Quick projects

A couple weeks back, the good lady wife bought a roubo-style workbench that had been converted to hold bathroom sinks. She wanted the sinks and the workbench came with it... so I inherited a 3rd workbench :) Timing-wise, it is interesting because I was about to start dimensioning lumber to actually make a roubo.

In all its bathroom-conversion glory

One issue is that whoever converted it did cut two chunks of the top and part of a back leg. I have started fixing the easy stuff, like reassembling the leg vise correctly.

Back to its original purpose

It's a bit lower than my other benches but works nicely for my wooden planes... so I'm a happy camper so far.

The planing stop and the holdfast went missing, luckily I still have a monster holdfast from another bench I'm currently not using. However, the holes are too small for it right now so I'll need to enlarge them at some point.

First time working with a planing stop

While I was in the workshop, and because I cleaned up the pantry yesterday... I though about making St Roy's dovetailed grease box as I have about a pound of expired shredded suet.

While the shredded suet was melting in a double boiler, I started cutting and drilling the dovetail box from some leftover fir. As I was in the zone, I completely forgot to take in-progress pictures and only grabbed the phone once the prototype was done:

I have tested the suet on the soles of a couple of wooden planes and it makes them very slippery indeed. The next time I'm in the workshop, I'll make the dovetail key to lock the box.

Working up the courage to attempt Sheraton legs

Now that I am settled in the new house and workshop, I'm thinking about more complex projects. I'd love to make cabriole legs, but that would require a bandsaw... plus my wife actually doesn't like them.

This weekend, I have found out that she actually likes Sheraton legs. So I have dusted the lathe and made a couple of quick small-scale turnings to try my hand at something else than tool handles.

I have used small leftover bits of riven beech to copy the legs of two antique tables in our stock.

Now I need to find larger pieces of beech to make a full-size copy of the top one :) And also to make an indexer to scratch and carve the reeds on the tapered section.

I'm also toying with the idea of turning a foot extension for one of the tables as it is a bit low for modern chairs. I'll post pics of the attempts if I try to make it.

Rebuilding old things is a lot of fun

In between tool rehabilitation projects and blade honing sessions, I have found some time to actually do some woodworking in the workshop. In the last two weeks, I've rebuilt a shattered 19th century violin and some broken chairs. Both were projects that were stuck in the pipeline for the best part of 5 years.

The violin is one the numerous 19th century German or Bohemian copies of Italian classics. This one was labelled as "Nicolaus Amatus" which was disproved with a cursory look at the neck. As it was unshortened, there's no way it could be older than 19th century. Funnily enough, the 20th century fake labels often have an indication of the country of real manufacture. As this one lacked that indication, and had a luthier note from repairs in 1904, it's most certainly a 19th century piece.

Let's start rebuilding it! First the two parts around the f hole needed to be glue back together.

 I made new patches from riven air-dried fir, dead straight grain.

 During previous repairs, 3 of the corner blocks went missing... so I made new one from riven air-dried fir. It's really nice to work with as you can simply split it to shape instead of sawing.

 A round moulding plane clamped upside down in the front vise quickly adjusts the corner blocks to fit.

 Shaving down the patches with a chisel

 The next day

 A bit further along, the top plate is back in one piece.

 The corner blocks are back in place

 I know, wrong clamp type for a violin but I didn't need to add a lot of pressure

 Pegs and end pin inserted, however the end pin hole was too large and off-axis

End pin hole plugged, drilled and reamed.

 Only missing the bridge and the strings

 It won't win any beauty contest, but at least it's back to one piece now.

So I've had this set of 4 old German chairs for a while... they're dusty, mouldy, the caning is damaged or ripped in places and some are broken. I had been planning to spend a couple of evenings fixing them but never seemed to find the time. A reddit discussion on cleaning up smelly wooden furniture made me pull one of them to take pics of the simple process I use.

Take a dirty smelly piece of furniture, this chair for example.

 Make a small pad from 000 or 0000 steel wool, then dip it in a BLO/Turps mix. Quickly wipe the piece of furniture with the pad and let it rest somewhere between 5 and 15 minutes. Come back with a lint-free cloth and wipe off the excess oil. If you used enough oil, all the contaminants on top of the wood will float to the top of the oil.

 Doing one half at a time really shows the progress

 The mortise and tenon joint in the front left leg broke at the shoulder, so I tried a fix I saw on youtube recently... wet the broken parts with hot water, then apply hot hide glue and clamp

 Clamped and left alone for the night.

The next morning, after removing the clamps, the chair could support my weight without any issue. We'll see if that fix will last or if I'll need to drill out the tenon and insert a new one.

As the first chair was a success, I decided to attempt a more complicated one:
All tenons were loose, one leg was broken, and a nail went through the mortise wall.

 The easy stuff first, let's glue and clamp the mortise wall. While this was setting, I soaked the broken off piece in the water of the hot hide glue pot for a couple of minutes and started gluing back the joints.

Quickly add the last bits of glue and clamp it all together. We'll see tomorrow if that worked out ok. Otherwise I'll need to drill out a pocket to insert a reinforcement dowel in the broken leg... Charles Hayward has a nice jig for that in his "Antique Furniture Repairs" book.

Talking of Charles Hayward... the post office delivered this today while I was at work:

I'll order the missing Hayward books at the end of the month then start collecting Wearing's books.

More molding planes!

So I "accidentally" stopped at the same flea market yesterday morning and it turns out that the seller had another laundry basket of tools for an even lower price!

The basket contained a lot of molding planes, and as luck would have it... the missing iron from a match plane in the previous basket.

The following pieces directly caught my eye, so I quickly scrubbed them clean and re-oiled them... cleaning and waxing the posts and threads. It's a sash molding plane, something I have been trying to find locally for the best part of 10 years.

I really love the whole-profile boxing on the complex part of the molding. However, it is becoming loose and will have to be removed and reset properly. I think I should be able to steam it out, let it dry and glue it back in with hide glue. The posts are also made of boxwood, and the glue has failed through drying.

 There's also one missing screw, I will need to take the mechanism apart to see exactly what screw to get.

 Slightly better view of the boxing coming loose.

 The maker's stamp "GW Denison & Co, Winthrop, Conn". From a quick search:

Name: Denison & Co., Gilbert Wright
Active: Winthrop, Connecticut 1868-1890
Tool Types: Augers, Bits, Carpenter Tools, and Wood Planes
Identifying Marks: G.W.DENISON&Co./WINTHROP/CONN. (all lines curve upward); G.W.DENISON&Co/WINTHROP.CONN.; G.W.DENISON/WINTHROP.CONN

 Most of the reseller's stamp has been removed by careless hammering in the past of the plane. I can just read the following "Casse???? Reed & Co"

Both irons are skewed and in a fairly decent state for their age. The flat one had some pitting on the bevel, so I freehand ground it back past the pitting and re-established a fresh bevel. I still need to work a bit on lapping the back of the complex iron, but it already works

Post-regrinding of the complex iron, as it wasn't matching the boxing anymore.

Restoring moulding planes

Two weeks ago, I bought a basket of hand planes for pocket change. I have started restoring them this morning, cleaning up the irons, waxing the soles and testing them.

A couple of planes were missing their wedges, so I thought I'd document how I make replacement wedges for those planes. I was relatively lucky, as I actually had a very similar wedge to copy.

I start with some riven beech I had stashed away, I then trace the shape from the similar wedge. I saw off the new wedge, clean up with a plane and start working on the finial.

As it is riven beech, I can simply pare the design off then come back to clean it with a rasp and then a file.

Almost ready, now it's time to pare off the ramp and start test-fitting the wedge.

The wedge is in and just needs to drop a few more mm. That's where I get a finely set smoothing plane and adjust the front of the wedge until it fits where I want.

For Brian :)

2 thousands of an inch in beech

1 thousandth of an inch in fir, yesterday when I was testing the plane.