Several jointers have shown up over the last year but either didn’t meet one of my requirements or was gone by the time I saw the listing and called.

Last Saturday the weather was a bit on the miserable side here, with quite a bit of wind and brief spells of hard rain. I was at my computer and decided to check craigslist. There was a listing for a 6” Craftsman jointer, listed for $75.00. I called and the owner said he still had it and it did run.

So, I consulted my wife and we agreed that I would buy the jointer if it lived up to the promise when viewed in person. I must admit her questions about why did a guy who cut off a finger on a table saw and whose father cut off two fingers on a jointer really need a jointer were a bit tough to answer but in the end we agreed to the purchase.

I called the owner back and confirmed that he still had it and that I wanted it. A twenty minute drive in intermittent rain and three attempts to find the right house and finally I got there. He plugged in the power cord and pushed the ON switch and it started up smoothly. The blades seemed clean and un-nicked. The bed has some minor surface rust and the depth adjustment seemed frozen. He admitted that he had not used it for several years.

Bottom line, since it was what I was looking for I paid him and brought it home.

Ironically it’s the same model as my father had when he cut his fingers off. I’ll try to avoid that on this one.

Remember, have fun but Be Careful!

Herb

I’m using the Leviton 6151 Full Range Electro-Mechanical Incandescent Lampholder Socket Dimmer. It lets you use standard incandecent bulbs and dims them thru the full range. I found them at PlumberSurplus.com for $12 each. Could have ordered thru Amazon but shipping was a lot higher for some reason…

Well, thanks for checking in and I hope to have some real progress soon.

Be Careful!

Herb

So this afternoon I planed the poplar and the sycamore down to the final thickness. I didn’t take any pictures of the actual planing operations but here’s a few photos of the planed material:

Poplar – one 1/2”, one 3/8” and two 1/4” thick.

Four pieces of spalted sycamore 1/4” thick.

The other four pieces of spalted sycamore 1/4” thick. The holes you see were made by flat headed borers which are the larva form of a beetle that got into the logs before I had them (the logs) milled into lumber. The borers that were not sawn up in the process died once the logs were milled and began to dry. The damage from the borers is something I have to work around as I use this lumber.

All the planed material makes a small stack…

Stacked and stickered and weighed down to minimize movement while acclimatizing.

Again, the sycamore will be used for the shades and the popular will be painted black and used for the bases of thes lamps.

Next process will be to rip the sycamore to rough width.

Thanks for looking in and remember…

Be Careful!

Herb

The base elements of this lamp design are made from various thickness pieces of poplar, painted black.

I didn’t have any poplar so I went to Home Depot and bought a board (3/4” x5 1/2” x 8’).

I decided to resaw the poplar rather than buy the different thicknesses at the Home Depot.

Again I used my table saw and the resaw fence I built. Here’s a picture of the stock ready for planing to final thickness.

From left to right, not counting the piece of 2×4 that’s 1/2”, 3/8” and two 1/4” pieces.

Hopefully I’ll get all the parts planed to final thicknesses early this week. I’ll have to go by my friends house to do it since he borrowed his planer back…

Thanks for looking in and remember…

Be Careful!

Herb

So when I said “I’ll do it my way!” one of the things I meant was that I wouldn’t use walnut for the pieces that make up the shade on this lamp.

Not that I don’t like walnut. I really like walnut. I might even go so far as to say I love walnut. But, (here’s the catch…) I don’t have any walnut. And there’s nowhere I can buy it locally. So instead of walnut, I’ll use:

Spalted Sycamore!

That’s right, I said Spalted Sycamore!

I managed to resaw the heavier boards into a total of eight boards that are currently 3/8” thick.

Now they’re stacked and stickered and weighted down. I’ll let them reacclimitize for a day or so and then run them through the planer to get down to 1/4” thickness.

So, until next time…

Be Careful!

Herb

The lumber is a full inch thick and eleven inches wide. My initial plan was to rip as deep as I could on the tablesaw and then use a handsaw to finish the rip. So I started by cutting the lumber to reasonable lengths and then making the first cuts:

Well, after ripping as deeply as possible I attacked the remaining portion of the cut with my trusty pull saw. Wellllllllll, that turned into too much work to quickly. I determined that if I used the handsaw to cut the remaining five inches that it would only take me forty-two days to finish the resaw operation. Not a good plan!

I decided that since the lumber was going to be ripped into two pieces for each lamp that I’d cut the 11” wide boards into 5 1/2” wide boards and then finish the resaw. Of course since I had the resaw fence set up on the tablesaw that meant I had to use my circular saw to rip the boards…

After ripping the boards I finished resawing them.

More in a little bit.

Be Careful!

Herb

Of course, I don’t have a bandsaw so the resaw will be a bit more complicated. I do have a table saw. As a matter of fact I have two table saws. One is an older Craftsman contractor saw that I’m refurbing. It’s not ready to use yet so I’ll have to make do with my other saw, which is a Ryobi that I bought fifteen years ago.

I decided to make a resaw fence jig that I could use on the Ryobi and later adapt easily to the Craftsman. Here’s what I came up with:

The fence is eight inches high. The base includes a replaceable zero clearance insert. Both the insert and the face of the fence are 1/8” Masonite hardboad which provides a smooth surface which allows the wood to slide easier.

See you in the next episode.

Be Careful!

Herb

Perhaps the most widely known and recognized building designed by Frank Lloyd Wright was a home named Falling Waters. Not only did he design the home he designed the furnishings.

One of the items he designed for the home was a bedroom lamp. Fellow LJ Randy Price has recreated this design and his finished lamp is shown in this project.

This is what Randy’s Lamp looks like:

I’ve decided to build one of these lamps. Actually, I’m going to try to build four of them, two for a housewarming gift for a coworker and two for an anniversary gift for my wife (shhhh, don’t tell her!)...

Of course I’m not Frank Lloyd Wright or Randy Price, so my lamps are going to be a little bit different, they’ll be inspired by FLLW and Randy but I’m going to have to do them my way…

So, I’ve downloaded the FREE PLANS for this lamp from Randy's blog and I’m getting ready to start my build.

Stay tuned for more episodes in the series in the near future and in the meantime…

Be Careful!

Herb

Of course I didn’t have a guide bushing for my old Craftsman router (remember guys, if the wife wants you to make something and you have to buy a tool to do the job she can’t complain too much about the purchase, especially if you’re making something she can’t buy…) So off I trudged, seeking a bushing set. Sears had a beautiful set for $30, Home Depot had an even nicer set for $40. Both were a bit more than I felt I could justify spending on this project. So I went to Lowe’s and they had a Milescraft set for $19.99. With the military discount they cost me $18.00. There was one box of old stock that had a baseplate and eight bushing and then in different packaging there was a newer set that had the baseplate and four bushings. They both had the same SKU and cost the same. Guess which one I bought?

I’ll be trying them out tomorrow and will report back with a review.

Herb

Here they are, waiting…

About the same time I also acquired several logs from three sycamore trees that were taken down in the neighborhood. Initially I had them on the ground under some shade trees but after a couple of years I staged them up off the ground also.

Early this spring I contacted a sawyer who owns and operates a portable sawmill and got him to come to my location and mill the logs into lumber.

Here’s sawyer Olen Barfield sawing into the first cypress log.

Most of the cypress was milled into 5/4 boards which I plan to use for decking and outdoor furniture. But some of it was milled into thicker slabs because of the special character of the logs.

At the end of the first day there was a good sized stack of cypress lumber.

The second day we finished milling the cypress and began milling the sycamore. There was quite a bit of spalting in some of the sycamore. This is a poor picture but you can see some of the spalting.

Some of the sycamore shows good ray flecks when it is quartersawn.

The end result of the milling is approximately 2000 BF of cypress, most of it 5/4 in widths from 4” to 12”.

And more than 1000 BF of sycamore, much of it spalted.

Now I just have to have the patience to wait for it to dry properly.

Herb

First I’d like to thank each of you for the warm welcome I have already received.

My name is Herb Cumbie and I live in Panama City, Florida. I’m 61 years old. I’ve worked with wood off and on since I was six years old. When I was a young boy I began helping my Dad in our workshop. We made a lot of cedar “hope” chests over the years. We also made some other furniture items and quite a few sets of kitchen cabinets. When I was 13 we built our first house and we build one each summer for the next five years. My parents died in an auto accident when I was 18. In the years since then I have made a few things but got out of woodworking for quite a while. About four years ago I began to work towards getting back into woodworking.

Over all these years I have worked with just about every kind of tool and never had any injury more serious than a blister. Until March 8, 2010…

I was using my Ryobi tablesaw to rip stickers for airdrying some lumber I had just had milled from some logs I had collected over the last couple of years. Of course I had removed and discarded the blade guard shortly after purchasing the saw in 1996. Since the wood I was ripping was roughcut lumber I was wearing kid leather work gloves. I was using a pushstick. I had been ripping stickers for almost two hours. I ripped one and used my left hand to pull the remaining portion of the board back to start the next one. My hand got to close to the blade which caught the glove on my little finger and pulled the remaining fingers down into the blade…

Well, I managed to get to the local emergency room in just 15 minutes and got excellent care. The surgeon who did the repairs did an excellent job. I have feeling and movement of all four injured fingers. As the photo below shows, the damage to my index finger was so severe that the doctor had to remove the first joint. I’m going to physical rehab for the hand twice a week and the movement and control of the worst injured fingers is improving gradually.

So as I begin this blog and return to my woodworking endevours my first and strongest message to each and every one of you is to be careful. I have a constant reminder that although I have a lifetime of experience I am still capable of doing something STUPID…

Thanks for checking out my blog.

Herb