Norse Woodsmith's Hand Tool Headlines

Inside the Oldwolf Workshop: I Am Wood Working And So Can You

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 23:43:00 -0600

Issues of Popular Woodworking Magazine always get a bit of a work-over in the blog-o-sphere after it's out. Not usually one of those "a few rounds in the ring with Tyson" work-over, more that the folks over there do a talented lot, excellent at more than just woodworking they have a knack for inspiring discussion more so than any of the other magazine publications. This would most likely stem from the fact that Chris Schwarz is a prolific blogger, and bloggers tend to keep up with other bloggers stuff,and this results in more discussion. All a very good thing.

Chris did make me laugh out loud with this most recent issue of Pop Wood in his "On The Level" blurb at the beginning of the magazine. Where he called out the woodworking to community to take up the cause of blogging about woodworking to preserve the knowledge for future generations. I have to say that kind of goal puts only a little more pressure on the quality of my own blog posts, but it did make me think about why I started blogging about my work.

It wasn't necessarily to teach anybody anything, not that I'm against teaching, I'll show you anything I know and make up some of the stuff I don't know if you ask me. And it wasn't to brag, if it was that then I'd be putting up finished pics and talking about how great I am instead of documenting my mistakes along side my triumphs. It was some about creating a chronicle of my work, Before I started the blog I had been woodworking for about 8 to 9 years, but I had rarely taken a camera into my shop. In fact some things I've built that have gone to other loving homes, I have no pictures or record of. The more that occurred to me the more it bothered me. How can you know where you want to go if you can't see where you've been. So the camera began to sneak it's way into the shop.

Then we moved from LaCrosse Wisconsin to Presque Isle Maine. Just under 1700 miles away from family, friends, and the lives we knew. Why? The usual reason, something that looked like a good job prospect,

While we were living out there I began a blog about us, my wife, my daughters and myself, so that the folks back at home could keep up with us and we could feel like we were still in touch. A few months in I realized that I could also blog about my woodworking and I started with my first real project done out there, building a real workbench, a hybrid version between the 175 dollar workbench and the Nicholson or English Workbench. It was kind of raw and I fumbled my way through the process. Several times I have been tempted to go back and heavily edit those posts, but I fight it because again, I want to know where I've come from.

We have moved back to Wisconsin, with lessons well learned, and the blogging not only continued, but I got a little more serious about it. Blogging about my work is great for several reasons, only one of those reasons is the point Chris brings up about passing along and archiving knowledge, but there are other reasons that are of a direct reward to me. One is blogging keeps me in the shop and motivated. I have a personal goal of making 2 to 3 posts on this blog a week, sometimes I do better, sometimes I do worse, but it averages out. To have something to write about, most of the time I have to have done something. This gets my arse in the shop, and more time in the shop equals better skills, and better skills lead to more ambitious projects, which lead to . . . you guessed it, new blog content, more work, better skills and better projects and outcomes. It's a delightful cycle that can fuel itself. If you need no other reason to blog, I suggest you use this one.

The other big thing blogging has done for me is made my very curious to read other woodworker's blogs, something that had never occurred to me before I forged a beginners blog of my own. This has opened the door to me to become part of an online woodworking community, both through reading and commenting on other's blogs but also being inspired to search out other woodworkers on social media platforms like Twitter (shameless plug: you can follow me on Twitter @oldwolfworkshop). This has also given me more of a connection to woodworking than ever before.

As you can see in the left hand side of my blog I follow a good number of the woodworking blogs out there, I enjoy all the content that each of them offers, but tonight I'm talking about inspiration more than anything and I want to point out a few blogs as particular inspiration to me. Obviously missing from the list will be Chris Schwarz's multiple blogs, his work goes without saying and needs no further fanfare from the likes of little ol' me.

First I am going to start with one of the heavy hitters from the list, Peter Follansbee, and his blog Joiner's Notes. Peter is a gifted woodworker who focuses all of his attention to working with hand tools only, using period joinery and carving techniques from the 17th century. You can tell from the execution of his blog that his work flows in an effortless practiced way that comes from a great amount of study, practice, and familiarity. I love his articles and how they delve past the "this is how you can do this" layer of work and into the thoughts and broad knowledge base behind the work. I feel smarter every time I read a post from his blog and I look forward to every one.

Next is a man who is a blogging machine, I am very happy if I can get up 2 to 3 posts a week. This guy posts

every

single

day.

His name is Brian Meeks and his blog is called Extremely Average, but it is far from that. Brian is fairly new to woodworking but he is really catching on fast and his progress is fun to watch and, through his blog, he makes you feel like you're participating in the journey. Besides being so accessible in his writing Brian's photography is incredibly beautiful. It puts me and my little digital camera to shame. I want him to come and take some photos of my work because I get so jealous of the quality that translates through with his. He is progressing fast and is definitely someone to read, and watch.

Here's a confession, I am definitely not a podcast kind of guy. I will watch a video if I feel it's right up my alley but generally speaking I get more from reading and pictures than I do from listening, maybe it's just me but my attention span checks out. That means that I don't get as much out of some great blogs like the Wood Whisperer, Renaissance Woodworker, or the Logan Cabinet Shoppe. (These guys all have great regular blog content as well, and are top notch, I'm not knocking them I just don't always get as much from their blogs as other probably do) But to every rule there is an exception, and my exception is Matt Vanderlist and his Spoken Wood Podcast, where he features blog posts written by others yet recorded read out loud, either by the author, or by Matt himself. The fact that he links back to the original post in his show notes helps me as I can go and look at the post while I'm listening, now the content really hits home.

Dyami is fairly new to the blog-o-sphere as he has only been posting at The Penultimate Woodshop for about 2 months as I write this post, but he is a great example of everything that is great in blogging. When I find new blogs, one of my favorite things is to go back and read the very first thing they posted, Dyami writes exactly about the reason people often don't blog, in fact the same hurdle I had to jump myself to start typing, the great question "Compared to those guys out there, what value can I possibly add?" and he's a perfect example of why that thinking is wrong. You should definitely be reading what he's up to, there's good stuff here.

When I started a hand tool only odyssey a year ago there were tools I wanted to use, but I could not find them as a "non antique" for an affordable price. What was I to do? Then I found Leif at the Norse Woodsmith, and began to read his blog. There is a ton of information over here on maintaining hand tools and even making some from scratch. (Making my own floats following his example is fast approaching on my do do list). A quick look at his archives told me he has been placing his quality content on the net since 2004, so until I wrote this article I didn't even realize the depths of information that are contained here. I'm going back to dip for more as soon as I finish this post, you should come with me.

Rob Porcaro and his blog Heartwood does things just right, He offers a good mixture of well thought out and well written content, from technique to tools to projects. He always has a new little tip or trick he likes to share. Again if you go back and look at the first post he blogs I think he really has the philosophy correct and verbalized better than I could. He talks about an oily rag he keeps in his shop for wiping down tools after use, I keep a similar rag and I think a lot of woodworkers do, but he's right when he says that something like that would never be discussed or covered in a woodworking book or magazine, and then that information is more difficult to pass along to those new to the passion. Rob describes the idea behind his blog is a chance for others to sneak a peek over his shoulder, maybe to be inspired, maybe to just find a different way of doing something. This mirrors what I try to do with my blog.

I should say that the choices I made in which bloggers to feature is like a slice of pie when it comes to getting woodworking information on the internet, I take that back it would be just a bite of a slice of that pie, and even though that bite is sweet on the tongue and lights off a million pleasure sensor's in the brain, there is another bite to take after this one, and there is so much more to discover out on the net. I cannot encourage you enough to take up the cause, to read, and start your own blog, You will not only be helping, motivating, and inspiring yourself, but you'll be sharing your time and motivation with others.

Cheers

Oldwolf

P.S. I would be remiss here if I didn't take a second to thank all of my own reader's out there. I have been blogging for a little over a year and my hit counter just hit the 5 digit level, that's 10,000+ pages read on my blog and that is indeed a humbling number, Thank you again for all the support and please keep tuning in.

Popular Woodworking Magazine: The Six-board, $100 Workbench

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 17:42:57 -0600

At long last, Megan Fitzpatrick (shown actual size in the photo above) and I began work on a new workbench for Woodworking in America. We're building this one from Eastern white pine timber left over from a log cabin that was built 10 years ago.

These six hunks of pine were kiln-dried then sat in a covered shed, where they checked a bit, gathered a bunch of spiderwebs and became covered in dirt.

Megan (who is really quite tiny as you can see in the photo above), snagged the entire lot for $100 after spotting an ad on Craigslist.com.

After bringing these boards into the shop and running some of them down to experiment with the material, I've become convinced that log home supplies might just be an excellent source of lumber for a workbench.

This week I chatted with a salesman from Discount Log Home Supplies in East Canton, Ohio, about getting some prices for "cants," which are squared-off timbers. This company sells several species, though the Ohio yard stocks Eastern White Pine, which has been kiln dried to 11-15 percent. It comes rough-sawn and is basically No. 2 common.

After some calculations, I figure than an 8' Roubo-style bench would require about 104 board feet of 5" x 5" x 8' boards, plus about 21 board feet for waste. The company charges 85 cents a board foot plus the trucking charge ($1.75 a loaded mile).

In the end, it would cost us about $160 to $170 for the material for a single bench.

That is not bad, considering that the top will be made of four pieces and there are no other glue-ups.

I was so encouraged by this that I asked Kelly Mehler at the Kelly Mehler School of Woodworking if I could teach a workbench class in 2011 using these massive timbers as the raw material.

And I think he's game.

Today Megan (my foul-mouthed featherboard) and I sliced into the material after tuning up our massive Grizzly band saw (a fine bear it is!) and knocking down the six slabs into manageable pieces that we could wrestle through the bear.

As the dirt, spiderwebs and checks dropped away, Megan and I could only "ooh" and "aah" at this beautiful and massive material. This is going to be a fine-looking bench.

More details tomorrow. Now I need a massage.

— Christopher Schwarz

Other Workbench and Vise Resources

• You can pre-order my new book on workbenches titled "The Workbench Design Book," which features a French design much like the one we're building here. If you order it now, you'll save 20 percent. Here's the link to our store.

• As always, I recommend you check out workbenchdesign.net for all your geeky workbench needs.

• Check out the new Sliding Tail Vise from Veritas.

• Benchcrafted has a new version of its awesome tail vise. Plus new instructions you can download from the company's site.

• And be sure to check out the wooden vise screws from Lake Erie Toolworks. Very nice.

Owyhee Mountain Fiddle Shop: Finding a new old tool I already had

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 16:24:00 -0600

I had a bass in the shop for repair. It had a couple cracks in the heel and a fingerboard that had been reglued in place, or almost in place, with some unknown glue. An amateur repair, the fingerboard had slipped after it was glued, but before the glue had set. Basically a mess. I was able to get the fingerboard off, but did not recognize the glue. It was still plastic, and a dark brown in color. To further complicate matters, a small chunk of the fingerboard had been left glued to the neck prior to the application of this brown glue.

I managed to lift off the small chunk of fingerboard attached to the neck, but none of my known methods of glue removal had much effect on this soft but stubborn glue. In desperation, I tried an old plane I had lying about. I got it several years ago at an antique shop for $20. Hadn't done anything with it, and it was in rough shape.

It actually worked fairly well. I was able to plane the glue from the fingerboard, and then from the neck. And the plane felt pretty nice in my hand.

So, I took the plane apart, cleaned up the blade and the cap, flattened the sole a little bit with a sanding board, and sharpened the blade. This is it in the photo. An old No. 5. It is resting on a piece of poplar about 16 inches long. The shaving is from the first stroke I took with the newly cleaned up plane, a full-length shaving, about 0.011-inch thick -- sometimes it's nice to move a little wood.

I'd been wanting a jack plane, and I just might have something here that works in that capacity.

Here's the bass with the neck and fingerboard newly cleaned of plastic glue. I have used hide glue to glue the cracks in the heel, held by the clamp, but will actually resort to a carriage bolt down through the heel to hold it together. On the fingerboard, you might be able to see the small chunk of wood I had to remove from the neck and glue back in; it's about 1/3 the way from the left end, on the lower edge.

The Bespoke Woodworker: Roubo Retuned

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 14:42:59 -0600

I finally got a few minutes this past weekend in the shop, and I used the spare time to work on tasks to bring the shop back up to speed. I did a bit of cleaning, and in the process, got all the accumulated home repair/upgrade leftovers (aka junk) off my bench and got to looking it over. While the movers had it in storage, and in transit (twice), it got a few streaks and scratches on it. In addition, when the old shop got waterlogged in the New England Flooding of ‘09, the leg vice detent ended up locked in place, and because the vise had to be removed from the leg to get it out of the shop, I really had no choice but to simply break it off. I managed to save the vise chop, but the detent is gone now. It is hard to remove what is essentially a drawbored tenon, even one a mere 1/2″ thick!

In looking it over, the chop is still in good shape, but I think rather than the traditional leg vise design, I’m going to renew my cross-braced mechanism and see if I can work out how to build that into the vise design rather than simply repeat the previous design. We’ll see!

In the meantime, the top needed love. I pulled out my winding sticks and straightedge, and I could see the top did not appear to need any flattening. There’s no warp, twist, or cup. Although there were some dings and scratches, none of them were deemed significant enough to take a whole layer off the top of the bench. Instead, I used a scraper, and some sandpaper, and merely removed the worst of the blemishes by hand. I’ll drop another layer of danish oil on top of the bench the next time I get out to the shop, and move on to revisiting the Leg vise design.

My cleanup intent was not to make the benchtop perfect, but merely to remove surface damage and to clean the top up so that it can once again take a layer of finish. I may try a few cleansers to remove some of the dark streaks, but I’m just as likely to label it ‘character’ and put the finish right over the top! I’ll save cleaning that up for a time in the future when I need to truly level the surface.

Galoototron: Making a Marking Gauge

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 13:44:23 -0600

I made a marking gauge a while back, complete with captive wedge and everything. For a long time, I didn’t have a cutter for its arm, so it wasn’t very useful. Then at some point, I made a cutter out of a section of an old saw, and it was then a working tool. The problem was that I never used it, and after a while, I realized that I never used it because I was always reaching for my gauges with thumbscrews. I guess I didn’t like the captive wedge.

To fix this, I decided to ditch the wedge and retrofit a thumbscrew. I bought all of the hardware necessary and immediately proceeded to bore too small of a hole for the screw insert, and this ultimately ruined the fence part of the gauge. I removed the screw insert, gave up for the day, and sulked:

The next day, I milled a new piece of beech to thickness, cut it to size, and mortised a new hole for the fence:

Standard through-mortise procedure applies: Cut halfway through on each side. Easy enough; then I roughed out the fence shape with my new saw (I’m using it more than I thought I would):

I finished the shaping with my saw rasp and some sandpaper–nothing new there.

In all of the thumbscrew-model marking gauges I’ve seen (the metal screws, that is), there’s a piece of metal acting as a guard between the screw and wooden parts. I don’t know what to call this, so I’m calling it a “saddle,” because it’s usually a U-shaped thing that fits over the wood.

I cut off a piece of brass from some stock I had lying around, put it in a vise, and smacked it with a hammer to try to form it. I guess I was expecting it to be a lot softer, because nothing much happened when I did that. So I took out my little sledgehammer and gave it a pounding. I don’t know if this is the way you’re “supposed” to do stuff like this, but it worked:

After some filing, it fit perfectly.

Then I turned my attention to boring the hole for the screw insert. I had already drilled a small pilot hole before shaping, so keeping the bit straight wasn’t a problem, and I’d also learned from my previous hamfistedness that I needed to use a #7 bit, not a #6 bit. Fortunately, I had one:

Notice the finished saddle piece at the right here.

After going to the correct depth with the #7 bit, I finished going all the way through with a #5 bit, then I used a large furniture connector driven by a ratchet to drive in the screw insert:

To finish it, all I had to do was hack the thumbscrew to a proper length and put everything together:

Immediately after putting everything together, I realized that maybe the marking gauge with a thumbscrew and wedged cutter is not as simple of a tool to make as it seems. That’s because there is a limitation of this particular configuration that I hadn’t thought about before, namely, that the cutter can’t be set less than about 3/16″ away from the fence. There are two causes here:

I put the wedge on the inside of the cutter rather thant the outside.
The saddle introduces yet more buffer space. That wouldn’t have been a problem if I put the saddle on the side, like some other marking gauges, but I didn’t like the fact that the arm had a little play in that configuration.

How interesting! I know how to overcome both of these issues, but I’m not going to bother for this particular gauge. It’s done and ready to use.

The Windsor Chronicles: Les Rabots

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 10:45:13 -0600

An amazing present arrived from Amazon.fr recently. It was a gift from Sieur Vincent Lavarenne. Many of you know Sieur Vincent. He is le Premier Chevalier de France – The First Knight of France. As such, Sieur Vincent commands all French Knights of Windsor. There aren’t a whole lot of them right now, but that is going to change. The French are very interested in culture and as we accomplish our stated purpose “for handmade Windsor chairs to take over the world” the will soon be an army of chaisiers.

Any way, my gift was a large full-color reference book titled Les Rabots and was written by Pierre Bouillot and Xavier Chatellard. Rabot is French for plane; as in the category of tools used by woodworkers. I have not yet read the whole book, but I have scanned its entirety. There is no doubt this is a landmark work. I have a huge library of books on woodworking and tools, but this one is full of information I have never seen before. For example, I own and use lots of English planes. I recognize the foreign shapes that tool dealers always label “European.” However, I could never tell you where in Europe they came from. As you probably remember from 4^th grade geography, Europe is a big place with lots of countries. Using Les Rabots, I can tell a foreign plane’s place of origin. I can identify a generic Asian plane, but it never dawned on me that individual countries in Asia would have their own plane designs. I recognize the difference between Anglo-American 18^th and 19^th century planes. I never imagined that plane design evolved in other countries as well, and even by region. I do now. In fact, this book is so complete it could have been titled “History of Planes of the World.”

The book begins with the planes of antiquity. You maybe surprised at how sophisticated Roman planes were, and the number of examples recovered by archaeologists. Did you know the Romans used iron infill planes 2000 years ago? Would you recognize a Roman molding profile? The book goes on to chronicle the plane industry. Many of the illustrations (engravings and some early photographs) are French and reveal a highly developed plane industry in that country during the 18^th and 19^th centuries. During the 19^th century when American plane makers were improving their planes and inventing new mechanisms French plane makers were doing the same thing. They worked out solutions I have never seen before reading Les Rabots.

Bouillot’s and Chatellard’s magnum opus contains lists of plane makers from different countries. These lists are necessarily incomplete, as such lists require books of their own. These listings of plan makers in The United States and in England exist and a curious woodworker will already own them. Les Rabots also contains similar lists of European iron makers. I love the cutters stamped with a standing Napoleon.

The book contains chapters on plane use as well as the devices, such as shooting boards – that are used in concert with planes. It has chapters on planes unique to various trades, such as the stair maker. The authors also cover plane related tools, such as spoke shaves and scrapers. The final chapters are for the collector, explaining how to buy and care for planes.

The book has one draw back for an American. It is written in French. I am able to read the text quite well, although I do have to look up an occasional term. The result is that I now know a lot more workshop vocabulary than I learned when I lived in France. I do wish now I had paid more attention to the ateliers I passed, but having turned 21 while there, I was more interested in girls, wine, and the great food. While you may not be able to read Les Rabots, you will salivate over the planes in the pictures. The photography is excellent and the planes enough to make any woodworker’s heart palpitate.

The book is not cheap. It costs Eur. 80.75 which the currency converter on the internet tells me is equal to $103. 36. Of course the exchange rate changes from time to time, but this gives you an idea of how much you will shell out. Trust me, you won’t be disappointed. Here is the link that will take you to amazon.fr and Les Rabots. The site is all in French, but is the layout is identical to amazon.com. http://www.amazon.fr/s/ref=nb_sb_noss? _mk_fr_FR=%C5M%C5Z%D5%D1&url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=les+rabots&x=0&y=0

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You probably remember an earlier posting about Freddy Dudak, the 11 year old who took the July sack back. I received this message from his father Sir Freddy Dudak. “Freddy’s chair was entered in the West End Fair which is a local fair in our area that is in its 89th year. The chair was entered under the category of original crafts-junior, and he took home the blue ribbon. I entered my chair and didn’t fare so well coming home with a third. Freddy was consoling me when we picked up the chairs saying that I should be glad I didn’t see what I lost to. I love that kid.” Those of us around The Institute are real proud of Freddy too.

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To receive my eNewsletter of periodic updates, tips, tool reviews, and new sources, that are in addition to this blog, join our mailing list by emailing me at mike@thewindsorinstitute.com Help us spread the word about this blog. Tell others.

The Renaissance Woodworker: A Sawing Exercise Hits the Road

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 09:12:27 -0600

I envy the carpenter. He can take his show on the road anytime. If I leave my shop and bench and tools, I am useless. Sometimes, even changing tools I am useless. I’m sure you know what I mean and if not, try cutting a set of carcass dovetails with a saw, chisels, and marking gauge you have never picked up before. This weekend my skills were put to the test as I was dragged from my shop to do a project in the wild.

It’s back to school time and the gloom that has settled over my wife in the last few days has made that blatantly known. After finally accepting the inevitable, she tells me that we need to visit her classroom on Sunday to do some organizing in the classroom. I also needed to deliver the Hepplewhite book case to it’s place of honor. Heather told me that I needed to build some shelves for an existing book case to store sheet music. Basically she needed 3 more shelves and to replace 2 of them that had bowed beyond belief. (I’m not sure who decided un-laminated particleboard over a 40″ span was a good idea for shelves that would hold books) The good news is that there is already some shelving material on campus that we could use and that I would just need to cut it down to size. I was dubious at this last statement since no further details were given. She assured me that they didn’t need to be pretty, just fit in the space and hold up to boxes of sheet music.

Here is the case after I pulled everything off the shelves.

I took a quick measurement of the sheet music boxes (the black boxes to the right in the above picture) and spaced out the shelves to be somewhat consistent from top to bottom. I then went in search of the aforementioned shelving material. I found it upstairs in the stage scene shop and was happy to see it was a good quality plywood with maple veneer and what looked like a few coats of poly on the surface. The edges had been banded with maple as well. Things were looking up, but I still had to deal with the size. The smallest piece was 24″ wide and 72″ long. My shelves needed to be just under 12″ wide and 40″ long. I knew going into this excursion that I would need to be sawing and I thought it would be great justification for the nice collection of Mark Harrell of Bad Axe Toolworks refurbished hand saws. Since I was traveling I thought I would take my “toolbox” saws AKA panel saws because they are 19 and 20″ long and make for easy travel. They are sharpened for a cleaner cut as I normally use them at the bench for final dimensions of panels and such. I also took along a few clamps, a square, and a block plane.

Woodworking on the road is not so much about having the tools, but having adequate work holding. This is where my clamps came into play. Using the chairs in the classroom I set up a sawing bench of sorts and clamped my pieces down. I was able to use an existing shelf as a template and went to work cross cutting the boards to the right length. My little panel saw performed admirably and soon enough I had the boards to length (and perfectly square, if I do say so myself)

Now comes the fun part. It was time to rip these boards in half to make 12″ wide shelves. Ripping scares a lot of people because you have so much real estate to cover and keeping a straight edge only gets harder over that long distance. Ripping over a 6 foot distance is not only intimidating, it sounds a whole lot like work. To these naysayers, I say, maybe you need to tune up your saw! A bit of positioning with the chairs, enter the clamps, and off to sawing.

After a few careful strokes with the saw at a low angle I determined the path of my saw. I tipped it up to close to 60 degrees and started to work in earnest constantly puffing to clear the sawdust from my line and ensure I am tracking correctly.

I have not had that much time with this little Spears & Jackson saw since Mark sent it to me. The cuts I have done have been great but on a much smaller scale. If I were in my shop I would be using my 26″ saw for a cut this long so you can imagine how shocked I was that this little 9 tpi, 19″ saw was racing through the board. In about a minute I had 2 boards from one.

A little block plane work to clean off the saw marks and a tiny chamfer to kill the sharp edges…

…and I have 3 new shelves installed and ready to be loaded.

This “project” was hardly fine woodworking and with no fit and finish that I would expect from my normal furniture projects, but something about it was thrilling. Leaving my shop to build things rarely happens and to know that I can take just a few tools on the road and complete a job without making a lot of noise, mess, or needing an extension cord is a truly exciting prospect.

Road weary tools back home in their shop

The Blokeblog: The Best Laid Scheme

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 07:50:00 -0600

The recent jobs completed in the 'shop, great though they are, have started to deplete my once reasonable stock of cabinet timber. Unlike Mother Hubbard, the cupboard isn't bare yet, but I'm distinctly aware that the rack isn't quite as full as it ought to be. Like most woodies I suspect, I tend to hoard timber, treating it like the most precious miser's gold and tending to only have a clear out when I've got a load of stuff smaller than my fingernail (which really is too small to do anything with.) I've got enough air died elm to make another cabinet and only one board left of the oak that I bought a few years ago, but that's about it...plus of course the assorted odds n'ends that inevitably accumulate in odd drawers and corners of the 'shop.

I've therefore decided that I'm going to adopt a very early New Year resolution. Apart from one or two essentials, the purchase of new and shiny toolage is going to be put on hold 'till I retire so that any available cash will be spent on building up the timber store.

So that's the plan...call it Plan A.

But as all good planners know, there should always be Plan B...and the best laid schemes o' mice an' men Gang aft agley...

Lost Art Press: Chris Schwarz: The Turning Engine

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 06:29:21 -0600

CLXIII. In this quarter is presented to your view the Head of the Turning Engine, for the turning of Oval Work, Rose Work, and Swath Work, with other kind of Work not yet named, because not found out, for no Man hath yet sought out the depth of that Instrument, or what it can or is able to perform. It hath so many parts that I know not either how to describe or tell their use; only as in other Tools I shall give you what names each Member hath, if I be rightly informed.

The parts of the Turning Engine.

The Bow, which is a strong Steel Bow fastned to the middle part of the farther side of the Puppet; having a Gut String, and to the middle of it, in a Noose is fastned another strong Gut String with a Noose at the end of it.

The Moving Collar, is an Iron Collar fastned on a Center pin on the foreside of the Puppet; this moves between the Iron Shackle and the foreside of the Puppet; though properly the Collar is only the hole in which the Axis is set. The Neck of the Collar is that part under the Shackle.

The Socket in which the Collar is moved; some term it the Shackle round hole.

The Stop Screw, which is to take out when the hollow Axis moves in the moving Collar; else it holds them together that the Collar moves not.

The Hollow Axis, which is hollow, having a shoulder on it, on which is fixed all the Guids.

The Head, or Case, or Box, in which is contained the several Guides, which is hollow, and termed the hollow in the Puppet.

The great Diameter of the Guide.

The small Diameter of the Guide.

The Axis of the Guide.

The Center head.

The Button.

The String Pulley.

The Wheel Pulley, is the Pulley to which the String comes from the Treddle Wheel, called also the Pulley of the Axis.

The Treddle Wheel.

The Guide Pulley, this is slipped to any of the Guides, as the Work-man pleaseth; it is of Brass, having a Groove in the edge of it to receive the edge of the Guide, which turning together with the assistance of the strength of the Steel Bow, forces the Guide and the Hollow Axis, to move backwards; and then an edge Tool held to the work in the Mandrell screwed in the hollow Axis, will describe the same Figure on the work, as is on the outer edge of the Guide.

CLXIV. In the chief of this quarter is the figure of a Draw Knife, an Instrument used by both Carpenter and Turner; it is a Knife with two handles turned down to the edge, much like in form to Wet Glovers Fleshing Knives, when they use it, one and off the work is set against a Wall, and the other to his Breast, and then with both hands draws Chips off the work till it be brought to their shape, and then smooth it.

S. 3 such Draw Knives A. Handle O. born by Chippering.

In the Base of this square is placed a Book-binders Plow, or cutting Knife by which the leaves of Books are cut even and smooth. It consists of these parts.

The two Stocks, one having the Knife on it, the other movable by the turning of the Screw, which hath a Groove or square hollow in the sole of it.

The two square Staves.

The Screw and Handle to turn it.

The Knife, which is held to the sole of the Stock by an Iron Pin.

The Iron Screw, and its Nut with Ears.

— From Randle Holme's "The Academy of Armory, or, A Storehouse of Armory and Blazon" Book III, Chapter VIII, Plate 2. Why am I reading this

Peter Galbert - Chair Notes: Magic Numbers

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 05:57:00 -0600

When I first read about working with green wood, I recall being overwhelmed by all the talk of equilibrium moisture content, tangential to radial shrinkage ratios and wet dry hygrometers. Clearly, you need an advanced degree to sidestep the lumberyard and work with green wood!

Of course, in time, I came to understand what all of those things mean, but most importantly, I came to recognize that there are a few common sense pieces of information that can replace them.

The basic notion has two parts,

Part 1. Wood has moisture in it and shrinks as the moisture exits and swells when it comes in.

Part 2. Wood shrinks more along the growth rings than it does across them. This is why becomes oval when turned green.

I used to split all my turning stock green and immediately turn my chair parts, leaving the tenon ends oversized. Then I'd dry the tenon ends and re-turn the final tenons once the wood stopped shrinking. Now I prefer to rough out all my stock green, then air dry it in my shop for anywhere from a few weeks to, well, forever.

This gives me less warping and distortion after turning, a slightly better surface quality and less waiting time for the tenons to be superdried once they are rough sized. After the rough sized tenons are superdried, I chuck the turnings back in the lathe and take them down to the final size, removing just a few thousandths of an inch to get there.

So what are these magic numbers!? These numbers are the amount that I oversize a tenon based on the moisture in the wood. I know to expect a certain amount of shrinkage once the tenon goes in the kiln, and if I don't leave enough extra material, I won't have enough wood left to turn to the final size.

So let's say that I'm using a 5/8" mortise, which translates to .625". If the stock is green, I assume that the tenon will shrink along the growth rings (tangetial plane) about 60 thousandths of an inch, so I oversize the tenons by turning them to .695" or .700"(notice that I've added a little extra). The beauty in doing this green, is that you can estimate the shrinkage accurately. Because it hasn't even begun to shrink, it will be the same every time.

When using air dried stock, I oversize the tenons from 25 to 35 thousandth. So depending on how long the stock has been sitting around drying, I turn the tenons to .660" or .650". In the image above, I am measuring the tenon along the growth rings (tangentially), which I drew in pencil. This is the plane that shrinks the most. This tenon was turned at .655" and you can see that it has shrunk to .635". To me, this is close to ideal.

Here is the radial plane, and as you can see, it shrank much less, only 5 thousandths of an inch or so, which is to be expected. I am showing you this to knock home the idea that it matters a great deal which way you measure your tenons. Once you've done it a couple times, you'll get and get used to measuring them in the two orientations, then you can accurately tell when they've stopped shrinking and are ready to be final sized and assembled.

At first, it's reasonable to oversize the rough tenons too much, but with time, you'll get the rhythm and get closer to the final size. By the way, I have a special drill bit that I ground for those "special" tenons that shrink more than expected. Good luck!