Starting projects of an absolute beginner
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25 June 2017 at 9:30 am #313230
@kamikazekrieger:
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Outdoor stuff you really wanna go the extra mile and use the proper wood in my opinion, in Europe thats either Larch or Robinia/Locust/False Acacia which ever name you prefer. The latter being pretty much the most durable wood we have here however its not easy to work with and bloody hard, which is why id highly recommend you go with Larch.
…Ah, too late. I already got spruce yesterday. :/
If this chair turns out nice, my friend probably wants a second one, to hang out with somebody. I could make the second one with larch then.
I am not yet sure, if my friend wants the chair painted with solid paint or keep the wooden look of it. I guess it depends on how it looks in the end.
So the next two weeks it is probably going to be stock preparation and doing all the curvy and round stuff.
Due to the size of the chair, I am going to prepare everything here and the actually chair build up will take place at his place. The finished chair would be way too big for me to move it in my small car.
@cobhhive
The chair looks really nice and comfortable. Well done! I like the “rustic” look of the wood. I just hope that mine will turn out halfway decent too.
I got thicker material, the original plans use 3/4″ ~2cm thick wood, I went with slightly more than an inch/ 27mm.About used pallet/ reclaimed wood with unknown chemical treatment, I guess it comes down to the purpose of the project. I would not mind such wood for a tool box/ chest or other projects for the balcony or garden.
Today, the “First Box”-Project came to an end.
I used shellac and wax on it, following Paul’s guidance in this this video:
Finishing with Shellac | Paul SellersAnd this is how it turned out:
I’ve put some of the original wood below it, so you can see, how the color changed. I used “lemon” shellac, so I got a warmer more yellowy tint.
I kept the flaws and little gapsI also made a small design change. The small holding piece for the axis of the gauge is on the other side, so I can store it away with a locked setting. The dovetail template fits nicely in the gap.
Since I don’t have a nice polishing brush yet, I used cosmetic pads for polishing. It took a “whooping” three pads for the whole box.
I have to admit that I really like the feel of the smooth surface with shellac and wax. This is a finish, that I will propably use more often.25 June 2017 at 5:00 pm #313235Here comes the next project:
Norm Abram’s Adirondack Chair
The original plans and cutting list can be found here:
http://www.popularwoodworking.com/wp-content/uploads/August_05_Norms_Adirondack.pdfThey were released in Popular Woodworking, issue August 2005.
Since I cannot (yet) work with imperial dimensions, I transfered everything into the metric system.
* Adirondack chair – cutting list metric: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwAX6pt9HnElQjBaeTNIMUlLT3M/view?usp=sharing
* Adirondack chair – rough cutting list for each board: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwAX6pt9HnElZWktN0tpcHlLUWM/view?usp=sharing
Boy, this forum is buggy as hell when it comes to using the link-tags ….
If you want to use the lists, check everything again. I did my best to get everything right though.
During this project, there will be some edge planing and more importantly lots of curves and waves. Due to the limitations of my “workbench” I came up with an idea, how to fix the pieces to the bench, so I can work on them safely.
Here are two pictures of the general setup. I might cut out a corner of the front and the back of the top beam, so the two clamps that fix the beam to the bench will not protude over the the top of the beam.
With this setup, I should be able to clamp an adjustable planing stop to the beam and secure the board with two clamps.
25 June 2017 at 7:08 pm #313238🙂
I got the idea when I wanted to take a nap. Halfway asleep, I thought about a moxon vise and how to work around it. I actually had to get up and see if this would work.
Not having a proper vise of any kind is challenging, but since you need quite a few clamps in the “shop”, you can work around that. Is is a poor mans solution. The beam is a leftover from the bench, the rest is scrapwood.
Allthough having a vise would obviously be more practical.1 July 2017 at 6:11 pm #313392I’ve done some “easy” stock preparation with the seating slats. I take my time and use it for planing practice.
I really have some problems with planing the edges to a 90° angle. Somehow I seem to prefer the edge closer to me, allthough I seem to get a full shaving. I am trying to compensate and fine tune the edge with a block plane, which is easier to manipulate.
Well, I am just at the beginning of my “apprenticeship”, so I will have lots to learn and practice.
With the bad weather, it is not that much fun on the balcony though, I hope it is getting better tomorrow.I am also in the middle of drawing the templates for all the pieces with a free CAD-program. I actually wanted to include them here, once I am finished.
There is one problem though, which they did not get by using a band saw. It is the bevel of the upper and lower rear crosspieces. The devil is one little detail and difference to using Hand tools. They just tell us to set the table of the band saw to a certain angle. If you are sawing those pieces, the lower part of the boards just follow the upper template correctly.
If you do those curves and bevels by hand, you kind off need templates for the upper and the lower side of that board. The small sketches in the original plans/ PDF-file are only for the upper side of those boards.The templates of the lower side for these boards depend on the thickness of the used material.
All the beveled edges in these templates shift byy = x * tan(α)
in radial direction perpendicular to the curves.
For the upper crosspiece with a bevel of 30° and a thickness of 27mm that results to 15,6mm, which is actually quite a lot. Even with the suggested thickness of 3/4″ that would be 11mm ~ 7/16″.
So, it does not make sense to release a generic and complete set of templates, if everyone uses a different material.
The former “easy” setup of the chair just became a little bit more tricky.
1 July 2017 at 10:13 pm #313395Pepperpot,
Each time you edit your post it appears as a new post and doesn’t replace the previous one.
You should delete the old for each edit, otherwise there appears multiple almost identical posts.
I don’t know why the forum software doesn’t replace the previous one automatically, but it doesn’t.
Thanks,
CraigPepper Pot,
Well you’re now up to 5 pages with quite a following and still not deleting your edits.
You may wish to considering having your own web blog page such as Greg Merritt did.
Best,
CraigActually, I was desperatly looking for that delete button, similar to the “edit” or “quote” button in this thread, to please you and all the others. Sadly, there isn’t one an I was quite frankly a bit confused what you might have meant.
As there are some issues with this forum, like the missing attachment function a few days ago, I thought that this button might have vanished as well.It might have been a good idea to mention, that I should delete the edit in the “Activity log” on the dashboard, a whole different page than this one. If I had known about this, I, of course, would have done it, just to please you. I am relativly new to this forum and you seem to be a bit of a pro, so a little hint or pointer would have been nice.
😉Who is this Greg Merritt? I am trying to find a blog, could you give me a link? Maybe it is an interesting read.
PS: The quote function does not work properly either.
- This reply was modified 6 years, 9 months ago by Pepper Pot.
- This reply was modified 6 years, 9 months ago by Pepper Pot.
- This reply was modified 6 years, 9 months ago by Pepper Pot.
- This reply was modified 6 years, 9 months ago by Pepper Pot.
I suspect that you’re making life a little hard for yourself by using those machine-based plans.
For the lower cross-piece, it’s easier to cut a notch into your stretchers to tilt the cross-piece (rather than laying it flat on the stretcher).
For the upper piece, it’s easier to add a vertical rear leg, with the top edge angled and the top cross-piece screwed to that. Then you fix the arms to the rear leg, rather than just the top cross-piece – which makes the chair much stronger too (people tend to pick up the chair by the arms, so you want them to be really solid).
Those would be minor changes to your plans, but would make your life much easier IMHO!
I could try to post a photo if this is hard to follow (but I’m not a regular poster…)
Hello again Pepperpot.
When I did my bevels I just cut the pieces square and then beveled them with the spokeshave by eye. It’s much more fun than doing it the “easy” way and you’ll be learning to “feel”. Also if you think about it, because of the splay in the seat back the bevel is slightly different in the middle than in the sides of the curve.
And I think the chair is plenty strong enough without the vertical supports mentioned. The angle of the seat back “triangulates” it once everything is screwed together.
I hope you’re enjoying it. D.@pepperpot There’s a young man trying to start in woodworking that posted the thread, “Necessary tools to do quality work.” See https://woodworkingmasterclasses.com/discussions/topic/necessary-tools-to-do-quality-work/#post-313419
He says he’s going to get a workmate. Could you tell us how well your improvised bench worked and give him some guidance based on what you did? Maybe some extra photos? Did it move around on you? Is it attached to a wall? Was it expensive?
Maybe just start a new thread about the improvised bench and let him know to read it? It might help him a lot.
9 July 2017 at 6:22 pm #313618Lots to do in the office, so I could not do a lot during the week, but today the gloves came off and I got busy.
All the seating and back slats are done, cut to size, curves done and sanded.
Somehow this might truely become a chair 🙂
I admit, that at one point, I just thought that this project might be too big for me yet, but piece by piece it will come together.I am learning a lot along the way, like planing end grain without a shooting board and getting some practice with the spoke shave, which I really learned to love. All of this takes quite a bit of time though.
I discovered, that it is more efficient, to clamp similar pieces together and work on them together.
Thanks for the advice of adapting the layout, but I am kinda stubborn now. I take this chair as a challenge and a learning project, so I’ll have to figure out how to make it work.
Oh, by the way, I talked to my friend and he rather wants a finish with the wood showing instead of an opaque paint.
13 July 2017 at 9:03 pm #313706My “workshop” is closed for now, until I can figure out a way how to keep my cats inside of the appartment while I am outside on the balcony. I can’t lock the door from outside.
My landlord forced me with threats of taking legal actions to take down the safety net, that protects my cats from accidently falling down.
My lawyer said that it is the landlords right to do so, so I cannot work on the balcony for now, since I cannot see, what the cats might be doing behind my back.
🙁 -
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