# New experiences



## albachippie (Feb 2, 2010)

*Steam Box*

In a recent forum topic I asked for help on curving a desk front. A suggestion came from Kent Shepherd to try water or steam bending. I have to say that I instantly dismissed this idea, more through fear of the unknown than anything else!
Well, I tried laminating 4mm strips of oak, but just couldn't get the finish I wanted, so, I decided to at least look into steam bending. Well, yet again, my Lumberjocks family has come through!
I didn't have to look very hard to find lots of entries on steaming timber, and lots of pictures on steam boxes. I was surprised to find that many were made from timber. So, I decided to bite the bullet and give it a go.

I had some 1/2" ply and some smooth softwood taking up space in my shop, so that is what went into this project.


From Steam Box

I fitted some dowling that I had left over from another job to keep the timber off the floor. I then fitted the top, and a loose fitting end cap with a notch cut out to take the steamer hose in, and let the water out.


From Steam Box

The steamer is just a domestic wall paper steamer I already had.

Dimensions for this are 4 foot long by about 8 inches square. This was plenty for what i needed, which was strips of oak at about 3 foot by 2 inches


From Steam Box

On the trial run it appears to have worked pretty well

My advice is, if you are afraid to try something new, try it anyway. What have you got to lose!!


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## RonPeters (Jul 7, 2010)

albachippie said:


> *Steam Box*
> 
> In a recent forum topic I asked for help on curving a desk front. A suggestion came from Kent Shepherd to try water or steam bending. I have to say that I instantly dismissed this idea, more through fear of the unknown than anything else!
> Well, I tried laminating 4mm strips of oak, but just couldn't get the finish I wanted, so, I decided to at least look into steam bending. Well, yet again, my Lumberjocks family has come through!
> ...


Heat is what instrument makers use to bend the sides. Steam heat is more efficient. We actually wet the wood before applying dry heat. Once you heat the lignan in the wood to about 212 F it plasticizes and will cool to the shape you leave it.

Sometimes you can cut thin pieces of wood and then bend them to shape as you glue it up. Banjo pots are made that way, but a guitar or violin is only a couple millimeters thick so heat is the way to go.

Nice job!


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## DanLyke (Feb 8, 2007)

albachippie said:


> *Steam Box*
> 
> In a recent forum topic I asked for help on curving a desk front. A suggestion came from Kent Shepherd to try water or steam bending. I have to say that I instantly dismissed this idea, more through fear of the unknown than anything else!
> Well, I tried laminating 4mm strips of oak, but just couldn't get the finish I wanted, so, I decided to at least look into steam bending. Well, yet again, my Lumberjocks family has come through!
> ...


Thank you for the inspiration! Gonna have to build me one of those shortly.


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## albachippie (Feb 2, 2010)

*Cutting curves with a router*

For the project I am currently working on, I required a perfect curve for the front of a desk and for two shelves. Because the top material is Melamine Faced Chipboard, I decided to strengthen this by using construction grade ply. This gave me a good practice material to get the curve right, before cutting the MFC, which is 3 times the price of ply! Although I own two routers, I have never really used them to cut. I was looking through Fine Woodworking website and came across a build off video for built ins. In this video Gary Striegler gives a great explanation on cutting arches with a router and trammel, so that is the principal I used.

I first drew full size the layout of the desk onto the ply.


From Recently Updated

I then found the centre point if the radius using a straight edge (not really clear from this photo)


From Recently 
Updated

Using the same trammel, I attached my small but trusty bosch 500 POF router, which is one of the first power tools I ever bought just after I finished my apprenticeship


From Recently Updated

Then I just cut the arc by running the router over the ply. I did the cut in four passes with a 1/2" cutter. 4 passes because the router is only 500 watt, and it keeps the cut clean also


From Recently Updated

I will now use this ply back as a template to cut the MFC top. For this I will use a profile cutter with my bigger Makita router


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## BigTiny (Jun 29, 2010)

albachippie said:


> *Cutting curves with a router*
> 
> For the project I am currently working on, I required a perfect curve for the front of a desk and for two shelves. Because the top material is Melamine Faced Chipboard, I decided to strengthen this by using construction grade ply. This gave me a good practice material to get the curve right, before cutting the MFC, which is 3 times the price of ply! Although I own two routers, I have never really used them to cut. I was looking through Fine Woodworking website and came across a build off video for built ins. In this video Gary Striegler gives a great explanation on cutting arches with a router and trammel, so that is the principal I used.
> 
> ...


If you use a 3/8 cutter instead of 1/2, it will put less stress on the router and will require fewer passes.


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