Woodworking Blogs at LumberJocks.com

From log to box in less than a month #8: A final note...

sras — Sun, 19 May 2013 04:54:06 GMT

The auction was tonight.

We all had a great time. The box was part of the live auction – near the end of the evening. After some spirited bidding, the box raised $275 for the youth.

Here is a link to the project posting.

Thanks to all who followed along!

Dungeon to Lair: That's the plan at least... #27: A JL7 Inspired Project!!!

DIYaholic — Sun, 19 May 2013 02:20:19 GMT

One of my LJ buds, Jeff (JL7), recently sent my friend “The Chef” a cutting board for testing and performance review. The board is to be put through it’s paces and evaluated. I have to say that the board is a beauty and inspires me to someday obtain the skills to build a few boards of similar quality. That or the abilty to pass off store bought boards as my own creation!!!

Jeff has a great shop and skills to match, but he may have an over inflated ego. Feeding his narcissistic personality seems to be a constant pastime of his, to which he has even designed a JL7 logo and bid’ness cards.

He does fantastic work (just don’t tell him I said that), so it is fitting that he is proud of his “Crafted in The USA” cutting boards.

Jeff sent the board, packaged extremely well. It was protected by “dunnage” consisting of maple & perforated hardboard. I was told to find a fitting project for the “dunnage”. If only I had a wood stove or fire pit!!!

Now than, my shop, skill set & ego are no match to that of the great JL7. However, I will task both my shop & skills to rise to the dunnage challenge!!! I want to thank Jeff for the motivation, inspiration and “dunnage”!!! I designed & built a storage solution for my most prized clamps. I just hope you (JL7) find this project (& me) “worthy”....

My JL7 Inspired Shop Project:

Jeff,
All in good fun. You truely are an inspiration for my wood working & so much more!!! ;^)

Easy to build bench top router table.

The Head Charles — Sun, 19 May 2013 01:12:15 GMT

This is a very simple to build router table made from half a sheet of 3/4” plywood and a 1/4 sheet of 1/2” plywood.

The Basement #34: Another Drum Sander Upgrade...

JL7 — Sun, 19 May 2013 00:51:35 GMT

Hey folks….another upgrade for the old Performax ST (22×44) drum sander. This is the original drum sander that Performax made and it bolts onto a RAS.

You can see previous mods here:

http://lumberjocks.com/JL7/blog/19321

http://lumberjocks.com/JL7/blog/19348

http://lumberjocks.com/JL7/blog/21269

The sander has always worked great for me, until the other day when I tried to sand a 21×36 solid Maple desk top. I don’t usually use the full width of the sander. The problem was the cheesy plastic paper holding things just didn’t keep there grip and the paper would overlap and burn...

(That’s the photo after I drilled out the rivets holding them in….)

I called SuperMax, which is the original company that built the early Performax stuff, before Jet bought them…...and they are still in the Twin Cities, so close to home…...

The young lady was so pleasant, I called right after she shut her computer down for the day, but she processed the order anyways, from memory…...works for me.

The parts showed up today in the mail. Only gripes…..no instructions….and no counter weights….I wouldn’t have even considered the counter weights until I Google’d the directions, which I found in an obscure re-scanned document not on the SuperMax site. Thankfully, it described the correct weight for the counterbalances…...

Here are the new grips:

The outbound:

The inbound…..this one uses some heavy spring pressure to keep the paper tight and is easy to load:

I didn’t take photos, but without the counterweights, the drum was a disaster…..vibrating all over the place…...Panic ensued….

Luckily, a few day ago I bought a HF scale for weighing out finishes….....$16 with coupon. Good call, because I could weigh out enough washers to balance each end of the drum…...used super glue and hot glue to attach. Runs nice and smooth now.

Oh yea…...

Got a perfectly smooth solid Maple top (from old gym floor) on the sander….no burn:

Deluxe Basement #2: Stairway to Hell

Sodabowski — Sun, 19 May 2013 00:30:58 GMT

Once we had a decent working opening to the basement, I made my fourth and last iteration of the plan for the staircase with the actual opening dimensions. This is where the parents saw it starting to pay-off: we bought for 250€ worth of nice heart pine boards (five 2m40 by 60 cm) to build the whole thing, and I got the sister involved in helping me out to cut the lumber into the needed parts.

crazy sist kept seeing funny critters in the boards’ patterns ;) we aren’t a family of artists for nothing!

I made the stairs in blocks of two, using the grain direction to add extreme strength where I needed it to be and keep the vertical walls/supports to a useful minimum. The steps are 20 cm deep each, and once the dados and endgrain supporting portions are taken out we remain with ~35 cm wide cabinets for the shelves, which has proved to be perfect. I used glue, screws and dowels to secure each pair of steps to the connecting things which name I don’t know in EN (“contre-marche” en français, baby)

You can see that all the horizontal rails are supported on the endgrain of the vertical separators. Those are heavily screwed in place and don’t move at all.

This last picture shows the last two steps, which form a 90 degree angle to the right while keeping a 60 cm wide step size. This block will also be used to hold the ventilation system and the control computer (I’ll use one of our old laptops with a USB sensors and control board). The staircase is installed in the left side of the basement, and the right side wall is fitted with wooden shelves with plywood backing boards, and to prevent moisture from developping I installed computer fans between the wall and the backs to move the air, and it works great.

Here you can see all the finished parts ready to be installed in their home. I’ll take pictures of the finished basement this summer when going back there.

TBC!

Building a Murphy Bed

WoodJediNTraining — Sun, 19 May 2013 00:27:12 GMT

This week’s Project is a horizontal Murphy Bed. The bed I built is a twin size bed using the Create-A-Bed Hardware kit from Rockler Woodworking and Supply. The finished look of the bed can be trimmed and finished to match your homes decor, really the limit on the final look is only limited by your imagination. These videos just tell you about the use of the hardware kit and the general construction of the project. I hope you enjoy it.

Deluxe Basement #1: Symphony Of Destruction (ie making a decent opening for the stairs and coating the walls)

Sodabowski — Sun, 19 May 2013 00:14:10 GMT

So after four iterations of the plan and much useless discussion with the parents about how better it would be to spend less money and have a better and more functional staircase that what’s on the market, I finally pushed hard enough to have them listen to their son and make the jump.

First order of business: enlarge the basement opening, too small for anything else than a ladder, there’s just no way that I let mom go up and down a ladder carrying anything. It took us three full days to get to the point were we had a full opening, first day I drilled through the concrete to prepare for the heavy destruction (I considered using explosives at one point – no kidding, this thing is really rock-solid) and then it was a matter of using the big boys toy and destroy it all. The holes I had made on the first day really helped keep things under control and we managed to get the armed concrete to break exactly as we wanted it to.

You can definitely tell we had a blast here… well, not quite, but at last we got the job done. By the way, how do you get a 20+ kilogram (~40 pounds) electric hammer in there and use it against an horizontal concrete slab without too much effort? by hanging it to the upper stairs of course (with the strong nylon flat rope I use to pull out stumps with mom’s ride :D). We had no effort to do to keep it where it should be and completed the actual dismantling in around an hour.

Secondly, we made a nice mold to tidy up the opening (which will be encased with wood eventually).
This is where you can definitely say: there is no such thing as scrap wood. I used polystyrene blocks to fill the gaps and wood spacers to keep the mould from touching the sides and preventing us from putting the cement where we needed it.

Gotta love daddy’s looks in his heavy duty outfit ;)

Next we coated the walls with a stone-colored, erm, construction stuff which name I don’t know in english (“enduit” in Froggish). I had dad buy a real compressor and projecting device for that – and later told him about the pneumatic nailers and the possibility to hack it into an air pump to build a vacuum press, which idea really got him excited. I made the most out of my free Facom baseball cap and managed to get very little sand in my huge metalhead hair ;) These compressed air projecting devices can really make a mess in no time. I couldn’t get decent pictures of that part of the process but imagine a nice warm yellowish stone colored wall in a basement and you get the idea of what we ended up with.

I’ll split this post here and continue with the staircase construction in part two.

Building a better woodshop #3: MagLight ;)

Sodabowski — Sat, 18 May 2013 23:35:36 GMT

Quick post on improving the short-range working conditions in the shop: overhead fluo lights are okay but I’m getting old and need a boost when working close-in with the bandsaw or the drillpress. A smack in the forehead lead to this: I snatched one of my old spot lamps, got one of the computer drive magnets kept aside in a box, three screws, a chunka plywood, and a few minutes later I exclaimed: LET THERE BE LIGHT \m/

I like it so much that after a while I thought: F*k it, I’m gonna hack my bandsaw and DP and install fixed flexible light fittings on each one. And they happen to stock them where I work. Greatness in the workshop sometimes lies in small details. Hope it can inspire others ;)

The Learning Curve #2: Measure? Who Needs to Measure??

GlennInTx — Sat, 18 May 2013 23:10:34 GMT

As I updated my latest…well, first project – I realized how important measuring is. When I originally made the rolling worktable I did a lot of “eye-balling” and although it looks nice and functions well – if I had worked a little slower and measured a bit more accurately – it would have been easier to do the modifications I’ve just completed.

I’m retraining my brain to do that thing called math (who would have thought adding fractions on the fly was so difficult – LOL). Anyway, I did take a bit more time and thankfully had only minor mishaps during my worktable overhaul.

My Toys #7: S. Biggin & Sons Backsaw

GMatheson — Sat, 18 May 2013 22:57:38 GMT

Here is another 14” backsaw the wife brought home from auction. It’s an S. Biggin & Sons saw from between 1852-1856 (according to the interweb)

Before

After

I used that concoction to clean the wood posted a while ago somewhere on the site

1 part oil
1 part Murphy’s oil soap
2 parts wax

It did a great job cleaning the handle except on the front where it looks like the saw got too close to the fire at one point. I thought about sanding it away but decided to keep the history.

Here is a pic of my last two saw restos

I scored at H. Gerstner and Sons Annual warehouse sale #1: Bought a Gerstner Pro Series 3 pc series set of chests

Toolz — Sat, 18 May 2013 20:33:21 GMT

I almost missed the annual warehouse sale that includes factory seconds and scratch and dent items but I saw the ad in yesterday’s Dayton Daily News. Went to just “look and admire” but ended up scoring a slightly scratched Pro Series 2 3 pc system in Golden Oak. http://gerstnerusa.com/opencart/index.php?route=product/product&path=72&product_id=194 for a ridiculously low price. There is one tiny chipped piece missing from the lower back of the base unit, it is dusty and has a few light scratches . A couple of drawers are sticky but a little wax will fix that. I will post pics once I have it cleaned up. Total outlay for this 3 pc unit, an apron, 12” machinist’s rule , a mini driver and a Gerstner Care Kit and sales tax: $501.83 and free delivery this Thursday or Friday. I’m so “Stoked” ;-) This will find a great home in my shop for all my carving and measuring tools.

Chevy in Plywood

apprentice — Sat, 18 May 2013 18:57:35 GMT

After a play in 3D CAD here is my prototype Chevy in the making.

She consists of a single sheet of grade C birch plywood 18.00mm for the main body, trans arms and internal levers, seat etc, and there is still a couple of square feet left over after all the parts were cut out.

So far the cost of materials comes to just under a hundred pounds for 99% of the materials, the plywood was £40.00 inclusive of tax. All the main sections were cut out acurately for me at the supplier at no extra cost.

I’m making the head unit similar to the traditional but slightly different, so it can be made without complicated joints for those like me without any planer/thicknesser or saw bench. I’m using a router and a bandsaw for the majority of the work, and I have opted for hand cut dovetails for the construction.

Picture above shows the one piece plywood body with the two halves split to show the internals.

The internals consist of two nylon pulleys an bicycle chain and an upholstery spring and three sections of 25.00mm aluminium tube which passes through the body and secured by a pair of R clips on each shaft for easy removal. I turned the pulleys by hand on the wood lathe to take the chain.

The chain travels from the middle of the vice/jaw, around the pulleys to the multi layer foot pedal and arm on the bottom.

Showing the spring sat in its groove to prevent it from wandering during operation.

The vice/jaw opens opposite to traditional Chevy’s, which opens when you depress the pedals with your heels, the vice holds the work nice and firm once you stop cutting, you can let go when you stop cutting.

The main transarm is fitted and passes right through the main body and its secured by a wooden cam to quickly lock up the arm itself, next post will show the arms made from plywood and dovetailed together.

More soon.

As The Shop Turns #3: I'm actually making a bit of progress.

Natalie — Sat, 18 May 2013 17:19:31 GMT

I have all the parts cut for 10 of these, each a different size in order to fit between the brackets that are holding up my wood storage shelves. I had some cherry plywood pieces that were the right size for cutting the sliding doors out of, and I used some Lacewood scraps I had to cover the plywood edge.

I used 1/2 inch plywood because I didn’t want to have to deal with the weight of 3/4 inch and I thought I could get away with it. I still don’t regret that but didn’t get away with it as well as I thought. It turns out that 4 gallons of paint need a stiffer board to hold them up, so even though I used a french cleat the length of the cabinet, I also had to anchor it to the shelf board above it, and use a shelf bracket (not shown) underneath it in the middle in order to keep the bottom from sagging.

The thing I don’t like about the french cleat is that I ended up with a small amount of dead space above the cabinet in order to get it in there above the cleat and drop it down onto the cleat. I’m not really sure how much strength the french cleat is adding, but I am thinking about changing the mounting by just screwing a piece to the wall and then to the cabinet without the cleat. Anyone have an opinion on how this will change the stability of the mounting?

Natalie

Grizzly Tent Sale

Vance100 — Sat, 18 May 2013 17:16:56 GMT

Went to the Grizzly Tent sale in Muncy, Pa this morning and scored a Shop Fox expandable roller stand. It was $100 off. The one leg was dented slightly and the bolt wouldn’t fit through the hole. I had to drill out the hole a little and find a new bolt.

I also got a Footprint dovetail saw new for $25 due to a pricing error.

Things that slow me down. #6: Not the update I was wanting to post.

Natalie — Sat, 18 May 2013 17:11:36 GMT

I’ve been waiting to send an update, because I just wanted to report good news, but I guess I just can’t rush this process. Truth is, I’m not I’m not exactly much farther along than I was and that troublesome issue is not resolved. I keep getting infections that make me sick and weak. It has to do with an area under my skin that doesn’t want to heal because of tissue damaged by radiation.

I’m sure you really don’t want to hear the details, but the Dr is talking about a potential reconstruction method that would facilitate the healing of the tissue. It is an 8-hour surgery with a 6 day hospital stay. Needless, to say, I am not thrilled about that! I am going to put it off as long as I safely can, but it could be within a month. I am sending up last-ditch prayers to get the easy way out, so please join me in that if you are so inclined. At this point, I don’t even care about reconstruction. If this would heal, I would never want to upset that apple cart again! But the reconstruction process may be the only way to get this resolved.

The good news is that about a month ago the dr finally said that activity restrictions weren’t helping, so I have been doing a few things in the shop. I have been working on cabinets that will go just below my wood storage shelves. I put one together and mounted it with a french cleat. I doing fine until I was mounting it, and that was a bit difficult for my arms and chest muscles. So, I’ll probably put them together but stack them up until I can get my hubby to help.

I thought I would spend some of this time posting my past projects on the LJ site, but I just haven’t had the heart, and am trying to stay focused on my income earning business. Once I’m done writing chart notes and dealing with insurance companies and billing software, I usually want to get away from my computer. However, I thought I would post a shot or two of the cabinets I am making for my shop. I posted it in my other blog about my shop progress.

Thanks to all of you have taking the time to wish me well. I’ll be done with this eventually and be able to close down this thread.

Natalie

Just for the heck of it, a couple pics of what keeps me happy: This is “Bampa” with Torsten and the R/C helicopter. Rowan is practicing his pitching. We had some great sunny warm days in April and May.

Vintage Tool Rehab Projects #20: Restoring a 19th-Century Disston Backsaw

Brad — Sat, 18 May 2013 13:57:53 GMT

The Craig’s List ad said there were some old woodworking tools. That’s it. No pictures, no heart-throbbing prose. Still, the garage sale was in an older neighborhood. And close by in case it was a bust. So I fired up my Chili-Red Mini and motored on over.

Five minutes and $5.00 later I walked to my car clutching a Disston 16” backsaw, some brass screws and brass l-reinforcing thingies. The saw cost me 300 pennies. A bit of sleuthing on the Disstonian Institutes Website revealed that the saw was born between 1878-1888 per its medallion.

Here’s the prize of my quest:

As grungy as it looked, I was very happy overall. The top horn was split off but I figured I could find some apple wood to mend it.

A Horny Situation
In the interests of expanding my rehab skills, I decided to fix the horn. And to ensure an aesthetically-pleasing repair, I sought out two vintage handles. But that didn’t work out too well. The aged applewood didn’t pair well with either of the two donor handles. So I set them aside to wait for another handle repair. The horn would stay as it was.

The Rehab
I gave the sawplate the usual rehab as I’ve detailed here and here.

Handle
After experiencing a “glassy” look from the use of polyurethane finishes I decided to go with BLO followed by wax. That’s it.

I like the natural feel of the wood in my hand. BLO + plus was works pretty well.

Sharpening
The original tooth line suffered from calves and cows so I had some evening out to do. I also tried adding some slope to my sharpening for the first time.

Here’s the finished rehab.

The Testing
This baby has some pleasing heft to it. I also like the longer, 16” length versus my 12” Disston backsaw. I find it easier to keep it true through the cut. And the longer length allows for a longer stroke through the work piece.

And here’s a look at the cut finish.

So all it took to add a nice user to my saw next was a five-minute drive, three dollars and two fun-filled rehab hours.

Not bad for a 125-year old saw. I wonder if 125 years from now (c 2138) some woodworker will get as much pleasure from finding this treasure as I did. I can see her driving up to the garage sale in her fusion-powered Mini Cooper (some things never go out of style.) “I found it among some other tools on a table,” she’ll say to her husband. “And I only had to hand over three $1,000 bills!” Her ever-supportive husband is sure to reply, “What a steal sweetie!”

###

Biscuits by Home Depot, they worked for me.

Oldtool — Sat, 18 May 2013 13:57:33 GMT

I’m in the middle of an oak trestle table build for my son & DIL, and currently just finished gluing up the top. The top is made from three 17” wide boards, purchased at a local saw mill, and the owner was gracious enough to provide S2S for me on this purchase, as I mentioned to him that my planer is limited to 13”.

Even though the top boards are surfaced to 3/4”, I know I’ll need to plane & scrape after glue up to remove all machining marks, so I want to get these two joints as close to perfect as possible without and ridges along them. Making this somewhat difficult is the fact that they are not perfectly flat, having set in my “shop” (a term I use with tongue in cheek – my wife insists it’s a garage, her garage to be exact) for the past 5 months or so since secured.

How to do this, especially with my limited resources. First there is glue up with many long cauls: nah – to much extra work needed in making the cauls, buying the wood, protecting these from sticking to the top.
So then there is dowels, easy to install, but tricky to get matching holes in the correct place, especially since I do not have a dowel hole drilling jig. I priced one, that then eliminated this procedure, probably won’t ever use it again.
Spline, easy to make, a simple 6 ft long strip of wood 1/8” thick and about 3/4” wide. But what about the slot for this?, cut by hand with a plane could be difficult, might wander. Besides, I think a full length spline might be overkill for a one time simple alignment. Actually, I didn’t want to make the splines – by hand.
Biscuits! That could be the solution. Priced a biscuit jointer, Nope!, won’t ever be used again, so why spend the money. However ….........
If I were to make my own biscuits, and insert into a slot, that might be the solution. So I broke down and purchased a 1/8” slot cutting router bit (which I could possibly use again) with an arbor & bearing. Took it home to experiment with it, and see how it cuts.
It cuts alright, fast & furious, and can takeoff on me rather easily. My concern wasn’t so much the length of the slot that this runaway produced, but rather any deviations in locatiion with respect to board thickness. To alieviate this, I added a plywood stabilizer to the router, similar to what I have seen posted as a circle cutter (see phots), and set a one gallon 7 pound bucket of paint on it when in use. This created nice straight slots of exactly 1/8” thickness.
Now for the biscuits. I spotted several of those free paint stirring sticks lying in the “shop”, and much to my surprise, the Home Depot sticks are exactly 1/8” thick, and fit the slot with slight pressure upon insertion. NOTE: not to knock Lowe’s paint sticks, but they fit rather loose, being too thin.
So now I have slots & biscuits, on the cheap, which suits me fine as there is a good chance I not need to do this again – after two dining room tables for family I’m swearing off such large project. Did you ever lift a 42” X 72” X 1” oak slab? Think I’ll stick to more manageable smaller projects from now on.
The following photos with notes show the results, could come in handy for any other thrifty woodworkers looking for a one time alignment problem:

Layout of the biscuits on the paint stick, with view of router & stabilizer;

Test fit of a biscuit;

Biscuits are 7/8” wide;

Jointed edge of boards;

Final results;

My Journey As A Scroll Saw Pattern Designer #1037: "Tole Town" is having a Block Party!

Sheila Landry (scrollgirl) — Sat, 18 May 2013 11:14:05 GMT

I really wasn’t going to post today, but I did want to share some information that many of you may be interested in. While I know that many who read are involved in woodworking, I also realize that lots of my woodworking readers also are interested in different finishing techniques and some painting.

I belong to a wonderful group here on the net called “Tole Town.” It is an entirely community that is dedicated to decorative painting. By belonging to Tole Town by obtaining a membership, you are able to access many wonderful downloadable patterns and tutorials and much information that will help you along.

While I understand that there is lots of free information available here on the internet, I think that paying a small fee to receive quality information from wonderful teachers and fellow painters is really worth the cost. They have several membership plans so that you can try out membership for a short time and see what things are all about. They also have a wonderful monthly digital newsletter called Paint The Town that you can download that contains lots and lots of wonderful full color patterns in many techniques which will suit any taste.

Today they are hosting a Block Party so that members and non members are able to spend the day sampling all they have to offer.

There are all kinds of goodies and free things for anyone who comes to participate! Their schedule for the events is posted here :

Block Party Event Schedule for May 18, 2013.

I have supported them by offering a free painting pattern that you will be able to download from the event, as well as offered a free combo kit of painting pattern and kit for someone to win! There are lots of free downloads and prizes to be won and it is a great way to try your hand at painting with some wonderful free instructions by some great teachers!

Even if you miss the block party, I strongly recommend that you spend some time to check out the site and bookmark it. It is a wonderful place filled with information and fun and friendship. I hope you check it out!

Happy Saturday everyone! Have a great weekend! :D

Brisbane RNA Located Timber & Working with Wood Expo 2013

robscastle — Sat, 18 May 2013 10:55:55 GMT

Hello Fellow LJs,

On Friday I attended the Annual Brisbane Timber & Working With Wood expo.
I guess you could call it and expo as that is what it is.

Admission was $16 per day per person and some concessions reducing the cost to $14 children were free.
Day exits were permitted and you could purchase a reduced revisit ticket of $5 once you got inside.

The Exhibition was opened to the public Fri Sat and Sun 10:00 and closed at 17:00 (16:00 Sun)
Come 10:00 on Friday the inrush of admittance’s almost knocked you over.

Exhibitors advertised as attending were:

Arbortech HNT Gordon Planes Australian Men’s Shed Association International Wood Collectors (QLD)
Australian Wood Review Ipswich Woodcrafts Club Inc. Australian Woodsmith Japanese Tools
Australian Woodworker JD Marketing Bayside Woodturners & Woodcrafters Club Inc. Lucas Mill
BenchPro 2000 Made – Makers & Designers Bidjiwong Aboriginal Art M & M Williams
Billinudgel Wood Working McJing Tools Boatcraft Pacific Newstyle Direct Pty Ltd
Boutique Timbers RDG International Agencies Burfitt Tools Australia Robert Bosch (QLD)
Carroll’s Woodcraft Supplies Robson Sales (Robson Toolking) C&L Tool Centre Pty Ltd Silkwood Cycles
Carba-Tec Sitco Australia Colen Clenton Tools Swarts Tools Enjoy Making Wooden Toys TG Creations
Fathom It Theo Haralampou Feast Watson The Wooden Boat Association of Queensland
Felder QLD Traditional Bushcraft Gifkins Dovetail U-Beaut Polishes Gregory Machinery UpholsterySupplies.com.au
Guilio Marcolongo VERMEC Hardware for Creative Finishes – Box Makers / Brassware Woodturners Society of Queensland Inc. Henry Eckert Woodwork Forum Hitchmaster Rope Tool Z-Vise and Howard Products.

Attendances for Sat & Sun I cannot comment on as Sat as I was at home playing with my “new Toys” (more about them later)

Anyway I met up with Larry Makin LLWW and we had a walk around and a coffee, on our walk around it was obvious there were a few more vacant stands than last year.

The demonstrations were all operating and a lot of hands on training was being conducted,
Both Larry and I attended the Col Hosie run Gifkins dovetailing demos which reinstated ones faith in making dovetail joints.

Some noticeable absences were the Carins Family from Tassie, and the Torque work center display, but there was plenty of additional gear to be seen, there were more CNC and Laser machines this year along with the traditional Wood working tools. There were some interesting wooden bicycles displayed along with a impressive range of wooden Toys.
The usual finishing products stands were busy demonstrating their products,and overall it looked like a well patronised Exhibition.

I will return Sun Afternoon for a quick return visit to make sure I hadn’t forgotten any supplies I may have needed for the next 12 Months.

Regards
Robert Brennan
Robscastle

River Red Gum Coffee Table #1: The beginning

icemanhank — Sat, 18 May 2013 07:09:57 GMT

Hi all,

I was travelling home from an Australian town called Coonabarabran and just as the road enters the Blue Mountains, at a town called Lithgow, I noticed a sign in the front yard of a house saying they had seasoned timber for sale.

Yep, I stopped for a look. There were lots of splendid large pieces of stacked Australian hardwoods and in the shed some really beautiful Burls, as soon as I saw this one I loved it. And yep I handed over the cash.

After getting it home I have started to level it off with a belt sander and straight edge and plan to fill the holes with a clear epoxy and finally give it a high gloss finish.

I have something quite quirky in mind for the base and am busy watching secondhand shops and garage sales for what I have in mind. First thing is getting it level and filled though, it is pretty hard timber and very heavy so the base will have to be a solid one. The wood is more of a pink colour than what shows in the pics.