Month: August 2011

Turning #6 – My Second Mallet

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I decided that after attempting to use the first mallet, I needed one that had a little bit of heft to it.  When looking at the prices on some of the mallets on the market that were comparable to what I was wanting to make, I decided it was worth it to use an exotic blank that was heavy.  In this case the mallet is made from a South African species known as Mopane.  This stuff was DENSE and HARD.  The blank was 3″x3″x12″, and easily weighed 3 pounds.  I bought two other blanks of the same size at the same time that were maple and cherry.  The mopane blank was heavier then those two combine!

For a newbie turner, the wood choice made this a challenging turn.  It forced me to get real good real quick at sharpening chisels as this wood was not at all forgiving with a dull chisel, and would rip out if the chisel needed sharpening.  My one regret is that I wish I had taken more time to try to smooth the head of the mallet and do a better job sanding.  There are some scratches on the head portion that didn’t become visible until I applied the finish.  Since this is a shop project, and the head is going to get abused anyway, I didn’t worry about it, and moved on.  The finish on it is, again, boiled linseed oil, with many coats of shellac sanded to 800 grit.  Overall, I am really happy with the piece, and have had two family members try to talk me out of using it for its intended purpose.  The final weigh-in for this mallet was just shy of 20 oz!

Turnings 3, 4, & 5 – Marking Knives

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I am getting ready to take a class at my local Woodcraft to learn to how to make hand cut dovetails.  Most of the tool requirements listed I already owned.  One of the exceptions was a marking knife.  I decided to give it a try at making one.  I bought a couple pen blanks of Brazilian Cherry as I really liked how the finish came out on the hand plane tote and knob.  Alas the first attempt at the first knife ended in disaster.  When I went to drill the hole for the blade tang, the piece split all the way down.  Bummer!  So I started over, and once I got the handle turned, I drilled progressively larger until I got to the size hole needed.  After epoxying in the blade and playing around with it, I realized the blade was too short and way too wide to be practical for marking dovetail cut lines.  I decided to try again, but this time used some scrap cherry left over from the chisel rack.  This is a much narrower handle, for a much narrower and longer blade.  This should be much better suited for cutting dovetails.  The last one was made as I had made an experimental blade before doing anything for real.  Even the it is beveled for a lefty and I am right handed (oops) I decided to make one more handle for this one.

Also, I made the blades from a demolition reciprocating saw blade, which is about 1/16″ thick piece of metal.  I used my Dremel to cut the metal, and grind and belt sander to do the shaping and beveling.  I then sharpened them like I would any other blade.

Turning #2 – Hand Plane Knob

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This was for a plane restore that I discuss in an earlier blog post, which can be found here.  I actually bought a bowl turning blank that if I recall correctly was a 6″x6″x2″ piece of Brazilian Cherry.  The purpose of using a big piece like that was so I could get both the tote and knob from the same piece of wood.  I cut a 2″x2″x6″ piece with my band saw.  Had I done this today, I would have cut that piece in half for another turning project.  But I still was real confident about getting the sizing right so I used the hole piece.  The finish on this is boiled linseed oil and several coats of shellac.  I was MUCH happier with the finish on this piece then I was on the last one.

My First “Practical Turning” – A mallet

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About this time last year my Dad gave me vintage Delta lathe, that I have figured out to be the Delta Double Duty 955.  It came with a lot of worn out turning tool, all of which were too small to be practical.  I still have them, but they do not get used much.  So that I could start the process of learning how to turn, and learning how to sharpen turning tools properly, I went against my rule of not buying cheap tools and bought a very cheap set from Harbor Freight.  I still take much flak for this today.  🙂  The sad thing is, they work better than even I thought they would, and I am still using them today!

After turning several pieces of wood into saw dust, I decided I would try something small, but potentially practical.  I had just completed the purchase of my chisels and decided I could use a good chisel/carving mallet.  I wasn’t really ready yet to try spinning a big piece of wood, so I made a small one.  A very small one.  🙂  So in reality it is too small to be practical, but someday I may have a use for it.  It was turned from a 1.5″ x 1.5″ x 12″ piece of maple turning stock.  It was my first attempt at finishing on the lathe, and I had not yet found the joy of using boiled linseed oil with shellac.  I ended up staining and putting a poly finish on it.  The finish ended up burning on the piece.  If any thing, it made a neat effect.  🙂

Adirondack Chair

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I built this chair following along with The Woodwhisperer Guild build of a Green  & Green style adirondack char.  While it is a traditional design, many of the tips given by Marc still applied while building this one, such as how to position where the screws for the back slats. If i hadn’t caught that video, I guarantee you I would have had a screw or two blow through.

The only issue I ran into was I should have cut my boards down sooner after planing. As stresses released, and the dramatic change in humidity I ended up having a couple boards that badly split. The adjustment I made as a result, otherwise, i wasn’t going to have enough wood is the number of back slats. The plans called for 7, I made 5. It was either that, or not have enough for the seat slats.

However, as you can see in the pictures, the chair is very comfortable to sit in! It was a fun project to complete!