scissors.  I then rolled the brush a bit and repeated the splaying and trimming, then repeated…  Once I was happy with the shape of the tip, the brush was done.

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For the smaller brush I used a similar approach, substituting upholstery thread for the linen binding.  For a brush this size I could not wrap it “in the open” and needed to find a suitable sleeve.  One was no farther than the brush drawer, as the plastic sleeves used to protect newly manufactured artists’ brushes fit the bill perfectly.

 

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I simply slit one with a razor knife and inserted the bristle bundle into it, then wrapped the whole thing with upholstery thread.

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At first I though about inserting the finished brush tip into a quill, but none of my quills were a perfect fit.  However, a piece of brass tubing from the scrap drawer was.  Again I gently forced the bound brush tip up into the hollow of the tube, but unlike the larger brush once the smaller brush was assembled I drizzled a little PVA adhesive into the tube to glue the butt end of the bristle bundle in place.

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The result of my little brush exercise is most gratifying, and will certainly lead to more adventures.  I know that when I build some more Gragg chairs over the winter I could use some new striping brushes.  The ones I have now just aren’t right.