Well, I’ve been wood and LumberJocks deprived for the last month or two. I’ve been in the shop for hours a day, but it’s not been my own (which has been kind of weird, messing with someone else’s tools). I’ve owned this old tractor for about a decade. It’s a 1955 International Harvester Farmall 200. My Father and Grandfather owned it before me. It’s been in our family for about 50 years or so. My Grandfather farmed with it, and we’ve use...
A mate was cutting down a Leopard tree [Caesalpinia ferrea] and asked if I wanted the wood… I had to think about this for a while because I am running out of room lol..Leopard trees have mottled shiny bark that someone thought looked like a leopard’s skin. This a graceful tree that lines many suburban streets and parks. They are perfect as a screen against the hot western sun, the light filtering though the leaves, highlighting their delicate shading.......And for those who wo...
A bit over a week ago I found some logs outside a neighbor’s place down the street while on my way home from work on a Friday night. They were Ficus microcarpa (AKA Chinese banyan, AKA Indian Laurel, AKA curtain fig, AKA etc…). Almost a week later – a few days ago – I found another load of the same logs in the same spot on my way home for lunch. This morning while heading into work, I passed the same spot, and the biggest haul yet was sitting there. I was running a few...
I didn’t want to waste any time slabbing up some of the minilogs I cut out of the mystery branches I found last week, so Saturday I had a go at it. Very exciting. I had some split pieces, so I sanded them up on my belt sander. I like the faint grain revealed in the piece on the left, sanded down from one like that which I’m holding: I clamped my belt sander down to the table to use it as a mini (though relatively enormous) benchtop model: Here’s a long piece sanded ...
I tried to get in touch with the guy who put the logs out in Canoga Hills to see if there were any of the 5 I had left on my last/first trip remaining, and if it would be worth the 30 minute drive. He never got back to me, but I noticed he reposted on craigslist a few days later that he put 15 more logs out there. That night after work I headed up. I’d wanted to find metal brackets that turn 2×8 or 2×10 planks into ramps that lay on the tailgate, so I could dolly the logs r...
I got the last 2 of the 5 sections built last week, sans the corrugated roofing. Here’s how I did it, at warp speed: This marked the first use of my new truck, for 2×4s and small ply panels from Home Depot. What a joy! As an aside, when I cut this particular 2×4 to length… ...I made a new friend. I think it’s a fat bird. As another side, whenever I stack up cut 2×4s like this, I get a terrific urge to build a deck, or workbench: ...
I was putting in the rafters on my shed roof today, when while taking a break I noticed a message on my machine from a friend. He had spotted a fallen tree, which didn’t make it through today’s heavy wind storms here in LA. I grabbed my Irwin carpenter saw – the best hand saw I’ve used so far for wet logs (I’ve tried 3 now) – and headed out in my inadequate hatchback. It’s getting traded in for a truck soon, hooray. This was the pile I found: ...
Continued from a previous post Scoooore! Maple quarter log sections/bowl blanks. Nice fall day. Scraped windows and removed old glazing. With the Honeydew list project out of the way, it’s on to fun! The original logs were big enough that I was able to get two natural edge face grain blanks and five end grain blanks, none with pith to contend with. And I got some nice wedges for future chainsawing, and likely some pen blanks, as well. I’ll keep a photoblog as these bowls unfol...
I’ve done some smaller things in Jacaranda lately, but what does the larger stuff look like inside? I wanted to do some larger bowl work and other things, so I went to one my larger limbs and cut it into some pieces. They’re simple, but pretty inside, so I thought I’d share. It’s not very common a wood for most woodworkers, I think. The piece is the large one front and center on top of the pile seen here (and blogged about here): Here’s me sawing it up ...
I promise not to start posting every log I resaw (lest my blog becoming nothing but!), but I think folks interested in resawing, or copying the jig I just made might like to see some more samples. First, I forgot I got some shots of this (before giving it away as a gift to a coworker girl who wants to paint on it like a canvas), but here’s some of that first log of Ficus microcarpa, resawn to veneer-like thinness: It’s about 1/16”-3/32” thick on one end, ...
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