HI Folks
A little more about Westonbirt. On the Sunday we had the pleasure of meeting Bill Carter. Bill makes the most wonderful infills, mostly Miter planes. But with a difference. The majority of his planes are miniatures and he ages the metalwork to give an antique look. These give the planes an wonderful timeless look. He also makes a lot of his plane from recycled tenon saw backs - check out his website for more info. Bill was very happy to talk about how he makes his planes and I was fascinated by his methods. As a bonus, his wife Sarah makes a smashing sponge cake ;) Here's a photo of Bill with fellow planemaker Konrad Sauer.

It was good to see so many members of the UK Workshop forum over the four days. Here are a couple of random pics....not sure about the axe one ;)


There were exhibitors from all around the world and it was great to socialise after hours. Here is a picture of Martin and Tommi from Magma - they are holding a Japanese plane they made during the show. A plane with a difference - not many have a walnut blade ;) Tommi (on the left) was also our star goalkeeper during the "International Soccer Match".

More tomorrow....
Philly

This week, Dennis Perkins, assistant editor for Woodsmith and ShopNotes, is going to give us some pointers on using hand planes and scrapers for a smooth finish. He’ll also spend some time showing us how he likes to sharpen his scrapers during this week’s Woodsmith Woodworking Seminar Podcast.

As usual, all of the links to articles, seminar guides, and products that you’ll see being used during the seminar podcast can be found at the Woodsmith Podcast Store.

HI Folks
Just finished a plane I haven't made for a while - a skew mouth miter plane.
This one is for a customer in the States and is made from Goncalo Alves. It features a 6mm thick iron, 50mm wide and has a 38 degree bed with a 20 degree skew.
The skewed bed is a lot of extra work (and the math a real brain-ache!) but the plane performs really well and the skew is a real feature on the shooting board.
Cheers
Philly

Many of the short course dates are full but some have a significant amount of space.

Tool tuning, sharpening and plane use, is the ...

I want to do another safety related blog entry before Woodworkers Safety Week gets away from us…

In the shop we should use all of our senses to detect danger. Well, use touch as the last sense for detection. Ya know…if you are unsure whether your table saw is on you should listen for the motor or look for the moving blade before reaching out to touch the spinning carbide.

I think our eyes are the most valuable safety tool we have. Hopefully, we see dangers. Even when we know dangers are present we use our eyes to determine our proximity to them.

So the Jeff Skiver Safety Tip of the day is…make sure your vision is clear by avoiding tears that can cause distorted vision. Therefore, never go to work in the shop immediately after watching any of the following movies:

1) Brian’s Song

2) Old Yeller

3) Love Story

4) Ghost

5) The Way We Were

6) Bambi

7) My Girl

8) E.T.

9) Forrest Gump

10) Pay It Forward

11) I Am Sam

12) Schindler’s List

13) Braveheart

14) Saving Private Ryan

15) Blazing Saddles

Also, if you are in the shop and any of the following songs come on the radio, IMMEDIATELY STOP WHAT YOU ARE DOING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:

1) Wildfire by Michael Martin Murphey

2) Honey by Bobby Goldsboro

3) Diary by Bread

4) Think of Laura by Christopher Cross

5) How Do You Mend a Broken Heart by the Bee Gees

6) Still by The Commodores

7) Alone Again, Naturally by Gilbert O’Sullivan

Finally, if you have been reading ANYTHING written by Nicholas Sparks then you should stay away from your shop for at least 4 weeks after you finish the book. You may think you are okay at 3 weeks, but you aren’t. Even three and a half weeks after finishing Message In A Bottle I would spontaneously break down into uncontrollable fits of agonizing tears. Nicholas Sparks requires FOUR FULL WEEKS!!!!!! You’ve been warned.

I finally got my hands on the tool accessories needed to turn a pen(cil). So using a scrap cutoff of padauk, I went to town and made this beautiful padauk mechanical pencil, with gold plated trim and a black stripe on the clip.

Wait, what accessories were needed?

Aside from the obvious (lathe, turning chisels, drill press, wood), the following are absolutely necessary:

1. Pen mandrel to fit your lathe.
2. Pen kit.

Yep. That's it. The mandrel is $9.99 at Woodcraft Item 141469. Pen kits are around $5 at all the usual vendors. I got a pencil kit at Woodcraft.

Another thing you may find useful is a barrel trimmer. this squares the end of the turning blank to the newly inserted brass tube. Keeps things neat and tidy. Mine was $20 at Woodcraft. All that is left is to make the pencil!

I took a scrap piece of padauk and cut it into 4" sections. Two of those sections I put into the drill press and put a 7mm hole through them to hold the brass tubes. I then pressed the tubes into the wood with a drop of CA glue ("super glue") to hold it together.

Then I mounted the whole thing on the turning mandrel with a bushing on either end, and one in the middle between the blanks.

After tightening things up and mounting the mandrel to the lathe I was ready to turn.

Too bad my craptastic Harbor Freight lathe wasn't compatible with the mandrel! I knew it had a "morse taper #2" fitting. But it didn't occur to me to check that the fitting was in the headstock... The part that turns. The fitting is only in the tailstock in the cheap 40" lathe. The tailstock doesn't turn, so the mandrel wouldn't turn. I had to find a way to get the mandrel MT2 base into the headstock.

I had a faceplate that was separated from a mug I made that I hadn't cleaned up yet. There was enough meat on the wood there to carve out a MT2 hole for my mandrel to rest in.

Once it was carved out, the arbor fit nicely. My live tailstock (a MT2 spinner) was tightened snugly into the dimple on the end of the mandrel and I fired up the lathe.

It worked perfectly!

All that was left was to start cutting the wood! I started off gently removing wood because of the thin diameter of the mandrel. I was afraid it would start bowing under any pressure. It turns out that my fears were unfounded. It's very rigid and does not bow under normal cutting pressure.

The pen blanks were turned with a 5/8" spindle gouge and finished with a 3/4" skew chisel. I got such a great finish I was able to sand starting at 600 grit! A pass at 600 and a pass at 2000 got me a nearly mirror finish all by themselves. I then applied some thick CA glue for a finish.

If you're applying super glue for a finish, don't worry about slopping it on the bushings and such. The pieces will pop right apart and the CA glue will be removed the next turning session.

I got the blanks out and started assembling the pencil. The package for the pencil kit didn't explain what parts went where. It took some trial and error to get things where they belonged. I'm sure once I've done a few of these the positioning will make sense. Until then, I'll have to pay extra attention to the order the pieces are assembled.

As you can see, the results were awesome! I'm really happy and want to make more! Lots more! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

I remember watching my Dad work around the house and in his basement shop when I was a young boy.  Most all of the tools he had back in the 60’s and into the 70’s were Sears Craftsman.  At some point in time he managed to get a Porter-Cable circular saw and the occasional Skil tool.  But really, there wasn’t a whole lot of choice in readily available tools for woodworking. Nowadays, you can go online or pick up the phone and order almost any tool from anywhere and have it delivered directly to your door.

But not only have tools changed over the years, our attitudes and methods have changed, too.  To get an idea of what I mean, look in on this discussion on WoodNet.  Add your 2¢ on how woodworking has changed in your lifetime.

I’ve always been impressed with Makita tools. My dad has always been a fan of their tools and I sort of grew up with them. He’s got an early model benchtop planer he’s had for over 15 years that’s still running strong. The quality of Makita’s tools is hard to beat.

Makita has recently announced some new tools, and you’ll be reading more about them here. The first one on the list is their new variable speed, orbital jig saw. The 4329K jig saw features a compact design, three orbital settings plus straight cutting, with a powerful 3.9 AMP motor for use in a variety of materials. The new jig saw features an ergonomically designed rubberized grip to provide more comfort and control, while the variable speed dial control (500 – 3,100 SPM) delivers optimal cutting performance in a variety of materials. The die-cast aluminum base bevel cuts 45 degrees right or left with a positive stop at 90 degrees for solid cutting performance. A through-the-body dust port provides optimal dust management with use of clear dust cover and vacuum.

The saw is ideal for professional woodworkers, cabinetry makers, and specialized residential construction workers who require a best-in-class engineered jig saw in a compact size. The saw uses Tang shank blades only, plus has an on-board hex wrench for easy blade changes. The saw includes a blade and tool case.

Read more about Makita tools here.

Chisels, turning tools, etc, all need sharpening. Usually fresh out of the box.

To completely remake an edge, my bench grinder gets the right shape going, and for repeated honing I have a fine diamond tool. But what about in-between? What to use after the grinder, but before the diamond hone?
I picked up a cheap "Sharpening Stone" from Harbor Freight. This thing is NOT one of their "gems". At 99c (with a coupon) it was still too expensive.

The stone, Item #07345, is labeled as "Superior Wear-Resistant Stone Sharpens Quickly, Evenly And Efficiently To Give You Sharper, Safer Edges" (poor capitalization theirs). It's crap.

The sharpening material dissolves with sharpening oil! Running a tool across it quickly removes the gray material exposing the white core sandstone.

Yes, sandstone.

The gray material is just a thin coating on top of a sandstone brick. Ugh.

I got one use out of this tool, sharpening my 3 chisels, before I had to toss it.

So a word to the wise: Spend the money and get a quality stone. Oilstone, waterstone, whatever. Just avoid this useless waste of space.

You can sharpen your woodworking skills with helpful tips and techniques from the editors of Woodsmith and ShopNotes magazines. Get a FREE tips sent to your email address each week! Got to Woodworking Tips.com and sign up today.

Here’s last week’s tip from Woodsmith online editor Ted Raife:

The easiest way to make a lidded box is to build the box and lid as one piece and then cut them apart on the table saw. This guarantees that the lid will be a perfect fit to the box. With a little modification, this same technique can be used to make a box and lid that mate with interlocking lips, as shown in the photo at right.

This technique for making a box lid is a little different in that you do part of the job before the box is assembled. A look at the two drawings will explain. To create the lip, you’ll need to cut halfway through the sides from both the inside and the outside. As shown in Figure 1, the inside cuts are made while the box is still in pieces. Remember that this first cut will form the “high� side of the lip.

Once the box is assembled, you complete the job with a second series “halfwayâ€� cuts that are offset a blade’s width (¹/₈″) from the first (Figure 2). These cuts are positioned below the first cuts. If you hit it right, the lid will separate cleanly and after a little sanding, you’ll have a snug-fitting, lipped lid.

For more helpful table saw tips and techniques, visit Plansnow.com.

Good Woodworking,

Ted Raife
Online Editor, Woodsmith

Send for a preview issue of Woodsmith magazine

Using a pencil Tommy transfers the outline of the writing surface pin onto one of the case's bombe sides. Shaving by shaving he chisels out the dovetail to receive the pin. While his hands move as if guided from Above, you can tell from his chatter that he's really sweating it. Cleaning out a dovetail on a priceless work is nerve-racking, but Tommy handles it with his usual cool. Thank God he has something great to look at when he's done.

Part IV 

All right then! Here it was, around the beginning of April, and I had a plan for the new shop (more or less) in hand. It was time to go ahead with the construction... or so I had thought, anyway.

I got a contractor lined up to do the concrete. I had decided that work was simply too much for me to handle on my own, and that it would probably serve me better to have it done by somebody else. I didn't have the equipment, nor did I have the help (or the back) to put down the concrete by myself. I might have mentioned that North Idaho was undergoing an unprecedented building boom at the time. What that meant for me was a wait for the permit. Permits usually take just a couple weeks. Usually, this might not be an issue, but the concrete guy I had lined up had a very tight schedule. Well, it turned out I had a couple of issues that permitting wouldn't allow, mainly the bathroom I had discussed previously. With that, I took the plan home and removed it entirely from the design (which actually helped me out budget-wise), but as it would have it I couldn't take the time off of work to get back to the permit office for two week. When I did finally, it was two more weeks before I got the plan reviewed and approved. I called the concrete guy up, and turns out I was past his window of availability. I would have to find another.

That delay led to a two week long search for another concrete contractor. The only one I could find available was still three weeks out before he could start, but he didn't do excavating - though he knew someone who did. So, I contacted him, and he was three weeks out too. So - what I thought might be a two to three week period of getting the permit reviewed and groundbreaking turned out to be entirely too optimistic. By the time I got the excavator there it was the end of May, a full 5 weeks later than I'd hoped.

Being an architect, I'm familiar with the whole process so didn't let it get me down, and just chalking it up to the way things work. But - when this showed up out front of the house early one morning, I started getting a little excited:

It's not really the machine I would have chosen for the task, but as long as the hole got dug, I wasn't going to worry. I had considered doing it myself... had I done it; I would have rented a loader with a backhoe mounted on the back. A track-hoe (like above) tends to rip up the lawn too much when you turn on it... It's also a very small bucket - which can be a good thing, both for digging utility trenches and when you have a plan with a lot of little corners... But I don't have a great deal of experience in digging foundations, and what little I had done was over 20 years ago... I figured it best to leave it to someone who knew more. Besides, the cost of renting a backhoe for myself would have been 2/3rds of the price of paying someone else to do it, so I figured it was better hired out.

It was finally time to break ground. Here's where the shop was to go shown in the site plan again:

Here is a photo of the yard, talen looking north from the end of the patio:

The scarring you see in the center of the yard was from an old willow tree that had to come down a few years prior when a windstorm had knocked the main portion of it's trunk down. The scarring was from the year previously when I finally got the stump out of the ground using a skid-steer I had rented when putting in the pavers for the patio, which you can see in the lower left. Within an hour or two, the trench for the main footings were dug:

Finally, something was happening. I was still worried about the excavation, though - I thought it odd that he would only dig the trench and not strip the topsoil within the footprint of the building first. In the end, it turned out I didn't need to worry about it. The fellow was a young guy, for whom renting himself and his track-hoe out was his main method of income in the warmer months. While young, in the end it turned out he was hard working, honest, and truly concerned with doing a good job - and for not really all that much money, either. But I didn't know that yet at this point, so was concerned. Even though it was taken care of later and I was satisfied with his work, I do wish it had been done properly. But with the building environment the way it was, I was just happy to have somebody to do the job.

Up next, the foundation!

Hi Folks
Well - that's that. I've finished in the workshop and put the bench in the back of the van ready for the journey to Westonbirt tomorrow. I've just about finished all the planes I was hoping to make and I'm sat at the computer now printing out signs and labels. The rain is falling outside (obviously having a last go before the coming heatwave...........) but I'm not worried. I know its going to be a great weekend :)
I've made a couple of planes from some Indonesian Rosewood I've been hoarding. One is the pretty little smoother I showed off yesterday - the other is a monster Miter plane. She looks just awesome! If anyone is interested they'll be on my bench this coming weekend :)

Shock of the day was the Wife coming out to the workshop with the phone. "It's Konrad", she says. My jaw drops - not Konrad Sauer??
Oh, yes - a quick call before he heads to the airport to make his way over. It was great to have a quick chat (and also to find I'm not the only one feverishly packing bags!) and I'm really looking forward to spending a few days in his company. Did I mention Konrad and I will have our benches set up next to each other (along with Infill maker Bill Carter!) in the Classic Hand Tools marquee?
So make sure you head over to Westonbirt this weekend for the "Festival of the Tree" - you won't be disappointed!
Cheers
Philly

To be used by Hobby & do-it yourselfers to display their Mesquite and other fine wood projects.


Check out this fist entry From Ronald Hesketh ... It's about Time ...


Read this heartwarming story about two Men and a Very Special Clock ! ...           >>>>>> Click on "more " >>>>>>>> 

 

WESTERN EARTH KNIVES

Unique handcrafted hunting knives custom tailored for you at WEK.

Photos Courtesy of Western Earth Knives                                            "The dagger"

Custom Handmade knives and sheaths, made to order, using materials of the earth: bone, antler, horn, brass, leather, exotic woods of the West, and only high quality high-carbon steel blades. Western Earth Knives are made using designs derived from the qualities of the earth and her creatures by Douglas Gilbert.

 

Douglas has been a painter and sculptor for 40 years. It is only recently in his life that he has come to specialize in knife making, continuing to exercise his love for the powerful qualities and images of the earth. He spent much of his youth in the woods, and whittling wood was one of his early interests. A temporary illness brought him to abandon the 9-to-5 work-world and to devote himself full time to his craft. He has two grown children, a loving psychologist wife, and lives in southwestern Washington state. For additional information or to talk directly with Douglas ...

 

Contact:

                           Douglas Gilbert, MFA, Artist/Knife maker

                            earthknives@hotmail.com
                             360-501-6939

A beautiful floor Starts with premium custom-milled Mesquite HardWood flooring from Arizona Desert Mesquite.



Photo Courtesy of Murdock Floors

Mesquite HardWood Flooring is the most stable solid surface you can put under your feet.  Custom milled tongue & groove planks made to your order insure the width and length you need. Matching BaseBoards can also be milled to your specifications. A wide plank Custom milled HardWood floor with Matching wide-tall base boards is a truly stunning SouthWest statement about you and your home.


Photo Courtesy of The Nelson Family


Photo courtesy of Wilkinson Flooring

Mesquite HardWood Flooring is an excellent choice for high traffic areas.

HI Folks
Was pleased to turn on the computer this morning and find this review......
Glad you liked the plane, Chris!
I better get back in the workshop, then :)
Cheers
Philly

After the doors are fitted into the cabinet opening the next step is to layout and create the hinge mortises for the knife hinge pairs. Each door has one pair of knife hinges as they come in pairs. I use spacers and my small adjustable square to make certain the doors are spaced uniformly from the cabinet case. This is important as the door reveal all around needs to be uniform. After the hinges mortises are marked the process of creating the recesses is accomplished with small chisels and a small hammer.

Al visits to check out Tommy's progress, admiring the valances and drawer fronts. Tommy shows him how he uses the shaper to add groves to the bottoms of the drawers. After running one through the cutter, he reflects that it was a little risky. With his second drawer front, he makes a little block of wood for the drawer front to sit it, which makes cutting safer and ensures against him accidentally destroying the grove.

I left off in the previous post with a few boards to flatten and smooth with handplanes. I typically use a planing board with a plane stop at the end to perform this type of work. The boards are relatively small and are easily held against the plane stop. This allows me to quickly flip the board around to plane either side without needing to clamp the board again. If I were planing a larger panel I would most likely fasten it between bench dogs.

The handplaning of these particular boards is straightforward along their length with little diagonal planing... so it works out well. Handplaning these boards which will comprise the panels for the drawer cases begins with a long fore or jointer plane to flatten the faces of the boards and ensure they are flat and parallel to each other. I also have the final thickness of each board in mind and work towards this. After the individual boards were resawn a little cupping was introduced , inherent to resawing, and although acclimatization to the studio environment helps to relieve this cup and any other tension in the boards, some minimal cupping remains in each of these boards.

I use a jointer plane in this case, I have it tuned and ready most of the time for work like this. A shorter fore plane would also be ideal since the boards are relatively short in length. Once the boards faces are flat with parallel faces I then move on to a finely tuned smoother plane to ensure the faces of the boards are flat as can be. The term which is used for this type of board preparation is four-squaring the board which ensures that both faces and the two long edges are parallel to each other, and the ends and edges are perpendicular. After completing this process on each of the other boards which will comprise the drawer case panels, I will be squaring the ends to achieve both the correct length of each board and to ensure the boards are perfectly square.

The latest Popular Woodworking magazine has a good shooting board article with plans. An expanded version of the article is available as a PDF file. It is pretty big at almost 2mb so it might take awhile to load over a slower intenet connection.

I'll try not to get into techno-garble but obviously we are all internet users here. I've started using an online app called Google Notebooks and it is a great tool for researching and sharing ideas and discoveries. I've been using it to organize notes and online info about tools and woodworking. You can publish your notebooks as webpages for others to use and also set it up to have multiple users add to the notebooks. The best thing is that it is easy to use and edit. Here are some notebooks I've made public Layout tools Workbenches Saws If anyone would like to join me in building these notebooks, just email me and I will add you to the list of editors. As these are filled in, it will create a great resource that is fully searchable.

The diamond was salvaged from a previous ring.
The ring shown is a Burley Maple wood ring with a real diamond set into it.

I have learned that the wood which is chosen carries more than just its physical traits but more than that the wood carries deeper spiritual meaning.

Your one of a kind wooden ring will give you the warmth of knowing that the true value of a fine piece of handcrafted jewelry is knowing how much meaning it has.

See more at : http://www.simplywoodrings.com

Here's our entry in LumberJocks Thorsen Side table Challenge.
I know we were going to build it together but my time and the challenge deadline forced me to just go for it.
The objective of selecting this challenge at the Lumberjocks forum however, still remains the same..... to see other woodworkers work!!! You will witness that as I expected, excellent CREATIVITY occurred.
So now is the time to wonder over to Lumberjocks and have a look at the craftsmanship of fellow on-line woodworkers.

GO TO: LumberJocks

Here's another video from our trip to The Woodworking Show in Atlanta, GA. In this video we get a look at a very innovative tool to sharpen your your woodworking tools, the Jool Tool.

My good friend Rob interviews the CEO of Jool Tool, Anie Piliguian, about how this sharpening system works.

We were sure impressed with the speed and ease that the Jool Tool can put a razor sharp edge on cutting tools.

If you have any questions about the Jool Tool or anything related to woodworking, visit our site at:

www.WoodworkersResource.com

Craig Stevens