Have any of you worked with this stuff? I have seen pictures of rods done with paua and they are beautiful. I would like to try it myself. Any advice offered will be appreciated.

Cheers,

Jeff

Me too. I was thinking of posting the same question a couple of days ago. I have seen photos of this stuff on rods and to me it is the peak of beauty.
I have researched this a bit on the internet looking for sheet, alas all I could find was the real thing which is the cracked shell itself and looks like a mosaic. It is supplied in relatively small sizes of a4-5 inches sqare that are a little less than 2mm thick for about $20/sheet if my memory serves me correctly. So this stuff does not appear to be what we can use on rods, at least if we want to wrap it around the blank-too expensive, too thick, and too brittle. I searched for a synthetic sheet substitute, but came up with naught.
Someone out there knows where to get the stuff and how it should be worked. I too would really love to know !
Earl

Earl,

Here is a website selling Paua:

[www.oceanshellnz.com] (Use the left-right arrows to browse)


Rena (I love the Pink Paua Laminate)





Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/11/2007 12:39PM by Rena Hall.

If you search around a bit, you might come up with the magic to bending shells. Capiz shells from the Phillipines are usually supplied flat. But when you look around at products made from them you will trip over some when they appear to be able to bend/mold the shell. Would seem there is some process to soften the shell temporarily. Might work on other shells too.

If no one chimes in on this, do a search for all dates on abalone and there was a post within the past year where a builder had a source for this and flexible, ready to put on the rods. Cannot for the life of me remember who it was, though? He did post a pic (or pics) of the work, too.

Putter
Williston, ND

Found something anyway:
Before the capiz shell can be fashioned into a work of art, it passes through labor-intensive processes. First, artisans wash the shells with hydrochloric (muriatic) acid, rinse them with water and use coarse sand to exfoliate the shells. Artisans place shells on a tray to dry and then bake them in an oven. To soften and whiten the shells, artisans soak the shells in peroxide. Then, they cut the softened shells into different patterns or mold them into shapes by gluing and pressing the shells into resin moldings.

OK,,, so you may not like the 'whiten' part. Sorta depends upon whether the colors of abalone are from pigments and/or from the refraction of the layers. Might be that this is specific to capiz shells as well. Anyway, seems softening is at least possible

Here is a previous discussion on the topic [www.rodbuilding.org] if you have any more questions after reading this thread just ask. Jared had good luck using this method and posted some great pictures of his work [www.rodbuilding.org] I will be giving a seminar in High Point describing the use of shell veneer for decorative accents. Thanks

Here is a link to a suppier in Hawaii

[www.aquabluemaui.com]



Raymond Adams
Eventually, all things merge, and a river runs through it..

Thanks every one for spreading some light on the subject. The laminate sold in some of the links posted on this thread may well work as they are down to 0.3mm in thickness so I will look into that.
Dave Hauser-as it happens, I live in the Philippines and capiz products are easily found anywhere here. There may be somthing in their methods and proceedures that can be transfered to abelone-I will research that too. I believe that you can do quite a bit of forming with very hot water, but I will have to verify that.
If I find anything out that might be helpfull I will put up a post.
Earl.