Slide of the month: Shell

June 2025

Time to make: .5 hours

Finishing: 1 hour

 
Boy's Life April 1980, page 76

 
Original design:  Wayne Mason













Sea shells are fascinating as nature creates some of the most beautiful thing. Now most folks wont find this Scallop Shell to be that great but what makes this interesting to me is I found it digging in my back yard. (I'm no where near the ocean and we are not big shellfish fans.)

Easy slide to make as all I had to do, after cleaning it up, was to glue a loop to the back of the shell.

Slide of the Month Extra: Leather stamping-Bear Paw

 

May 2025

Time to print: 1 hour

Time to make: .5 hours

Finishing: .5

Original design:  Bill Macfarlane

Initial 3D print: Viking Bear Paw by Kenny Reniff

veg 

A friend of mine and fellow Wood Badge patrol member was complaining why I wasn't doing more Bear slides. (Yes I'm a good ole Bear.) So Ron, this one is for us. 

The bear paw here has four claws and represents the four of us in the Bear patrol who had a great time at NE-II-192 Wood Badge.  

The process of creating this slide uses a piece of tooling "veg tan" leather, a 3D printed stamp, and a method of pressing the stamp into the leather. I started by editing the Viking Bear Paw in Tinkercad to add the letters to the final stamp. 

After 3D printing the stamp, I cut a piece of leather to size based on the size of the stamp. I dampened the leather, placed the stamp on the leather, and squeezed the two of them together. Now there are many methods to do this like an arbor press, H-frame press, or C-clamp (G-clamp) home made press I found on the Scout Woggles Facebook page by Julian Ashcroft. After letting the leather dry, I treated the leather with Fiebing's Tan Vintage Gel and polished the leather with a soft cloth. Lastly, I stitched the ends together with waxed string to form a loop. 

This was a very cool method and I'll probably be making more leather slides in the future.

Slide of the Month: State

May 2025

Time to make: 2 hours

Finishing: 1 hour

 
Boy's Life: April 1984, page  71

 August 1994, page 48

 
Original design:  Bill Andrews         Jeff Springer

It's not the first time I've seen a slide idea repeated in Slide of the Month but maybe the first time I've given credit to both contributors.  Massachusetts, like many states, is a loaded with area with their own regional flavor. From Boston to where dragons live (insert Harry Potter reference here) there is a lot to do and see here.

Carved from a piece of maple, I liked the challenge of cutting the shape of Massachusetts into the wood because of the intricate detail of the outline. With the state raised above the base and ready for finishing, I had a hard time trying to decide what to put on this slide.  A Red Socks emblem (I'm a Mets fan), Mt Greylock,  Basketball Hall of Fame... to many choices so I went with a representation of the state flag. 

I used flat white spray paint to paint the background, a paint pen to outline the state and water slide paper to do the lettering.  

Slide of the Month Extra: Chicken Jockey!

April 2025

Time to make: 3 hours

Finishing: 2 hour

Original design:  Bill Macfarlane

3D file: Peter Farell - Chicken Jockey : Minecraft the Movie

Chicken Jockey! (...and the crowd goes wild!)

I couldn't resist making this slide after seeing this phenomenon and after all it's just fun. While I really wasn't interested Minecraft, my son played it right up into college.

Printed on a 3D printer with white PLA filament, based on the file above, I peeled away the base to give me the start of slide. Next i filled void on the bottom chicken's feet with super glue gel and left it to dry. I painted the slide with multi surface hobby paint. Lastly t drilled a couple of holes in the back for a coat hanger loop. Neat slide!

Slide of the Month Extra: Angry

 

April 2025

Time to make: 1 hours

Finishing: 1 hour

Original design:  Bill Macfarlane








It's April and as the snow disappears I find black walnut shells left by the squirrels in my yard. The odd part is I don't have any black walnut trees in or around my yard. I saw this half shell and it looks like an angry creature in the forbidden woods. 

The split in the shell was a natural mouth so I painted it red. I also added a couple beady eyes using a couple of quilting pins. I also filled the back to the shell with some 5 minute epoxy to keep the shells from falling apart and to give me something to mount the ring for the neckerchief 

Slide of the Month: Untitled

 

April 2025

Time to make: still working it

Finishing: when I get around to it

 
Original design:  Bill Macfarlane








OK, just a few more minutes, hours, days till this one is finished....What was I carving? 

Once again just my odd sense of humor here on the first of April. Somewhat carved from maple. Kind of painted from hobby paints. Labeled using waterslide paper and sealed with a couple of coats of ... well haven't gotten to that step yet.

Slide of the Month: Camp Lantern

 

March 2025

Time to make: 3 hours

Finishing: 1 hour

 
Boy's Life October 1983, page 68

 
Original design:  Bill Andrews

 My old Scoutmaster taught me many things and I am forever grateful. He also was the first person I knew with a propane lantern that gave us all some much more light than out Scout flashlights. I knew once I became an adult Scouter I would also own one of these marvelous bright lights.  

I wanted to try something different with this slide reusing some materials I would have normally thrown away. So I'll list what I used and what it was used for.

Contact lens cleaner container - glass globe and base

Plastic thread  spool - top or ventilator 

Paper clip - gas pipe and mantle holder

Paper towel painted yellow - mantle

Hanger nail - regulator control

Plastic squeeze bottle filled with green paint  and allow to dry- propane bottle

Shipping label printed with Coleman logo