JesseParsons

Test

2009-05-29T19:56:00.001-07:00

this is only a test

2009-05-04T11:52:00.001-07:00

This weekend I went to my friend Steve's house to pick up some lumber. Steve has a sawmizer and a friend with a tree business. Therefore he has lumber! This time I met him at his house because he had some wood that has been drying for about ten year in a shed he wants to clean out. He has a very nice home in ridley park with a small apple orchard on it and a section he plans on making a good size garden on. He hooked me up with some incredible red oak. This guy is a really great guy. Here is the wood stacked in my basement.

You cannot tell how much is there but it was an ample load
I ripped two 14" boards into 7" boards to relieve stress. When boards are dried at this width they can cup or twist so it becomes easier to rip them into smaller pieces to work with. PLUS my tools cant handle such wide boards. The I planed the boards down to make four even pieces. I think I'm going to need to cut one inch off to make four 6" pieces which will also cut off a knot I want to get rid of. The boards are bookmatched meaning that when they were cut from the tree these two peices we next to each other. So you get the same grain on each piece. I am remixing them to make the grain align but be a slight remix. so instead of this first one it'd like the second

Here are more pictures of the actual wood after planing. I haven't joined them yet to lay flat next to each other.

next I will join the edges to fit together and hopefully I can find someone with a biscuit joiner I can borrow to fit these. I am still working on design, trying to come up the the leg shape I want.

Plaque and Mirror

2009-04-23T17:48:00.000-07:00

I haven't updated in a while. Lets start with a plaque I made for Meg Lemieur. I wanted to make it cheap or free so I found two 12 inch boards I had and glued them together. I dont have a planer so I used my router to join the 3/4" edges of the board. I forgot to take pictures. Once I got them glued up I drew a template that was half of the plaque so that I could flip it and be even on both sides. I cut close the edge of the drawn line with a jig saw (didn't have my band saw then) Here is a picture at that point

THen I used a tracing template cutter on ,my router table to cut perfectly along my cardboard template.

Next I tried to round the edge better by using a file and a rasp.

Next I used a roundover bit to finish the shape

Here is the finished product before finishing (which didn't go well because the wood was soft wood)

My more recent project was to expiriment with a mirror I wanted to make for my bedroom that would be made out of the wood from the wall I knocked down in my room.

My main goal was to test out some butterfly keys and see if the would hold as joinery on a 45 degree right angle. Here is a photo

These were semi successful. When I had to slide the keys in some of them did not quite fit so I used my file to wear it down which ended up being a setback as you can see in this photo. I used the band saw to trim some off for the lower keys and it fit like a glove. I had a jig I had built to hold the 45 cut wood perfect while running through the router. THat worked well and I will try to use it again when I make some picture frames. Here are some photos. I think the mirror reflected the idea of a fram that looks and feel like it was made from part of my 100 yr old house. All in all I could do it a lot better now but it was worth learning. Other issues were

A. the wood was too soft

B. I should not have filed the keyholes

C. When the wood glue came out of the holes I didn't wipe it correctly and it ruined my stain even though I used a prestain oil half cut with mineral spirits.

new plan

2009-03-11T05:56:00.000-07:00

so the desk will not be constructed from the flooring of my house. It was too much work for little pay off. I will instead get a wood species more suited for my purposes. I found a place with consistently good black and red oak prices. I can't decide between the two. I think I would need to see them in person. Even in person what can you tell from an unfinished unsanded piece of wood?

I am going to make a taxidermy plague for Meg I-E-U. Should be fun and fairly easy. I'll make a template out of cardboard (fold a piece in half and cut as though it were a quarter, therefore making a symmetrical half). Wish I had a band saw to make this happen easier. Craftsman has a deal when you can finance no interest no payments for a year.

Here is the first "sketch" of the desk. Seeing as it has to have some storage, two seating places, and fit in exactly in the space while not creating and awkward corner in front of the window

tables over, desk here I come

2009-02-16T05:10:00.000-08:00

Last week end I delivered the tables to my parents, took a few extra weeks plus I hadn't had an excuse to drive to the burbs. So I made sure to take some pictures before delivering them, so in the post below are the pictures I had taken.
One process I have not talked about is the drawers. I decided to do a half blind dovetail on the drawer front. This is very difficult but was worth it. many lessons were learned. For the rear piece I decided dovetails on two peices of soft pine would not be worth my trouble so I made a sliding tenon, or slotted (I'm not good with lingo but can draw a picture). Since the drawer would be made from a sliding top rail attached to this piece I stopped the joint halfway down so that the rear would pull up on the two side pieces. Here is a picture to explain

Since I started this blog to document my process of learning below is a small list of the things I have learned.

make a jig- it is not worth trying to do something the hard way or half assed way in hopes of saving some time. Do it right the first time or make a jig to help, otherwise you end up with a waste of time and wood.
having the correct tools makes everything a thousand times easier. This is something I had said to lindsey a bunch of times, she takes it as an excuse to have more tools, and though it is, you simply cannot find another way to so some of these cuts. Sometimes you can but it will not come out looking the best. For example, using a jigsaw instead of a band saw to get a tapered and curved leg in two inch red oak is far from reasonable. I ended up ruining a leg. But I still need a band saw.
always try something new and more difficult than you may know how to do. It will always be better to learn than to end up with stale dead work pieces.
spend a good amount of time on joints. obviously joinery is the heart of hand made woodworking, but it is increasingly obvious why mass produced furniture uses much easier joinery if any at all.
dovetails and softwood don't go together well. Handcut dovetails and softwood are especially bad.

Thats not it, but are the most important overall themes without pin pointing mistake only related to this project.

Next project will be a workspace/desk for my bedroom. It will be made out of the floorboards I am ripping out of a room in my house. The floor is a hundred year old heart pine subfloor in good shape. The boards should be easy to glue up but will definitely need to be planed down. It will be an interesting project. The desk must fit my computer and accomodate all of my control room type of recording gear, as well as have an extention for a sewing desk. It may be a built in with shelves to the ceiling, we will see. But I am excited to design it because it will be difficult to pull of all of the functionality I need and still pack it into a seven foot wide nook, all the while keeping it subdued enough to fit in a bedroom and not look like an office. I will post pictures as the design comes along but It will be three weeks until I pull the wood from the floor then three more weeks until I finish rebuilding the closet door in that room and laying new hardwood in the entire second floor.

2009-02-07T10:03:00.000-08:00

The day from hell

2008-12-22T07:22:00.000-08:00

I had a strict plan for finishing these tables by christmas (all but the drawers because let be honest I'm not genie). Friday went great! All of the tenons were cut perfectly and laying out a plan with the next logical step was perfect to help me make the most of time by not setting up the table saw a million times but instead use the current blade height and fence setting.
Saturday came and after one disastrous attempt to cut the curve in the leg with the jig saw I quickly desided i would cut a straight angle with the table saw from 4.5 below the leg to 10" up the leg fading from 1 3/4 to 1 inch. I didn't have time to make a jig but will do in the future. This went wonderfully fast and easy. Next step comes to shaping the leg with the 2" long straight router bit I just bought and the template/jig I have setup on my work table. The first few were difficult because I had to be sure to only take a little at a time and not dig a trench into the leg, other wise it would get stuck. I got better and better which was good because I started on the back legs then had to move to the front. By the time I got to my fifth leg I was a pro until. ZWIRP ZWING CLANG! the router bit went flying across the room luckily not hitting my head which would have been a very possible outcome! (safety glasses would have only helped my pretty eyes). Turns out my brand new bit had broken off at the stem and not only was it unusable, but the stem was now stuck in the router. Frustrated, I got out my chisel to take off some steam doing something else when BAM! the router fell off my work table onto the floor and broke part of the face plate. At this point I called Lindsey to buy my parents a gift because it looked like nothing was gonna work out here.
Recollecting........
I decided I could manage to have one table ready and just finish the other one soon after.
This was a great plan though the four that I had were not up to my standard I had to let go and work with the legs anyway.
MOving on to mortise and tenons things went well and I used my doweling jig to get the holes just right and then went on to chiseling the tenons to be rounded.
Finally I sanded and rubbed two coats of danish oil to bring out the grain and get some more color.
Last night I set out to the depot to look for some sort of hardware to attach the table top. I was looking for somethign of a z shape when the top would get screwed in and the bottom would protrude into a slot in the apron that was deep enough to allow for expansion. There is nothing like this at the depot. So I found a cheap brass L bracket hit that included the screw which made it affordable and for expansion I bought small washers that will keep the head from seating in the bracket and allow the bracket to slide around the screw. This is a little ghetto but in theory should work. Only time will tell. Tonight I will belt sand the table tops to rid myself of an uneven ledge between the two joined sections.

mortise and tenon

2008-12-19T05:48:00.000-08:00

The most exciting part of woodworking for me, or currently, is joinery. The planning and execution are equally entising. I kept remember and forgetting to plan my front front rail I'll call it. It is the piece that will hold the front from twisting and the drawer from sliding in too far. The issue is I'd like the front drawer to sit just like the side aprons, 3/8 inset from the legs. But unfortunately that would only give me 3/8 behind the front to put a front rail ( or two). My only option then is to push it flush with the legs, giving me 7/8 to work with. The next issue is the joinery of those rails. I would like to put the top in with a dovetail but don't have the room for it because of how I have made the side aprons with the split tenon, the first starts 1/4 of the way down, but now as I write this I have just realized that I have not yet made that cut, it may not be too late for me to reconsider, I'm gonna go back to the drawing board, more later. (pictures and sketches too)

A week off

2008-12-15T10:24:00.000-08:00

Excited to come home after a week of vacation, several disasters awaited. First thing to mention is that in Ventura they have a woodcraft store. I was very excited and stopped by to purchase a few things I would have bought online. Well when coming home on the plane I was paying to check my luggage and found out that flammible poly could not be checked. I don't understand the harm in 16ounces of flammible liquid versus hundred of gallons of jet fuel! So I had to throw it out, and buy more online when I got home. I will never fly NWA again after a few really terrible experiences this week. I've never been so afraid for my life on an airplane.

On the plane I realized I was more sick than I thought. The stabbing pressure in my ears for 8 hours put me in pretty bad spirits by the time I was home.

Once home I came to realize that my Basement had gotten water in it while I was gone, and furthermore I had forgotten to put all my lumber up and part of my project got wet.

On the bright side, I will be getting the router bit this week that I need to finish my table legs, and all of the wet lumber are the pieces that still need to be milled for the table aprons. I may mill them today as I try to figure out how I want to go the tenons for them.

shakey legs

2008-12-05T07:28:00.000-08:00

Last night I glued up the final table top with the breadboard ends and here is my review

Do not use breadboards on a top smaller than an inch, some people say 3/4 is okay but i would not recommend pushing it
use a dado or router to get the slots perfect, they need to be perfect.
if you need to trim something off the mortise or slotted end, trim in two passes

I also tried my first tapered leg. I don't have any extra wood so I have to learn quick. I started with the table saw cutting a ten inch straight cut with the fence set at 1 1/4 so that after smooth I will have about 1 or just over. I then used a jigsaw (not prefered but only option) to cut a curved line over the next 9 inches. THen i built a jig that had a place to slide the leg into therefore holding it in place. THen I made a template out of some mdf that I had laying around. The template was easy to cut perfectly with the jig saw. Then I attached the template to the jog so that when the jig held the leg the template would be perfectly spaced away from the router bit to just touch the edge of the leg. This worked amazingly well. It would only be better if a had a router table with a flush trim bit. I was using a bit that was 3/4 in cut length so to level a 1 3/4 leg I had planned on making three passes but it turns out that the plunge depth limitted me to only smoothing 1 inch of the leg. SO what did I do? I got out my chisel and the jig saw to finish it and that is when it got ugly (as would be expected) but It is still decent and I will be able to fix it but I have to first get a straight router bit with a longer cutting edge, I'd like to get a 2" cutting edge and have my eyes on a cheap set on ebay that also comes with the template bit so if/when i get a router table i can attach the template and rout them easily. I am very excited at the prospect of getting these legs done, then being able to fashion the aprons with some mortise and tenons and moving on to assembly!

floating tenon insert

2008-12-03T06:01:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago I became frustrated by someone saying that they wanted to learn the skill of furniture making, which I happen to be learning. The reason for my frustration had more to do with me than with them. I was frustrated that so many times myself and others say this kind of thing but rarely do we take initiative to learn and do. I thought it would be cool for me to document the process of my learning. This also forces me to recognize what I have learned and how to adjust in the future. A lot of this is learning and reforming my brain to work with what I have to make what I want. Bending some rules and creating a learning the hard way. For instance I often realize that I simply dont have the "tools" to do something but I have to learn how to do it another way, which normally teaches me how to work the wood with hand tools or more primative means. I almost have all of the tops assembled. Last night I realized that I Don't have as much wood as I thought so some measurements are gonna be smaller and I may need to make my drawer out of another wood, we'll see.

dowel jig disaster

2008-12-01T05:47:00.001-08:00

I should have bought the "long setup, slow dry" titebond glue. But regardless I think I would have been screwed. Yesterday after being very excited about my new dowel jig, which I will use on both the table tops and the leg mortises, I got right to doweling and gluing the table top. I used a router and a straight edge to join both edges (meaning I made them perfectly straight to sit together). I'll try to stay away from jargin. The dowel jig was supposed to be self centering but I don't know why I buy into this crap. It wasn't centered, Well there are a few things working against me. furniture making isn't like a lot of other things like oil painting, you can't just "fix" it in the next step. If you have a problem in the initial setup then you will have more and more problems further on. For instance, twisted boards aren't straight, you cannot easily joint a crooked board, when you plane it the board will appear to be even all around but the torque is still there, now your dowel jig is slightly off as well as from the snipe on the board, you glue it up and squeeze them together but it is not level, you pull it apart and it is stuck so you break the dowels. Now your back to the beginning. Why would I go through this frustration? because on the third time I got it right. And I had enough extra wood (by mistake) in width to saw the boards apart if they didn't glue correctly. The other stupid mistake I made was to drill the dowel holes just a little short which you wouldn't notice until you glue up and clamp then the boards start to lift on the end and form a v shape. That was attempt two. I am also thinking that I may need to do the breadboard ends with dowels because I am not sure making a 3/4" tongue and groove will be successful with the tools I have.

Todays lessons

Always leave enough wood to resaw at least once
Just drill your dowel holes a little too deep because its alot better than too shallow

2008-11-28T09:12:00.000-08:00

This is the newest sketchup video is of what I'm calling my final idea or design in the side tables I am building. At the top is a progression of the designs as they got better, worse then better again. This joinery is going to be tough with the tools that I have but I have already come up with a few ideas of jigs I will try to fashion to make the mortise and tenons for the rails. The back rail will not hold the weight of a drawer so it was made into a smaller tenon. The reason for this design is that I wanted deep mortises but didn't want the two to hit. I'm doing this out of what I call common sense design. I'm hoping there's nothing more to it here than common sense. Right now I have the legs and table top pieces planed down, I'm just finishing jointing the two 9" pieces that will dowel and glue together to get the full width of the table top. I am jointing by hand by using a straight edge and clamping it to the top then routing the edge with a straight bit. I am somewhat doubtful of the longterm strength of dowels and glue but if the prefered method is using a biscuit joint then honestly a dowel can't be any weaker. The breadboard ends I am hoping will help hold it too. Again all of this is off my own logic of how I think things should work.