What have I been doing? Spending time with my daughter who turned one last month! Of course, looking forward to the time when we can work on a birdhouse together… but that’s a few years away… My wife wants me to make her a small play kitchen first.

But I’ve also just got my own blog up-and-running over at WoodworkDetails, so most of my regular postings will move over there, but I’ll always be a ‘jock!

Just finishing up on some bathroom cabinets, and probably going to start the demolishing of the old bathroom next weekend.

But I did manage to swing by the local PrincessAuto yesterday on my way home, and I walked out with a cheap $12 diamond-plate sharpening block (on sale). It has four 2×6 sides, each with a different grit (200, 300, 400, 600). I had a variety of oil stones, and a small pocket diamond sharpener, but the stones were already getting gouged/worn. I also wanted a larger diamond plate sharpener so I could more easily flatten the face of my chisel which has been in desperate need of a sharpening.

Well, I brought the stone and chisel to work this morning, and being the first in the office has its advantages ;) I worked that chisel over the coarse side for quite a while until I could see the cutting edges were at least “straight”. I then worked through the grits to made the cutting edge actually sharp. For the first time (ever), the sides/shoulders of the chisel are clean and square to the flat base.

Having sharpened it, I’m just worried about using it now… it will get dull again!

Oh well. At least if it gets dull, I can say I spent some time with the wood!

There you have it. My boxes are dry-assembled.

Of course, all boxes need some glue, and again I neglected my inner wisdom and went for my clamps. When will I learn to use the masking tape??

• I knew it would be a pain to joint and plane shorter pieces
• I knew I’d eventually need small pieces in the future

So after slicing off 12”, then squaring my 12×6” block, I split it in two with the tablesaw (to give me 2-1/2 wide pieces), and split one of those pieces on the bandsaw so each was just over 3/8” thick. I re-planed the exposed sides, then cut from that my two box tops. I cut them just slightly oversized, since I wanted to trim them to a tolerance of about 1/32 or so, but I couldn’t actually drop in my blanks until the clamps came off.

So that is where I left this project for now. Maybe one more day for fabrication (sanding the tops, sanding the boxes), then a few layers of oil or an oil varnish. Want to get that bird’s-eye to sparkle!

So I took a 2×4, jointed it then planed it, then spent the next hour chopping the h311 out of it, adjusting the blade after every chop, until it was giving me perfectly accurate 45’ angles. I also adjusted it for 90’ angles.

Hopefully now when I do my glueups, the miters will be perfectly flat with no gaps!

The nice thing about the design is its frugality: It only takes one piece of wood 17” long and 1-1/4” wide to make the carcase sides, a 1/8” piece of ply for the base, and you can customize the lid in many ways. The lid can even be polished stone! That is the nice thing about slab lids. Since the wood required is so narrow, I will again make two boxes since the effort to make two is almost the same as for making one for small boxes like this. And besides, cutting narrow slices from stock wastes so much. May as well use the remainder to make more copies!

I had bought some walnut a while ago and I thought that would do nicely for the body. I have not decided on the lid yet, but I think I will use some bird’s eye maple which I have waiting for a project… So I cut 17” off my walnut, using the “bad” end of the plank, since I could get enough usable wood from the board without worrying about the bark, and it would leave the rest of the walnut in good shape for a larger project.

You’ll notice all the planer shavings under the board.

I then jointed a face and end, passed the other face through the planer to bring it to exactly 3/4”, then made some rip cuts on my tablesaw (jointing between cuts to keep one edge perfect) to give me some oversized sticks that I could shape before slicing into the carcase sides. Since I did not have any walnut ply for the base, I decided to use the small amount of wood next to the bark to fashion into my base. If you are attentive, you will notice my mistake… I have two carcase pieces, and only one base… Easily solved, but it was another Doh! moment…

So here you have the base blanks, resawn on my bandsaw into bookmatched pairs. I will glue these pieces together to form a blank for the base, which only needs to be 1/8” thick. After glueup, I will plane it to the final dimensions.

The following two images are my rather low-tech clamping methods… The clamp is good enough to keep it together, but I found it had a tendancy to slide, so I just put some very light weight on it to keep it flat. The paper might stick to the surface, but that would get planed off anyway…

You may note that the wood being used as a paperweight is cherry hardwood flooring… That was some free wood that I was lucky enough to pick up yesterday, and it came in handy ;)

Well, that’s it for today. I’m still pleased with my progress in getting back into woodworking. My deadline, if you will, is quickly approaching, with my wife’s first craft show of the season coming Nov 3, and the next being Nov 11… When I started my kick, I did not realize just how fast that was approaching. That’s next weekend! I’ll be shellacking my first boxes over the next couple days, but for these boxes, I think I will go with a tung/varnish finish that cures much faster. Though I will not have a full display of boxes (I will have two designs, two copies of each), I will at least be able to sit behind the table and talk to some of the husbands that were dragged to the jewellery booth!

The end of this pair of boxes is now in sight. Here you can see the two boxes laid out on my tablesaw ready to be finished.

For a variety of reasons, I am going to finish the boxes with pure Tung oil, and then topcoated with a few coats of shellac. This first application is a VERY THIN coat of Tung, probably 3/4 spirits and 1/4 pure tung oil.

You can really see the difference in colour between the bare/raw lacewood (left) and the lacewood with the tung oil on it.

I just love the pattern that is visible on this lacewood. I won’t be able to see these boxes in the daylight until the weekend, so I’m anxious to get the finish applied so I can see the full effect this weekend.

What can I say… I really love the look of “wet” wood!

Though it looks exactly like the last photo, this one is after 5 minutes of soaking in, and after I wiped off the surface excess.

These next two shots are of the same box top, but from different angles. I was trying to capture that chatroyance that shows itself in lacewood (kinda like those “dunescape” boxes someone else posted). Unfortunately, being in an unfinished state and way too many fluorescent lights being used, the effect is very minimal at this time… I’ll have to see after I’m all finished!

I had some “issues” with my mitered joints, namely my forgetting the technique of taping the joint prior to glueup… but after adding the keys, I think things came out pretty good.

And here is a quick demo of the lever action box top. Douglas Bordner and CajunPen were curious to see it in action, so here it is!

I think there will only be one more entry for this pair of boxes: final pure tung coats then shellacing. Then they’ll be off to the Projects page!

I know, most woodworkers would have gotten to this step in a day, but it’s the best I can do with family life and a new baby :) And who knows, in 10 years, I may have a “helper” who’ll want to make a birdhouse, dollhouse, doghouse…

Just this morning picked up two small boxes of leftover cherry hardwood flooring cutoffs. They are 2-6 inches long, with a couple 2-footers. I got them through my local FreeCycle organization. I had put out a “wanted” poster for leftover hardwood flooring, fully expecting to get some oak, but the first response I had was for 3/4” t&g cherry!

I don’t really know what I’ll do with them yet. Absolute worst case, I’ll make woodchips and use it in my barbecue as a smoker. Best case, I can turn them into boxes. Maybe even one of those 3-D puzzles… I just stuffed them into my car when I picked them up, so I did not get a good chance to look them over, but I’m sure I’ll think of something!

Having had such a positive experience looking for wood, I can only recommend it to other small hobby workers

In the end, I picked up some Bloodwood and some beautiful bird’s eye maple. The bird’s eye is something I’ve been wanting to work with, having seen some really great examples in the LJ gallery. I also picked up the maple because I was looking for a nice light-coloured wood to contrast with the predominantly dark wood that I have in my collection,.

The bloodwood was an impulse purchase, though, and I’m interrested to see how it machines and finishes. Has anyone else had experience with it? My lumber is only skip-dressed, but it appears there is a bit of shimmer in it. Is this just a trick of the light, or is bloodwood known for its chatoyance?

And by the way, are there other Jocks out there who buy lumber just ‘cause it is inspiring, even though you don’t have any immediate plans for it??

Well, at the time, The New Router Handbook (Patrick Spielman, 1993, Sterling, ISBN 978-0806905181) was the book of choice that was recommended reading. I picked up a copy and was absorbed by the world of routers, what they could do, what makes a good router table, and pretty much everything I was looking for. The only real problem was that the “buying guide” section of the book was not much use: the hardware mentioned was outdated, and could not be readily purchased. And the black-and-white photography gives the book an old feel compared to today’s slick publishing standards. Regardless, I got enough information from the book to get my first router, and I am still very pleased with my purchase of the router. This book gave me many skills that I still use today.

But times roll on, and in the meantime many more books have been written on the subject. The current “cream of the crop” in router books is Woodworking with the Router: Revised & Updated - Professional Router Techniques and Jigs Any Woodworker Can Use (Bill Hylton, upd 2006, Readers Digest, ISBN 978-0762108008). This book is chock fully of information for everyone, from beginner to advanced, and even includes a large number of jig designs. His motto seems to be “build it, don’t buy it”, which is part of the fun with woodworking, and the plans included let you do just that. All you should need to buy is the router and the bits themselves (and this book, of course).

Overall, I’d say Hylton’s book is the most relevant router handbook today. Who knows, I may have to revisit this topic in the future. but for now, one book is all you really need to get you started. Besides, why do too much reading? Wouldn’t you rather be in the workshop making sawdust?

But now that I needed to do some precision router table work, I finally got a chance to use it, and so I’ll give a bit of a review. Though I’m sure there are other examples of the same concept, this one can be gotten from Rockler for $5.99.

Though they illustrate the gauge being used directly on the router, it is also useful for measuring the height of bits as they protrude from a router table

Deceptively simple in construction, the aluminium is sturdy and can stand unsupported on its “feet”. I keep the bit low, slide the gauge over the bit, and raise the router until the gauge moves. If you can slide the gauge side-to-side over the bit, you have to raise it some more… but once it touches you back off a fraction.

You can also use this tool to measure table saw blade heights, but you have to make sure you are measuring at the peak of the highest tooth, or your depths will not be accurate.

The gauge can measure from 1/16” to 1-1/2” in 1/16” increments, so unless you are working with smaller increments, this tool should be adequate.

Overall, for a tool that costs less than a board-foot of maple, you can’t really go wrong!