woodworking tools tips

Now, lets all spread the word and get Tommy the attention he deserves.
UPDATE 7/23/10 - Heres a link to a great article on Tommy and the show from the Canton Citizen. Its a very good read.

Rabu, 25 Januari 2017

Cherry Settee with Hand Woven Seat

This soild cherry settee was built a few years ago and was my first attempt at using hand tools to build furiture. A band saw was used for the legs, everything else by hand. Stock was rough diemensioned using a #40 scraper plane and finished with #5 and #4 smoothing planes. The seat is hand woven from 5/8" wide ash strips. Cherry darkens with age so the applied finish is danish oil.

Senin, 26 Desember 2016

a 60 wide slab of claro walnut

well, we got a big one here. its going to aspen when its finished. this is the widest slab of claro walnut we have ever had ... it clocks in at 63" at the wide point ... after we trim it up a bit, it will be about 60" wide at both ends and about 8 long. it will have one of our new trapezoid bases. click the photos to enlarge them....

couple close ups of the rough slab here ... were working on it in my garage as were a little jammed up at the shop at the moment.

heres the cad drawing

will and trevor wheeled it out to the shade by the woodshed yesterday to begin the flattening process. fire up the makitas ...

the slab was astonishingly flat for something so wide ... a tribute to skip and norman at good hope hardwoods and their ability to dry this stuff so we can work it up. its truly amazing. that really is a four foot level there on the right end. the winding sticks are about 45" i think.

time ran out before they could completely smooth the face, but the bottom side is pretty much ready to sand and they should be able to finish this side today ... more later as we progress.

today we finished the rough smoothing of the top of the slab, did some rough sanding and mocked up the base with some 2 x 4s we had from when we picked it up at our friends loading dock.

just like this only in natural finish steel .. all for now

Jumat, 23 Desember 2016

The Penultimate Woodshop Now with Mobile

Thanks to an update from Blogger in Draft, the Penultimate Woodshop is now available for mobile viewing. If youve got your phone handy, scan this QR code to check it out.
Once youve read the site on your phone, please get back to the woodshop.
p.s. - as an aside, Im loving this update because I do about 70% of my web activity from my Droid phone. While I can alchoices check my analytics, how about a discussion instead. What device do you use for your interweb activity?

Sabtu, 17 Desember 2016

21 years later

its not often that you get to see a table you made 21 years ago that lives 300 miles achoice. just after christmas though, one of my long time clients emailed to say that their table had sustained some damage over the holidays and needed some help. coincidentally, my shipper was in the area and was able to pick it up and return it to me for refinishing. i regret not taking a photo when it arrived, but i do have one below from early in the refinishing process. the scratch was not small, but neither was it deep, so it sanded right out. this table is one of my early studio style pieces and loyal readers will recognize the style from a recent post on a dining room we completed early last fall. its a comfort to me that we are still making pieces in a style i originally started working on choice back in 1986. nice to know that an idea you came up with has some legs and staying power. click the photos to enlarge them ...

this is a close up of the red abalone inlay squares in the central element of the table design. the black is milk paint from the old fashioned milk paint company and looks as good as it did (minus the dog chews) 21 years ago. it polished up like new.

i had actually forgotten about the square detail, and now that im reminded, will maybe do a new piece or two using the square rather than our regular angled look.

regular angled look above from the dining room post last fall ...

early in the refinishing process. the oil finish we used in the early 90s has since been replaced by more durable brush on poly finishes and this client was good about refreshing his finish a couple times a year. theat did create quite an oil buildup that, while it protected the table, proved difficult to remove. the table was also in a sunny south facing room, which created a kind of sunburned bleached surface which was kind of whitish until we got through it.

this picture shows my first wiping with mineral spirits ... more work to do ...

and here it is after the first coat of finish ... ill be interested to hear what the clients have to say about it after it is returned to pennsylvania on thursday ... its a cool thing to visit with an old friend ...

Jumat, 25 November 2016

Yo ! Turkeys ! and other images of spring

We had these daffodils on the kitchen island a week ago and they gave me the feeling that the weather was about to break ... And it did. We still have snow on the ground but this weekend was 100% sunny and warm. I think I saw 50 degrees on my car thermometer for a minute .. Anychoice, it was beautiful and I was lucky to catch some turkeys prowling through the woods a few minutes before I found my first pussywillows ...

Click the pictures to enlarge them

Mr. Turkey above, and his ladies below ... He had a nice beard but hes turned just enough that you cant see it in this picture ...

I think there were 3 or 4 more ladies I cropped out ..

Pussywillows on the porch and Cactus Man Goes to the Pyramids by Jim Parsons, the guy Jim you see working in the shop photos ...

Sunset yesterday ... two months to leaves ...

Rabu, 16 November 2016

The Biggest Problem With My Shop

My Bench

As my shop is ever the work in progress, I could fill this entire web log entry with current complaints and risk clogging the interweb tubes with my frustration. In an attempt to keep my whining to a minimum Im going to limit this entry to my biggest current complaint: my total lack of counter space.
It seems that every project I embark on requires more counter space than the last. My continual multi-tasking of project seems to exacerbate the issue. To illustrate, allow me to describe the surfaces I currently have in the woodshop that serve double duty as counters (of course I have no actual counter tops).

My Table Saw

Workbench: a common counter substitute. Mine is presently home to my small compressor and my box of wrenches & ratchets as I perform open regulator surgery. Table Saw: another surface we small shop folk use for double duty. Mine us currently overflowing with new base moldings for my kitchen & living room. Rolling Drillpress Bench: its overflowing with my drill press, my dual bevel sliding compound miter saw, my tapering sled and miscellaneous finishing supplies. Band Saw Table: mine is filled with cedar shingle cut-offs which are waiting to be used when I re-start my siding project.

My Big Compressor

Those are all the horizontal surfaces I have. My currently lack of available space had led me to resort to some less than ideal arrangements. Ive been using my big compressor as a makeshift table to open my drill & drill bit boxes on. My Kreg & air tool accessory toolboxes are sitting on the floor turning my sheet good pile into a bigger tripping hazard. My new Jet ambient air filter (still in the box) is housing my new Kreg accessories, boxes of shims and drill accessory tool box, all covered in sawdust from being behind the temporary miter saw stand.
From this situation Ive developed a two pronged strategy I hope to be incorporating into the shop as soon as I can.
First, Ill put as many items as I can into cabinets or drawers (such as my planned "Suitcase Style Case" rack) which will allow access without having to lay out cases on countertops. Second, Ill be building as many horizontal surfaces as I can into the final shop design. I presently plan on a proper workbench, a table saw outfeed table, a long miter saw bench and an assembly table. Im sure all of these surfaces will double as counters at some time or another. Hopefully this combination of deceased need and increased capacity will address my current counter top woes.
What passes for counter space in your shop?
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Selasa, 08 November 2016

The newest additions to the hand tool arsenal

Waited for the UPS guy to deliver this week and deliver he did! A LN #4 Bench Plane plus a Rip Cut carcass saw and a Cross Cut carcass saw are the newest additions to the hand tool arsenal. First the plane, I have never felt anything like this in my life!! I have Stanley planes sharpened and set up and I thought they did a good job until I used this #4. For those of you that have one you know the feeling, for those of you that dont, save your money and order one when you can.
Now the saws, it is a real pleasure to work with hand tools that are set up and sharp. I have a LN dovetail saw, so I thought I knew what to expect when I handle these carcass saws. Again, I was quite surprised as to how easily these saws cut.

Senin, 31 Oktober 2016

Youre Getting to be a Habit with Me

A couple of recent tool purchases have changed the choice I do work, and as the song goes, youre getting to be a habit with me. I first received the Evenfall Studios Shooting Board a month or so ago and other than just trying it out, I really didnt have a project that would require its use. While working on the project you see below, I bought Capt. America, a beautiful 16" tenon saw made Bad Axe Tool Works at the WIA this year, used it cut tenons of course, but also to x-cut the frame pieces. This is where things changed for me, an epiphany of sorts.

Though I have tried in the past to make my own shooting board, I never could quite get it right, some things are best left to the professionals. I have alchoices made my x-cuts on my table saw thinking the blade was square, it is close, but not close enough. I used my #3 Stanley souped up with a Hock blade, and it squared up the ends of each piece perfectly. Works great, I have also used my low angle block plane on this board.

The project is three tables for a clients sewing room, I have delivered one, working on the second, and one more of these to build. It is now almost second nature to reach for the saw, instead of the table saw, cut the piece, square it up, move on. One step closer to going "cordless". :)

Evenfall Studios Deluxe Shooting Board and the Capt. America
16" Tenon Saw from Bad Axe Tool Works

Bottom frame drawer support

Sabtu, 22 Oktober 2016

a reclaimed chestnut table with self storing leaves

sometimes you start out headed for one place and end up in another. this is one of those times. this table with the self storing pull out leaves on the ends grew from a design we created with another client, in another place, a table with round ends, and without the leaves ... you can see it in the photo below, and loyal readers may remember it from this blog post from may of last year. my current client liked that design but wanted a rectangular table ... no problem i thought ... or almost no problem in the end ... click the photos to enlarge them ...

basically, i thought i would just cut off the ends and add the pull out leaves, which i did in the drawing below, and we agreed it was great ... off we went ...

until we arrived here, where i noticed that sitting at the end of the table would not work, as you can see below, unless the leaves were pulled out.

so we discussed this situation ... 3 chairs per side for six, pull out the leaves for 8 or more ...

not so good we decided in the end ...

fortunately, since the table was made from reclaimed lumber and already had a few patches, after considering some reconfiguration options, we decided to remove the lower, mostly decorative understructure entirely, giving our client the seating flexibility she desired ... our previous design for pull out leaves was fussy to fabricate and sometimes confusing for the clients to operate, so using another table as a model as well as a nicely written fine woodworking article by tage frid from the 70s, we decided we would improve upon our design. will made a 1/4 size mockup using the math in the article, and we decided this was the choice to go ... it works slicker than our old design and by applying the large areas of felt you can see on the bottom of the top below, it works really smoothly and the leaves are protected from scrathcing. you can see a very short you tube video of the opening and closing process at this link.

the top is not actually attached to the base but rather floats up and down via a pair of steel pins in holes in the center of the center frame. you can see that in the video. in the picture above, the leaves are in the closed position but you can see the little guides that will made that are attached to that center frame and keep the leaves square as they open and close. a little shellac and wax on the runners and guides and they slide like a dream.

we routed a half inch wide channel, an 1/8th inch deep, around the felt area so we could staple the felt and not just glue it ...

ta dah .. 88" closed to 132" open ... thank you again fine woodworking website ... the online access is the best $15.00 you can spend ...

Rabu, 21 September 2016

a walnut table with carved legs

1/10/2012 ... all in , all done ... leaving for arizona thursday morning ... were all happy with the final and will is proud of his carvings ...

12/27/2011 ... were on the home stretch on a new walnut dining table. this client came to me from reading this blog, so we knew how to work together immediately. and, the process was, as expected, a pleasure.

the concept for this table is based on two previous tables, the original, a more formal mahogany project with wildlife carvings (ducks, a turkey, a woodcock and a grouse) on the leg corners,

and the maple leaf table, a project that appeared in this blog in june of last year.

this table also, is a variant of our own dining table, a studio style dining table that first appeared in my design repetoire back in 1987, and still is a popular part of our style. we have made many, many variations on the theme. you can see some by browsing that link to the small tables section of our website. im working up to a post on the life of various designs concepts and how they can run as threads through a designers work and continue to generate new ideas. maybe soon ...

on to this table ... this client has a background in the california fruit orchard culture and while we kicked around a few other ideas, the fruit themed carvings were the final winner. after a couple of quick test carvings where we even considered paint and color, we gravitated to a natural finish for the whole table with some glazing in the carvings to make them stand out a bit and give them depth ... well be wrapping it up this week and hopefully sending it off to arizona shortly after the first of the first of the year.

here will is scraping the two board 42" wide, bookmatched walnut top. these are boards from the same log as the bethlehem steel table, only without the defects.