(FORTUNE Small Business) – By day, Jerry Fank is a metals man. A machinist by trade, he co-founded Fancort Industries 32 years ago and still serves as vice president of manufacturing. The West Caldwell, N.J., company designs custom high-tech equipment used to cut and form integrated circuits (the chips that go in watches and PCs) and counts Lockheed Martin and Boeing as clients.

But come evening, Fank, 67, can be found in his basement working on a decidedly low-tech pursuit: woodcarving. He took up the hobby five years ago, attended some classes, and quickly discovered that he had a knack. His third carving, a praying-monk figurine, won first place in the intermediate division at the 2001 Mohawk Valley carving show, and his "Man in the Moon" piece--which he spent a year on--took top honors in the relief category. (Relief carvings are made on a flat surface; the three-dimensional pieces, like his praying monk, are called "in the round.")

Starting with blocks of butternut or basswood, Fank works from a model and creates the shape using knives, gauges, files, and a $300 set of chisels. His toolbox even includes something he invented himself: a trademarked positioning vice called a Jerry-Rig that he now sells through Fancort.

Unfortunately, tools and talent can't prevent every mistake--and some of them aren't even his fault. For one of his early classes, Fank had carved an Indian's head on a long piece of cottonwood bark. When his instructor tried to demonstrate how to break off the excess wood, he broke the Indian's neck instead. "I wanted to break the instructor's neck!" Fank says. "I'd spent three months on it." --Erika Rasmusson