debor054

As I haven't built a stool for a while, I decided to try my hand at a Shaker style bench / stool.  My scaffold boards have warped a fair bit in drying meaning a full bench was not really practical. Ok, I admit it, with a lot of planing it could be done, but my natural laziness told me to keep it small... hence I'm calling it a Shaker stool. With some inspiration from Google images I rough cut my two side pieces of timber and attacked them with my winding sticks, a no#6 Foreplane set for a heavy cut followed by my no#7 Try plane set fine to get them flat. After getting the edges straight and parallel, I cut the ends square on the bench hook.  I am definitely getting faster as milling rough sawn boards into usable stock. The main feature of this stool is the cut out design of the side pieces. I first found the centre of the board and marked the position of my desired hole.  Now it's confession time... I didn't have an auger bit large enough and resorted to using ....

In the 'tradition' of my last birthday , Axminster Tools and their free next day delivery got the better of me - again! I treated myself to a few 'shiny things' ... as I've said 'It's an addiction!'. Firstly, a Lie Nielsen no#4 Iron bodied smoothing plane . I decided against the Bronze body as this more than meets my needs for a smoother. It has the standard A2 blade and I have the option of a high angle frog at a later date if needed. My 'beater' Stanley no#4 will be kept set rough, as that's all its capable of anyway to be honest.  Secondly, an imperial Lie Nielsen Dowel Plate . I have some riven Oak and Walnut  stock that will make nice draw bore pegs for Mortise & Tenon joints and dowels for boxes etc.. The other items include, a really posh Cap Iron screw driver which is lovely to hold and prevents scratching up your nice new premium planes as the brass collar captures the large screw head. A joiners Scratch Awl which unfortunatel...

I decided to make use of my newly acquired antique oak mainly to see what it will look like when planed and finished. I also decided some more dovetails wouldn't do me any harm. So, in the same style as my last dovetailed box  I got started. I wont go into great detail as the build process has obviously been covered before. Usual drill - cut the four pieces to make the box sides and shoot them to exact length. Exact length being - two pairs, each pair being exactly the same size - I didn't bother to measure actual length. I also made the effort to avoid all knots and only used clear straight grained pieces of Pine. The next stage, mark out the dovetails, I'm still a tails first guy... and ... I got to try the new Poor Mans Moxon vice out properly. My brain obviously hadn't woken up yet ... Look at my 'waste marks' ... phew! Luckily, I realised what I had done, before grabbing the saw! I got the tails cut and chiselled out without any further mishap. Wow! ..What...

While making the simple bevelled wall board for my ' Ships Clocks ' a few days ago, it occurred to me that the very same design might make a good (albeit chunky) box lid.  My stock (scaffold board Pine - of which I have a lot of it! ) wood is around 1 1/2" thick, the simple design allows me to use what I have without having to waste most of the wood making it thinner. It also saves me a lot of sweat with a hand plane! It also occurred to me that I have never made a simple Rabbet jointed box... I completely forgot to take any pictures during the build as things progressed pretty quickly. A rough description of the steps I took are below: Box Carcass Cut four pieces (2 long , 2 short) of cheap (pre-planed) Pine to length on the bench hook. 'Shoot them' to exact lengths with square ends on the shooting board. Mark and cut the shoulder line of each rabbet on the short sides of the two long boards (the front and back of the box) again using the bench hook -...

With some well earned cash in my pocket I have decided to treat myself to a long awaited indulgence - A 5pc set of Lie Nielsen Bevel edged chisels complete with the leather tool roll.  After some discussion with a few other woodworkers who's opinions I have come to value, I decided to opt for the O1 tool steel, over the A2 steel. As I do a lot of stuff with soft Pine, I'm hoping the lower 25/30 degree bevel of O1 steel will be more suited than using a 30/35 degree bevel as required with A2 steel. These Lie Nielsen chisels will replace my cumbersome Stanley Fat Max chisels, for finer joinery like dovetails etc. The Stanley chisels will still earn their living doing 'DIY' type chores around the house & garden. Each Lie Nielsen chisel feels so light and balanced in the hand, I am sure they are going to be a joy to use - as are all my other LN tools. The sizes are 1/8", 1/4", 3/8", 1/2", and 3/4". The leather roll, while expensive is very nice q...

After attempting my first dovetails around November last year, I haven't built upon the experience or attempted any other dovetails since. The Small Pine Chest was (and still is) my favourite project so far and I think I got very lucky with some quite tidy joints for a beginner. I decided it was time to attempt to repeat the experience, almost knowing ahead of time that the first time was a fluke, and so to prepare for disappointment. The idea for this project came from a small piece of Oak I had which was an offcut from the first ever thing I made . I decided it would make a nice lid for a box, and this with a length of 6" wide Pine board formed my stock. I wont bore you too much with the starting process, needless to say that the bench hook, tenon saw and square, chisel and knife saw to cutting the pine to length, before using my no#4 plane and shooting board to shoot the ends clean. Having all my components to size, I started to get a feel for the finished box. After cutt...