How Is This Carving?

[JarBlues 24]

I tried to take pictures that really showed the flaws/imperfections in the carving. There's a good number of flaws imo but I was already 5 minutes over so I just stopped.

I have a lot of trouble getting any plane to be flat and not bumpy -- I don't really know a good technique for that so if anyone knows how it would be much appreciated if you could tell me  

Have particular trouble getting the semicircle planes (the super tiny ones that result when you cut into the soap) to be even. I normally just turn the soap on its side and press the blade down and rake it across. It's definitely not very even.

 

http://imgur.com/a/Ty7af


If I marked this soap I'd probably give it an 18? Hopefully.

[StriveP 74]

I tried to take pictures that really showed the flaws/imperfections in the carving. There's a good number of flaws imo but I was already 5 minutes over so I just stopped.

 

I have a lot of trouble getting any plane to be flat and not bumpy -- I don't really know a good technique for that so if anyone knows how it would be much appreciated if you could tell me  

 

Have particular trouble getting the semicircle planes (the super tiny ones that result when you cut into the soap) to be even. I normally just turn the soap on its side and press the blade down and rake it across. It's definitely not very even.

 

http://imgur.com/a/Ty7af

 

 

If I marked this soap I'd probably give it an 18? Hopefully.

 

 

 

You can't tell with the image you provided. There's so many things that go into marking the soap carving and that picture doesn't provide enough information to mark it. But by glancing at it, it's roughly around 15 to 18 (just a guess).

[Dannny 36]

Really isn't that bad  

[nerve 0]

Something that would improve the overall attractiveness of your carving would be to make your guidelines finer. I used my pencil to mark up my soap and made sure my lines were very light. Notice all the junk accumulating within your lines? First impressions are important so make sure you clean up your carving before you hand it in. I also think your deep lines contributed to the chippiness at the ends of your soap. Try to keep your edges as sharp as possible.

 

I wrote the DAT last February and practiced with a mix of these navy soaps as well as the older purple ones. The scraping technique works well for the chalkier purple soaps but I wouldn't recommend it for the navy soaps. They're super sticky and thus show the fine serrated ridges of the blade on all of your planes. The stickiness also makes you prone to gouging it as you scrape (notice the 2 gouges on the middle portion? also looks like you stuck your nail in there). Try laying your blade near perpendicular and lightly shave material off the soap. You'll get perfectly smooth, shiny surfaces when you hold it up to the light. I ended up using a combination of the scraping and shaving technique on my DAT soap. What technique you use ultimately depends on the feel of the soap you get on test day.

 

Hope that helps 

[StriveP 74]

Something that would improve the overall attractiveness of your carving would be to make your guidelines finer. I used my pencil to mark up my soap and made sure my lines were very light. Notice all the junk accumulating within your lines? First impressions are important so make sure you clean up your carving before you hand it in. I also think your deep lines contributed to the chippiness at the ends of your soap. Try to keep your edges as sharp as possible.

 

I wrote the DAT last February and practiced with a mix of these navy soaps as well as the older purple ones. The scraping technique works well for the chalkier purple soaps but I wouldn't recommend it for the navy soaps. They're super sticky and thus show the fine serrated ridges of the blade on all of your planes. The stickiness also makes you prone to gouging it as you scrape (notice the 2 gouges on the middle portion? also looks like you stuck your nail in there). Try laying your blade near perpendicular and lightly shave material off the soap. You'll get perfectly smooth, shiny surfaces when you hold it up to the light. I ended up using a combination of the scraping and shaving technique on my DAT soap. What technique you use ultimately depends on the feel of the soap you get on test day.

 

Hope that helps 

 

Good advice but they don't look at the junk accumulated at the lines, it won't effect the score. But you're right about the other stuff. One more thing to add on to what Nerve mentioned, make sure the middle section of the soap is smooth. Every DAT soap carving will have this design in the middle and so you can perfect this section just by practicing.

[Tdent 12]

Like has been mentioned earlier kind of hard to tell from a picture but it looks a lot like my soap I handed in the first time I wrote the dat (just the general appearance and neatness) and I scored an 18. Keep practicing and you will improve. I think some people catch on to it a bit quicker than others but you're well on your way you still have a whole month and are on track

[nerve 0]

Good advice but they don't look at the junk accumulated at the lines, it won't effect the score. But you're right about the other stuff. One more thing to add on to what Nerve mentioned, make sure the middle section of the soap is smooth. Every DAT soap carving will have this design in the middle and so you can perfect this section just by practicing.

 

You're right, the junk shouldn't affect the score. I just feel that subconsciously, an evaluator would grade a neat looking soap better than a messy one.

[BScDMD 72]

You need to work on sharpening your edges and smoothing the surfaces (the saddle in the middle looks pretty rough)

[Sidney Crosby 12]

Pretty sure my soaps looked like that and I got 26 and 28 on both exams. I wouldn't worry, just work on sharper and cleaner edges/surfaces

[StriveP 74]

Pretty sure my soaps looked like that and I got 26 and 28 on both exams. I wouldn't worry, just work on sharper and cleaner edges/surfaces

It's definitely not a 20+ bud. I got a 28 on my soap carving and mines wasn't perfect but it was definitely WAY WAY better than this.

 

OP I would probably try checking out RockTheDAT course since it helped me out a lot for the soap carving. Even though it's a bit expensive, its worth it imo. I also saw DATBreaker somewhere on the forum which looked interesting, i believe they do soap carving evaluations which might help you.

[Sidney Crosby 12]

You are probably right. Im just sharing my experience, and saying that it's not so impossible to do well with those carving skills. Good luck OP! Let us know how it goes

[msuneong 18]

For the fluted ends, make sure you have good parallelism to the ends. So for example, when you look at the end face on, the edges should be perfectly parrelel.

[cleanup 433]

Man, it will shock you how little this matters in reality at the end of the day. I really wish they would just abolish soap carving. 

[StriveP 74]

Man, it will shock you how little this matters in reality at the end of the day. I really wish they would just abolish soap carving. 

 

Actually it does matter, maybe not for UofT dent, but Alberta makes a big deal out of the soap carving (33% of your admission for the DAT). It can essentially make or break your application. There's also another school that looks at it too. 

[skye204 24]

Actually it does matter, maybe not for UofT dent, but Alberta makes a big deal out of the soap carving (33% of your admission for the DAT). It can essentially make or break your application. There's also another school that looks at it too. 

I believe what he meant is a high score on the MDT has little to no correlation on how well you will do in dental school and even as a future dentist.

[Lebron James 30]

That's probably true for the DAT as a whole, tbh

[JarBlues 24]

Silly question guys, what's a saddle and a flute? I'm assuming the saddle is the middle part where you cut an almost semicylinder out?  

Something that would improve the overall attractiveness of your carving would be to make your guidelines finer. I used my pencil to mark up my soap and made sure my lines were very light. Notice all the junk accumulating within your lines? First impressions are important so make sure you clean up your carving before you hand it in. I also think your deep lines contributed to the chippiness at the ends of your soap. Try to keep your edges as sharp as possible.

 

I wrote the DAT last February and practiced with a mix of these navy soaps as well as the older purple ones. The scraping technique works well for the chalkier purple soaps but I wouldn't recommend it for the navy soaps. They're super sticky and thus show the fine serrated ridges of the blade on all of your planes. The stickiness also makes you prone to gouging it as you scrape (notice the 2 gouges on the middle portion? also looks like you stuck your nail in there). Try laying your blade near perpendicular and lightly shave material off the soap. You'll get perfectly smooth, shiny surfaces when you hold it up to the light. I ended up using a combination of the scraping and shaving technique on my DAT soap. What technique you use ultimately depends on the feel of the soap you get on test day.

 

Hope that helps 

Thanks for the help. I'm doing one soap a day after my midterms until the test so hopefully I can get a good quality soap in after the test. do you have a good technique for making the semicircles on either side of the saddle flat?

 

Good advice but they don't look at the junk accumulated at the lines, it won't effect the score. But you're right about the other stuff. One more thing to add on to what Nerve mentioned, make sure the middle section of the soap is smooth. Every DAT soap carving will have this design in the middle and so you can perfect this section just by practicing.

I have trouble with the middle section... what's a good technique for it? I just cut a triangle like |__/-----\__| first and then i get rid of the triangle so it becomes |_______|. Is there a better way?  

 

It's definitely not a 20+ bud. I got a 28 on my soap carving and mines wasn't perfect but it was definitely WAY WAY better than this.

 

OP I would probably try checking out RockTheDAT course since it helped me out a lot for the soap carving. Even though it's a bit expensive, its worth it imo. I also saw DATBreaker somewhere on the forum which looked interesting, i believe they do soap carving evaluations which might help you.

not offered where I live otherwise i totally would!

[StriveP 74]

I cut it out by starting from the middle. So basically the opposite of what you do by  cutting a triangle in the middle first and then slowly everything else. At the end, everyone will have diff techniques so you just have to find what works best for you.

[nerve 0]

Silly question guys, what's a saddle and a flute? I'm assuming the saddle is the middle part where you cut an almost semicylinder out?  

Thanks for the help. I'm doing one soap a day after my midterms until the test so hopefully I can get a good quality soap in after the test. do you have a good technique for making the semicircles on either side of the saddle flat?

 

I have trouble with the middle section... what's a good technique for it? I just cut a triangle like |__/-----\__| first and then i get rid of the triangle so it becomes |_______|. Is there a better way?  

 

That's what I do.

 

For the sides of the saddle, be sure to angle your blade ever so slightly to compensate for the tapered edge of the blade then make one continuous cut. You probably know that already since everyone watches that one YouTube series. 

 

[evanli78evanli 8]

 https://www.datsoapcarving.ca/# 

 

seems sketchy.. checked its info on https://www.whois.net/ and it says the site registered on 20/02/16. Meaning that the reviews are fake because they registered on on Feb.20th and there hasn't been a test since its release. Also, its youtube video has 20K views and 57 likes lol so obviously the person outsourced for those stats. 

[Guest]

 https://www.datsoapcarving.ca/# 

 

seems sketchy.. checked its info on https://www.whois.net/ and it says the site registered on 20/02/16. Meaning that the reviews are fake because they registered on on Feb.20th and there hasn't been a test since its release. Also, its youtube video has 20K views and 57 likes lol so obviously the person outsourced for those stats. 

Yeah, the reviews are definitely fake... They haven't even released their video courses yet and already have reviews... However I am desperately looking for cheaper DAT soaps (seriously can't find anyone who has extra soaps).

 

Where is this blue soap (pictured) from? Is this actually the official one sold by the canadian DAT?

[Null 1]

Yeah, the reviews are definitely fake... They haven't even released their video courses yet and already have reviews... However I am desperately looking for cheaper DAT soaps (seriously can't find anyone who has extra soaps).

 

Where is this blue soap (pictured) from? Is this actually the official one sold by the canadian DAT?

Is there a pre dental club/society where you live? I know the UAPDS facebook page always has people selling soaps and dat prep books

 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/UAPDS/

[Lemons 0]

Hey OP,

 

Your soap looks okay but from the pictures, it looks like it can use some improvements. Like everyone said, focus on smoothing your lines and edges. This will make a huge improvement on your score! You want to also make sure that you're cutting to the line you've marked, one of your fluted (sloped) ends is cut past your indicated line. Accuracy on the MDT is very important so make sure your dimensions are as solid as possible. If theres a possible 90 degree angle on any edge, make sure it is exactly 90 degrees. One tip you can use to make sure you have a 90 degree angle is to rest your DAT ruler on the flat surface and line it up with the edge. If the ruler is straight, your 90 degree angle is perfect. 

 

My general schedule for carving is:

 

6-7 minutes for the outline of soap, marking the dimensions on the soap with a sharp pencil

7-8 minutes for a coarse carve, taking a bulk of the soap out without making precise cuts. You can imagine that you can take a lot of the middle cutout before you start to have to be careful about going over your measurements

10 minutes for finishing all sides, paying attention to detail. Finish up the soap at 25 minutes

5 minutes for fine tuning, make sure everything is as you wanted. This schedule also accounts for nervousness during the actual DAT.

 

Remember practice makes perfect. Good luck! 

[2020Dental 5]

To answer the question about blue soaps (partially) - I recieved those same blue soaps 3 years ago from a relative who had recieved them 8 years ago from the DAT website. They were the soaps they used and the ones the DAT sent with the practice packages.

 

Not sure where to get them currently though

[kdd737 22]

The last set of soaps I ordered from the CDA website were the same colour of blue. My guess is that they are from the CDA.