Friday 15 February 2013

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Making a Lamination Style Wearable Wooden Ring! With Inlay!



via LumberJocks.com RSS Feed - All Posts http://lumberjocks.com/WoodenFrog/blog/34552

Hi Everyone, this is my first time trying to do a blog. So please bear with me, I’ll do my best!

I have had a lot of request to do a blog about my rings, I do 2 kinds of rings. The Lamination style and the Bentwood style, this blog is on the Lamination style. This ring is made out of Cocobolo, Brass and has a Mother- of-Pearl inlay.

I start out with 3 thin squares of Cocobolo, about a 1.5”, I have a thin sheet of brass that I cut about the same size as the wood. I lay them out to orientate the grain of the wood in different directions, this helps the ring with strength. I then sand and scuff the brass to make it have a little more bite, I use the good old Gorilla Glue(Brown Poly Type) to glue the pieces together, I spray all pieces with water before gluing to make sure of a nice sticky bond(tough on the fingers though). I try to keep the parts all lined up the best I can, this makes for easier cutting and a nicer ring. I then clamp the ring together ( I use many little clamps the better the clamping the better the bond! Once the piece is dry (I wait 24hrs)

I then clean all the foamed out glue from the piece so I can see what I am working with, I use small saws to cut the piece down to a somewhat Stop sign shape, I do not have or use very many power tools. I have a blood disorder that I must take large amounts of blood thinners, Me and big power saws do not play well together. My favorite saw is an old hacksaw blade with tape around it for a handle, I do have a scroll saw but I rarely use it! I like the way I am kinda hands on for these rings( I really enjoy it!) My other favorite tool his my Dremel tools, I now have 4 different ones, it makes it easier than switching tips all the time. I also do not have a shop of any kind, I do almost everything on the front porch of the house, that is a lot of fun on real cold days. I have a little work bench in my bedroom and my kitchen table is always a second work space, Thank God I am not married!! Enough about that, after I have got the ring into a somewhat stop sign shape, I can begin making it take shape, I start by inserting a drill bit in the Dremel and drilling a starter hole in the piece, so I can then use a Dremel spiral cut blade to open up the piece enough to get my Dremel high speed cutter in the hole to begin getting the ring sized!

In these pics I have already started with the High speed cutter to make the ring go from Stop sign shape to a bit more round! Here’s a pic of the high speed cutter that I am referring to,! Sorry that pic is not the best, I then basically just keep at it until I have something close to a ring, I try to size the ring to a paper sizer that I printed off the net, I have a ring mandrel on order it has not got here yet! as for the shape of the ring I kinda just let the Wood/Ring speak to me. This ring will not only have the brass in it it will have the Mother- ofPearl inlay also, after I get the ring down to almost what I want. I use sanding drums of different grits to kinda almost give it that finished shape. !https://s3.amazonaws.com/ljimg/mi9rb8c.jpg!

This ring is about a size seven, I make them a little larger so that when I add the CA glue finish on them, the will be very close on size, The next step is to cut a groove around the ring to have a place to put the crushed stone/shell! I use a lot of small files and things to do this, take your time this is when it starts getting fun! you can now prepare the inlay material, in this case Mother-of Pearl I bought off Ebay I use this little pipe on pipe thing I made to crush the small squares into crushed pieces for the inlay,!https://s3.amazonaws.com/ljimg/mi9s3rr.jpg! I then proceed to dab a little super glue in the groove and place a piece of shell in the groove a do this all the way around the groove in the ring. After that has dried I go back and fill the small gaps with glue and even finer shell powder. After I have all the shell in and around the Ring, I use my Dremel tool with coarse grit sanding drum to grind the shell back down to the surface of the ring and to clean off the extra glue and shell, I would like to say use caution when doing this step, safety glasses and dust mask are a a must for this, some shell and stone as well as wood can be toxic. Super glue is not fun to breath either! After I am satisfied with the results of the inlay, I begin to do the final sanding and shaping of the ring, this is just a mater of taste. I like my rings real smooth so I go an extra mile final sanding, I then wash the ring with water and let it dry. After it is dry I sand again, wet again, sand again, this raises the grain to assure a real smooth finish!

After I am sure the ring is ready and
Willing_for the final finish, I start applying several coats of CA glue, I use the kind Instant Crazy Glue Brush On, just store bought you could use whatever kind you like. I just like this kind,


I coat the ring over and over again, most of the time with about 8-10 coats of the glue. I then use a micro mesh polishing kit to get that super gloss shine and look, if I see any spots that need more attention I add more glue and sand/ buff again. I make my on buffing wax mostly just Beeswax and Carnuba wax, melted together. I add 2-3 coats of the wax and buff by hand. This is how I make my little rings(Lamination Style), I hope you all enjoy my first blog! I know it was long but I wanted to include as much as I could, I hope to be able to show you all how I do the Bentwood Method Soon! That is a whole ‘nother ball game!

I know that some of you will say man I could do that a lot easier on the lathe, or with this tool or that tool!

That is fine, this is just how I do it! I hope you all try them soon they are fun and rewarding, they take time but so does great Wine doesn’t it? Please feel free to comment and suggest(I like Reading that stuff).

or if you have questions, drop me Aline Thank you all for all your help, and God Bless.








Crafty Puzzles

“Inattentional Blindness” Illusion



via Mighty Optical Illusions http://www.moillusions.com/2013/02/inattentional-blindness-illusion.html

Here’s an interesting study that was performed recently on a group of 24 qualified radiologists. Each was given a series of CT scans showing diseased lungs and was told to locate 10 abnormal nodules, or white lesions on the image below. Before I continue, let’s see if you are able to spot something abnormal in the provided CT scan?


Surprisingly, the last scan this group was shown included an image of a dancing gorilla (48 times larger than the nodules they were looking for!) A staggering 83% of these qualified practitioners missed it, despite looking at the scan four times on average. You’ve almost certainly seen the “Awareness Test” video we’ve featured before. It perfectly demonstrated the theory of change blindness — a phenomenon which means we don’t see changes we’re not expecting.


Inattentional Blindness Illusion



Researchers also determined by eye-tracking that radiologists spent 5.8 seconds looking at the scan with the gorilla, and out of the 20 radiologists who did not see the gorilla, 12 had looked directly at it” – said one of the scientists conducting the study.




According to the study the radiologists were suffering from “inattentional blindness”, a psychological phenomenon which occurs when ones brain is focused on a task and only registers what the mind considers important, or part of the job at hand.


Once the radiologists had been told that there was a gorilla somewhere in the sequence of scans they all found it immediately. Perhaps even more worrying than their inability to spot a silverback gorilla amongst the nodules is the fact that only 55 per cent of those studied were able to correctly identify all the lung abnormalities on the various scans… And they were actually looking for them!




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The Wood Thief



via LumberJocks.com RSS Feed - All Posts http://lumberjocks.com/BonnieBartay/blog/34545



The Wood Thief – Maggie

This past weekend, I realized I was being robbed by the wood thief. I began several new projects for clients and friends. One piece in particular, has a significant amount of very small pieces of wood. Each piece is cut out, sanded, and put together like a jig saw puzzle. I turned around to do some sanding and when I came back to my work bench, I notice one of my pieces that I had just completed was missing. After looking under my workbench and around the area, I determined that I must have done something with it and redid the piece. I came back a few moments later and another piece was missing.

To continue reading, please visit www.cmobleydesigns.com





Crafty Puzzles

Kids Lego Table #1: Legos arn't complete without a building plan



via LumberJocks.com RSS Feed - All Posts http://lumberjocks.com/Whooboy/blog/34541

The goal was to create a LEGO/Craft Table that our kids would enjoy (ie keep them busy) for years. After brainstorming with my wife, we decided on a few design ideas.


1. The lego table should have permanent LEGO base plates

2. The Tabletop should be reversible so if your not using legos your kids can color or play games

3. The Tabletop should be split in half so 2 kids can work on different activities.

4. There should be some kind of storage for the legos

5. It should be short and stable for small kids


After working on a few different versions, this was the final plan.


Full Table



Table without the plywood top



You may notice we picked the Duplo lego block (the bigger one) if you kids are older you can use the standard lego baseplate


I am a self taught hobbyist and still learning/refining my woodworking skills. I enjoy reading the pages of lumberjocks to learn new techniques. My hope is to document my journey encase its helpful for other LJs out there and pay it forward. Ultimately for this project, I decided to put a few very simple joints (large box/finger joints and a through mortice) into my project so that I can work on my techniques. Maybe next time i’ll expand to dovetails, but I dont want to bite off more than I can chew.


Time to head to the lumber yard….





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