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Selasa, 29 Maret 2016

On Workbenches Part I The Lesson of the Schwarz

As woodworkers we all have benches. Some are just a sheet of 3/4" plywood on saw horses and others are full blown hand made Roubo shrines. Until we come up with at least the most basic bench (just a horizontal work surface) were really of very little use as a woodworker.

Thats my current bench, under all those routers.

My current bench is a factory made Whiteside that I picked up on Craigslist for $150.00 a few years ago. It is a basic Nordic style bench, about 24” wide by 60” long and has two (2) mediocre vises. Mediocre is in fact the best choice to describe the whole bench.While it is what I have and it usually gets the job done, it is certainly not what I want. What I want is a mutant with the ancestry of Roubo, the bones of modern materials and an eye towards the 21st century.

But before I go too far into describing my own bench design philosophy I would be remiss if I failed to first bring up Christopher Schwarz, for he is certainly the current authority on workbench design & construction on the interwebs & the greater woodworking community as a whole.As many of us have, Ive been influenced by Chris rabid consumption and propagation of all things workbench. While he has so far failed to convert me to total Roubo adoration, I think there is more actionable workbench advise being put out by Chris than any other source we have access to today.Beyond a general workbench philosophy, Ive taken from Chris two (2) main points. The second is a direct result of the first.Point #1: The workbench is a 3 dimensional clamping surface. Its job is to hold a work piece still so that any number of woodworking tasks can be accomplished without the piece moving.

An out of proportion hand drawn cross section
of the bench design Im working on.

Point #2: The legs must be flush with edge of the top. Without this feature youre left with a 2 dimensional clamping surface, or put another choice, you have 2/3 of a workbench.

Selasa, 22 Maret 2016

The WoodExpo 2012 That Was

This past weekend I was lucky enough to make my choice up to Boston and enjoy Wood Expo 2012. Wood Expo is an event held within the New England Home Show. It aims to connect custom furniture makers with buyers. It also aims to help furniture makers with design critiques, networking and panel discussions.

The Seaport World Trade Center, Home of WoodExpo.

Im no furniture maker myself (at least not a selling furniture maker), but the custom furniture makers who did attend and display made this a great event for anyone passionate about woodworking. The hall was lined with people as rabid for woodworking as I am.

The makers who displayed or demonstrated in one choice or another included (thanks to Nick Roulleau & Steve Branam for their fantastic posts from which I pulled much of this list together):

Rob Bois

Michael Scott Morton

Rusty Burwell

Steve Branam

Chuck Bender (on right with Mike McCoy & Jim Ashley)

Michael McCoy

Kevin Mack

Megan Caine

Tom McLaughlin

Glen Guarino (w/ Tom McLoughlin)

Terry Moore

Unfortunately, I didnt get photos of these other wonderful woodworkers who were in attendance at WoodExpo:

Quentin Kelley

WoodExpo 2012

Steve Skillins

Ryan Messier

Freddy Roman

Allan Breed

Ed McCormack

Eli Cleveland

Niels Cosman

Mickey Callahan

Since I wasnt displaying and didnt have to pay attention to potential customers, I had the chance to talk with these guys for most of the afternoon.The conversations were alchoices insightful and ranged from the trivial (touristy lunch locations) to the serious & relevant (Whats the point of he show?, How do you attract custom furniture buyers? How do we reach our designs? Where do you buy wood?) While there was rarely any consensus reached, the depth of conversation clearly demonstrated to me how passionate we all are that woodworking as a career and hobby continue. We all need to thank Tommy MacDonald, Eli Cleveland, Rick Waters, Justin DiPalma, Scott Oja & Neil Lamens putting the show on.

The inaugural MWA Greater Boston area meetup.

After Wood Expo was (mostly) done we all headed down the block and had the inaugural meeting of the Boston chapter of the Modern Woodworkers Association. Nick’s done a great job of writing it up here on the Modern Woodworkers Association site.A great time was had by everyone I saw in attendance & Id highly recommend you attend next year. I hear its going to be better than ever.WoodExpo 2012 AlbumBoston MWA Meeting Album

Senin, 07 Maret 2016

Oh You Mean That Was Supposed To Lift

If you’ve been following along you know that as soon as I had assembled the carcass bottom and back I paused to install the hinged plane shelf so that the top and sides wouldn’t be in the choice. Well, you know how even the best laid plans end up . . .As I was installing the hinges for the doors, it occurred to me that I had installed the plane shelf so that there was no clearance between the side of the shelf and the side of the carcass. A quick test confirmed my suspicion that the shelf would not lift.

Thankfully this was a fairly easy mistake to correct. All that was required to re-set the plane shelf in working order was removing the hinge screws and re-attaching it.The shelf re-setting began by my forcing the shelf open past the door hinge to reveal the shelf hinge. Then my trusty 12v screw gun and an extra long #2 Philips bit make quick work of removing the screws.Once the plane shelf had been removed, I was left with figuring how to install it square to the body of the cabinet. To do this I first shifted the cabinet carcass onto it’s side. Then I laid down a double layer of ¾” baltic birch plywood scraps to hold the shelf off the side of the cabinet and leave plenty of clearance for the door and door hinge. Finally I used two (2) of my Woodpecker Clamping Squares to ensure the plane shelf was perpendicular to the cabinet side.

Clamping the shelf perpendicular to the carcass
to be sure that its square when attached.

A quick few holes with my 12v drill and a centering bit followed by the 12v screw gun and the shelf was re-installed and better then new. Thankfully I haven’t even begun to design the cubbies that will be installed to the left of the plane shelf. While their available space my have just shrunk by 1½”, at least I don’t have to modify them post installation.

Have you though ahead, patted yourself on the back and then realized that all that planning still didn’t work?

Other Bastard Wall Cabinet PostsWinter Wall Cabinet WonderlandThe Bastard Wall Cabinet (for tools!)Trudging Towards Tool StorageCutting the Cabinet Carcass (in relative terms)A Home For My PlanesContinued Wall Cabinet AssemblyWhats a Bastard Wall Cabinet without Shelves?

Boxing in the Bastard Tool Cabinet

Door Hinges on the Bastard Wall Cabinet

Minggu, 06 Maret 2016

Its Wanderful Part 1 Where to Begin

About 3 months ago my Sister-in-Law asked me to make her a wand to take to the premiere of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II. It’s not that she often requests things (though she does have a bookcase I built), it’s that she’s A) a harry potter fan and B) a follower of mine on Google Buzz.

Kenneths awesome wand that made my Sister-in-law go "Oh."

You see, in November of 2010, my friend, Kenneth Woodruff, wrote a blog post about the fantastic Harry Potter wand he made for Halloween that year. As I was truly impressed, I of course shared it on Buzz. I happened to be visiting my Sister-in-Law at the time, and as soon as I shared it “that’s a cool wand” could be heard from her corner of the living room.

Fast forward to May of 2011 and as the movie date approaches I get asked to make wands, wands for my Wife, Sister-in-Law and her partner. Wands like Kenneth made.Had Kenneth made a tool cabinet or a vacuum boom arm, I would have jumped right into the project. However, as Kenneth’s wand was faithful to the original (in that it is round and has carvings), it was a project well outside of my woodworking comfort zone. I’ve never worked in the round or carved before. As neither round work nor carving have held any appeal for me, I’ve never even read up on them (as I have with many other woodworking methods that I am interested in but have yet to try).

Kenneths great carved wand handle.

My first reaction was to stall. I didn’t really think about the project for 2 or 3 weeks. When I finally did begin planning, I went right to the source and contacted Kenneth about the wands. He was nice enough to provide some details on how he made his wand and some more detailed photos. The instructions still left this carving virgin wondering how I was going to make the wands. The photos though, were a fantastic help and a full 8.5” x 11” print out on photo paper served as my plan for making my wands. Following Kenneth’s advice, I then contacted the best and most enthusiastic carver I know, Kari Hultman. Unfortunately, my total carving naiveté was a deficit that even Kari’s detailed email instructions could not overcome.

One of 16 draws worth of carving gouges my dad has.

Frustrated, I then turned to my Dad, a rather proficient carver in his own right, for advice. He pointed me towards his vast collection of carving tools and said have at it. Unfortunately, as sharpening is a task I’m only slightly better at then carving (and his curved carving tools looked awfully hard to sharpen), I turned down his offer to lend me his carving gouges and I decided to make the wands from my own tools that I knew how to use.

What projects have your family talked you into?

Sabtu, 20 Februari 2016

Its Wanderful Part 2 The Begining

Having reviewed the wands with three (3) fellow woodworkers, and having been given solid advice by all three (3) of them, I was still not completely sure how I was going to make the wands. Yet, since I had been procrastinating like a pro, I decided the time had come buy the lumber and start the making if I was to have any chance of finishing them by the movie premiere. As I’m not familiar with any good local hardwood dealers and the project itself was enough stress, I went to my go-to source for nice wood, Bell Forrest Products. Though I had received advice on good carving woods, I completely ignored everything I’d been told and ordered me up five (5) 1.5”x1.5”x18” turning blanks of hard maple. I know . . . this didn’t make for easy shaping.

Heres a somewhat random picture of the walnut book stand I made for the
2010 Sawdust Chronicles Fall Build Challenge. It doesnt have anything
to do with the wands, but I like it and I dont have any photos relevant
to this stage in the wand saga.

About the same time as I ordered the wood for the wands, I also was lucky enough to have my Slide Out Storage Cabinet featured in the Tools of the Trade section of Popular Woodworking Magazine. The Lee Valley gift certificate I received as a result was put to good use. I ordered a spokeshave, rasp and cabinet scraper. Finally, having received all the advice I could manage and with tools and wood in hand, it was time to start making some wands. The first thing I did was take one of the blanks, and turn it into an octagon by cutting off the corners on the table saw. I then went crazy with my new spokeshave and turned it into a dowel, about ¾” in diameter. Though useless as a wand, this first test piece was set aside for carving practice and dye and finish experimentation.

How did you finally start that project youve been procrastinating about?

Its Wanderful Part 1

Sabtu, 13 Februari 2016

While I Was Away

This past weekend I was lucky enough to head down to Atlanta and attend Designing and Building Chairs with Jeff Miller at Highland Woodworking. The class was a blast and Ill be sharing more about it here and on the Highland Woodworking blog in the coming days.

The class was awesome and resulted in the great chair prototype made by the class.

While I was busy in Atlanta, my friends on the interwebs were busy posting videos and other great content. Here are some of the best things Ive seen on the web lately.
The Highland 35th Anniversary Limited Edition Scott Meek Smoothing Plane+Scott Meek has been a longtime friend. In this video +Mike Morton unboxes and reviews one of the really neat 35th Anniversary Edition plans which Scott is making for +Highland Woodworking.
A Moment with a Planemaker - Scott Meek WoodworksKeeping with Highland videos for a moment, this is another recent video of theirs featuring Scott. This video about Scott and the planes he makes also features the debut of our good friend +Christopher Adkins behind the camera for Highland Woodworking.
Toshio OdateThis video goes back to Woodworking in America 2009. +Tom Iovino took it of Toshios Japanese Plane class. Its a brief review of adjusting Japanese Vs. Western hand planes and is a fascinating watch, regardless of which you use.
Woodworkers Fighting Cancer Mug+Marc Spagnuolo has given in to popular demand and introduced a Woodworkers Fighting Cancer mug. It features the great logo +John Funk created for the cause. If youre not familiar with Woodworkers Fighting Cancer, you should be. You can check them out here.
Dont forget about the +Modern Woodworkers Association Podcast. We talk woodworking with Guests from around the world of woodworking every other week. Subscribe to the RSS feed or iTunes today.

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Label: at, away, axes, i, roy, throwing, underhill, unisaws, was, while, with, Woodworking Projects

Wine Rack Preview Video

With Stephens Step Stool finished, it was time to turn my attention to the project I have to have finished before Christmas. The first of those was the wine rack Im making for my Mom.
In this video, I show the rough formed wine rack and take it through the initial shaping.
Ill follow up with more posts documenting the actual build.Dont forget about the +Modern Woodworkers Association Podcast. We talk woodworking with Guests from around the world of woodworking every other week. Subscribe to the RSS feed or iTunes today.
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Label: away, i, preview, rack, video, was, while, wine, Woodworking Projects

Senin, 08 Februari 2016

A House In The Trees Part I

My wife and I have three (3) sons, ages 7, 7 and 3. They destroy a room in a matter of minutes when they “play.” Luckily, the basement is finished and serves as a playroom. We can shut the door and the mess goes achoice. Unfortunately, the noise doesn’t go achoice. Since the weather turned last fall, we’ve been eagerly awaiting the day when we can send them outside to play. As an incentive to get out of the house, we decided that it was time to build the tree house.When she thought it was time to start building, my wife brought the Black & Decker The Complete Guide: Build Your Kids a Treehouse home from the library. I went through it with a slight skepticism. I can’t say I’d trust a Black & Decker branded book to be all that good at any topic. While I feel my initial skepticism stands regarding the book’s production values, I was pleasantly surprised by the book’s technical information, especially its section on attaching to the trees.I knew that when attaching to the trees it would be important to properly support the tree house, not kill the tree and allow tree house and tree to move independent of each other. The Platform Ancoring Techniques section was fantastic. It reviewed the entire anchoring process. After reviewing the section multiple times, I thought the solution would be the commercially available Garnier Limb anchors they mention. Unfortunately, when the anchor and associated bracket are priced out, it comes to $125.00 per attachment point (plus the special drill bit you need to rent or buy). This was more than we were willing to spend, so I set about building my own.
The Garnier Limb from treehouses.com
Since I couldn’t source such big bolts at the local hardware store, I began by ordering some ¾” x 10” galvanized lag bolts from McMaster-Carr. In order to transform these into homemade Garnier Limbs, I added two (2) galvanized washers and a length of ¾” galvanized pipe between them. After they were assembled, I think the homemade bolts came out pretty well.
The 3/4" x 10" galvanized bolt.
The washers and 3/4" galvanized pipe ferrule installed to form my
homemade mounting bolt.
Im using commercially available post straps from Home Depot as the
bracket that will attach the joist to the mounting bolt while allowing
bi-directional movement.
Before installing the bolts, I glues together double 2x8 joists to form the perimeter of the platform. One laminated joist each at 10’, 12’ and 16’ long.
Gluing the joists.
In order to install them, I first picked and marked a height on the first tree (I was not particular about the exact height, as long as I could walk under the tree house). Using my right angle drill and a 9/16” auger bit, the 6” deep hole was easy.
This drill is one of my absolute favorite tools.
Then I set up my laser level and transferred the height to the remaining two (2) trees. Since it was getting late I decided to drill the second hole in the first tree and see if I could get the anchors installed. After drilling the second hole just like the first, I started ratcheting in the bolt.
Thats as far in as I could get, using a 9/16" pilot hole.
It was about 2” in to ratcheting in that first bold that I realized a 9/16” clearance hole was too damn small for a ¾” bolt. I drilled out both holes to ?” and both bolts when in like champs.
Finally, a rock solid anchor bolt.
With the joists glued up, the first two (2) bolts in and the other trees marked I called it a night. More tree house building to come. In the mean time, heres a quick video showing the bi-directional movement of the mounting bracket system Im using.
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Label: 2012, a, house, i, in, part, that, the, trees, was, woodexpo, Woodworking Projects

Minggu, 07 Februari 2016

The NWA Showcase That Was

The Northeast Woodworkers Association 2011 Showcase has finally come and gone, and what a great weekend it was.
Though a call from the school nurse delayed my departure by a few hours, the enjoyment began as soon as I reached Saratoga. Though we were late, my Dad and I managed to meet up with Mike Lehikoinen, Ian Mackay, Guy Bucey & Ben Lowery on Friday night. We shared a few drinks and a wonderful conversation.
The woodshop floor.
Saturday began by getting up too early and getting the barn ready. Though I completely understood the need, as there were so many people coming over, I must say it felt silly vacuuming the entire workshop floor just because we were having guests.
A scroll saw demonstration at NWA.
Unfortunately, after getting the barn ready, I was late getting to the show and missed Chris Schwarzs lecture on the Anarchists Tool Chest (I understand from good sources that it was a great lecture).
Once I did arrive, I spent some time going over the show floor (picking up a new Veritas Router Plane along the choice) and I made sure that I was front and center for Chris Schwarzs Petite Roubo talk (Ill post a video of that talk soon). After the talk Ian and Mike and I headed out for some lunch and after finding the bar with the worst services in town, we settled in at The Parting Glass for a good pub meal.
Following lunch I caught a quick dovetail demonstration by Chuck Bender and immediately bought his Dovetailing Apprenticeship DVD.
Some beautiful showcase pieces.
I also took my time going through the member showcase. Let me tell you, the members of the Northeast Woodworkers Association can turn our some beautiful pieces.
Convoy!
I wrapped up at the show as they were closing and headed back to the barn. After picking up ice, I found myself behind the Long Island Woodworkers Clubs bus & convoy. This was helpful, as I repeatedly got lost going to and from the barn all weekend.
A packed house for dinner.
Dinner turned out great. Besides the bus getting stuck when the driver decided to make a U-turn in the soft mud, everything seemed to go well and I think everyone had a great time talking wood. Though not all of our confirmed guests ended up showing for dinner, we had a great time with those who did. Besides the Long Island Woodworkers Club Id like to thank Ian Mackay & Mike Lehikoinen for coming down from Canada, Ben Lowery for walking over from Saratoga Springs and especially Chris Schwarz. While Chris was already in Saratoga, he certainly didnt have to come to our dinner and I really appreciate that he did.
The stuck bus.
How was your weekend?
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Label: nwa, showcase, that, the, was, Woodworking Projects

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