Hi all folks. Just a small project made of wood, to keep myself on track.

I´ve been out of the shop for a long period. I needed to keep close and take care of mom (90). She finally passed away last december. On January, in the middle of our summer holidays, my father in law passed away too.

To make things better, I decided to get into a hip replacement surgery,. I arrived home last monday, and just started the rehab exercises. These hurt indeed.

Back to the matter, this pen was finished in January, a birthday present for my daughter. Is made of maple with wenge laminated strips. With a small fret saw , I saw the spider legs, and filled the voids with epoxy. In total followed (so to say) the instructions from Mike Vickery´s page, where the article of Jim Boys is hosted.http://www.distinctiveturnings.com/tutorials/SegPenBlanks.pdf

I hope to get back to business promptly (which may mean loooooooong time)

Take care and thanks to stop by
Fernando

Seems now is my time for turning pens.

After looking into Roger´s Civil War pens

I went to the supplier´s page, and you imagine the rest.

I bought a lathe two years ago, but only managed to turn only a couple of rolling pins. I am not prepared yet to turn anything else. Here are some catastrophic results:

However, I make a new try, this time with something smaller. Much smaller

I bought the Rockler newbie kit which brings 3 pen kits. Almost simultaneously I purchased a couple of kits from woodturnerscatalog.com.

Now the very first pen turned, is the Olive blank, which is the 3rd. photo. It took me more time reading the one page instruction, than turning and finishing the pen. I went into the house, and gave my wife her first present for Xmas 2012. WOW. Her reaction was so cool, that I think I have found all the Holiday presents for the family.

The following day we were having the birthday party of my 4th son Santiago. Even I already had finished his Tambour Box present, I decided to try turning a Celtic Knot. After reading Lew´s and Karson discussion on the matter, I finished more confused. However I kept going. This pen is in photos 4 & 5.

I prepared a smaller sled to make the cuts. The green blank is Palo Santo, sort of Argentine Lignun Vitae.

And the inserted 3 pieces o veneer of same thickness as the saw blade. (Well, that is what I thought I was doing)

And managed to glue the pieces with Tbond III.

As you can see, I made another slim pen with a Celtic knot (photos 1 & 2 ), but I inserted only a piece of oak, and I glued with CA. Easier, and quicker.

More on that quickness later.

The squared maple and walnut pen was a learning experience.

1. Don´t hurry
2. Dont hurry
3…......
....
n. Don´t hurry

The following photos describe more or less what I did.

Cut some maple and walnut blanks in 45°.

Glue them in pairs.

Then I glued 2 pairs

WHen I had two halves of the blank, I sanded the bases which were to be glued together to get a perfect glue up (well, almost perfect)

Finally, a complete blank

So far, I haven´t even started. Next step calls for drilling the center of this blank.

.

Then needs to get rounded in the lathe, much larger than the finished pen. Just rounded.

I then sliced in a miter box, keeping track and numbering each slice. Keep an eye.

Next time I will write numbers i¿with a 4B pencil, and not a marker. Ink bleeds !!!

Following I start gluing with CA each slice inserted in the pen tubing, forming the squared pattern.

Then is just matter of turning. Next time I will sand the blank exactly up to the tubing. Which in this case provides the support to the blank pieces. You can see how the first two squares flew from the mandrel.

At the end I managed to fix it, by making the pen 2 millimeters shorter. These kits have enough lay-line

All the pens were finished with CA, and then wax polished

So bye now, we will continue flooding the site with pens. So you are warned. (Hey Martyn, I will still make some boxes)

Inés received a heirloom silver cutlery set from her husband family. (The one in the main photo is her mother, or SWMBO) The set had previously been divided between her husband´s family. They received a fancy shoe box with half of the original 12 piece set tidy individually wrapped.

Guess what!.

Right. For sure I can make a chest for it.

Even I am by no mean an artist, I do not like building anything custom with all the details and specifications. The only condition accepted was to use a clear wood. So I just drank twice and start thinking about it.

Ines lives in Rio (Brazil). She asked my not to send any photos of the chest, until finished and delivered. So for the time being she doesn´t know the outcome of the project.

I started in April 3. Wood used are lignun vitae for cutlery dividers, ebony for the plugs, and wood of flooring which I am still in process of finding out what it is.

Measures (h x w x d) 30×43 x 37 cm ( 12” x 17 1/4” x 14 13/16”)
and each drawer 4×36x 30 cm ( 1 5/8” x 14 3/8” x 12”)

FInished with sealer an nitro laquer.

Quite frankly, I was not keen of G &G style. Watched some YT videos, surfed the web, and dove into LJ Thorsen Table Challenge entries, and finally decided to tackle a G&G stye. During the process I found Don´s blog on the Aurora table, that also helped a lot (Thanks everybody !)

A couple of years back, my wife found some flooring scrap in the street, and she just picked up and filled her minivan with all the wood she could. Still after some boxes made, there is some stock left.

Of course, the wood needed some cleanig, planning, and cutting to length..

After cleaning and planning the width barely was 3/8”. So I decided to try my new Rockler doweling jig and start making side and back panels.

I still use my ipaper sKetch up for designing. So far so good.

But I also found in the file section of a Yahoo G&G group, a good pdf sketch of a table, which I used to cut the cloud front divider.

But at the time of cutting to length the panel, I didn´t take into account where the dowels were. With such a fortune that after routing the raised panel the dowel popped out !!

So finally I found a place for the signature

Since the wood was only 3/8” , I glued 3 previously rounded pieces for the handles. At the end is pretty much easier than carving a whole piece.

I have a metric set of chisels. 6mm would be fine for the peg squares I thought. Didn´t account that there were only 38 small 6mm sqaures to mortise !!. Made the first 6 of the drawers.

Almost half an hour for the first one. OK. A more clever way should be around LJ or google. There I went.

I finally bought from Rockler a 1/4” mortiser chisel. What a breeze. I finished the mortises in half an hour.

The pegs are another story. As someone said, making 40 of anything is a pain in the A. Fortunaltely I found a Ytube video by William of http://wnwoodworkingschool.com/ explaining how to speed up the process with a drill and several grades of sanding paper. I use 220 up to 1500, and then a buffing wheel.

The lid has a small lock. And to simultaneously close the drawers, I included a rudimentary mechanism at the back. When the lid is closed, the drawers back are catched by the aluminium foil, and cannot be opened. Pretty simple. The drawback is that even if the lock is unlocked, you need to open the lid in order to open any drawer. So is a two step process.

I use some lignum vitae wood for holding the cutlery inside the drawers. I think it weights the same as all the chest.

This was the hardest and most time consuming part of all. Not cutting, but designing it. Actually was the first step. The dimensional of the chest and each drawer was a result of how the cutlery were to be ordered.

OK, that´s all folks,

Thanks for passing by

It all started as follows:

Besides those little boxes, mallets and other stuff you worked on, can you make something useful?

And here we are. She hardly needed a place where to store her etchings drafts, papers and finished work.

Unfortunately my SD failed to keep the photos taken while under construction.

The good new is that I finally learned and applied sketch up technology, not as tidy as Neil or Mads, but helped me a lot during construction

The case measures 1 meter x 70 cm depth and 47 cm high. ( 39 3/8” x 27 1/2” x 18 1/2” ) It is supposed to be leaning in a similar chest. (Which will be started as soon as possible. (Meaning exactly that: as soon as possible, which may mean, never))

Rails and stiles of the chest are made of some figured cedar bought for the purpose of this make.

It was a great opportunity to make use of some flooring left overs, which were paneled and then planed to 1/4” .Such pieces then veneered to 1/2” ply. I am challenging the expansion and contraction myth here. So will see.

To keep the paneled aspect, the six drawers fronts mimic the sides and the top.

To maintain simmetry alive, the top and lower drawer front are one piece rail, and have no pulls. They are made with 3/4” plywood sides, and 1/2 ” ply bottom. Tonge and groove joints. There is one thing more boring than making a drawer this size: Making six. They are so big, heavy, rude, clumsy. Not fun at all.

The top is attached to the case by means of a piano hinge at the front.

In the back it is locked with a bronze ball catch. It can be raised 15 cm, to let the papers fall simultaneously to the floor. (She wanted that way, to keep her busy) It is held up with a wooden lid support in each side.

The case back panel has a middle stile, since I didn´t have enough length of flooring left. Besides, it was easier to press the smaller veneered panels.

This is the only photo left from the construction phase.

It is finished with buffed sanding sealer.

Hope she like it. Despite the drawers, the paneling, the veneering, and the finishing, I enjoyed a lot the process: I bought a new table 8” jointer for this purpose.

Thanks for passing by

Since everybody seemed to enjoy the making of their own tools, with their own hands. and the using of such tools, I decided to make a try.

I made a sliding bevel square with two blocks of Palo Santo ( lignum vitae), and a 400 mm (16”) long and 2 mm (5/64”) thick piece of bronze.

The square handle measures 25mm by 25mm and 130mm long. (I made that measures to be easy to translate to imperial, which would be 1” by 1” by 5.125”. The blade itself is 190mm( 7.5”)

Making the handle was straight forward. Apply CA glue and drilled 4 pilot holes through the bronze ends and the wood. I insert two 2mm bronze rods in the end, and 4 bronze screws in the top ends. (Were the bevel slides)

The most time consuming task was the drilling of the bronze to make the guide

Well not exactly the drilling, but the filing. And I´ll tell you it was quite difficult to me to keep it perfectly straight. (Needless to say, I failed in that one too)

FInally I screwed a 0,25” bronze screw and a wing nut to lock the bevel.

Very happy with the outcoming. But with such piece of bronze plus the Lignun vitae wood, the bevel weights only 300 grams (10.6 oz). Almost a Mallet.

I started trying as a mallet, but end to the conclusion that both the bevel square and myself would be much better off if I decided to make a mallet for my own.

Continuing the Mads spree on hand tools.

Since I had some other pieces of LV and other hardwoods lying around (VIraró and guatambu) (Not so nice as Mads ones), I start some ripping planning and sanding. Made two glue ups of 12mm (0.5”) guatambu (Yellowish); 6mm (0.25”) viraro (reddish); 3 mm (3/8”) guatambu. A third glue up was a 13mm ( more than 0,5”) sorrounde by two 2mm (5/64”) viraro

I did also turned the handle consisting of a piece of LV and two of viraró. The LV had some holes from screws (Was some old flooring scrap) Before assembling and gluing it I didn´t bother since I thought the sides of LV were to be covered by the other wood. Fool of me, didn´t think what would happen after turning it !!. (Still happy since this handle will increase my pricing due to the environmental friendly approach, :). This environmental alibi is great for fool woodworkers, isn´t it?

After cleaning, sanding all the blocks, I cut in half the third block, and glued to the handle and one of the other.

I the make a 30mm hole with a Forster bit, and fill the holes with lead.

Following the final glue up, and cutting the angle, I finished with 5 coats of Linseed oil within 3 days.

The head measures 12.5 cm (5”) 8 cm tall (3 3/16”), and 6 cm (2 3/8”) wide. Total lenght is 34 cm (13 3/8”)

Total weight is 1,150 grams (2.5 pounds or 40 oz)

This week I managed to finish this Box. For the very first time in a life, I did finish it a couple of days before my wife´s Ines birthday.

I was able to overcome the mathematics issues involved in determining the measurements of the box sides and lid. , I made all measurements in inches which proved to be far more easier than using higher number in millimeters.

The box itself and the tray are made of Maple, as well as the veneering. While ¼” bandings are walnut.

Measures w x d x h 9.5” x 6,5” x 3,75”

Finished with lacquer.

It all starts in determining the size of each square. Then decide how many squares for the lid, and the height of the box.
My squares were ¾”, and the lid is 12×8 squares, and 4 squares height. Then edgings of ¼” were added.

The width of the box sides and lid is 3/8”.

Inspiration came from The Caver JC project posted a while ago

The first step was building the veneer.

Edited after David Patron´s comment.

Started with 2 pieces 13” long and 4” wide. Were planned one to a ¾” and other to 7/8”.

The ¾” piece was crosscut into 7/8” strips, while the 7/8” was crosscut to ¾”.

All the pieces were glued alternating ¾” and 7/8” thickness pieces rotating every other piece 90°, thus obtaining a 7/8” thick board piece.

So still you don´t have squares yet, but rectangles ¾” X 7/8”

After glue has cured for 24 hs, I passed through the thickness sander, to get a ¾” thickness on both boards. It took a while. But was safer than using the planner. (I didn´t even consider it !)

BTW, a couple of months ago I managed to build a thickness sander. I ´ve been playing with that idea for a while, and found StewartYorkshire blog including compendium of sanders very useful research. Thank you Stewart!! After building and using it, I couldn’t understand how I managed to work without it. (I didn´t post it since there are a lot of blogs in LJ about. Moreover, no one will be wiser after seeing my sander anyway)

Getting back on track, the board then is cut in thin strips (1/16”). I use the TS with a thin kerf 7 ½” blade.

Building the box is quite straightforward. Tongue and groove for the sides, and rabbets for the lid.

After my experience with chessboards, I decided to apply the veneer strip by strip. Time consuming indeed, but was the safer way to go for my WW level. I glued it with TB III.

To make things a little easier, I decided to miter all corners of the banding. I almost got it,

I am continuing catching up with the birthdays. This time is my son Fernando, born on January 29th. So only 3 months behind!!. From now on I think I will start giving vouchers for wooden gifts.

This time I used walnut and maple for the board. No table, nor drawers or box for the time being. I just gave him a voucher for the next birthday. :)

Squares are 2”, and inlays are cedar and guatambu (tiny small squares) Finished with sealer, and then air brushed lacquer.

Chessmen are Staunton Classic – 4.0 inch King. Sorry, no time left for turning and carving horses, :-))

One of the works I hate the most is starting from rough lumber and preparing it.

After ripping I did include a small banding between each stripe, as so

then proceed for the first glue up, with some Flintstones kind of cauling.

Once glued, I made some other glue ups to obtain stripes that will be inserted sideways

Hope following 2 photos be self explanatory.

The toughest part was to make the white stripes exactly the 2” side of each square

After the first crosscutting, I was anxious to check whether the measurements were OK. Glad they were.

To avoid any kind of trouble, I started gluing up the bandings one by one.

Once dried, then glued each stripe with its banding, one by one, to a 5mm (0.2”) plywood base.

Then all is matter of tying the wood hardly, so it will not escape away.

Keeping together the miters is another story.

Before gluing the frame, I pass through the 18” drum sander the board. A piece of cake. (I should have made the drum 22” wide. )

Cleaned up the sides inlays.

Then, preparing for finishing. This is the second work I hate as well.

After finished and tidying the shop mess, I took some photos

Thanks for stopping by.

The chest is made out of cedar, salvaged from an old corner cabinet disassembled 20 years ago when we moved to our current house. Fortunately I kept the lumber in the attic for all this time.

I have been researching for a tool chest since a couple of months ago. (I don´t know why surfing the web is now called research)

I finally decided for a chest similar in size to Gerstner 92XL , but I didn´t like the fact that upper drawers are partially hidden by the front rail of the chest. So I made the upper case copying from DocK16´s blog (Woodsmith 183)

PS: This short video shows the lid and drawer opening

Overall measurement of this tool chest (HxWxD)

Cm 47x60x33 ( 18.5” x 23.5” x 13”)

Top compartment cm 8 x 56 x 26 (3.125” x 22” x 10.25”)

Drawers

(4) cm 4.9 x 9 x 27 (1.93”x 3.5” x 10.625”)

(6) cm 16.5 x 3 x 27 (6.5” x 1.2” x 10.625”)

(2) cm 16.5 x 3,5 x 27 (6.5” x 1.4” x 10.625”)

(2) cm 56.5 x 4.5 x 27 (22.25” x 1.75”x 10.625”)

(1) cm 56.5 x 6 x 27 (22.25”x 2.375” x 10.625”)

Total 15 drawers

Total empty weight : A lot. This type of tool box should be placed on a roller chest.

I started building this chest by beginning of March this year. So at the end it took me 6 weekends as average. A lot of distractions, besides daily work for a living, business trips, etc. Suddenly I was required to make and finish a couple of presents, such as the last chessboard . I still have one in progress.

Cutting the boards left quite a lot of scrap. Almost all the miter ends.

Meanwhile I saw Woodworker’s Journal video. Couldn´t resist to build my Tambour Box from the corners leftovers. A fun distraction indeed.

One of the toughest parts was planning the measurements, and the cuts. Despite I choose a nice curly cedar for the small drawer fronts. I needed to redo some of them, and lost the nice continous grain pattern. (It could be worse)

For the measurements, I picked up Gertsner measures, and made the carcass. Measures of the drawers were taken from the dry assembled case.

I include a style and rail horizontal drawer separator dadoing the sides of the carcase. I did also make 3 vertical separators for the small drawers.

Trying to get aligned the drawers as much as possible was also a challenge. Got to get things right in four dimensions. Length, width, depth, and grain pattern !! I almost forgot about that. Knowledgeable people only concentrate in grain and design. I need to concentrate in the basics, just to say to protect my fingers. (Still a long way to go)

Drawers are standard tongue and groove jointed, and lined up with green vinyl.

Lid is box jointed in the sides with a mitered inlay in the borders. Piano hinge and neumatic support.

I know, that piston has nothing to do with this stile. But I liked the way it worked. I may change it in the next one.

Hope you enjoy.

The appealing of this box is the surprise of the movement. And everyone who opens the box, takes a breath and Wooooww factor gets in scene. (The problem is that everyone wants one !!)

Pull the drawer, and the tambour rolls back.

Box is made of cedar scraps from the building of a toolchest that is still in progress. At the same time, the toolchest is being made of recycling of an old corner cabinet that was disassembled 20 years ago when we moved to our current house. Fortunately I kept the lumber in the atic for all this time. But that is another story.

Inspiration came a couple of weeks ago from a clip, where Sandor Nagyszalanczy talks through building the Tambour-Topped Box from the April 2011 issue of Woodworker's Journal. I was able to download the templates from the Magazine page.

Couldn´t resist start building it almost immediately, distracting myself from other projects.

"Templates & Video":http://www.woodworkerjournal.com/Main/Articles/Making_Tambour_8273.aspx

I will not extend myself in the process since the video is self explanatory. Watching Sandor making this thing appears to be a piece of cake. As usual, those who know, make everything appear easy, simple and stupid.

But this is the case. I followed Degoose instructions for cutting (drink twice, don´t bother to cut 20 times), and have a lot of fun. I routed the grooves with a dremel with the plunge attachment. After dry assembling, I made the drawer. It is only a one , so I hand dovetailed it.

I just added some inlays before cutting the slats, and changed the pull of the drawer for a brass one. Finished with sanding sealer.

Measures

H: 15 cm ( 6”)

D: 19 cm (7,5”)

W: 34 cm (13,5”)

Thanks Sandor, and thanks for watching and hope you enjoy.

Addendum PS

The mechanism works well, with a clue. I forgot to mention in the description that I contact cemented a piece of anti-skid to the base of the box. I first try with only four piece in the corners, but were unable to hold in place the box when opening the drawer. Probably that was due to my own inexperience.

My first attempt to woodworking was two years ago : the building of a chessboard for my third son Francisco.

I blogged this story when I joined LJ

I do also have other sons, that each and every year have their own birthdays.

Happy birthday Juampi !!

The one in this project is finished and we have just gave to Juampi (my daughter Ines´ husband)

After finishing it, we flew to Rio de Janeiro were they live. And take the opportunity to keep up with Barak Obama who was visiting Rio as well. (I walked the streets while presumably Obama flew them by helicopter, anyway, yes we can)

Woods are Cedar and Guatambú, a yellowish quite hard tropical wood. Squares are 2”.

Building process was almost the same used for the first one, which turnwise I absolutely followed Steveinmarin youtube´s 7 part tutorial.

But with a tremendous difference: I now have Bessey paralel clamps, which made the gluing much easier than before.

I made only the board. No table for the time being since I wouldn´t be able to take it with me in the plane.

Finish is sanding sealer with limited buffing, since they wanted a non shiny board.

The chessmen were a present from her wife. Made out of elephant bones were brought from India during her last trip. A quite non regular fashion pieces.

When I vas routing the grooves in the mitered ends, the bluetooth connection failed, and the board didn´t stop. So the groove

went throgu the side. I inlayed a piece of guatambu (white wood) to make sure everyone see the mistake. But finally didn´t like it being isolated, and decided to plug an initial.

ANd yes, I now have a non iron signature as David, but without any tracking microchip.

Thanks

This week I managed to finish the Sewing Box for my wife Ines. Fortunately I was able to overcome the hardware issue I had with the one built for my daughter´s birthday.

I replace the rivets of the pivot arms, with a kind of screw and nut used to bind pages.

Indeed the lids are different. She participated in the lid design and opening. One of the lids with hinges, opens backwards. While the other one opens freely, and can be taken apart. (Yes , this time the box is square)

Ines made pin holders for both lids, as seen in photo 5.

A couple of months ago I made the inlays as a practice, not knowing what to do with them.

Fortunately I almost used all of them in this sewing box.

The checkerboard is not perfect,. I learned that is best to apply scotch tape to the back of the small pieces before gluing. That will prevent sliding during gluing.

Boxes are made with flooring scrap, and the lids and handle are bolivian cedar . Finished with buffed sealer.

Thanks for passing by.

Happy birthday Ine!!

I made this sewing box for my daughter Inés´ birthday. Hope she´ll like it as I did during the construction.

As a matter of fact, I started a mass production of sewing boxes, and taking advantage of the saw & router t setting, I cut 2 of these sewing boxes.

The second one will be given to my wife, at my earliest convinience. Probably the second will get over the mistakes made in this one. But for sure, new mistakes will crop out then, so I am well prepared. (Hope she doesn´t expect a Steve kind of box)

Total measures are L X H X W 41cm X 16cm X 20 cm ( 16 3/8” X 6 3/8” X 8”). Boxes are made with the same flooring wood as the Holidays´gifts. The chess lid includes Palo Santo, and the borders and handle are Bolivian cedar. Finished with buffed laquer sealer.

Now, the two top boxes are supposed to be square. In order to let the lid fit always. But after cutting and dry fitting the boxes, I realized that there were not enough space left for fitting the handle, which is 3/4” (19 mm) width. So, I just cut two fronts of each top box a 1/4” ( 6mm) and ran through the finger joint jig again. In such a way tht the top boxes are no longer square. Next decision was to put hinges on the lid.

I left all procurement of the hardware for the finishing day, which was last Friday. That was other mistake. Friday evening, my son Francisco was passing by to lift the present and take it over to Rio in Brazil where my daughter lives. So I hardly need not only the hinges, but also the rivets that hold the pivot arms. I spent the whole Friday morning looking for the hardware. And as you can see, I was unable to find adequate small hinges and good rivets.

Instead of a Sewing box, it looks as hinges with a sewing box!!

I´ll do better next time.

Thanks for watching and take care

All the family know that I started the woodworking game. So I was somewhat prepared for a little present. Boxes seem something everyone would like. But I was hesitant to give an empty box as Christmas gift.

So I filled them with tissue paper, a domino sets, and even with a wooden (Chinese made) combs.

All the following yellow wood is a very hard one. I am still in process of finding what it is. Still a lot left (4 times the quantity of the photo), so I will continue boring you with these boxes for the next 5 years.

I only know, that my wife Ines found a pile of scrap flooring in the street, waiting to the recycle company to fetch it. So she picked her minivan together with my eldest son, and filled the van with as much wood as they could.

AS you see, box 5, the one with the wooden comb in it, is a kind of Andy´s box. I made the chess lid, since I didn´t have any nice or figured piece to use. Quite satisfaid with the result. Even there are only butt joints, the box building was as demanding as dovetails. Thanks Andy for the inspiration.

I made the inlay of the following yellow tissue boxes a couple of months ago for a veneered tray. I didn´t post it yet since I could not compete with Scott´s model.

Was fun finishing the inlay, probably I could blog something. But I didn¨take any photos at that time. So we´ll see.

I made this tissue box with a bottom and a lid, so the owner may decide the use of it

Thanks for watching, be safe

A couple of years back, ...well 20 years ago, I bought a 3/4 HP, 2850 RPM Chinese made grinder. I replace the grinding stones with shoe circular brushes. Kept it fixed in the floor near the reception closet, where was at hand and very friendly to shine shoes on the spot.

After many years, two weeks ago I decided that was time to box it in some way. This is the result

Base and lower sides are 3/4 ply, while lid and upper sides are cedar. Finished with buffed sanding sealer.

Plywood base is the recycling of the back of a music baffle, that explains the squared hole in the bottom.

I dadoed all pieces, but didn´t use any glue. Just screws, since I imagine that some day I may need to take the motor out. For the time being it holds well.

I made two small panels for the upper sides ( to practice a little)

Drawers sides are made with scrap 3/8 ply, and 1/4 ply bottom. Applied front is 5/8 cedar. A pity I didn´t try harder on the drawers. Maybe next time.

I still need to figure out how to camouflage the on-off switch. I will probably glue ans screw a piece of cedar.

Thanks for passing by.

Have you all the best for the coming year.

Hi over there,

I´ve been out for a time taking care of some family issues which are hopefully under control.

During the last month my mind kept thinking about the EZ miter technique depicted by Martyn somewhere in LJ.

Quite frankly, when I saw that blog I thought, this guy is out of his mind. Trying to build a wooden box as if it were a paper box !! Why? Is that necessary?

At some point I realized that depending upon the drawing geometry of the box , EZ miter is the easiest approach. That doesn´t mean is easy. At least for me.

So thank you Martyn for opening our minds in that regard. (Well, in some others too)

BTW, let me also tell you that this was the second attempt to make, not the box, but the stripped board.

Getting exact measure on such thin strips can only be handed with the sander. Once again after reading a lot of posts about the Drum sander, I made one of those before attempting the second board for this box.

The wood is bolivian cedar and guatambu. Finished with clear Poly aerosol.

I will not describe the building process since Martyn BritBoxmaker has already made a wonderful job in this respect. Just inform that the miters were cut at the router table with a 45° bit. (edited 3 months later: meant a 90° bit) I tried using the TS, but won´t tell you the mess I made.

Made a couple of mistakes during the cuttings.

In the third photo watch the brown line, and the groove.

Both shoud be in the opposite side. What I´ve got was a very tall lid, and almost no box. (It could be worse)

That is why I made after a second box.

Stupid of me, forgot to make the routing groove for the lips of the lid. ( I managed to put the lips in the lid as Martyn did in his tiny box Atom

I will also address some doubts, that my lazy mind at this stage doesn´t allow me to understand:

If you look at the boxes, all stripes concurr. Yes, only in the sides shown. But the mistery of Geometric Godness, show the hide side of the wrapped box where two sides mismatch the stripes. I don´t know why, nor how to avoid that. To lazy to continue thinking on that. So if someone wants to take the challenge, let us know. I can still sleep.

Finally, one of the unbelievable moments of this process, was to fold the box as if it was paper made. So I made a video of that.

Hope you enjoy as I did.

Take care

I made this piece for my father´s 87th birthday. I will give it probably next week. Since a couple of years ago, we can only discuss kitchen recipes. Economics, politics, football and family issues are medically prohibited due to blood pressure.

I presented this Ravioli Marker project for the Kitchen contest, which also commented in
the blog

Wood is Bolivian cedar. It measures 6×6” , and each square 30mm (1 1/8” aprox). CA glue, and lacquer sealer.

Enjoy, take care, and thank you for visiting

Last september I purchased a WhoKnows made lathe . At that time I still was using a casual dinning room as shop. Not all family members were convinced of my shop location, hardly only myself. To brake the ice among us I decided to turn a cool rolling pin. Just to give peace a chance, at least for a certain period of time.

The basic glueups were obtained from ShopSmith´s Dust sessions. This particular podcast was conducted by the enthusiast Nick Engler, http://www.shopsmithacademy.com/SSArchives/SS109/SS109GeometricRollingPins.htm

Nick showed a kind of barber post rolling pin, and explained the construction process in the above linked page.

I don´t blog this construction since:
1. Nick Engler knows a lot more than I do, so you may learn nothing from me (OK you may learn others people´s mistakes, (that would be me) which is a cheap enriching process.)
2. I don´t still have the class style that Lazy Larry and Steve in Marin do.

However the process I followed was:

1. Got 2 pieces maple, and other 2 pieces contrasting wood of 2 feet long 1,5” x 1,5”
2. Rip at 45° and get 8 pieces in total.
3. Glue them up.

I did turn those and get a stripped rolling pin. (Watch the rotted knot I found while turning. I almost got a tooth pick rather than a rolling pin). I just turned because I was anxious of using the lathe. But this step can be avoided.
4. Sliced the rolling pin in the tablesaw, getting 3/4” discs.
5. Made a hole in the center of disks to introduce a threaded rod. You just could insert a dowel. I preferred the rod, since I planned to turn small handles from other piece of wood. Then if you turn around the disks, you´ll find different patterns. I chose the chessboard one. Then glued once again, and kept on turning in the lathe.

Sanded and finished with CA

Thanks for looking

This is a tiller made for my son´s J-24 boat. The previous one was about to reach its end life.
Cut 1/4 inch stripes of cedar and guatambú, and glued them with polyurethane. Clamped in a jig with the required curves. Then cut with the band saw to final shape. Finished with UV resistant poly.

Out of leftovers came a shoehorn I am about to finish for Xmas.

Hey Flemming, I´m sure this is also a pending assignment in yours bros´ boat

My daughter Ine married to Juan Pablo last November and moved to Rio de Janeiro. I gave her this present. I think her husband was not very happy since he is supposed ti fill in that box.

Wood mosaics are Guatambú (yellow) ; Palosanto (Green) and Cedar (Brown). Lid and sides also cedar.
Finished with laquer.

The case design was copied from Steve in Marin, and sides curves were done exactly as he explains in his video

However I checked twice with Mathias Wandel´s cove calculator (this guy is astonishing!)

Quilted was made according to Robin´s instructions. So any claim please should be addressed to Robin.

Did not have time to include a more reasonable base or feet.

Thank you

Why not?

After finishing the Hex Straight Box, I started to look into compound angles. How to calculate them is the challenge.

So we started a competition among my wife Ines, my son Gonzalo, and myself. They will be trying to develop the formulae to calculate the angles while I be looking into the web for hand ready solutions.

Needless to say I win this contest. I found several web pages explaining, and even providing calculations on how to determine the exact angles.

However it took us more than 4 hours to reach results in paper. Thereafter I´ll need to execute in wood: Another story.

Made a trial first

Same woods a the Straight hex box. This time I splined the side joints. Learned the hard way.

Applied mineral spirit for the photo. I´ll finish it with laquer

Thanks for viewing