Accidental Woodworker

 As I was thinking about my opening paragraph I realized that I hadn't checked the 2nd dowel test joint yet. In fact I can't remember where I put it. I'll have to head down to the shop after dinner and find it. My curiosity is in overdrive wanting to know how it came out. News update and pics upcoming.

figured it out

The plastic ring on the can is what I thought it was - a shipping thing to ensure the lid didn't come off while in transit. It took some calories to pry it off with the slip joint pliers.

they screw together

Here it the pic of them together Frank. From the Container store in the desk stuff aisles. I didn't know that the Container store had just gotten out of bankruptcy. That would explain why the store didn't look as fully stocked as it did the last time I was there.

neat product

I like that these can be stacked together securely. Being able to see what is in each container is a bonus too.

one coat

This stuff is about the same as Clancy's oil IMO with the exception that this has a citrus smell to it. I think I'm going to put on one more coat along with a coat of wax from the same maker. That contains tung oil too. I have plenty of time to apply it and let it cure. The instructions state to wait 2-3 days after applying the last coat before using.

3 new ones

Two of these 3 are going to be pencil boxes. I think these are a better size vice the larger ones I made for the grandsons. The third one is an extra so I decided to make it to the size of the stock - it is too short to be used as a pencil box.

new method

I am going to make these 3 the same way as I did the grandsons boxes but with a new twist. On the previous I measured and used a pencil line to set the 'posts'. On these I used the actual end piece to set the 'post'. Did it this way because neither of the grandson's boxes had the ends flush.

2nd step

I glued and clamped the ends and set them aside to set up. Previously I applied glued and nailed them after setting the posts in place. The idea here was to get the ends set and somewhat secure and then drill and drive the nails home. That took out the potential 'shift' of the ends as I nailed them.

ready to glue the ends

The two smaller boxes are getting a solid pine bottom. The larger one (on the right) is getting a 1/8" plywood bottom. I didn't have any thin pine wide enough for a bottom.

one down, two to go

I could see the benefit of doing this right away. It didn't add that much more to the time line neither.

now I wait

I waited 20 minutes after the 3rd one was glued and clamped before I worked on the first one again. That was a sufficient amount of wait time and I had no problems driving the nails on any of them.

oops

Another thing I wanted to do first was to sand the long sides because they have the nails. I forgot to do that so I sanded it now before drilling and driving the nails. I was a little leery about this but the box survived the ordeal.

almost dead nuts

All three of the box diagonals were bit more than a 32nd and less than 16th from agreeing.

largest one

I glued the bottoms on and let them cook for 30 minutes. After that I nailed off the bottom. I flushed the bottoms on two of the boxes with one more to go. I am going to use this one as a pencil box for my shop pencils.

lights out

It was 1505 and decided to wait and do the last box in the AM.

couldn't wait

I went back to the shop just before dinner to find this. I went searching for it and I couldn't find it. I was looking for something in clamps and I didn't use any on this go around. Walked by it twice without noticing it.

Mr Lumpy

That is my name for this and I was anxious to see how this would fare an assault with it.

two whacks

It broke apart and initially I was a bit bummed out by that. But after I looked at the two pieces I was smiling.

the pins held

accidental woodworker

 I finally finished the woodworking on the 3 japanese style boxes. No tricky joinery, just butt joints that were nailed and screwed. Surprisingly it still takes a bit of skill and patience to execute these. I went into it with an inflated head and got bit on the arse. I made a parade of me-steaks but fortunately none rendered what I was working on to firewood bin.

I'm still not done with making these. I have made 3 so far and how many more will come is anyone's guess. I'm thinking at least 15-20 to start. I am still somewhat surprised with all the ones I'm seeing on You Tube - they all use simple construction methods. I still haven't seen one that is dovetailed together. Doing one that way is in the top 3 of the next batch to come from my shop.

not the elves

I came back to the shop after dinner and glued on the back cleat on both boxes. I also roughed out the two wedge cleats. Getting all that put together is what was in the batters box this AM.

one needs some help

The top one needs to be trimmed/fitted/shortened and the bottom one has a gap that I had to close up.

I like

Happy with the fit but not the length. In trimming it to fit, that caused the wedge to seat further and further inward. I got lucky with it in that the bottom (by my thumb) ended up almost flush with the face of the side. When I pushed it fully it went in about a 16th too far.

me-steak

I put the screws on the wrong side of the lid. It isn't a deal killer but I wanted them to be on the underside. I used screws because I didn't want to rely solely on the glue keeping the cleats attached.

You can see the wedge cleat is too far inward now so I had to make another one. I took one too many swipes cleaning it up.

ran them proud

I tried to get the cleats glued to lid to length but I gave up on it. Decided instead to run it long and trim it after the glue had set. I trimmed them flush with a low angle blockplane.

sigh...

While fitting the wedge I found out that I had put the fixed one in the wrong orientation. I was able to pop it off and the screws for this one were on the underside. Now they were swapped to the top and match the other box. And I had to make the wedge over again because when I trimmed it to fit, it ended up being too short. 

container store goodies

The store doesn't sell the small plastic boxes anymore. I had to settle for these which came in 3 sizes. I bought two each of the smallest ones. They have twist on/off lids and they twist and lock together. 

new lid

I decided to make a new lid after removing the glued on cleat didn't want to cooperate.

on to the fourth one

Fitting the wedges wasn't the problem. I was having no problems fitting them snug and with no gaps. The headache was once I achieved the fit the wedge would be too short. I was making them initially an inch longer but I was ending up on the short end with them. I made the 4th one 2" longer than necessary.

hmmm.....

That idea worked and the wedge is a wee bit long now. However, I think that is a good idea for the grandsons. I am going to make the wedges for their boxes to extend beyond the sides. That should give them a helping hand with removing them.

this is aggravating

The fit of the last wedge I had to do was the shortest one so far. Good fit between the wedge angles and no gaps but no cigar yet.

not the next one

I think this was the 3rd one I did before it fit and extended past the sides.

save them or toss them?

These are some of the wedges that didn't make it. I tried to come up with a formula or some way to determine the required length but came up dry. What seemed to work was making it 2" longer and then trimming it to the final length.

done (almost)

The big one is done with the sanding and is ready for the finish. The two smaller ones I have to sand the ends. I didn't sand it before I nailed it together so sanding in and around all the nails is going to be a Royal PITA.

duh

This is the finish I want to use and I was stumped. I don't know how to open the can? I tried (what I think are the obvious ways) and nada. I am assuming that under the plastic thing that there is a run of the mill metal can with a lid. The trick is how to remove said plastic lid thing?

my back door

The back door and the door directly behind it were the old porch. The board about 3/4 of the way up from the floor goes from behind the door jamb and continues to the left.

nothing surprises me about this house anymore

The board runs behind the closet door and dead ends on the back wall. I ran into the same headache when I removed the base board too. 

another )(#&%)(*)#@ headache

It looks to me like the ceiling is about 1/2 way down on the top molding on the door. Getting this door replaced has the potential to turn into a class A (*@^%$)P(_+@(%_*@#%_@%(@ cluster ________ - fill in an expletive of your choice. I'll find out tomorrow how this goes and how much more money it will cost me.

accidental woodworker

 This AM was the first day of the current month where the sun was shining at sunrise and it wasn't hidden by gray clouds. It turned out to be a nice spring day where the temp almost got up to 70F (21C). I got in my post lunch stroll and I didn't feel like going to the shop after it. There will be more nice days and I wanted to finish the 3 japanese toolboxes I was making. A new to me woodworker showed up on You Tube and I copied how he made his box. Turned out to be the perfect model to follow for pencil box. 

unintelligible pic

Nothing about this pic was ringing a bell with me. Based on the size of the quick grip clamp it isn't something related to the japanese toolboxes. Maybe it was about the tile tables? Nope, it is the dowel test joint I glued up yesterday.

nope again

The test joint I glued up yesterday didn't last long. It took almost nothing to break the two pieces apart. At this point here I was able to pull it apart with hands. 

nada

I tried to pull out the pins on the left out with pliers and they held fast. The pins let go coming out of the holes on the right like they weren't glued at all. I am not going to chance these dowel pins working on the tile tables.

did better

I didn't go Cro Magnon with the pliers this time. The grooves aren't as deep and pronounced as the ones I did yesterday. I made up 3 pins from the ones I sawed up yesterday on the bandsaw.

new test joint

I used 3 dowel pins (from a 1/4" dowel rod) to mimic the 3 pins on the tile table rails. I also minimized the face grain to face grain contact on two test pieces. I put glue in the holes and brushed on a light coat on the pins. I'll check this one in the AM.

finishing up the first one

This side has the largest gaps on this box. I sanded and planed all the fingers flush at the corners. I filled all the gaps in with wood putty. I am going to use the new tung oil finish I bought on this box and the grandsons' pencil boxes.

99% done

I have to wait for the wood putty to set up before I can sand it. I should be able to get the finish on it in the AM.

once it is dry......

This is done. One coat of oil based primer done by me. Color coat to be picked and done by Amanda or Seth. It is looking like I'll have a pile of goodies going south to NC in august.

good tip

I was going to use a shallow (1/8" deep) dado to seat the ends in but I used this instead. This is the method used in the You tube vid I watched this morning twice. I glued these 'posts' in place with super glue and yellow glue.

zooming along

I seldom make things in pairs but I'm doing it for these pencil boxes. This way both Miles and Leo will be getting almost identical boxes. Amanda told me that they like getting matching things be it clothes or toys or......

I got the two fixed cleats glued and nailed in place on both boxes. Both have their respective bottoms glued and clamped too.

I only have two of these boxes under my belt but I can already see an area to improve on. The lid for these two I left snug. I will wait until I have the fixed wedge and lid closure cleats glued and cooked before I plane the lid to fit a bit looser.

On the first two lids, they are both too loose. I was in a rush to get them done and I didn't plane and check - I eyeballed and ripped them on the tablesaw instead.

ready to go

Got the last 3 cleats rough sawn to length. I'm thinking now that maybe I should make this lid loose for the grandsons. Them having to deal with a piston fit might be aggravating and they won't use them? I'll have to think about that overnight.

Container store road trip?

The packages the brass pins came in are garbage. I thought I had a boatload of these plastic boxes but I only found these 3. My wife told me that I had given them to her and she wasn't parting with them. I'll have to make trip to the store tomorrow.

accidental woodworker

 Haven't strolled for 3 days in a row. So far this april has been one of the crappiest I can recall. It is either raining, or it is cloudy, and to mix things up it alternates between them. The extended forecast doesn't show any improvement up till the end of the month. Should have a ton of may flowers to look at, maybe. The temps have been lower than normal for this time of the year though. I'm still having the heat come on - I usually shut it off in the first week of april but not this year.

nope

The pkgs of dowel pins (2" and 1 1/2") came in last night and I have sad, sad news. The 2" pins are loose in the holes and when checked, more fall out than those that stay put. I'm a little leery about using these for the table. The 1 1/2" pins were a slightly better fitting.

1/4" dowel rod

Decided to try and make my own dowel pins. I had a 2' long piece of dowel rod and I was able to saw off 16 pins. It wasn't enough but I can get a feel for it it will work or not.

grooved

Used the slip joint pliers to make grooves in a pin. It will take some practice before I get it right - I was a bit too aggressive with the first two.

a touch too snug

I didn't try to seat this dowel. I didn't have a warm and fuzzy that it wouldn't split the rail.

drat, and double triple drat

I checked all 100 of the pins and all 100 were loose. I didn't have one come close to being a friction fit.

measured 15 of them

All of them measured a frog hair over a 1/4" thick. These cost me $5 so I didn't lose too much on them. I recall Dowel Max saying something about looseness of the dowel pins causing problems.

need an angle

I watched Norm do the angle on the butler's tray but he didn't show how he did it. He just says that he determined it to be 27°. After clamping the base I am going on the assumption that the angle goes kitty corner from one outside 90° to the other. The ruler is lined up on that and it doesn't pass through the opposite corner of each leg.

second choice

The first choice was a protractor and I eyeballed the angle. Didn't like that so I set a bevel gauge to it checked it against my bevel angle monkey gauge. I couldn't get the bevel gauge to line up with any angle on it.

this one worked

This gauge confuses me royally. Is it 53° or 127°? Or could it be 37°?. I wrote down all three of them and made a drawing of the legs/base. I'll plug in the angles and use trigonometry to find out which angle is the one I need.

Lowes road trip

Last night I got an email from the 'Canadian Woodworker' on japanese tool boxes. He sent along 3 PDFs of drawings on them. I couldn't satisfy the itch and since I couldn't work on the tile tables I decided to make a couple of said boxes.

I think what I find so attractive about them is firstly their simplicity. There isn't any complicated joinery involved with them. Secondly I like the total lack of hardware. No hinges or clasps needed, everything you need to secure a box is done with wood. Lastly, and what I like a lot, is the lid detail. Making one of these is simpler and quicker to knock out then my beloved sliding lid box.

3rd pile

The Lowes stock will be used to make two pencil boxes for the grandsons. This pile are scraps that have been in the shop for a few years now. I'll make one out of this first to warm up for the pencil boxes.

before I left for Lowes

I couldn't get the dowel pins from bouncing around in the brain bucket. So I glued two of them in some scrap to see how they would glue and cook. I checked it after I got home and they felt solid. I pulled on them with pliers and nada. I can see a teeny gap on the left dowel pin but nothing on the right one. Maybe the glue swelled the pin a 64th to glue it almost 360 in the hole?

completing the test

Decided to glue the two pins together to see how that will shake out. I only put glue in the holes and brushed a thin coat on the pins. I tried to minimize how much glue would get on the faces of the two legs. The two mate only on about a 1/4" shared piece of the faces. I clamped this and set it aside until the AM. I fully intend to beat the snot of out it trying to break it apart then.

ready for primer paint

I checked it over and all the gaps, splintered edges, and other sins were all filled in and sanded smooth and flush. I primed the bottom and set it aside to dry. Tomorrow I'll prime the top and it will call it done. 

not anymore

I am not putting a center stretcher on the tile tables. With the outside long side rails the stretcher is not needed. Besides it doesn't look anything like the pic anymore.

yikes

This is what happens when you get distracted. Forgot about this and after sanding it, I couldn't tell what it was. I branded it again and initialed it. I did not prime this part of the table.

3 PDFs

The middle one is from Toshio Odate and it is the one I wanted. The first one is a small box that is about the size I wanted to make for the Grandsons. The weird looking color is due to my printer being low on one ink and almost zero on the other two.

new detail

I am going to put this 'T' stretcher detail on the bottom of the tile tables. I can't get past the possibility of legs doing stupid wood tricks. It is pine and I did think of getting poplar at Lowes but it is ridiculously overpriced IMO.

using dowel pins

I had an extra T stretcher part left over and I drilled it for pins. I wanted to make sure that the width of the rails (1 1/2") could be drilled with the Dowel Max. 1 1/2" is the minimum width for drilling two equidistant holes with the jig.

first box

This box size was dictated by the stock. I plan on making Toshio's full size box but not now. I don't have any 1x12 pine for that yet.

3 upcoming boxes

The middle and right piles are the grandsons boxes.

Tremont headless brads

The first japanese box I made I used one finger joint that I glued and nailed. Wasn't happy with this it this time because they turned out sloppy and with gaps. I was rushing and I paid the price for it. I wasn't expecting any hiccups with my sawing the vertical walls on the notches.

finger joinery

Glued and nailed the fingers with cut brads from Tremont nails.

sigh

The bottom is 1/4" thick poplar. I would have bet a lung that I had made the width of it a 1/4" wider than the box bottom width. The box is square - the diagonals were dead nuts on. One end of the bottom wasn't square and that is end I anchored and nailed first. I'll plane and sand this flush after it has cooked.

nope

I had eyeballed it this and I thought I was ok. It is too short on the width to use as the lid. I used a piece of 1/2" maple to get a new one.

got confused

I drew a complete blank on how assemble the cleats on the lid. Got the first box I made to bring me back up to speed.

hmmm......

Got the angle on the two correct along with a good fit right off the plane. However, they don't lie square on the lid. Couldn't figure out why initially. I had sawed the angle on two separate pieces of stock. You have to saw out the two on a single piece. Did that and got the fixed wedge to be square to the lid.

nailed it

The two wedges lie up against each other gap free and the outside wedge is square to the lid.

almost done

The lid works and locks down securely. I have to flush the ends of the wedge cleats to call this 100%.

not planned

I was going to veg out and watch the Firestick offerings this PM but I had an itch to scratch. Killed the lights here and headed topside.

accidental woodworker

 I started the tile tables today because why not. I have a boatload of projects in varying stages of being done and all crying out for some attention. I didn't realize I had so many projects in house. I think I will definitely hold off the desks for the grandsons and concentrate on clearing out the backlog first.

 I'll have to go to Highland Hardwoods in New Hampshire  for the desk wood and I'm not looking forward to that. I will have to drive up and back in a ton of traffic. Especially in the AM I'll be fighting the Boston commuter traffic.

filled the errant hole

Unfortunately I still don't know of anyway to completely hide a patch like this. After it is painted it looks good but it will pop on the first seasonal change after it is done. It is low to the floor and it shouldn't be visible.

chamfered the feet

Used the sanding block because it was on the workbench. I was satisfied with how even looking the chamfers came out. I usually do this with a chisel or a blockplane.

nail holes filled

I didn't have any wood putty that doesn't shrink or fall out. I had to make a road trip to Benjamin Moore to get a small tub of it. I also used it on the top in the areas where the plywood edges had splintered and the gaps between the banding and top.

hmm.....

These screws aren't countersunk deep enough to glue a plug over them. As of now I'm going to leave them as is and I will cover them with paint. I don't like filling in large void like this with wood putty. I might revisit this and fill them in with epoxy.

ugh....

Started drilling the holes for the tile table with a me-steak. I had put the spacers on the jig and I didn't need them. The spacers are for when I drill the holes on the legs, not the rails. Glued in a dowel, sawed it flush, and drilled it correctly.

hmmm......

The fix looks good and only a teeny bit of the new hole is missing due to it.

change of plans

Decided to add an extra dowel - this should increase the strength of the rail/leg attachment.

did it right

I didn't think this would be a problem and it wasn't. I drilled the extra dowel hole with the dowel jig referenced off the top of the leg. I double triple checked myself before doing any drilling.

minor brain fart

Got the first table dry fitted and that was looking good. Went looking for the center stretcher and couldn't find it. Then it dawned on me that I had used them for the rails on the plant stand. Totally zoned out on saving them for this.

pine

I don't have any more poplar in the shop and I didn't feel like a road trip to Lowes so I'm using pine. I checked the pic of the table that Amanda liked and this one is different. The pic doesn't have any long side rails, just the short ends and the center one. I assumed that it had 4 rails and I'm sticking with this.

sneak peek

I like the floating aspect of the top but the legs look spindly to my eye. They are tall and don't have anything towards the bottom to keep them from moving in or out. I especially don't think not having the two long rails is a good idea for maintaining stability.

not enough

I didn't have enough dowels with only two holes for each rail end let alone a third one. I ordered more from Dowel Max but they aren't coming until the 23rd. They are coming from Canada. I ordered some from Amazon and I should have them today by 1815.

nope

It doesn't matter what my choice of 'wood button' is because it is a moot point. The rails are 2" below the top so this one is a wee short.

thinking out loud

I might possibly use two figure 8 fasteners on each leg. There is sufficient room for them but there are reservations. The first being screwing into end grain and screwing up into a 1/2" thick top.

2nd table

No surprises or hiccups with the dry fit of the 2nd table. No me-steaks drilling any of the 24 holes neither.

2nd table sneak peek

My opinion of the legs hasn't changed. My biggest concern is the legs will bow inward more so than outward. Either way ain't good but my money is riding them going on in.

nickel plated #8 screws

I made my jello decision on how to attach the top to the legs. Two #8 FH screws into the leg diagonally from each other. At least that way the two won't be screwed into the same grain direction.

center brace

Spent some time giving this my very best goofy looks. Trying to determine the best way to do the center brace. The two contenders so far are dowels or in a stopped dado. A simple butt joint secured with screws or maybe Miller Dowels is bringing up the rear.

15/16"

I got 100 two inch dowels coming. The ones I had on hand are 1 1/2". I'll bandsaw off a strong 1/8" before using the 2" ones. Both the legs and the rails have the same depth with the holes.

test joint

This is something I haven't tried before - an X brace at the bottom of the tile tables. I sawed/chiseled a flat on the corner of the legs at a 45. The angle on the table will be different because those legs are a rectangle.

the concept

I think this will work. The tricky part will be figuring out the angle. Thinking ahead about chiseling a 45 and doing any angle work on the ends of the X brace legs? I remember Norm making a X brace like this on a butler's table he made. Note to self - check You Tube for the episode.

didn't work

My first attempt was not wide enough. The X brace leg is 1" wide so I thought if I came down on each side a 1/2" it would work but it didn't. It took two trial and error adjustments before the leg lined up with the mortise. BTW that ended up being a few frogs hairs more than 5/8".

Another potential hiccup is how to attach the ends of the legs into the open mortise? Epoxy with a snug fit was the first thought that transited the brain bucket. The second one was screw but that would be an end grain hiccup along with how to plug the countersink. Something to think about. 

accidental woodworker

I got zero time in the shop this AM. Instead it was spent 90% at the VA, 5% driving, and 5% stopping at the grocery store on the way home. I left for the VA at 0650 for a 0900 appointment. I was expecting to have to drive in bumper to bumper traffic on RTE 10 but that didn't happen. Traffic was light both on Park Ave and RTE 10 and I go to the VA at 0709. Totally didn't expect that to happen in my lifetime. 

I met with the Dr and he explained the the operation (a TURP) happening on the 22nd of this month. I'll have a catheter for 3 days but he told I can do my normal routine. After the doc I went to a pre-op/post op appt where they explained what prep I had to do the day before and the day of the surgery. I still wasn't done as I had to stop by blood draw and leave a urine sample and donate some blood before finally exiting the VA.

Got home at 1050 put away the groceries and headed out to Johnny's Chalet to have fish 'n chips for lunch. I think I'm going to have change my lunch choice because 5 hours after eating I still felt stuffed. I'll try a burger next friday and see how I fare 5 hours later with that choice.

ready to unclamp

I was a good boy and left this to cook. It was almost 1300 when I took the clamps off.

teeny bit

I didn't use sticks on this first, instead I checked it for rocking on the tablesaw. There was a slight bit of it.

flushing the top

Had to remove some dried glue blobs first with a chisel. Then I used the blockplane to flush the legs with the rails.

teeny bit still

It took 3 plane and check steps before I was sighting straight over both sticks.

less than a 16th

Both the inside and outside diagonals read the same.

first choice

This is half of a table top that I got from facebook marketplace. I was going to use part of it to make the top for the plant stand.

better choice

I had a 4'x4' piece of 1/2" thick plywood in the boneyard. I have looked at that for over a year thinking it was 1/4". Sawed off a piece 1" wider and longer than the base.

centering the base

The top on the tile tables is 1/2" plywood too so I'll use this one to experiment on attaching the top. 

transferring the legs

Transferred the outside corner location of the legs onto the top.

two choices

These are the first two choices I thought of on how to attach the top to the base. Four #10 x 1 1/2" long FH screws - one each from the top down into the legs. As I was typing this I thought I could also put another screw down into the center of each rail.

screws won

Not a big fan of driving screws into what is end grain. Initially the grip is excellent but in my experience they tend to loosen over the years due to seasonal swings in the wood. Four extra screws in the center of rails would have helped keeping the top on. 

hmmm.......

How could I not remember this? Wood buttons would work and the top is repairable if it needs to come off. The only draw back I can see to wood buttons is the top is only a 1/2" thick. That is, IMO, not a lot of meat for a screw to bite in.

metal ones

Another choice I totally zoned out on having. These would work well too but again the top is only 1/2" thick. I like using sheet metal screws to attach these and I don't think 3/8" is sufficient.

two more

The two at the top I saw on a Wood Whisperer you tube vid. They will allow for more expansion/contraction than the figure 8 ones. I haven't used them yet but I think they aren't necessary for a plywood top. Found these two styles while searching for the metal buttons.

I forgot why

Can't remember what point I wanted to make with this pic. Other than the ugly plywood edge, I am still clueless. Covered the edges with left over banding I had in the boneyard. Nailed it by hand because I didn't feel like getting the compressor out. This worked out just as well. Applied it to 3 sides and than planed and fitted the last one.

last one

 I think I'll prime it and leave that way. Amanda can paint it whatever color she decides on.

$69 on special

I didn't know that Woodsmith had bought Fine Woodworking. I pulled the trigger on this as soon as I saw it. This archive is normally $99. I was going to put it on my shop computer but Microsuck is discontinuing support for Win OS (Win 10?) This USB stick is not Linux compatible and I don't want to install Wine. Something else to ponder, eh?

accidental woodworker

 I started my post lunch strolls again on the 1st of this month. I am still only walking about 1/2 to 2/3 of what I was doing before I stopped. I am not breathless nor winded but I was a wee bit for the first couple of days. Today I finished my walk in under an hour. I am slowly taking less time to do my stroll. On the 1st it took me over an hour and 15 minutes and today it was 57 minutes. I will stick with what I'm walking for now and see how much quicker I can walk it by next thursday. Then I'll add in some more and do that until I'm back to what I was strolling before I did the bounce test with the sidewalk.

can't see the glue joint

The glue joint closed up and I couldn't see/find it. I got lucky in that the grain lines ran parallel to it. Although I couldn't see it, I could feel it on both faces. I was few frog hairs off flush on both faces. I sanded the outside face flush with 80 and 150 grit but I couldn't sand the inside face.

Clancy's oil

I slathered on one coat of Clancy's and this pine drank it like a it was sucking it up with a straw. After 10 minutes I wiped it down and put it in the boneyard to await its trip to North Carolina in august.

stretchers and long rails

Planing this poplar overall wasn't that bad. My last experience with poplar many moons ago wasn't that easy nor where the results good. A few more years of planing paid off - got these thicknessed in less than 1/2 an hour.

all done

On the left are the rails/stretcher and one extra for an oops. On the right are the short rails and one oops. I didn't go nutso getting them all to be +/- one atom of thickness. There wasn't any need for that because nothing will be married to them in any way. All that matters here is that the ends are square and the outside face is flat and straight.

shavings pile

It looks I could glue these together and have enough for 4x8 sheet of OSB plywood.

rails are in batter's box

I sized the rails so that the legs are inset from the outside edges by a 1/2".

cutting to length

I use a rip blade only in the table saw. I do that for two reasons with the first being I mostly make rip cuts on the tablesaw. The second one if the teeth on the blade are flat so it makes a flat bottom when making grooves. The only hiccup with the rip for crosscutting it that it splinters on the exit. As long as I back it up I don't have to deal with that.

checking

The top on the left one is an 1/8" wider/longer than the right one. I sawed the rails for both the same. That little difference is going to amount to diddly squat.

hmm......

Off cuts from the legs. I was able to get four them to be 3 5/8" long. I couldn't bring myself to shitcan them without trying to make something with them.

teeny table?

Thinking that maybe I can make a plant stand out of this. My first thoughts on it was a speaker stand but I no longer have stereo speakers the size of a volkswagen. Plant stand makes better sense.

2nd purpose

I came up with another use for this. I can practice making the dowel joints for the two tables. The first time I used the Dowel Max I got confused and messed up. This way I can work out the kinks.

step one

This is step one - label the rails and legs. The check marks on them are used to ensure the dowel jig is positioned properly on the rails/legs.

marked

I thought I had this licked but I didn't. I got confused, not with the labeling, but with the legs and the rails. I didn't position them correctly on the jig in spite of the labeling.

sigh, and a bigger sigh again.......

I was on the right road doing this until I had a brain fart. I should have aligned the dowel jig's left side with the pencil line. Instead I aligned it with the left edge and drilled a hole there. 

corrected

I'm glad that I used this to practice for the tables. In typing hindsight I should have glued a dowel in the one of the side by side holes first before drilling the 2nd, correct one.

it fits

This corner went together without any hiccups.

last two

I got the remaining 7 done with no brain farts. It was confusing me because the legs aren't square. Before I drilled each set of holes I put the leg where it should be and then put the jig on it. This came back to bite me on the arse and draw blood a little further on down.

dry fit

Happy with this and I don't see any problems giving this away as a plant stand (of course it needs a top of some kind). I'll have to ask Amanda if she wants it. If not I'll give it to my sister Kam because I know she has plants.

hmm.....

The tops of the rails are less than a frog's hair off flush with the legs. I'm impressed with those results. IMO this dowel jig is worth every cent I paid for it. And I got it before the tariff hiccup going on now. Although it was way less than $800 so it wouldn't have been subject to any tariff?

where I drew blood

I got it glued and clamped and I couldn't see why it looked crooked. Then I saw that I had turned two of the legs 90° to the other two. I wasn't paying attention to the orientation of the legs with respect to the rails and other two. I was able to break it apart and reglue it.

broken dowel

This dowel broke when I pulled the rails and legs apart. I sawed it flush and drilled it out again. There wasn't anything I had to do with the dowel jig to line it up.

gluing up

Made a third brain fart. Put the back two legs on going up instead of down. I got the legs orientated correctly this time in spite of it being a blurry pic. Thanking my lucky stars that I did this practice run first.

2nd blurry pic

These are two shims that I put in the jig that offset the holes from the edge of the leg. These two are about 3/16" and that is the distance the rail is offset. I didn't want the rails to be be flush with the legs. The jig comes with four of these shims.

quit early

After making a three bone headed me-steaks I cut my losses and quit the shop early today. Getting these clamps to tighten down drove me nutso. They ran out of threads before twicebefore they were applying any clamping force. I find that to be incredibly annoying especially so when you are stressing out over a glue up. I'll let this go until the AM.

accidental woodworker

 I wasn't so sure this AM when I got up that today would turn out as nice as it did. It was dark and cloudy at 0600 along with the temp being 29F (-1.7C). I had my doubts that it would improve. It did weather wise, with lots of sunshine, but the temp wasn't cooperating. Along with a stiff breeze, it was frigid working out in the driveway. The good news is I got the planing done on the cherry and legs for the tables.

one toolbox handle

Got asked to show a pic of the tenon end of the handle. There is a 16th of shoulder on both cheeks - that is enough to act as a stop and hold it against the ends of the toolbox.

glued and cooking

This is the 2nd toolbox and I left it in the vise to cook. I didn't have any problems driving the wedges home - I wasn't sure how well that would go doing that with it in the vise.

first one

This glue up tried my patience to the max. One end was cupped top to bottom and two ends of the long sides were also cupped slightly. It gave me fits trying to clamp the ends and sides flush. I got it done and I learned a few new wood curses to use on the next glue up.

legs done

The temp was only 34F (-1C) when I ran these through the lunchbox planer. It was so cold that I had to wear gloves. I left the legs as thick and as wide as I could rather then planing to 1 1/4" x 2".

cherry was next

I picked 3 boards at random and checked them for twist. I was relieved to sight over the sticks and see straight across on both. Hauled them out to the driveway and planed them to 7/8" thick. The two treads got planed to a 64th over 3/4". On those two boards I had to plane more to clean up one face.

done

Survived the cold but I came close to not doing it. If the past couple weeks of weather weren't so crappy I would have. The wind chilled me to the bone. I felt of twinge in my groin when I lugged the planer out of the house and on to the planer table. I hope that it didn't effect my hernia repair operation because that was where the short burst of pain came from. 

not the best tenon/mortise

There aren't gaps but the mortise wall ends are a bit ragged out. They aren't as clean and crisp but for a toolbox it will do. I am going to make at least one more of these (wider & longer) and I'll use this handle detail on it again.

the better one

This one came out better. Good fit, no gaps, and clean and crisp on all four sides.

holy bat turds Batman, said Robin

Noticed this hiccup after I had nailed off one side. I'm thinking that it had cracked when I clamped it and nailing it broke it off completely.

glued and cooking

I used three nails at each end of the long sides. I didn't use nails on the short ends but I might add a couple of cut nails there tomorrow.  The break was ragged out but clean and I don't think the glue joint will be visible. I'll find out in the AM.

back to the other toolbox

Glued a 1/8" dowel into the handle. That serves two purposes, the first being to keep the handle from spinning. The 2nd is to keep it where it is between the two ends.

Clancy's oil again

This toolbox most likely will end up in the SIL's garage but I couldn't let it go without some finish on it. One coat of Clancy's will do the trick. I doubt that he will even notice it.

it was almost 1500

These are the rails and stretchers for the two tile tables. I got two of them thicknessed before I killed the lights. Based on how quickly these two were to do, I should be able to whack out the others lickety split in the AM.

accidental woodworker

 My new gas service was installed, tested, and done at 1612 today. The gas company had put in new higher pressure gas lines last year and today they ran it to a new meter outside my house. They also did the two houses directly across the street from me but there are three more to go on my street. So it will be a couple of more days before the streets are clear of all the construction vehicles. It has been a bit of a chore to get out of the driveway and onto the street with the truck since thursday. Hopefully that will change and ease up starting tomorrow.

yikes

This cleat shifted a wee bit when I nailed it in place. I need this to be square to the outside because the wedge will bear up against this.

Record 073

It took some patience but I got the cleat square to the outside long sides.

sigh

Minor brain fart - I planed the angle on the wedge going the wrong way. Unfortunately it wasn't wide enough to correct the angle so I had to make a new one.

fitting the wedge

I didn't lay out an angle on the fixed or movable wedge. Instead I did it by eye and counting how many strokes with the plane I took. I had to sweeten this end a wee bit.

good fit

This end of the wedge had about a 16th of a gap that I had to plane and check several times before it closed up.

done

This one is done and the itch didn't go away. This was made out of scraps I had and I want to make more of these. I didn't think anything would take my attention span away from sliding lid boxes but this has.

nope

I swept up the shop and dropped the shop shitcan into the driveway shitcan. I also swept up and tossed the wedge for this box. I played with this one (the original) and I planed the angle in the correct direction and it did work. But, the wedge was too short. I had to try and make it work.

found it

I dug through the driveway shitcan and I found it on the first dive. Sometimes you get lucky. I'm going to give this to my son-in-law and I fully intend to make at least two more for me (bigger ones).

two more tool boxes

My wife told me that the SIL needed tote style toolboxes. I am still giving the japanese one to him along with these two. They aren't overly large in any dimension but the sizes were driven by the scrap I had on hand.

Clancy's oil

Initially I wasn't going to put a finish on this at all. Then I thought maybe 2-3 coats of shellac. In the end I went with Clancy's oil. One coat is all this is getting and having seen the before pic, I'm liking the after one a lot more.

clipped the ends

Decided on rabbeted joinery that I will glue and nail with rose head nails.

1/4" groove

Several years ago I had an iron made for this plane for 1/4" plywood. I ran a test groove in some scrap and one piece of plywood I had was a snug fit. I was going to do the groove on the tablesaw but the blade height gave me fits when I made the rabbets with it.

lined up

The fence slipped on me and I saw it before I ran the groove. I reset the fence using the first groove I planed. The vertical one is what I planed next and it lined up perfectly.

good muscle memory

When I first started out using this plane my grooves were iffy. Sometimes they were square and sometimes they weren't. I hope I'm not jinxing myself now, but I now am consistently plowing square grooves.

long groove

These are the grooves that I usually planed out of square. The exit end being slightly worse than the entrance end.

measuring stick

The ID on the tool box was dead nuts square. I ticked off the length and width on the stick and add 2x the depth of the groove to get my final dimensions.

first one done

I marked the two dimensions a 16th shorter then the measuring stick said and it fit dead on. I was expecting to have to trim it to get it to fit especially on the width.

this sucks pond scum

I don't know what is causing the tablesaw blade to rise up. I tightened it as much as I could but it still did this on 2 of the rabbets.

2nd toolbox

Both toolboxes are the same width. The 2nd one is 2 1/4" longer.

stick handle

This one is getting a stick handle and the other is getting a 1" dowel. I wanted to put a dowel on both but I only had enough to do one. This one is a stopped through mortise.

first mortise

Drilled out most of the waste on the drill press and than chopped it coming at it from both sides.

snug fit

I made the width of the mortise a 1/8" less than the thickness of the handle. I planed the cheeks of the tenon with my skewed block plane. The height of the mortise was a 16th less than the handle height.

first mortise tenon dry fitted

I was happy with this fit and if I make more of these I'll go with stick handles and stopped through mortises.

not quite on the 2nd one

I missed squaring the bottom right corner on the mortise. The tenon pushed it out partly. I glued and clamped the blowout back in place. After 20 minutes I unclamped it and cleaned/squared up the corner with a chisel.

oops

Forgot to snap a pic of the two dry fitted. I will get these two glued and cooking in the AM.

one short

Because of the grain orientation of the ends I couldn't put a wedge at the top and bottom of the tenon. That could have possibly split the ends. Instead I am going to wedge it on an angle. The will exert the force in line against the direction of the grain.

quitting time

It has been a long time since I've worked in the shop this late. The gas techs just left and I killed the lights here.

happy face on

Yesterday I got what I thought was the correct OTG thing for the Firestick but I was wrong. The Firestick requires a micro USB C and I had ordered a USB C. The silver one is the wrong one. The black one is a Firestick OTG - that is what I plugged into the Amazon search bar this time around. 

I found instructions and You Tube vids on how to install the WiFi keyboard and I'll probably get around to that tomorrow or the next day or....

accidental woodworker

 It actually goes back to the end of March with the current weather. Today it rained off and on all day long. Tomorrow is forecasted to be partly sunny with wind and wednesday is looking good enough to do some lunch box planing in the driveway. Like just about everything else I'll cool my heels and wait and see what shakes out. In the interim I have plenty to do to keep me busy in the shop.

hmm.....

What do you do when the swamp floods and the gators get loose? You look at a stash of wood and decide to start a new project. Lee Valley put out a You Tube video email this morning on making a japanese tool box. I have seen them before but they didn't interest me then. But this video changed that and I had to scratch the itch and make one now.

breaking down the stock

Used my bow saw for this round. 20 years ago I used this for all my crosscut and ripping needs and then set it aside. What I'm finding out with all the various and different saws I've been using is it doesn't matter. Sawing is an acquired skill that isn't dependent upon the type of saw. And it was quicker using the bow saw than my favorite western crosscut saw.

there isn't much stock required

From L to R, cleats, sides, and bottom. Didn't realize it here that I was short on what I needed.

kept going from here

Initially I was just going to plane a reference edge and face. But it  only took me about 15 minutes to get this done and I decided to keep going. This board had been in the shop for a few months so it should be acclimated by now.

tiny bit of twist

Took me about 20 minutes to plane each of these flat, straight, and twist free.

light came on here

This is where it dawned on me that I didn't have a lid or a bottom and the short ends. 

the bottom

I went back and forth on how I would get the bottom to thickness. The board was a 1/16th less than 3/4" thick and the target for the bottom was 3/8". Finally settled in to planing it to 3/8" thickness.

the lid

The pine I used for this box is dead clear and has the straightest grain I have ever seen in pine boards, and it isn't quarter sawn neither. I also got the lid cleats and the ends from this board.

humph.....

My workbench was rocking like it was twisted. I have been using this bench for over 30 years and I have never experienced this headache before. I had moved the bench a couple of days ago and tried to reposition so it wouldn't rock but I couldn't.

Made a quick pit stop and bandsawed out a couple of wedges. One of them worked on the left front leg but wasn't anywhere near thick enough for the right leg. Made a thicker 3rd and that one worked. No more rocking and no more benchtop wiggling while I was planing the stock.

frog hair more than 1/4"

When I checked the bottom after thicknessing it I saw that I have planed a taper in it. Flattening it again brought the thickness down to a 1/4". I would have rather it to be the original 3/8" but 1/4" will still be adequate.

ready for joinery

I worked past the ringing of the lunch time bell so I could finish them. After lunch I made a road trip to ACE to get some small ring shank nails for attaching the bottom. The selection wasn't that large and I settled for a small package of over priced copper ring shank boat nails.

new WiFi keyboard

My wife has one of these but she lost the USB receiver for it so it is useless. I found out how to install a USB Wifi or BT keyboard on the Firestick. I also had to order a USB C OTG that hasn't arrived yet. It is annoying and a ROYAL PITA typing in Firestick. I have been thinking of installing Alexa because Firestick will accept voice commands. I'll be trying the kybd route first.

not much to it

I did a quick search for japanese toolboxes and I didn't see any done with dovetails. Everyone I saw was done with finger jointery or nailed together with butt/rabbet joints.

gang sawing

I put the finger notch on the long sides and sawed that with the two together in the moxon.

used the gents saw

I scored the square line for the gents saw to track in. I find that to help a lot with sawing square across the edge.

removing the waste

I was going to use a coping saw to remove the waste but switched to using the bandsaw. I think Paul Sellers would approve of me using either method. I wasn't going to chop it out because I don't get good results with this type of chisel work.

some gaps

I made a mistake when I sawed out the waste. I sawed it almost dead on the marking gauge line. When I chopped on that I didn't do that good. There wasn't enough meat for the chisel and I didn't chop in a straight line. On a couple of them the chisel moved backwards away from the waste area into the good meat. Not horrible gaps but gaps nonetheless.

 Drilled pilot holes in the fingers for the rose head nails that I am using. I test nailed a ton of scrap together before I committed to the real thing. It took several different sizes of pilot holes before I was able to fully seat a nail without it splitting.

took two drill bits

If I used just the small bit, the nail would split the top board. If I used just the larger bit, the nail was loose. It seated but I could pull the two boards apart with my hands. What worked for me was to drill the top board with the large bit and the bottom board with the thinner one. I got no splits at all doing it this way.

flushing the fingers

I intended for the fingers to be proud. I was going to chamfer the stick out part but I changed my mind. I like the look of them being flush. That looks cleaner and simpler IMO.

bottom nailed on

No glue, just nails all around the perimeter. The You Tuber didn't glue his bottom on neither.

another change

The bottom did have a 1/8" overhang but I flushed it. One long side was slightly tapered so I planed it flush.

stopped here

I'm pretty sure that I could have finished this but I was a wee bit fuzzy on how the lid locks in place. I also realized here that I was short one cleat. I need one on the left that holds up the lid so it can go underneath the cleat on the top left. I know that I need that cleat in place so I can determine the final length of the lid (along with the width of it). 

Blogger still is acting wonky on me. It is freezing now at least once every time I type a blog post. That has come down from it freezing 3-5 times or more. Once is still annoying but better than multiple times. I haven't find anyone online having this problem so far. I'm fairly certain that once this headache goes away another one will take its place.

accidental woodworker

 I didn't spend much time in the shop today. One thing on my mind was the two desks for the grandsons. The bases will be pine but I don't think that is a good choice for a desk top - it is way too soft. So before I start into nutso mode I'll check with Amanda and see what she wants/expects. I'm thinking a formica top over a plywood substrate and something adult sized so they can grow into them. 

now it is done

The right side has a bit of missing banding - other than that the outside is good. I like the simplicity of this box a lot. The inlaid banding and what I covered the plywood edges with match up pretty good.

inside peek

The veneer I used on the covering the inside proved to be a PITA. It was tissue thin and didn't like being cut, sawn, or sanded. Both the top and bottom lost a couple of silvers around the perimeter.

Stanley poster frames

Sanded the 7 frames up to 220 just on the upside face. On the back I ran the 120 grit sanding block on it once.

oil based primer

I should have bought this when I got the paint for the tile tables. Using oil based because it is better than a latex primer. Fingers crossed that I won't have to put on 3 topcoats to cover it.

waited a day

I flattened these two a couple of days ago and I waited until today to check them. Both them, according to the sticks, are still flat, straight, and twist free.

test time

I ran a knife line 360 and I'm going to thickness this. The weather isn't forecasted to be clear and sunny until wednesday. So I'll thickness this one and check it for a couple of days to see if it does any stupid wood tricks.

3/4" thick

I checked all the rails/stretchers to find the thinnest one and that happened to be 13/16" thick. I was happy to find that out because 3/4" is what I wanted the rails/stretchers to be.

hmm.....

This is an extra and I sawed it to final width (2"). The Dowel jig minimum for drilling two centered holes is 1 1/2". Got me to thinking about how to center two holes on a 2" wide board with it. 

One thing that became apparent was there was no way I could use both screw clamps to hold the board. Turned out that it was held securely with only one. The instructions clearly state that they are to be tightened only finger tight.

nope

The first go around I drilled the left and middle hole. I drilled two holes on the mating piece and the fit was good. However, I wasn't fond of the empty space between the center hole and the right side edge. I put the jig back on and added the right one. It is not symmetrical/centered with the other two.

 The corresponding 3 holes I drilled on the mating piece didn't line up. The first two did but I missed something with lining up the 3rd holes between the two pieces.

WINDRTI

When In Doubt Read The Instructions. However, comma, backslash, there was nothing in the instructions that addressed this dilemma. After eyeballing it I came up with an idea to try out.

step one

The idea was to drill two holes centered but also the same distance away from the edge. Started by drilling hole #1 on the right.

followed by repeating it on the left

this surprised me

I wasn't expecting one screw clamp to securely hold the board but it did. I thought drilling would cause the board to shift and move but it didn't. And it did it with just being tightened with finger pressure.

hmmm.....

The mating piece is the leg stock that I will have to drill the mating holes on. I used a scrap of 1 1/4" square stock to drill into. The holes in the rail look good and it should keep it from rolling on the top or bottom

ain't going to work

The bushings in the jig aren't lined up with the holes in the rail. 

had to confirm it

I could see that they were not going to line up but I checked it anyways. I had a false hope that maybe I could force it if it was only a few frogs off. FYI, it was more than a few.

back to square one

Sawed off the ends of the test piece and drilled two new holes. I then marked the width of the rail onto to the test leg. 

drilling the first hole

This side and the opposite one are the reference faces for this jig. I didn't use them when I drilled the third hole. Because of that I couldn't line the 3rd one up. On the leg I lined up the left side reference face with the top of the leg.

drilling the 2nd hole

I lined the right side reference face with the pencil line on the leg. This is the width of the rail. Drilled the 2nd hole.

dead on

It worked perfectly. There was zero misalignment between the holes on the two.

look Ma, no gaps

I'm using the dowels because chopping mortises for the tenons would be a bit awkward due to the dimensions of the leg. One mortise would be would be less than an inch long and it would run into the other one. Don't have that headache with the dowels.

Happy that I sorted this out. I've been thinking about it for a few days now.

my back up

If I couldn't figure this out I was doing to use these imperial dowel points. I also have a set of metric ones - why, I don't know but I had to have them.

ready to go

Ran my knife lines and darkened them with pencil. Thinking now that maybe I shouldn't have done this. If any of these have stupid wood tricks yet to spring on me, I'll have to do new knife lines.

Killed the lights here and headed out to get a coffee with the wife. Maybe I should get some ground coffee before the tariffs put it out of reach. Giving up coffee would be a ship to far for me to abandon. I wonder how the restaurant I have breakfast at every monday will deal with it?

accidental woodworker

 Got what the next two projects are going to be. Amanda thought of using the old back door as a desktop. I nixed that and said I would make Miles and Leo both a desk. Of course other than being a desk, I'll have to make the two of them different. Can't have them getting identical desks. The thoughts about making them have been transiting my brain bucket since I got the word on them this AM. Still working on massaging the blob of ideas into something coherent.

detour

This is the self in a cabinet I made last year(?). I didn't make any pockets for the shelf pins then so I'm doing it now.

where the shelf calls home

This is not the first time this has happened. What is that you ask? Well, when I take anything off the shelf it comes forward a little and a pin falls out, and the shelf comes crashing down. Annoying but it finally pissed me off enough to now end it this AM.

The pockets sit down and around the pins so when it is pulled forward slightly, no pins fall out and it stays in place. I double, triple, checked it 4 times to confirm that.

flush

I should have made the banding a wee bit wider. It is only a frog hair proud of the tile. Not a lot of meat left for clean up.

first one done

I glued and nailed the banding to the substrate. I clamped the miters to fully close them up. I let this cook a few hours before I removed the clamps.

2nd table substrate

I got a good fit on the miters on both of these. The clamps are more for insurance to provide a good bond on the miters.

ready for paint

I got a good fit on the miters on both of these. The left one is 1/8" wider and longer than the right one. Sawed the plywood board in half on the wrong side of the pencil line.

not going to be easy

I can already feel my OCD trying to downshift, and punch the accelerator to the floor. Both of these will use 140 of these irregular tiles to fill in the field. Along with the irregular tiles I will have to contend with irregular spacing between the tiles for grout.

This is the 2nd table that I'm making. My initial thoughts on it were to use black tiles around the perimeter and mix up the other colored tiles to fill between the black ones. I laid out one long and short side to eyeball that and I'm wavering now. I'll wait until I get the whole lot of tiles before I decide on what to do.

calling it done

I like this box but not the me-steaks I made on it. I learned a few things and I should do better (hopefully) the next time I try inlaid banding.

nope, not done

I saw a drip and tried to feather it out with 4-0 steel wool. I managed to do that and also to break off a piece of banding. I super glued that back down and put on another coat of shellac. Fingers crossed that tomorrow it will be done. I consider this to be below a 2nd but now maybe a bit too fancy to use as a shop box.

 accidental woodworker

 Since monday construction crews have been working on my street installing new gas lines. Today they finished up doing my house and the one directly across the street from me. There are 6 more to go so they'll be back on monday to finish it up. After they are done with my street (3 blocks long) another crew will be installing new gas meters and new gas lines on the inside of the house. It wasn't that bad other than the street being crowded and little noisy at times, no heartaches.

hmm.....

This confirms I'm brain dead. The 4 at the top didn't rock at all when I checked the reference face on the tablesaw. The lone one did rock a teeny bit but when I checked it with the sticks they said it was flat and straight.

no rocking

On this one board, it didn't rock on the rough planed face neither. All four of the top ones checked flat and twist free with the sticks. I did say I would toss this if any these showed any twist but I changed my mind. The amount of twist in one board was minimal. Maybe the boards are finally done doing stupid wood tricks? I'm going to move forward on that thought.

finally some good news

The two long ones on the right checked flat and straight with the sticks. I was a little surprised by that because I was expecting to sight over the sticks and see a pretzel. I sawed these two up because I needed two stretchers and one short rail.

ta da, happy times are here

I checked 9 boards and 6 were flat and straight. 3 had a little bit of twist, a ton less than what I saw on the first two rounds of planing. It took only a few wispy shavings to remove it. I now have a positive feeling about this stock. 

It will be a few more days before I get to use the lunchbox planer. I will only use it to surface the leg stock. All the rails and stretchers I will plane to thickness by hand - they are too short IMO to run through the planer.

done

The two short boards on the far right are the ones I planed a wee bit of twist out. I purposely set these apart from the others so I can check them again tomorrow.

ditto

The 3 top left stretcher/rails are the ones I planed twist off again. Separated these too for the same reason.

I saw this finish being used on a You Tube vid and I was impressed with how it looked. The big one is a blended tung oil finish and the smaller one is a wax topcoat. I will try it on a future project. The You Tuber used it on walnut but mine will most likely be pine.

hmm.....

It would appear that I dodged another bullet today. These sticks are destined for banding the table tops of the tiled tables. All of them look straight with no discernible twist, cup or bowing. 

prepping the screws

Sanding 10 of the screws that I am painting the heads on. None of the screw heads were ding or burr free. Sanded starting with 100 grit and ending with 220.

first of 3

I will put two coats on now. I'm sure that I'll need a 3rd one after driving them home on the kitchen ladder.

one down, one to go

I thought I would get at least one of these assembled today but it didn't happen boys and girls. The plan is to glue and nail 3 legs on and than plane and check the last leg until it fits.

done

I managed to get both sets rough sawn and fitted before 1500 rolled around. I am still taking my time working because my wrist doesn't ache anymore but I am having occasional drop-sees when I pick up things. It wasn't too bad doing these two.

love this color

The keepers are from a table top - it was solid mahogany. I love the chocolate brown color that develops in it after I apply shellac. I keep an eye on Facebook Market place for tables. I have gotten 3 since that one but the last 3 were all veneered. I used up the last bits of that table for the keepers and the top and bottom bandings.

accidental woodworker

 I've had carpel tunnel for over 30 years and every now and then it wakes up and says hello and wants to shake hands with me. I don't want the surgery because I'm not 100% sold on it working for me. So yesterday afternoon it woke from its slumber. When I got up this AM it ached and did so throughout the day. The bad side of it that is I lose my grip and sense of touch. I get no feed back on picking my coffee cup and when using planes and other tools. It usually goes away if I take it easy and limit stressing it. It is a good thing I'm at a stopping point with the current project(s). Made for another slo mo day in the shop.

looked promising

I eyeballed everything and the reference faces looked good to my eye. I didn't bother eyeballing the edges. Of the 8 legs I had to plane a teeny bit of twist out 2 of them again.

dipsy do

The stretcher/rails were a different story. This leg here dips inward L to R at the far end. Didn't pick up on that yesterday. 2 of these had just as much twist as they did on the first two planing runs. Wasn't looking good for the home team with the first two I checked being OTL (out to lunch).

happy days again

I had lost one of these in the shop somewhere months ago. I found it yesterday when I was cleaning it up. It had fallen through one of the bench hook holes on the workbench onto the shelf beneath.  Nice to have found it and at least something is going my way.

not good

The far stick was showing over 3 lines of twist. I don't know if this is one of the original boards from day one that had this much twist too. 

cutting my losses

7 of the 9 boards are toast. 2 had a lot of twist and the others had a healthy amount. At this point here I thought that these were a lost cause and I just wanted to give them flying lessons.

hmm.....

Two of the rail/stretcher boards have no twist and the other a couple of frog hairs. Because I am obviously brain dead I am going to try and salvage this one more time. If it goes south on me this time I'll process the last poplar board for new rails/stretchers.

fingers crossed

Here's the new plan. I sawed up the wonky full length boards into the long and short rails and the center stretchers. I checked them and several of them were tapered across one face. All of them had some twist but nowhere as bad as when they were one board. Fingers crossed that being smaller/shorter now they won't do any more stupid wood tricks.

banding

The full length board in the preceding pic I cut up to get this banding. This will cover the perimeter of the table and provide a enclosure for the tiles. Just had a thought about this - will the wonkiness pop up in this thin banding now?

sneak peek

This is how the table will look. The rails will not be flush with the top of the legs. Instead they will be set down from the top the width of the legs. 

I haven't decided on how the table top will be attached to the legs. No matter which way I chose, it won't be replaceable. The tiles negate getting any access to how I'll attach it.

humph....

There was a cloud of poplar wood dust in the shop. Most of the pile under tablesaw is a talc like dust. Pine doesn't throw dust throughout the shop like this poplar has each time I've sawn it. I had to turn on the dust fan box to clear the air in the shop.

confusing myself

This rail or stretcher is dead nuts flat and straight, end to end. This face is square to the top edge. The face is tapered and it is twisted. Couldn't wrap the brain bucket around how it can be flat/straight and still be twisted. Even the diagonals said it was flat/straight.

parallel upcoming

I had to try this to unscrew my thinking about it. I ran a gauge line 360 off the reference face and I planed that face down to the lines.

NFG

Planed a lot of wood off and it is still twisted. Both faces are parallel now and both faces exhibit the same amount of twist. This one got tossed into the shitcan. On the flip side, it didn't unscrew my thinking.

last chance

I am going to check this again in the AM and if any of them show twist they are going directly into the shitcan. I am not even going to pack rat them for some other use.

2 coats

I took my time planing the twist this time. Not sure if I over did it or not. If it still hurts/aches tomorrow I'll take the day off from the shop but I'll check the rails/stretchers for twist. That shouldn't effect it to any extent.

accidental woodworker

 Day two after planing a reference face and edge on the wood (poplar) for the tile tables. Because the weather isn't anywhere near what the weather seers say it will be I double check what I had planed. Tomorrow it is supposed rain off and on but if it is clear, I plan on using the lunchbox planer. I want to get the poplar processed and in table form before it does any stupid wood tricks.

double checking

Checking my reference edges and for the most part they were still flat, straight, and square to each other.

the first sigh....

I had planed all the legs and a 3rd of the rails before I realized I had missed something. I was just checking the faces and edges were square. I thought it would be wise to check for twist and I'm glad I did. All the legs had some twist in them. Nothing major but I did have to go back and plane the twist away. After that I had to check/adjust that the reference faces and edges were still square to each other.

no warm and fuzzy

The wind got sucked out my sails here. I wasn't expecting the legs to move as much as they did. They weren't as bad as the rail and stretcher boards. Those went absolutely postal. Not only did the face show twist, but the edges did too. I was surprised but how much wood movement I saw. Of the nine boards (for the rails/stretchers) 4 had a ton of twist, 3 had a little face and edge twist, and two were kind of normal - just a tad bit of movement.

the worse one

Fingers and toes crossed that at a minimum the leg stock will still be flat and straight tomorrow. I had eyeballed the stock and it looked ok but the sticks told me different story. I don't have much hope the boards for the stretchers/rails behaving though. Based on the initial amount of wonkiness and what I planed away again today, the odds are on stupid wood tricks 4 to 1.

almost done

It was past lunch here with four more legs to go. It took me over 3 hours to get to this point. I tackled the last legs after my post lunch stroll.

not all of it

This is the shavings I produced flattening the stock for the 2nd time. This always amazes me how big of a pile I generate from just a few boards.

deja vu

This is how it looked before I checked and corrected for twist again. One face looks straight and other rounded and rough. Learning that my eyeballs aren't as calibrated as I think they are.

I'll let these go until tomorrow and I'll check them for twist with the sticks before I do anything else. If the rails/stretcher boards show twist I'm done with them. I have one more 4/4 poplar board that I will process for a new set of rails and stretchers.

This is all I got accomplished today other than sweeping the deck twice. This was disheartening because this poplar wasn't cheap. The 8/4 and two 4/4 quarter boards set me back almost $100. I can feel some nightmares about stupid wood tricks happening tonight.

accidental woodworker

 Today was a beautiful spring day. Blue skies, bright sunshine, and white fluffy clouds. I heard birds singing this morning and buds are popping up everywhere I look. As nice as today is, the rest of the week ain't looking so good. The forecast is rain and cloudy conditions until thursday after next. That is putting a damper on me using the lunchbox planer.

Today was April's fools day and I went on a post lunch stroll for the first time in months? I haven't walked since I tripped on the sidewalk in dec? It has been a while and I felt it today. I barely did half of the walk I was doing before I got hurt. My thighs got a wee bit sore walking and I was a little breathless walking up the one big hill on the trek. I was able to walk up it without stopping but not in the steady stride I was doing it before. It is going to take a while for me to get back in shape. I'll keep at the 1/2 way point until I get my stamina back.

what a relief

I was hoping that it wouldn't happen but I was expecting the 3 boards on the right to do stupid wood tricks overnight. The board had some significant twist in it and that usually means it has a strong tendency to move again after planing it like I did. Sometimes you get lucky with it.

had to force myself

Calling this box done. I had to force myself to finish it up - it just needs a finish to be 100%. I mitered the banding around the bottom and glued the last two keepers in place. I still have a great fit with the lid on the bottom part of the box.

sigh

I piece broke off while I was sanding the top edges of the keepers round. I didn't lose what broke off and I was able to super glue it back on.

the color of the tables

This is the color Amanda picked out and I got it today from Benjamin Moore. I only have to get the grout to have everything I need to make the tables.

sawed the rails and stretchers

The rails and stretchers will be 2" wide and I was concerned with the the hump on the unplaned face. The hump is still there but it isn't as pronounced as when the board was whole.

the bottom of the box

This detail looks odd to my eye and it is something that I will change on the next one. I will size the rabbet width so the banding will cover the bottom banding. I have to live with as is for this box.

cleaning them up

I didn't plane the two faces parallel to each other. I just planed the rough sawn face off along with most of the hump. This should make it easier to plane the faces parallel when I do run them through the lunchbox planer.

As an aside I was asked why I don't use the lunchbox in the shop. Two reasons - the first one is the noise. I have used it in the shop and the noise is much louder then doing it outside. I'm a little nutso protecting my ears from loud noises so the shop is out. The 2nd one is the mess. A shop vac can't keep up with the amount of dust and chips the lunchbox spits out. That dust also gets into every single nook and cranny in the shop and it will also migrate upstairs.

stickered

I made a change to the legs. Instead of going with 1 1/4" square legs I changed my mind and they will be 1 1/4" thick by 2" wide. That will be a more stable footprint for the table.

The rails and the stretchers will be roughly 3/4" thick by 2" wide. I'm thinking of using my dowel max to attach the rails to the legs. The stretcher I will probably do with a stopped dado similar to way I did the front rails on Leo's dresser.

The rails won't be flush with the top of the legs. The table Amanda picked out has the rails set down from the top about 2-3 inches with the stretcher running between the short side rails. It is an interesting design and not one I would have guessed that she would have picked.

accidental woodworker

 Finally got the Firesticks installed and working. The first one I stumbled a bit with the pin number screen but I resolved it. The second one on the bedroom TV initially had me frustrated but fixed that after lunch today. Both TVs now have prime video, Amazon Silk (internet browser), and You Tube installed and working. I can't get a USB keyboard to work on the bedroom TV. I thought that would make it easier to surf the WWW but I was wrong. I can't surf the internet because I don't know how to input/type anything in the search query. I'm sure I'll figure it out because after all I'm retired and got lots of time to waste how to.

table legs

This is a rough sawn piece of true 8/4 poplar. It is 54" long and just under 6" wide. I can get 2 sets of (4 legs each) out of it. The legs will be 1 1/4" to 1 3/8" square. More than likely it will be closer to 1 1/4" because I'll lose wood sawing the individual legs out.

has some twist

I sawed it in half length wise and I flattened one face and edge. I almost missed checking the edge for flat and straight.

rails and stretchers

I got one extra out of this poplar board. From each board I can get four rails and one stretcher. The extra will give me some oops. 

true 4/4 boards

Another rough sawn poplar board but this time it is 4/4. I didn't know it here but this board had twist, cup, bow, and humps in it. The plan was to flatten and straighten one edge and one face. Then sticker them until I can use the lunchbox planer in the driveway.

a 1/8" cup

The cup is so large on this end that I could see it. The plane just confirmed what the eyeballs told me.

a lot of calories

As you can see I took a lot more off the near end than the far end. The cup at the far end was a strong 1/16". After I got the board flat I expended 3 time the calories planing the twist out of it.

finally done

I don't have a warm and fuzzy with this board not doing stupid wood tricks on me. I had to plane the twist out of this board in quarters. The twist was horrible and the only way I removed it was to plane the first quarter and then the 2nd one etc etc. Checking for twist with the sticks at the ends just had me pissing in the wind.

more fun

The cup at this end of the board is over a 8th.

the other end

This end is barely a 16th. Almost as bad as the first board I did. This one took me just  as long to flatten and straighten - about 40 minutes.

removed a lot of wood

I am a frog hair shy of this board being 7/8" thick at its thinnest point. My goal was to have 7/8" thick rails but it is looking like I'll have to settle for 3/4".

last one

This board was a ROYAL )&(@%*_^)(@_+)^(%* PITA to do. This one I had to flatten the opposite face partially first. I prefer to flatten the cupped side first but the hump wouldn't let me do that. This one took me the longest to do and I was only doing one face and edge too. I flattened the face by doing it in 5ths. Fingers are crossed that the 3 of them don't compete with each other as to who will pretzel the most.

yikes

I initially criss crossed the board and then planed it at 90 with the #6. That was to rough flatten it and I checked it for twist. There was a ton because the board corkscrewed from one end to the other. The sticks had almost 4 lines from the front to rear sticks - each line on the sticks represents 1/8".

frustrating

This was not the face I wanted to flatten. It had a huge hump on this side. I didn't go nutso on it - I planed enough (twice) to get it to lay reasonable flat so I could work on the cupped face.

almost an hour

I thought I was getting closer but you can see that I still show a couple of lines of twist. I didn't bother checking the ends and switched to completing it by 5ths.

worked through lunch

I wasn't expecting to spend this much time flattening these boards. I'll have to sweat it out and see how they behave overnight. I do have another 4/4 board that I can get the rails and stretchers from if these don't behave. This is longest time I recall flattening one board - over two hours.

sigh

This is the practice frame which might be a plus. I had a spot on the other frame that I covered with black magic marker. That was a me-steak because I could pick it out in raking light. I don't know if I should strip off the poly or just touch up this spot with the black paint. I'll try black paint first and then deal with it if it goes south.

I got the third coat on the kids frame and I think I'm going to leave it at that. I'll bring it to Maria on wednesday.

hmm.....

I don't have any way of cutting these tiles - they are 1" square. The tile substrate needs to be sized so that whole tiles end up within a 1/8" of the sides. That should be adequate for grout. I played around with this and settled on a substrate that has ten tiles on the short side and 14 on the long ones. 

need more tiles

Amanda wanted the table to be 12" by 16" and that would require 192 tiles. This layout needs 140 tiles which makes what she shipped to me 40 tiles short. As you can see the tiles are not even remotely square. That will leave ragged out grout lines but it will match the not so square tiles.

sigh

This keeper broke but I'm still using it. I super glued it back together and used yellow glue to glue it in the box.

ghost sticks

I went nutso on these because the right side keeper broke in two. I will leave this be until the AM rolls around.

underside of the lid

This was not the result I was expecting. The veneer is too fragile and splits, breaks, cracks, and splinters just breathing on it. On the next box I will use thicker banding than this paper thin veneer. I will bandsaw some a strong 16th thick. 

top of the box

This is 1/8" thick banding and looks substantial unlike the veneer on the underside. This box is almost done. I killed the lights here and tomorrow I'll finish it by getting 1/8" thick banding on the bottom. 

When I got done typing this blog I noticed that yesterday's blog showed it was still a draft, not published. I would have bet a lung that I had published it in the AM. I am a creature of habit. I proof and publish the blog each morning before I eat breakfast or have my first cup of coffee. Hope it isn't another blogger hiccup to take a bite out of my arse.

accidental woodworker

 The weather of late and what is to come, is below norms for this time of the year. It is looking like Mother Nature didn't get the memo spring is here. Temps are 15 degrees lower than what they should be. Along with cloudy skies and the threat of rain, it made for a crappy day. Tomorrow is supposed to sunny in the AM and rain in the PM. Of course this is a complete reversal of what the weather seers were predicting yesterday.

annoying splinter

I had a teeny splinter in the tip of my index finger on my right, dominant hand. I was just under a notch going postal about it. My eyesight isn't good enough to look at this and dig out the offending piece of wood without help. I bought this magnifying glass for sharpening my saws. Used it twice for that and this was the 5th time I've used it to dig out a splinter.

my splinter removal tools

I have had a ton of splinter removals tools/kits over the years but this one is the absolute best of the lot. I use the spear looking tool to slice open the splinter entry point. The finger nail clippers I use to cut away skin exposing the hole so I then can use the the gripper thing on the left to remove the offending splinter. It took me over 30 minutes to dig the )@!&^($@)(*&%()@_)_  damn thing out.

hmm......

This isn't going as well as I would like. I used butt joints at the corners and I don't like that look. I couldn't think of any way to miter them. Part of the banding disappeared on the top corner - it caved it. That was due to the rabbet having a bit of missing plywood veneers there. 

nope

I was happy with how well the miters came out. However, slicing and sawing them caused some silvers of the veneer to pop off.

keepers dry fitted

I cut the height down an 1/8" - this is thin mahogany and being this high might be to floppy and potentially cause them to break. I quit here because I wasn't happy with how this was turning out. I'll take this as a learning experience and hopefully I'll do better on the next one. I will finish this but it will be a shop box once it is done.

good slip fit

A bright light - the lid fits great. I could easily put it on and take it off. And it fit just as well flipping it 180 and putting it on and taking it off.

new clock

Got this from Amazon and of course it is from China. You probably could also see the time from Mars with this clock. I searched but I couldn't find any digital clock kits - something with just the display screen - anywhere.

Still haven't completed the Firestick install. The plan is to complete the living room TV tonight. Updates and pics on tomorrows news.

accidental woodworker

 The temp today was 22 degrees lower than the temp yesterday. It was also cloudy with a cold breeze blowing. Needless to say I didn't get any exercise planing the cherry and it ain't looking too good for next week neither. The forecast has rain and cloudy skies until next weekend. I'll have to find an interim project to fill in the void that is coming.

protectors

I stuck these between the metal corners and the box. Without them the metal corners leave impressions there. A couple of silvers of it stuck to all four corners.

a little chisel help

Only one piece threw a hissy fit removing it. The rest came off clean with the first swipe. The recalcitrant one took 3 swipes but in the end there was no evidence of it left.

it fits

I clamped an auxiliary fence to the tablesaw and buried the saw blade in it. I used that to make a shallow rabbet for the banding. Nailed the fit with a test piece and did the same with the box. The banding is flush with the face of the box. And I'm putting one at the bottom and top edge only on the bottom half of the box.

hmm.....

Not liking this look. I am covering all the exposed edges of the plywood (on the box). That means two pieces here, one for the bottom of the lid and the top of the bottom half of the box. With the banding it looks funny to my eye. The solid mahogany banding is an 1/8" thick so it will be roughly a 1/4" thick there.

solution

Mahogany veneer. It is as thin as a piece of paper and two together are barely a frog hair thick. I get to have the plywood edges covered and not distract my eye from the banding.

Lowes road trip

Got what I need to make the tables for Amanda. The 2x2 piece of plywood is rated for tile. The silicone is to attach the tiles to the plywood substrate. The box has the 1" square tiles - the ones Amanda picked out and 5 bags I bought. I still have to get the paint and some 'L' shaped moldings. But I am going to try and make the 'L' molding myself. I don't remember seeing 1/2" 'L' molding at Lowes or Home Depot.

I am going to make a second table to give to Amanda. The 2nd table will have 4 different colored tiles whereas Amanda's tiles are all the same. I could even start on making the tables next week.

pics wouldn't rotate

These are two of the ones I bought. The black ones I'm not thrilled with - they looked better on the ETSY site than they do in person.

it worked

I had to tape the veneer to keep it from moving but it sliced through it like a hot knife through butter. 

switching the banding

Sometimes you get lucky. Both of these are the same width and thickness. I like the one I'm holding more than the single one at the top. I have just enough to band both the top and bottom. So I'll have to be on top of my game because I don't have any oops to give.

keepers (?)

I don't want to hinge this box but instead I'm going with a lift off lid. I resawed some mahogany to make the keepers. Doing that gave me enough stock to get the required 4 pieces.

hmmm.....

It is better but not perfect. All of the resawn pieces are tapered. It isn't as bad as I was getting and I don't know exactly why it happens. I have minimized the amount of the taper by pushing the bottom of the stock up against the bandsaw fence as tightly as I can while pushing it through the blade. That helps a ton but I still get a wee bit of to deal with.

+/- a half of frog hair

First I planed the taper away checking for flat by eyeballing it. I then flattened the largest piece and flattened and checked all the others against it. I checked for flatness between them with my fingertips. I didn't go anal on it but I got good, consistent results. More than adequate for keepers.

should be ready for tuesday

Got the first coat on the front side of both. One more coat on sunday and monday and both of these will be done. Then I can go nutso on painting the Stanley poster frames.

accidental woodworker

 With spring here now for a week, I am going to plane up the cherry tomorrow or sunday. Today the mercury got pushed up to 64F (18C) and the overnight temps are now are on above freezing (0C). I'm at a standstill with the maple ladder - waiting on screws and what finish to apply? I have to make a run to Lowes to get some clear silicone adhesive and I will check on non slip stair strips. 

As for the finish I might go with satin oil poly because I don't think shellac will hold up nor offer much protection. Getting poly will involve another run to Koszela's lumberyard. I have grown rather fond of General Finish products. I would rather buy in person than order it online.

behaved themselves

No major stupid wood tricks overnight. The left one has a crook in it on the far end but I can get what I need from the opposite end. The wonky part will be waste.

no burr anymore

I could not find my accu-burr gadget. I searched the shop for over an hour without finding it. I didn't even come across any crumbs pointing me in any direction it might have been. Checked all the spots I think I would have put it but nada. Got frustrated with myself that I couldn't remember where I had )_@*%$&^*@%_*@_)%() put the @#)%U)WT%)_QWU)^T)QPEWT thing. Took a time out and went topside and had some coffee.

found it

I was grasping at straws when I looked in this box for it. The box was behind the shop computer - out of sight and out of mind. I put this box on the table with all the toys I have in miniature dressers and boxes. Hopefully I won't go through this the next time I need the accu-burr.

upcoming

I am going to try and apply banding to the box I am making. The plan is to band the bottom edge of the box for sure. Thinking of doing the top edge too but that depends - I'll have to eyeball it to see if I would like that look. I think it would also behoove me to practice on some scrap before I commit to doing the box.

almost

I used the thinner of the two walnut boards for the bottom. I planed a rabbet along the outside edge and fitted it. The first check revealed I was too long on the length and then too wide on the width. Corrected for both of them on a shooting board. When I could close up the box tightly on the miters with hand pressure I was done.

planing a bevel

I have 3 fielding planes, one was way too big for this small panel. The other two were also too big. I thought that the Philly plane one would have worked but it didn't. I planed the bevel with the #4 and the LN low angle block plane.

not yet

Fitting the bottom to seat fully in the grooves of the box. I had to do a few dance steps planing and checking but eventually I got it done.

fitting the top

This portable vise worked a treat doing both the top and bottom. I got the top fully seated on this end but it wasn't fully in on the opposite end. 

success

The box miters fully closed up with hand pressure - all the toes and heels were gap free. This walnut board came from a woman's make up dresser that I took apart and made new drawers for it. It is good enough for this box.

sectors

Two of these I made and the far left one I will eventually make into a small sector. The 2nd one from right is toast. It is OTL and that is being kind. It isn't even remotely accurate. I couldn't find any documentation on how to make a sector and of the 5 I made (only two survive) all but one were failures. The far right one I made with Brendon Gaffney at Lost Art Press a couple of years ago.

hit or miss

This sector gives me fits because I can't seem to get repeatable results with it. Some of the lines are accurate while others are slightly off. I want a sector that is reliable each and every time I use it.

Lee Valley straight edge

When I was doing plane rehabs I used this check the flatness of the plane soles. I could have used my combo square to get a good enough check but I thought I would have other uses for it. I was wrong - this is the first time I looked at this in about 5 years?

jumped into the deep end

Bought a sector from Red Reproductions made by Acer-Ferrous tool works. Made from 1/4" aluminum with a brass hinge. I got it mostly for the lines scale and for the leg splay and angle function. I have making a chair on the bucket list and being able to set and check this should prove to be handy. Buying this emptied the wood buying savings.

no inside edge lines

There are several short You Tube vids on the Red Rose site that explains how to use this sector for each of the functions engraved on it. I had to watch the line function You Tube again because I forgot how to do it. It is going to take some time and practice to get proficient with it.

glued and cooking

I used the piggly wiggly glue because it dries clear. I had a hard time getting this glue to flow - soaking it in boiling water (nuked in the microwave) softened it but it wouldn't soften and flow. I nuked it for 20 secs in the microwave and that made a mess. There were 4 pin holes in the bottle that I didn't know about. Made a mess in the microwave and on the bottle too.

Other than the hiccup warming it up, I didn't have any problems spreading the glue on the miters. It didn't set up before I got the clamps on. I had plenty of time to position and move things before I tightened the band clamps. I'll let this cook until tomorrow.

what finish?

I filled that the gaps I have in the X brace with veneer and I'm calling that done. First choice for the finish is something clear like poly. I am also entertaining painting some of it. Not the entirety but maybe just the legs and applying a clear finish on the rest. I got lots of time to make the command decisions about it.

accidental woodworker