roughing out w/ router

This is my first post. I am working on my first tiki carving. The wood I am using is A. sycamore. I decided to rough our the negative spaces with a router. This is a pretty unwieldy way to remove material. I was just wondering have any of yous guys approached a carving in this way? If not how do you go about removing large bits of material. Gouges?
Also, What are the best woods to use? I live in CenTex so species choices are more limited than in other areas.
loblolly pine, e. redcedar, A. sycamore, cotonwood, cedar elm....Any other species that are good for carving? What about boxelder and hackberry, or even royal pawlonia?

I am really inspired by the tikis on this forum. Incredible stuff. I hope to figure out how to post pics of my hunk a wood soon.

I rough out with a chainsaw. Most carvers here use chisels. Never heard of using a router on anything but flatwork. What other tools do you own?

Can't help you on the wood, all I use is palm.

Welcome to the forum!

I have an incomplete set of gouges and some carving knives. Most tools required for carpentry as well. I have a chainsaw too. I carved a mushroom out of a piece of cedar with the chainsaw a few weeks back but I would be scared to carve anything that required a lot of detail with a chainsaw. I could turn it into a chunk of firewood pretty quickly.
The peice is a round log, and for the most part the router worked well. I just had to be careful not to give it too big a bite at a time.

Thanks for the reply.
I like your style of tiki.

Here are a couple of pics of my tiki so far. This is just router work and a little bit of gouge work.

Wow, looks like the router works fine for "roughing", it leaves a nice clean cut.
Any power tool is a plus in my book!
Have you seen this thead? http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?mode=viewtopic&topic=10451&forum=7&start=0&hilite=tools carvers use

Like 4wd said, nice clean cuts with the router.
Seems it might be very slow going though, with the round log surface and flat
router base. Kinda sketchy. One of my first tools was a carbide bit wheel for a
grinder, made by arbor tech. It really works well for removing stock
and 'freehanding'. I must give caution, this tool can be very dangerous !
Thats why I always wear welding gloves whe using it. (I'm not sure the gloves will
stop any injuries, but they let me know when the blade is too close for comfort)

Chop On !

Thanks Kino and 4WD. I will be shopping for a tungsten wheel for the angle grinder.

Hello Greenjeans and welcome. I live in San Marcos and have carved most of the common hill country species. All have disadvantages as well as virtues. Seasoning the wood is still a mystery to me but I am convinced the time of year it's cut has a lot to do with how bad the wood checks and I've learned to only carve seasoned wood. I never turn down a sound, straight-grained sycamore, cottonwood, cedar elm or hackberry. I've only done a couple of pine but don't have a problem with it so far. Happy carving.

I always use a router for roughing out tikis. They work really well and always leave a clean edge. I used a router on all of these guys:

http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?mode=viewtopic&topic=18642&forum=7&start=60

I gotta get back to carving...been awhile

Well I agree with the others it looks like the router works great for you. My Personal Philosophy is to use ANY Tool that removes the wood the easiest and the fastest. I would try All your tools for different stages as right now or from the last photo, you are ready for chisels to clean up the lines and finish the Detail.
Nice job for an Early carving, Post more photos as you work so we can share.

It looks like you're doing well with the router. I tried to carve my first tiki with a router. I thought it would be easy. I have made a lot of cabinetry, furniture etc. I found that while it leaves a clean cut but the router tends to run on me. It was very different, for me, than a flat board. I felt it was too risky for me and the log. I also started with oak. If it works for you (it looks like it does..nicely too) then stick with it.