I’m on a roll posting my projects tonight.
This is round two of the dog bowl platforms. This time I made them for my motorhome. And since the interior is cherry, I thought I would use some of my scrap maple and cherry to make these.
Again, I used this project to learn new skills and enhance existing ones. As you can notice, the bases has dovetails. Since the first set was rabbet joints, I thought I would try my hand at dovetails. Well, of course, I would try my first set on hard MAPLE and not a nice soft wood like pine or poplar.
The dovetails were made as hybrids. Partial machine cuts and partial hand cuts. I cut the tails first and the angles were cut with the table saw. I then did the rest by hand. I then used the tails to mark the pins and cut out the waste with the table saw again and then did the final trimming and fitting by hand. AND i used my newley made chisel mallet for these so it was doubly fun.
I will tell you this, I have a new appreciation for those who make dovetails by hand. Man that is a lot of work but I can see that after you get more experience, it must get easier. And Maple is a challenge to make them in too.
The tops have rabbet joints so they sit in the bases.
Final trimming of the pins was done with a hand plane to make them flush and after sanding things smooth, I put on 4 coats of clear shellac.
Yea, I know, the dogs don’t know any difference but they sure look nice in the motorhome and the cherry wood matches perfectly.

I got tired of using a standard claw hammer with my plastic handled chisels and since I was planning to buy some Stanley sweetheart 750s, metal on wood chisel handles was not a combination I wanted to do. It also helped that I missed the chisel one or two times and the hammer hit my hand. Ouch…

SO, I did some searching here on LJ’s and found some basic plans as well as watching a couple of videos including the one by Steve Marin. All this gave me enough information to make my own mallet.
The plans I used as a basis for my mallet are here. LJ Mallet thread.

The mallet is composed of hard maple surrounding cherry. I followed the assembly of the head like Steve did with his mallet. I glued the two cherry pieces onto the first piece of maple then when that dried, I glued the second piece of maple onto the previously glued assembly. The cherry pieces were cut with a 3 degree angle on the inside edges to allow for the handle to be wedged in with some maple wedges. Once the head was completely assembled, I used my table saw to cut the 5 degree angle for the faces. the top arc, I used a hand plane to shape it and then did a fair amount of sanding. The radius on the edges of the head was routed with my trim router.
The handle also has two maple accents. I cut a pair of 3/8 thick maple pieces and glued them to the handle. I then got to learn how to use a spokeshave. I then used a sanding drum to do the final shaping and smoothing. The end of the handle with the bulb on it is really nice. One of my biggest issues was always having the feeling my hammer would slip out of my hand or gloved hand because the handle was pretty straight. Not now. My hand fits really nicely in front of the bulb without the feeling the mallet is going to fly out of my hand when i n use.
I cut slots in the tenon portion of the handle to accept the wedges and glued everything together and sanded it all down prior to putting 2 coats of a 50/50 blend of BLO and mineral spirits. The last coat was concoction of 50/50 BLO/mineral spirits and dissolved beeswax.

Overall, it was another fun project and I learned about BLO and BLO/beeswax finishes and I built something that I can use. It works great on both my plastic handled chisels and wonderfully with my new Stanley 750s. It has a nice balance to it and the handle is shaped good enough to my hand that I can choke up on it for lighter hits or move my hand back for heavier hits.

With all of our dogs, I have made platforms for their food and water dishes. I had read that it makes it easier for them to eat and drink (which makes sense to me). So, I decided to make a new set for my current dogs and use it as an excuse to not only work with wood but practice rabbet joints.
The ones above are 6 1/2” square and 2 1/2” tall made of the big orange box store clear pine. All the joints are rabbeted including the top rabbeted to the base. The finish is a couple coats of amber shellac and the writing is courtesy of the wife. The dogs can’t read so I am sure they don’t care if their names are on them.
And yes, they are different… I didn’t pay attention to grain direction when putting the tops on so one shows all end grain and another doesn’t. A rookie mistake that I know but the dongs dont care.

Again, another simple skill building project that came out ok.

My wife wanted A(as in ONE) basic sewing/embroidery table. She said, nothing fancy but a basic table where she could do sewing and embroidery. Her old table was a fold up table from camping and it moved around like crazy when using her embroidery machine.
SO, I looked around at many of the manufactured designs and their overinflated prices and though, this will be easy to make one. And it will be much more stable. Off to the big orange box store to pick up materials. A 4×8 sheet of melamine coated particle board here, 4×4 douglas fir posts there, and some clear pine.

The design is a 24” x 72” table with pine edging. the outer perimeter of the melamine par is double thickness for stability and the mounting of the1 1/2” wide pine banding. The stretchers under the table are 1×6’s on all sides with clearance cutouts for legs and knees on the long sides. The legs are 4×4 Doug fir posts and the stretchers are mortised into the legs and held together with bed bolts on the long sides. I had to make the table in sub assemblies as it was too larger to fit thorough the house as one piece.
The top is attached to the legs via pocket screws.
When I was almost finished with the first table, the wife says “Hey, it would be really nice to have a smaller table for my computer, printer and all my supplies to fit under. So, I started making the second table. It is of the same design but 24” x 48” and I made it so it clamps to the main table via clasps under the table so they act as one.
THEN, as I was putting finish on the pine pieces of the second table, the wife said, “Hey, it would be really neat if you could make a third smaller table behind me so that I can put more supplies on it. SO, I made the third table at 18” x 24” and that one clamps to the mid size table. SO now she has all three table surrounding her. They are REALLY stable and don’t move at all when the embroidery machine is going full bore. She also likes all the available workspace for everything.
After they were all in, I added the hook on the main table for the machine hoops. In the future I think I will add a drawer under the midsize table as there is some wasted space between the stretchers.

It was a fun project and I learned a lot about pocket screws and using different densities of wood and the melamine coating on the top of the tables is a great work surface for her projects.
AND, best of all, my wife loves the tables and was showing them off to who ever came over.

This is my first project I am posting here at LJ. I made this a while ago but am finally getting around to posting this. My Wife is a preschool teacher so I get occasional requests to make or repair something for the classrooms. Well, when came home one day she requested a holder for the scissors used in the classroom. I asked how may pairs and what size were they. She proceeded to dump a small container of scissors onto the table and said to make something “small and easily movable to store in a cabinet. BUT, make it easy for the kids to put them away too. OH, and don’t over do it.”
Sorry there are no in progress shots.

SO, I put on my thinking cap and came up with this. It is laminated clear pine from home depot and 1/4” hardboard/Masonite. I did each pine/Masonite pair individually and then ran them over the table saw with a dado stack to cut the grooves in the Masonite.
Then I glued all the layers together such that when I did my final shaping, everything would be at an angle.
It is finished in water based clear polyurethane.
The biggest challenge was cutting the clean up angles on the table saw.
It was fun.