First non-shop project

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This is my first actual (not a shop project) woodworking project. It’s a bridge used my members of a Masonic lodge. I built it at the request of my father in law, who is a Mason. It’s two pieces, held together with carriage bolts and wing nuts, making it easier to move by disassembling it. It’s about 8 feet long, 20 inches wide, and 6 inches high at the middle. I used 3/4 poplar, painted it white and then topped it with two coats of polycrylic. My father in law plans to add no skid stair tred strips to it. The 2o inch pieces going across sideways are glued and screwed, the screw counterbored and plugged. That turned out great, my father thought I had used glue since the plugs worked great at hiding the screws.

The toughest part of building it was that I was working off a set of plans that only noted the length and width of the piece. That was all my father law had, someone from the lodge left them lying around. Determining the slope of the support pieces that hold cross pieces on which people will walk, not to mention some of the other dimensions, was hard. I stared at the horribly done set of plans and a picture for weeks trying to figure it out. Design is not my thing. Neither is planning ahead. A few problems that arose during the build could have been avoided had I thought ahead. In the end, it turned out great.

By the way, I cut the long support pieces for one side on a Saturday, with a jigsaw. A few days went by and Santa (my wife) brought me a Rikon 14 inch bandsaw for Chirstmas. I have it for a month now and I can’t imagine how I got by without a bandsaw. I have a table saw, miter saw, radial arm saw, and of course the jig saw, but the bandsaw is a game changer. I can’t imagine going with out. I need to post a review of the bandsaw and my table saw. I’m very happy with both, and reviews I read on this site have been very helpful. I also need to post pics of my shop.

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Jorge Gs Challenge to Me Ha ha ha What a pathetic attempt for Notoriety

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Jorge Gs Challenge to Me Ha ha ha What a pathetic attempt for Notoriety

As some of you may know Jorge has been slandering me for several days. He has said that I purchased tools off my disability check which is untrue and pure slander. He then challenged me to a contest to make a marking knife. I told him why would we do a build where there was no skill involved. So he said fine lets do a box build like Stumpy and Charles did. I told him fine and that the build would have to be witnessed so he could not pass off his bosses work as his own. He balked and then later he posted a challenge against me to do this build. I am game with the same stipulation. I don’t think Jorge has ever made anything on his own. What this all comes down to is Jorge is a Jealous little man who cant make it on his own. So he needs to try to bring down others. When he was confronted by Ted about challenging me to a box build to prove his greatness he blocked me from replying this is just more defamation of character. but ted was told that I was unblocked by Jorge this is a lie. as seen here. I am not afraid of this challenge but it is pointless he hates me I hate him he likes to bring others down then claims that is what i do . I don’t slander people. I will take the challenge as long as the build is witnessed by someone I trust not to help him. see this screen shot I am blocked and he continues to get away with slander.

MY Thanks to Ted for being a man who stands up to wrongs being done to others your a gentelman.

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Daily Sudoku: Mon 28-Jan-2013

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Bokken Meditation Bench

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I call this a meditation bench, but it is as much a statement about meditation as it is a place to sit and meditate. My experience with meditation stems from my training in Budo, Japanese martial arts. There are many references to my training in this bench.

This was an extremely challenging project for me. Not only was the joinery tricky, but most of the components have some sentimental value and could not be replaced, so I had no margin for error.

The seat is walnut and the bowtie inlay is cocobolo. Both were given to me by someone important to me. The stretchers are bokkens, wooden practice swords used in Aikido training. I used them for years. The blade edges are bumpy from whacking other weapons. The grips are discolored from my years of training. They are made of Japanese white oak. Only the legs have no sentimental value. They come from a wide, thick slab of cherry that I purchased for this project.

It was important to me to maintain the integrity of the bokkens. They are incorporated into the bench permanently, but they were not cut into three sections. I did cut joints into them, though. The bench itself needed its own integrity, so there had to be shoulders to support the legs. Each leg is from a solid piece of cherry that I ripped up the middle, cut matching joints and then glued back together, sandwiching the bokkens in between. The trick was finding a straight line through the grain and ripping it with a thin kerf blade to hide the glue line. The edges of the legs were then cut relative to that center line.

The smaller, lower bokken is curved. I cut the joints perpendicular to where the legs intersected. This defined the slight cant of the legs. The upper, large bokken is straight and so has angled joints matching the cant of the legs. Figuring out how to do this precisely was quite the puzzle and I seriously do not have the space here to describe the solution. I’ll just say it was nerve wracking, but I’m happy with the end result.

The curve of the seat matches the curve of the small bokken. Miraculously, the grain of the walnut slab closely matched this same gentle curve. Also, there were two bullseye patterns that I was able to roughly center over the legs, so the bench has a nice symmetry to it. The edge profile echoes the profile of the bokkens. The beveled back edge was done with a chamfer bit, but the curved front and ends were done entirely with hand tools.

I used through tenons because I wanted to carve kanji characters into the end grain. I originally planned on three tenons, but the middle one would have exposed the seam in the legs, so I opted for four. The carving was done by wodburning to get the nice deep inky black. It was the very last step prior to finishing, so it was also very nerve wracking.

The inlay in the center is a pagan symbol representing a crucible. It means purification by fire or trial by fire. The wood is yellowheart, which is a really great color for this application and it has a nice fine grain. However, it is a very hard, dense wood; too much so for me to do the entire inlay by hand. I really wanted the main inlay to be one piece and I just couldn’t get the circles right. I created a set of patterns using SketchUp and sent it to a friend that has a CNC machine. He routed the yellowheart positive and three templates from 1/4” MDF. That was also a long arduous process and involved quite a bit of hand work.

I started with a couple coats of shellac on the legs and seat, followed by numerous coats of Bush Oil. I finished the legs before attaching the seat. The stretchers received no finish due to the history of the bokkens.

This was a very challenging project, the most difficult I have done, so far.

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Purposely misusing contractions

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From now on when I use a contraction that is also an homonym I am going to use the wrong one for the hell of it. Who else wants to make it a game and point out where we mess up and use the right one?

Nonship forum only.

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