Mantel Clock – A Free Form Project

Published on by Mike

2013-09-16 21.21.37I like using sketch-up.  I think drawing my projects as a 3-D model has gone a long way in developing my skills as a woodworker.  So the next logical step…..   No drawing at all!  Just a mental image from a magazine project.  The project I am going off of is a mantel clock that was in an issue of Popular Woodworking Magazine.  I am not using any plans, predetermined measurements, guidelines.  At this point, I still have some decisions to make along the way, so I am not completely certain how the end product is going to look.  It could be something fantastic or a total bomb!  Either way, its gonna be fun!

I am using a combination of cherry and maple.  So far, the corners are square tapered columns, made from cherry.  I had gotten some 5/4 cherry, so I was able to get 1″ thick columns.  After testing out some 3/4″ pieces, they just looked to thin, especially since I wanted to taper on two sides.  After I got the columns milled, I determined the length of them.  Then on the table saw I cut tenons on the top of the columns that will eventually be used to attach a top.

The front, back, and sides are going to be 1/4″ thick solid panels that will fit into stopped grooves on the columns.  I used a plunge cut on the router table to create these grooves.  From their I cut the tapers on the sides opposite of the grooves.  The taper is subtle at an 1/8″ in.  I made my own taper jig/sled for these cuts.  In a future blog post I will go into more detail of this jig.  Once the tapers were cut, I used a card scraper to to clean up the cuts.

The next post on this project I will discuss the panels.

Leave a Reply