Benching your teeth?

[Gary Hodgin]

Gary,

Which way did you finally go: aluminum or phenolic? Let us know if it comes in dead flat or if you have to grind it yourself. Number of set-screws?

Going with phenolic. Suppose to be flat but I expect to do some lapping. I'll probably use my exe-lap mini diamond hones. They are machined to a .0000001 tolerance.

['Jacques Malan']

I use my teeth for gnashing only.

But I do push my tongue out. Does that count?

[Doug Bowman]

I use a different method. I like to use diamond paste from Lee Valley. I do like a sparkley smile .
Bob

Diamonds !?!?!?!?

all you need is hard Arkie and some castor oil to keep your teeth sharp. Done it that way fer 40 years now! Don't need to go spendin' money on some new fangled method!

[David Nelson1]

One has to re learn to whistle with falsies LOL
Don't ask me how I know this LOL l

[george wilson]

David,I have hippo ivory, It is a LOT harder than elephant ivory,which is why it was used for false teeth. Washington's false teeth(which I have seen in the Smithsonian) were actually porcelain. The uppers and lowers were connected with little steel coil springs.

I was planning some day to make a set of hippo ivory false teeth for the Apothecary Shop in the museum. Didn't get to it. Got the hippo tusk,though. You can get them 2 feet long,really incredible to see teeth that large. The hard outer shell has to be ground off,but it isn't very thick.

We actually had this rather eccentric clock maker in Williamsburg. He was scared to death of the dentist. He finally got into such pain that he had to go to one. When the dentist started drilling on his "fillings",he began ruining burrs. He asked what the heck those fillings were. The clock maker told him he had filled his OWN TEETH with something called "Plastic Steel"!!!!

The clock maker lost a front tooth,but didn't want to pay for a bridge. He was very conscious of his appearance,though(actually,he looked like a cadaver!!) so,he got hold of a piece of ivory,made a tooth from it, and JAMMED it into place!! How he lived with that,I don't know!! Ivory will invariably turn yellow in the mouth. When it did,he's make another tooth and jam that one in place!!!!

[robert dankert]

Well my teeth kept falling out and right on my workbench top. After awhile the bench top surface got kinda all scratched up. I didn't think much of it at first, but the more of those tooth marks that got on there, the harder it became to move boards on the bench top. Good thing I finally made the connection that the tooth marks were causing the problem, as I was resorting to using a 36" crowbar to get those suckers to move. So I put some duct tape over my mouth, to keep my teeth in, and planed the bench top smooth again.

Now to answer your question directly, I take my teeth out. The tape was just too hard on the goatee and mustache.

[David Nelson1]

David,I have hippo ivory, It is a LOT harder than elephant ivory,which is why it was used for false teeth. Washington's false teeth(which I have seen in the Smithsonian) were actually porcelain. The uppers and lowers were connected with little steel coil springs.

I was planning some day to make a set of hippo ivory false teeth for the Apothecary Shop in the museum. Didn't get to it. Got the hippo tusk,though. You can get them 2 feet long,really incredible to see teeth that large. The hard outer shell has to be ground off,but it isn't very thick.

We actually had this rather eccentric clock maker in Williamsburg. He was scared to death of the dentist. He finally got into such pain that he had to go to one. When the dentist started drilling on his "fillings",he began ruining burrs. He asked what the heck those fillings were. The clock maker told him he had filled his OWN TEETH with something called "Plastic Steel"!!!!

The clock maker lost a front tooth,but didn't want to pay for a bridge. He was very conscious of his appearance,though(actually,he looked like a cadaver!!) so,he got hold of a piece of ivory,made a tooth from it, and JAMMED it into place!! How he lived with that,I don't know!! Ivory will invariably turn yellow in the mouth. When it did,he's make another tooth and jam that one in place!!!!

Infrickingcredable!

[george wilson]

The museum could attract some strange types,though he was an excellent clock maker!!

[Jim Matthews]

I take them out and scrape the bottoms of my shoes with them so they grip better.

I'm cornfuzed - izzat de shoes, or da teeth what grips better, afta?
Perhaps a video is in order...

[Adam Cruea]

This thread was definitely good for a laugh, that's for sure. Especially the post of "I keep my teeth sharp with the waterstones I bought from Stu".