Around the house
Welcome! / Forums / General Woodworking Discussions / Projects / Around the house
- This topic has 10 replies, 4 voices, and was last updated 11 years ago by Ed.
-
AuthorPosts
-
The plan had been to work through Paul’s Working Wood book and video, but that was interrupted by needing to get our house in Chicago ready to sell including three months of house painting. (Anyone want a house?) The work has required a few woodworking projects, most minor, so I thought I’d post some notes to share in case they interest anyone. More to follow once some photos are off the camera.
Here’s the first task: A chair rail and corner trim. The chair rail is a piece of oak casing into which a rabbet was cut to accommodate the corner trim. The top of the corner molding and the end of the casing were rounded over with a hand plane. You can see the casing was cupped so the round over was not even. I was going to correct this with a file but decided I liked it. It reminds me of a Japanese roof. The casing hides the nail holding the corner molding. Since the nails for the casing could not be hidden, I spaced them carefully and did not try to hide them with putty.
Attachments:
You must be logged in to view attached files.The next project was making a cornice from crown molding for a pantry I built a few years ago. Here are before/after pictures without and with the cornice. The pantry was made from birch ply for the carcase and birch ply for the shelves nosed with solid cherry. The face frame is also cherry. Nothing fancy- “glue and screw” joinery (pocket screws).
Attachments:
You must be logged in to view attached files.Here is a simple miter box I made for cutting the crown with a tenon saw. One unexpected lesson was that the miter box must be able to cut all the various combinations of the angle because sometimes your cut is on the left, sometimes on the right, etc. The box holds the crown at the correct spring angle (since the crown has flats on it, it just sits in the box). I wish my tenon saw had a deeper plate. That caused some trouble. After cutting, I tuned things with a handplane with the crown in a vice. The final job isn’t as tight as I’d like, so more practice is needed. I also tried to scribe the left side of the cornice to the door trim. It’s better than nothing but not as tight as I’d hoped. With the spring angle involved, it is a bit confusing figuring out what is going where. You get extra points if you figure out why the short side of the miter box has a slot in it.
Attachments:
You must be logged in to view attached files.Okay, here’s the last one for awhile until I get more time and this one isn’t complete. I made a cabinet for the bathroom when I made the pantry, but never made doors. This is running before walking, but I need the doors now, so I’ll make my best guess via things in the various videos and other sources. I drew a plan and made a cut list, cut the materials, and then got some scrap to make a single mortise and tenoned corner with groove to receive a panel. Here’s the result. It wouldn’t be bad if it weren’t for the detail of cutting one groove on the wrong side. This happened because I got confused between which was my reference side/edge and which were my face side/edge. Another issue that came up was whether to groove first then cut cheeks or cut cheeks then groove. I cut the tenon cheeks first then plowed the groove.
The shavings photo is just for fun. Those are cherry end grain shavings from the shooting board. Shavings rather than dust- Paul’s sharpening method works. I need more practice but if it can do that with what little experience I have freehand, it can only get better and better.
Attachments:
You must be logged in to view attached files.2 April 2013 at 3:27 am #10383Nice work Ed; and clear explanations. I keep getting projects that get in the way of my “lessons” as well. It’s been two days with no guesses, so what’s with the slot on the short side of the miter?….I can’t stand the suspense and not experienced enough to make one!
Steve & John- Thanks for the encouraging words. The slot in the miter box is real simple to understand: I messed up. The bevels on the miter box were cut by hand and trimmed with a plane. Somewhere along the way, I goofed and had two acceptable bevels on the short side, but the side was too short. So, the slot is equal to one saw kerf plus whatever my mess up was. I then lined up the two halves and used 4 screws instead of two, then moved on.
Thanks, Juryaan.
Here’s the next around the house project while I’m getting the place ready to sell (and not working through the course. Sigh. This hamper had a broken lid. The woven section was made by the manufacture with thin wooden staves that collapsed. I glued up a panel from pine, cut a rabbet around the perimeter, rounded over the edges, and then finished it. Some effort went into lining up the grain in a pleasing way. It is somewhat like making a lid. The endgrain rabbets were cut with saw and chisel, starting like a housing joint but then just sawing down, popping out the waste with a chisel, and leveling with a router plane. The rabbet along the edge was cut with a plow plane.
In the end, this project was disappointing because the finish spoiled the work. Several issues arose. I wanted to stain it a dark color to contrast with the rest but the wood became too blotchy on a test piece. I tried cutting some shellac and using that first to control the blotching, but it did not help enough. I also tried amber shellac, but it was too yellow and clashed with the nutty color of the hamper. In the end, I used clear, but it came out terribly (not visible in the photo) with heavy brush marks and imperfections. The problem is probably some mixture of using the canned shellac which is probably too thick, the wrong brush, and working in an environment that is too dusty.
On the skill side, I need to improve my skills getting a camber on the plane blade and improve scraper sharpening skills.
Attachments:
You must be logged in to view attached files.Another project cooking is the repair of a balustrade. This is zero woodworking for me except for some finishing work and learning where some local resources are. A balustrade at the top of our stairs has loose spindles. Since this might be a safety issue, I wanted to have an experienced finish carpenter evaluate things and do the work, but I’m getting the replacement balusters. A local mill turned copies of the balusters in red oak. The photo shows their work plus what they look like after I put on some stain (first coat of three). I’ll post a picture of the balustrade later. Not really woodworking except for some practice finishing (perhaps my weakest skill).
Attachments:
You must be logged in to view attached files. -
AuthorPosts
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.