Ideas Wood working

The plans called for making the benchtop out of 3/4" plywood.  Ive had this sheet of 1/2" plywood in my garage forever.  I planned out all my cuts and I was able to make the bench top and bottom shelf with 2 layers of the 1/2" plywood.  I made the tray bottom out of 1 piece.

Table update 11/6/09 Ok ... Im back ... Box and funeral last week, meetings and catch up this week, and I actually had a paid writing assignment that I had to work on ... More on that when it hits the stands ... Anyway, the construction on the cherry and burl table is complete. Were still fussing with the finish samples though... looking for the right shine ... It should all be resolved this coming week ... all for now ...

Close up of the corner and leg inlays ... They are shellaced with a seal coat and we wil 9mostly0 stain around them when we color the cherry to maintain their clarity and contrast ...

the whole table with the two leaves inserted ... Table slides we use are by Moin hardware Theyre great and they are the same ones we used on this project ...

While were still a little ahead of the carpenters on the other project we have going, were slipping in an order for a table from our website. We made the original in 2006, custom designed for a client in New York City. This one is very similar in size and design so we actually know exactly what we are doing for a change.

Always start with a great log of cherry from Irion Lumber

Make some legs and put in the inlays

layout the top and glue up the halves and the leaves

cut it to size and rout the channels for the inlays

Make sure everythings the right size before you glue up the base

Make some finish samples using a different varnish than we usually use at the clients request

Glue in the walnut strips and corner inlays ... not shown in the photo here is the fact that the walnut strips actually are cross cuts of 3 or 4" wide thin boards which are put in individually, the grain of the wood of the strips runs in the same direction as the grain of the wood of the table, allowing everything to expand an contract seasonally together ... The longs ones go in in one piece.

fit up the corners and the inlay strips ... trhe burl strips will be cut into shorter sections before gluing ..

Glue and clamp them in... Tomorrow Trevor will flush them up, scrape and sand the whole top, and we should be ready to start the finishing process Monday if we get an approval on the color and varnish sample ... All for now .. Back to the Yankees game ... Doesnt look so good for them right now ....

Well I was hoping that the sub-contractor for pouring the walks would have started last week, but I guess since it was Masters week here in the Augusta area, they didnt even call. Hopefully, the walks will be done this coming week.

We did spent the week running errands, and buying stuff for the deck and other projects around here.  Decided to at least post some pictures of the deck with the new furniture and a fairly full complement of plants (at least for now).

Approaching from the driveway.

Entering the deck.

Succulents  to the left of the steps.

For dining alfresco.

Headed toward the sun-room.  A railing post installed next to the gutter down spout holds water and power,

View toward the sun-room.

Looking out from sun-room door.

The pollen fronds have finally finished falling from the oaks.  Without any cracks between the planking, it is quick work to blow them off the deck.  Even the mud tracked on the deck during installing the water and power, came off with just a spray of cleanser, brushing with a long handled brush and rinsing with the hose.  A lot easier than wood or composites in my experience.

Well have less of a problem with tracking once the walks are installed.  Of course, once all this work is finished and vehicles wont be in the backyard, we can finally get something done with the  backyard so we wont have so much mud.

Part 7

A client sent me some links recently to tables that she had seen online that she kind of liked but not exactly ... The size she was looking for (60 x 86) was not a standard one for most manufacturers so, I made a drawing for her. Working with ovals to define the curves, I played around with the proportions until I arrived at something that had some promise .. I got her ok for the concept and gave the drawing to Trevor, who cncd up a quick 1/6th scale model to look at. After a little more back and forth, we came to an agreement and we were off. Click the photos to enlarge them ...

The 1/6th model is on top of the bottom of the English elm table we finally finished this week ...
Without the top showing the interior flower kind of concept ...
We started with 4 really nice wide boards of walnut from Irion Lumber ...
and after the top was glued up started in on the 16/4 pieces for the base. From the model drawing, Trevor made full sized patterns to help layout the cuts
After mitering them on the tablesaw, we added 3/4 inch hardwood dowels that passed through the center of each section to allow us to later run timberlock bolts up through the x cross base and into the four sections.
Before gluing up we also added some long grain walnut to reinforce the short grain out near the ends of the arcs. We tried a bunch of different approaches to clamping ...
and then hit on the idea of a cut out piece of plywood collar, clamps on the bottom, and cross clamps on the top, which allowed us to view the place where the four miters came together ... It all seemed good until we added the actual glue which for a minute turned the whole process into a small wrestling/clamp juggling match which we eventually won ...
Before adding the crossed base elements, Trevor routed and glued and screwed in a half inch baltic birch play reinforcing spider that gave us all confidence in the integrity of the glue up ...
A little more sanding and it will be off to the finish room next week ...
Were liking it and have already discussed a couple of variations on the theme ...

Heres what has been absorbing any free time Ive had for the last two weeks:


Its the long overdue, long planned, new shop wood rack - and it is finally done! Wahoo!

The posts are three 2x6s laminated together with glue and screws. The arms are 2x4s, set in mortises created by missing sections of the center post lamination:



I debated using 2x6s as arms, but decided Id try the 2x4 arms first. If there are any problems, I can make 2x6 arms with a cut down tenon to fit the mortise and a supporting lower shoulder.

This is really the first phase of the "Total Shop Overhaul". For some time Ive been wanting to change things in my shop, which is in one half of our two car garage. When I stand facing into the shop half, everything makes me happy. But when I face out of the shop half, I am looking at all sorts of things that just dont feel right: recycling bins, hot water heater, boiler, kitty litter, random storage, exercise area etc. In short, Ive been wanting a 360° shop.

I thought about moving the shop out to the small shed in the yard, but its unheated and has no windows and no real door. Then I thought about building a new, dedicated shop structure in the yard. This was more exciting, but I finally realized, with a lot of help from my wife, that it just wasnt going to happen this year. In the end, I decided to go with an idea that my brother Josh championed. Im going to build a temporary (it will need to come out at some point) partition wall down the middle of the garage. This will solve the 360° shop issue, and also give us more storage (shelves on the non-shop side) for our teaching supplies/materials that are currently filling a rented storage unit (my wife and I are both teachers, and are moving to a new school and have way too much stuff that needs an accessible storage space - i.e. NOT the crawlspace).

Heres my tentative plan for the Total Shop Overhaul:

Phase 1: New Wood Rack - complete!
Phase 2: Remove Old Wood Rack to make room for the wall - pending.
Phase 3: Partition Wall w/ door - planning.
Phase 4: Window Installation - planning.
Phase 5: Rearrange Shop - dreaming.

Id love to think that this will all be done soon, as the shop looks like a bomb went off and is almost unusable at the moment. Its like being in the middle of one of those sliding picture puzzles - move this, to move that, to move that, to get to that, to reach that. Frustrating! But the reality, especially with the new job, is that it is going to take a while.

Sigh.