# New State, New Shop



## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*First Steps*

This is my first foray into blogging about my workshop. Whether or not I keep up the blog is questionable, but I thought it might be interesting (to me at least).

A little bit of history to start with. I did a bit of woodworking as a kid (lo these many years), partly at school in woodshop class, more at home. Problem was that my father had two left hands when it came to tools and my sole power tool was a 1/4" power drill. But I managed to build a pretty cool workbench with vise, electrical power, light. Didn't build much furniture but lots of projects kids enjoy like go-karts, model planes and the like. I was also an avid slot-racer for several years and built some pretty cool cars and a complete layout. Long ago.

Later, in graduate school I pursued a degree in earth science and ended up in the subarctic, studying hydrology in permafrost terrain. As part of my studies I had to build a ton of instruments, shelters, and the like. I also worked out of a lab in northern Quebec where we built all sorts of lab enclosures, etc. Not fine furniture, but made a lot of sawdust.

Back in the south (Montreal) I had a small shop in our basement and built another workbench and actually had some power tools (small desktop table-saw, router, and the inevitable power-drill with one of those funky make-your-handrill-into-a-drill press. I actually built some furniture though I doubt you could label any of it "fine" but it worked for me.

But after back and forth to the froze north and divorce followed by relocation back to California, my shop and tools were gone. Not much woodworking for many years but always wanted to get back to it, but with lack of space and money (multiple kids in college has a way of nuking one's budget, eh?) it wasn't happening. Finally, most of the kids finished college and we were rebuilding the front of house, including the garage, which used to be double, but in the new construction was a large single. Being the SF Bay area, nobody used their garage for cars, so I claimed the garage as "mine" and had the garage fully wired and lighted for woodworking complete with subpanel, 220V in the floor, etc.

Then, just as it was finished but before the machines were bought, and my wife was struggling to find work at her level in California, she was offered a wonderful job in northern Illinois. We dithered then decided my job (software engineering) was portable and we couldn't pass her chance up. So we sold the house in Palo Alto for a small fortune and moved. Prior to the move my wife looked at 100+ houses near her new place of work. I was bummed at losing my shop so I told her and the real estate agent that MY one criteria was that there be space for a woodworking shop. We eventually settled in Johnsburg, IL in a immense house on a gorgeous lake with a large 4-car garage with 16-foot double doors and 11 foot ceilings.

The garage is divvied up as his and hers. She parks her car with gay abandon on one side, so if I want my car indoors, I'll have to share my side of the garage with my car. Being northern Illinois, one normally wants the car indoors during winters for comfort, not having to clear the car out of drifts and to keep the driveway clear for the snowplow. I expect my car will spend most of the summer outdoors though.

So I have a space 22 feet long by 19 feet wide and 11 feet high. There are two windows and a row of small windows in the double garage door. Walls and garage door are insulated and the concrete floor has radiant heat.

I have already started the modifications, putting in a 100 AMP subpanel and a mess of outlets (110v and a couple of 220v) along with nine 4 foot fluorescent fixtures. Next step is to run a wall down the middle with a single 32" door. I'll put more outlets in the new wall. And an air-conditioner to mitigate the hot and humid Illinois summer is a requirement as the garage can get to over 90F in the summer…

Here's what it looks like now (minus the new wall which is going up soon)









(To be clear, I didn't do the electrical work or the wall. Simple household electrical I can do - subpanels are out of my scope.)

Meanwhile, I am starting to buy some tools and building some mobile carts etc. The shop is already underway… More on that next time.


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## dbhost (Jul 20, 2009)

DrPuk2U said:


> *First Steps*
> 
> This is my first foray into blogging about my workshop. Whether or not I keep up the blog is questionable, but I thought it might be interesting (to me at least).
> 
> ...


Keep on writing. I am interested as I need to wire up my shop too!


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## Kroner (Mar 26, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *First Steps*
> 
> This is my first foray into blogging about my workshop. Whether or not I keep up the blog is questionable, but I thought it might be interesting (to me at least).
> 
> ...


Yes, keep writing. I have a need to run some power into my shop area and would like to see how yours turns out.


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *First Steps*
> 
> This is my first foray into blogging about my workshop. Whether or not I keep up the blog is questionable, but I thought it might be interesting (to me at least).
> 
> ...


I will add another blog soon (I hope) about the details of the electrical work, but thought I would wait until the new wall, air filter and AC are installed. But for those who can't wait, the gist is that I had installed a 100 amp subpanel and ran two 30 amp circuits at 110v around the shop in 3/4" surface conduit (didn't want to whack at the walls) so that each four-outlet box has two circuits (two 110v outlets each). There is also one dedicated 20 amp circuit for the dust collection and one dedicated box with a 30 amp 100v circuit for the table saw and one 220v 30 amp circuit for the joiner. This same setup will be mirrored in the new wall. There is also a separate circuit for the lights. There will also be separate circuits for the AC and air filter. More depth later.


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*Step 2 and 3 - the saw and the jointer...*

We moved to our new home in northern Illinois more than a year ago and I spent a lot of time planning the shop, drawing plan after plan, searching the net for ideas and so on.To give her credit, my wife tired of the plans (even though I told her it was half the fun) and gave me a SawStop Professional Cabinet Saw for Christmas! If you wonder why I went hog-wild with a SawStop, I'll tell you that one of my long-standing rules, even back in my days up north was "nobody gets injured, safety is job one". And when you're working out on the tundra miles from anyone else at minus 20F that's a *really* good rule to stick to! And it's important for a software engineer to have all his fingers and thumbs so the safety of the SawStop was worth the extra cash. Besides, the saw is really sweet machine!

But when I got the saw the first problem arose. The saw comes in several boxes on a pallet and weighs over 300 pounds. Fortunately, the delivery man had powered pallet lifter and was nice enough to wheel it down our long (300 foot) drive to the garage.

That's a big, heavy box…









Another couple hundred pounds of iron-mongery…









Now what? The cabinet alone (with motor) was over 150 pounds. I'm pretty strong but I also value my back and didn't want to damage the saw before I even used it. Part of the problem is we are in this semi-rural area where many of the homes are vacation homes for folks down in Chicago. So there aren't a lot of people around. And as someone who works remotely with teams in San Jose, Seattle and Bucharest (not to mention India) I can't ask for help from a co-worker!  Fortunately, I have a new neighbor who is friendly and he lent me a hand to get the cabinet on it's top (to put the mobile base on) and bolt on the cast-iron wings. Then I could assemble the rest myself.

Rolled on to its side:









The saw takes wing(s)!









And ta-da!









I was in business! Well, sort of. A table saw is good, but it's going to take more than that. My plan is to build (like everybody else it seems) a Holtzappfel type bench. THEN I can start buildings some real furniture (my wife is making a list and I work all day on a piece of crap kitchen table from Ikea). So I'm either going to need to spend years with a set of handplanes, or get a jointer and a planer.

I decide to be lazy and get a jointer and a planer. After a lot of research I decided to get a Grizzly 0490X with the spherical cutter head. Price was good and I didn't fancy hassling with straight knives. So it arrived last week. First problem was when UPS called me and said they were ready to deliver it - did I have a forklift? Um, no. "Curbside service" meant, apparently, that they pulled up to the curb then looked at me expectantly. Yikes. Thing was on a pallet in two boxes, one 150 pounds, the other 400!

Well, turned out I DID know someone who owned a forklift, a local contractor who builds and maintains seawalls (lakewalls really). He was willing to help out for a small fee. But when UPS arrived his forklift was DOA. But he had a bobcat with bucket. "Don't worry" he said, "piece of cake". So he trundled up with the bobcat. We managed to load the cabinet box (ONLY 150 pounds) into the bucket without too much hassle, walked it down and deposited in gently on the garage floor.

Now the jointer bed. That didn't go so smoothly. When we tried to move it from the truck into the bucket we underestimated how much momentum that sucker had and it almost tumbled off. Eye-bugging moment as we steadied it. Second try was better and we go it into the bucket. Then walked it to garage and ever so gently decanted it onto the floor. Whew! Mission accomplished.

Coming in for a landing!










The plywood box with the jointer bed was a little cracked on one corner, but but with the lid pried open it was pretty clear it was undamaged.










Next was getting it assembled. That proved … interesting.

Once again, even handling the cabinet was challenging. Helpful neighbor wasn't around so what to do? First instructions were "with the help of another person, turn it upside down, remove the box, then turn it back over again". Well, that seemed like the hard way to do it. So I pulled out my trusty pocket knife and slowly cut my way around the base of the box the cabinet was in. This was not easy as it was a very robust "cardboard" box, a dense, half-inch cardboard with very dense 1/8" cardboard reinforcements on each edge. But by sawing away I managed to cut the sides of the box free from the bottom. About halfway through I realized that I was destroying the packaging. If the jointer was damaged how could I send it back? Oh well, too late anyway. I wasn't going to put the crappy plywood box back together again, anyway.

I then mounted the wheels and dismounted the motor, which was bolted to the inside of the top for shipping. Easy enough, this was going to be a piece of cake (ha). Then I needed to put it back on its side - while not letting the heavy motor tumble about. "Another person" should hold the motor, according to the manual. Hm, nobody about. Quick! To the bungees! I grabbed a couple and lashed the motor to its future mounts and slowly tilted it onto its side. I then bolted it to its mounts and heaved it back on its base, now complete with wheels. Great, this really would be easy. Somewhere the gods chuckled.

Now I had to get the 300+ pound bed up on the cabinet. Back to the phone and my contact with the bobcat came back with a couple of guys to lift the bed into place. The bed was supposedly bolted to the crate, but the crate was so flimsy that at some point it had buckled and pulled the washer and bolt through the bottom. You'd think they could spring for a couple of decent sheets of 1/2" ply, but cost is cost. So two of them grabbed it and lifted it up and we guided it into place.

Once the bed was on the cabinet, it was simple to bolt it down. Then, mount the control column and the fence carriage. I was on a roll now. Mounted the cutterhead and motor pulleys without difficulty. Now, let's see: "Wrap the ribbed belt around the cutterhead pulley and the motor pulley". Check. "Loosen the bolts holding the motor and let it slip down, tensioning the belt. Now tighten the belt". Check. Turn the motor a number of turns and … the belt starts crabbing off. What the hey? Repeat process, same result. Hm. "Ensure the pulleys align by visually inspecting their alignment". Easy enough if you are superman, but I can't see through cast iron and 1/8" steel, so that didn't work. Finally figured out to wiggle my thick steel straightedge up to check if the two pulleys were aligned. I put my small Stabila level on the straightedge and checked. Yep, perfectly plumb. Now what?

There ensued a frustrating eternity (half hour) of grunting, straining, sweating, swearing and generally futilely trying to convince the two pulleys to align with the belt tensioned and still keep the belt on. I figured out fairly quickly that I somehow had to also ensure that not only did the pulleys have to be aligned, but the shafts needed to be parallel. But how? I loosened every bolt, pulled, tugged and wiggled to no avail. I eventually realized that the lower rail of the motor mount was not machined quite right and was preventing me from getting the shafts parallel. So I took the damn thing off entirely and pushed and pulled. In so doing the light finally dawned that the right way to ensure it was all good to go was put the level on the straightedge, place it flush against the cutterhead pulley, then check that not only was the straightedge plumb, but also that the other end of the straightedge was exactly flush across the entire face of the motor pulley as well. If these conditions were met, then the pulleys were aligned and the shafts parallel.

I achieve this, replaced the other motor-mount (inverting it so it fit better) tightened the whole shebang and I was in business! Be nice if Grizzly had added this little tip to their manual.

So now it was time to remove the grease and paper and generally clean up the jointer for the homestretch. Well, the cleanup took a little while. Apparently, when the jointer is completed in China they have a person with a bucket of grease and a small brush with instructions to swab grease on each and every surface that looks like it is not painted. And they do. There was grease everywhere! Getting it off the flat beds was easy, but everywhere else? Yikes. And the spiral cutterhead? OMG, getting it off the cutterhead was a bear (tip: use a toothbrush and patience). I finally finished (more or less) but it took me the better part of 2 hours to get it all off. It is nice that they do this - wouldn't want to have rust on the machined cast iron. But did he have to grease the galvanized wrenches they supplied? And the anodized bolts? And the blued Allen keys?

But it was finally done and I then truly was on the homestretch, mounting the fence and other bits (and cleaning more grease every five minutes). And then I was done. The jointer gleamed and it looked really nice. Beautifully machined. Putting my Starrett straightedge on the beds there isn't a glimmer of light underneath. No way to get a 0.002" feeler gauge underneath it. Nice.

Sorry that there aren't any photos of the process. Between my frustrations, sweat and grease, I didn't really think about picking up my camera. But here's the beast. 









Then the real test. Ran a piece of Afromosia through it. Slid through with almost no resistance, honing the board flat and glassy smooth. And quiet? I was amazed how quiet. Thought it would be really loud but it wasn't. Hooray.

Next, getting the planer up and running so I can actually start building my bench.


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## davidroberts (Nov 8, 2008)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Step 2 and 3 - the saw and the jointer...*
> 
> We moved to our new home in northern Illinois more than a year ago and I spent a lot of time planning the shop, drawing plan after plan, searching the net for ideas and so on.To give her credit, my wife tired of the plans (even though I told her it was half the fun) and gave me a SawStop Professional Cabinet Saw for Christmas! If you wonder why I went hog-wild with a SawStop, I'll tell you that one of my long-standing rules, even back in my days up north was "nobody gets injured, safety is job one". And when you're working out on the tundra miles from anyone else at minus 20F that's a *really* good rule to stick to! And it's important for a software engineer to have all his fingers and thumbs so the safety of the SawStop was worth the extra cash. Besides, the saw is really sweet machine!
> 
> ...


Sounds like you are having way too much fun. They call those "pucker moments", as in "could not drive a 4-inch hat pin with a 2-pound sledge hammer". Been there, now use the T-shirt to wipe on poly.

I'd probably like you a lot more if you ever got around to posing pics, just a suggestion ;>)


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## stefang (Apr 9, 2009)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Step 2 and 3 - the saw and the jointer...*
> 
> We moved to our new home in northern Illinois more than a year ago and I spent a lot of time planning the shop, drawing plan after plan, searching the net for ideas and so on.To give her credit, my wife tired of the plans (even though I told her it was half the fun) and gave me a SawStop Professional Cabinet Saw for Christmas! If you wonder why I went hog-wild with a SawStop, I'll tell you that one of my long-standing rules, even back in my days up north was "nobody gets injured, safety is job one". And when you're working out on the tundra miles from anyone else at minus 20F that's a *really* good rule to stick to! And it's important for a software engineer to have all his fingers and thumbs so the safety of the SawStop was worth the extra cash. Besides, the saw is really sweet machine!
> 
> ...


My back started hurting after the first paragraph. Good luck with your new tools.


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## Bigrock (Apr 16, 2010)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Step 2 and 3 - the saw and the jointer...*
> 
> We moved to our new home in northern Illinois more than a year ago and I spent a lot of time planning the shop, drawing plan after plan, searching the net for ideas and so on.To give her credit, my wife tired of the plans (even though I told her it was half the fun) and gave me a SawStop Professional Cabinet Saw for Christmas! If you wonder why I went hog-wild with a SawStop, I'll tell you that one of my long-standing rules, even back in my days up north was "nobody gets injured, safety is job one". And when you're working out on the tundra miles from anyone else at minus 20F that's a *really* good rule to stick to! And it's important for a software engineer to have all his fingers and thumbs so the safety of the SawStop was worth the extra cash. Besides, the saw is really sweet machine!
> 
> ...


You did great, as it is said in the South. I know you will enjoy the sprial cutter on your jointer. I love mine and I have them on my planer. Like you said it is a lot quieter. Have Fun


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*First Project - Rolling Outfeed Cart*

So now I had the saw and the jointer set up. I went to a local lumberyard (Woodstock Lumber) and bought 14 16-foot 2×12s and 3 sheets of baltic birch plywood. The 2×12s I stickered and left in the middle of the garage.

The plywood was for building three rolling carts, patterned after the ones in Fine Woodworking #190. My intent was to build one cart the exact same height as my saw and use it as an outfeed table. Then build another to hold the planer such that the outfeed for the planer would be the same height. The third cart would be for the drill press.

Here's what the carts look like. Very simple.










So big moment! First project in the shop. They say that the best way to learn is through your mistakes. Quite true. What an education I had ahead of me! 

Ironically, with my beautiful new tablesaw, I still had to get out the sawhorses and my circular saw to cut up the plywood since I couldn't figure out a safe way to cut a 4×8 sheet on the saw with just one person. So I fired up the circular saw and away I went.

First mistake, first lesson. I had figured out what pieces I needed, but didn't really think through the set of cuts that would be most efficient. For convenience, and because I didn't (then) have an 8-foot straightedge, I cut the sheet in half so I had two 4×4 sheets. Later, I realized that I should have made one 8-foot cut so that I ended up with a 30" x 8 foot length then cut that in half to form the top and bottom.

Then I needed three pieces to form the two sides and the center cross-piece. Each of these needed to be 25 7/8" high. Should have cut the sides as one long strip too, but I didn't. Ah well, next cart. My other errors were not realizing that when cutting with a circular saw, tear-out is minimized on the BOTTOM side of the piece you are cutting. And that a 24-tooth blade is great for cutting 2×4s and the like, but not for plywood - especially 9-ply birch plywood. Result: Lots of lovely tearout. Oh well - it's an outfeed table, not a dining room table.

So I got all the pieces cut and then assembled the carcass. This turned out to be pretty easy. It was particularly so because of the implicit tip in the article from FWW. If you look at the photo of the guy assembling the carcass you see he is using a right-angle clamp to hold the pieces steady.










As a one-man operation, a third hand like that is invaluable. So after hunting around I found an Irwin clamp online like the one in the picture. And it works a treat. Unlike the article, I didn't pre-drill anything, just used 2-inch #8 Spax screws and it went together easily and is very strong and stable.

Once it was assembled, I positioned the casters, bored the holes for them, mounted them and then turned it over onto its wheels. Perfect! Except… it turned out to be 1/8" too high. Dammit! How did I mess that up? Turned out that the saw was a 1/16" lower than I thought and the casters were 1/16" taller. Sigh. No biggee. I turned the table over, removed the casters, got out my plunge router and routed 1/8" into the base for each caster-base. Re-assembled and it was good to go.

Next I needed to make some holes to accommodate the table saw's mobile base and dust collection ports. Since I intended to use the table sideways (30"x48") for cross-cutting and lengthwise (48"x30") for ripping, I had to do this on two sides. A little jig-sawing and we were good.

However, there was one gotcha. I should have thought a little more about which end of the table was which. At first glance, it doesn't seem to matter which end was which, but this turns out not to be the case. On further reflection, AFTER I mounted the casters and cut the holes for the dust, I realized that you want the casters that swivel and have the brake to be on the end away from the saw. It doesn't matter too much when using the table for crosscutting as you are pivoting it sideways, but when ripping it you want the brake-wheels away from the saw so that when it wheels up to the table, the brake pedal protrudes and is easy to set. Not a big deal but a minor annoyance.

In addition, I realized that the article in FWW has one detail of mounting the casters not quite right. It had the casters being mounted 1/2" from the side of the base, but an inch or so from the end. For the fixed casters, this wasn't an issue, but for the swiveling casters with the brake, this was too far - the result being that the brake was half hidden most of the time. The right setup turns out to be like this:










With the table butted against the table saw and the wheels locked, it was pretty solid. However, it I use the miter gauge or (once I have built it) the cross-cut sled, there will be a problem because the outfeed table has no slots. Moreover, if I do rout grooves for the miter-guide to follow, getting them to line up every time with the saw could be a pain (see above about casters).

One solution would be to use the back rail of the table saw, which has a series of 12 mm holes in it for no obvious purpose. I assume the back rail on my 36" PCS is the front rail on the contractor saw or something like that to ease manufacturing. Net net, there are these holes, spaced about 8" apart. I could use two about 16" a part and run a 1 1/2" x 3/16" bolt up through it. I could bore two corresponding holes in the table's edge and I have some registration pins. I'll use the table a little and see if it is worth it. In the meantime, I marked the grooves for the miter slots, making them a little over-size, routed them out and I was done.

Well, this has run on longer than I intended, so let's say that simply varnishing (varathane) is an area where I still have much to learn. I put on a coat with the brush I had handy and that turned out to be an error. It was a old nylon brush of dubious quality and, as I had taken longer on the outfeed table than I had expected, I was impatient. Lesson: use a foam brush and go SLOW. Otherwise it is bubble city. But a little extra work with the orbital sander and another coat and it was finally done! Whew. Here's what it looks like:



















So how many lessons did we learn? Let's see… wrong cut-list, wrong side up during cuts, wrong blade in the saw, 1/8" too high, improper location of the casters, casters on the wrong end, too hasty and wrong brush with varathane. Hmm, 7 errors on a simple cart. Not bad.  A good set of lessons! Good news is the new outfeed table works great.

And the second cart (for the planer) was built in half the time, with none of the errors above - amazingly enough. There are more carts a coming (drill press, clamps), but first, I want to get started on the workbench so it's time to start ripping up those 2×12s.

Next time: The Wall Goes Up!


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## GrandpaLen (Mar 6, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *First Project - Rolling Outfeed Cart*
> 
> So now I had the saw and the jointer set up. I went to a local lumberyard (Woodstock Lumber) and bought 14 16-foot 2×12s and 3 sheets of baltic birch plywood. The 2×12s I stickered and left in the middle of the garage.
> 
> ...


DrPuk,

Those are very nice roll around carts and stands you're building, should serve you well. 
We have all had those "Ah-ha!" moments during a build and sometimes you can't 
"unring that bell", in your case, you recovered remarkably well.

Two of my favorites quotes are;

"Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement".

" It's not so much how bad you screw up, but how well you can recover."

Work Safe and have Fun. - Len


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*Rippin' and Grippin'*

Well, the wall hasn't gone up yet - the start got postponed a day or so. And I had time to start ripping down the yellow pine 2×12s This proved interesting, so I thought I would post a short snippet about that. I ran into a frustrating problem so I will probably post this on the forum as well.

My plan is to build a big heavy Holtzapffel bench a la Chris Schwartz et al. Supposedly, yellow pine is a good candidate, strong, heavy and relatively cheap. I've never used it before as I am from the West Coast originally. It's widely available here in the Midwest so I figured that would be a good choice.

I bought the yellow pine a little over two months ago from a local lumberyard. Southern Yellow Pine #1. Bought a total of 14 16-foot 2×12s. With the help of one of the lumberyard workers , I picked through the bunk (which we had to open, stripping off the plastic) and chose the boards one by one, trying to get good, straight boards as free of knots as possible.

The lumberyard delivered the wood the next day and I stacked it in my garage , stickered with one-foot lengths of 1×2 furring. The garage has radiant heat in the floor and I kept the garage at 60F. I checked all the wood when I first stacked it with my moisture meter. Values were typically 8-12%, with a few at 6-7% and a few higher - one or two of them at 20%.

I rechecked them this past week and they were all down below 10%, many of them at 5-6%. I figured they were probably ready to be ripped. My plan was to cut them into 6-8 foot lengths, depending on knots, then rip them down to 4 1/2" widths. So I started crosscutting the 16-foot lengths down with my circular saw and that was when the first signs of potential problems arose. Most of the cuts weren't a big deal, but on some of them my circular saw started to bog down a tad. The saw is a fairly robust Milwaukee with a 24 tooth Freud rip blade so that seemed a little surprising, but I persevered.

But when I got to ripping them on the table saw I got some real surprises. My saw is a SawStop 1.75 HP cabinet saw which I equipped with a Freud LMT72 24 tooth rip blade. I bought the blade specifically because I was a little concerned about the difficulty I ran into simply cross-cutting the boards. I figured that ripping the long pine might be an issue with the 40-tooth blade that comes with the saw.

My worries were soon confirmed. Most of the boards I managed to rip, but I ran into a number of them - maybe as many as a third of them - where I simply couldn't rip them. Instead, I got part way through the board - usually no more than afoot or so and the board would start closing up so fast and tight that it pinched the blade, smoke would start coming off the blade and the blade would stall. Then it was a real hassle to get the dang board off the saw.

After a couple of these, I got more sensitive and as soon as the blade started to bog I would stop. When I checked the problem boards I noted that they tended to be heavier than the others, but surprisingly, they weren't measurably *wetter*. A couple of them were only 7% whereas some of the boards that I was able to rip were 8%.

And when I say they closed up, I ain't kidding, as you can see.










The top board in the photo is near the heart of the tree, but that wasn't the case with all of them by any means.

So I put the problem boards aside and continued on. I did finish ripping all the rest and now have a respectable pile of wood ready for the next step.










My biggest problem is that with bows, twists and knots, I am not sure I have enough for the whole bench and yet am not sanguine about being able to rip the rest. I don't want to wait a year to finish the bench. Well, have to take a week off for my real job and wait for the work on the new wall to be done, so I'll revisit it in a week or so.


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## oluf (Jan 29, 2010)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Rippin' and Grippin'*
> 
> Well, the wall hasn't gone up yet - the start got postponed a day or so. And I had time to start ripping down the yellow pine 2×12s This proved interesting, so I thought I would post a short snippet about that. I ran into a frustrating problem so I will probably post this on the forum as well.
> 
> ...


Rip your problem boards just under half the thickness. Turn them end for end and cut the same amount from the other side. Now raise your blade just a little and part the thin remaining strip. You can drive a wedge in the top half of the cut if you don't want the kerf to close on you. A cheep rip saw blade with some set to the teeth would also be a better choice. I use $11.00 Harbor freight blades for all my rough rip cutting. Beats those fancy high priced ones every time.


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Rippin' and Grippin'*
> 
> Well, the wall hasn't gone up yet - the start got postponed a day or so. And I had time to start ripping down the yellow pine 2×12s This proved interesting, so I thought I would post a short snippet about that. I ran into a frustrating problem so I will probably post this on the forum as well.
> 
> ...


Nils, Thanks for the feedback. I like the sound of the cut from each side then all the way through. I'll try that. I am using a rip blade, not the thin kerf that came with the saw. But given how much the wood was clamping down, I'm not sure that any amount of set would solve it. Your proposal sounds like it might work.


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## gfadvm (Jan 13, 2011)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Rippin' and Grippin'*
> 
> Well, the wall hasn't gone up yet - the start got postponed a day or so. And I had time to start ripping down the yellow pine 2×12s This proved interesting, so I thought I would post a short snippet about that. I ran into a frustrating problem so I will probably post this on the forum as well.
> 
> ...


I just drive a wedge into the kerf as soon as it starts to close and continue ripping. I get along well with the 24 tooth Freud Diablo blades from HD. The thinner kerf seems to rip easier than a full kerf especially in a lower HP saw like you have.


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*The Wall Goes Up!*

So, for a number of reasons, I decided to split our 4-car garage into two halves by putting a wall down the center. This has a number of advantages:


Sound insulation from the rest of the house
I can keep the shop air-conditioned without try to cool the whole garage
Gives me more space to hang stuff, including lumber
More electrical in the wall to make the shop more flexible

The downside, aside from the cost (which wasn't bad) was that it makes the remaining side a bit darker as the two windows are in the shop, but there are still windows in the garage door and the door in the back.

Here's a shot of the garage as a whole before the wall. You can see the pile of wood for the Holtzapffel workbench on the left and the materials that will be the wall in the foreground.










The floor has radiant heat so it was not possible to anchor the wall to the floor in the normal way. All we could do was glue it to the floor and drive big anchor bolts into the walls and ceiling.










Here's the framing of the wall going up. Nothing special except notice that three of the studs are triple 2×4s (glued and nailed together) for extra strength so I could hang the lumber rack on it.










Another shot of the framing, showing the electrical in place, including two 110v circuits (two outlets per quad box) as well as a dedicated 30 amp 100v circuit for the saw or planer and a 220v circuit for the jointer. Everything in the shop has to be mobile (since I will still park my car inside in the winter at least) and having flexibility of how to position stuff is key.










The finished wall and fire door.










The Lee Valley lumber rack. Starts around 4 feet off the floor so I can store sheet goods below it. Currently runs to almost 9 feet off the floor. I am going to add 2 more feet so it runs almost to the roof. Rack is lag-bolted with 3/8"x3" bolts to the studs. The rack isn't going anywhere.










And voila, the finished wall with the preliminary layout of the machines. Another cart is in the offing which will hold a bunch of drawers (Ikea special from 30 years ago) and have the drill press on it. That will live just behind the shop-vac you see. You can also see the Jet air-cleaner hanging from the ceiling. Not sure how effective it will be but better than nothing. Also note the AC hanging up on the back wall. You'll see a pile of clamps on the outfeed table - a wall-mounted clamp rack is this week's lunchtime task if I can fit in.










Two more shots of the back wall and the side wall. You can see the two windows. Where my 40-year-old Workmate is sitting is where the Holtzapffel will go. The ever-useful workmate will get a place of honor hanging somewhere - except when it's in use. What an investment that workmate was lo these many years! What I call the "machine" bench is on the right. My big machinist's vice that goes on it is MIA since I got to Illinois. May have to go buy a new one.



















And that's as far as I have gotten so far. Of course, I cleared out the "other side" so my wife can put her car back inside while mine still sits outside. Next step is to start jointing and planing the billets for the top of the bench. And of course there's lots of little stuff (clamp rack, dust separator, reinforcing the extension table legs on the table-saw and on and on….)


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## dbhost (Jul 20, 2009)

DrPuk2U said:


> *The Wall Goes Up!*
> 
> So, for a number of reasons, I decided to split our 4-car garage into two halves by putting a wall down the center. This has a number of advantages:
> 
> ...


If you shop is half of a four car garage, your two car half must be twice the size of my two car whole garage… You can actually see floor!


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## Bertha (Jan 10, 2011)

DrPuk2U said:


> *The Wall Goes Up!*
> 
> So, for a number of reasons, I decided to split our 4-car garage into two halves by putting a wall down the center. This has a number of advantages:
> 
> ...


Wow! What a great space! I don't know how you got such tall ceilings in a garage. That's really going to be a wonderful space to work in. Congrats!!!


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *The Wall Goes Up!*
> 
> So, for a number of reasons, I decided to split our 4-car garage into two halves by putting a wall down the center. This has a number of advantages:
> 
> ...


Ah, you can see the floor in those photos. All that workbench wood that was in "my wife's garage" is now in mine - taking part of the floor. The space is 19 feet wide and 22 feet long. I tried to convince my wife we could both park on her side so I could have the machines stationary. But after watching how she parts, I reconsidered… 

But, yes, it is a great space. Not sure why the builder built a garage with 11 foot ceilings, but I am happy with it!


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## Smitty_Cabinetshop (Mar 26, 2011)

DrPuk2U said:


> *The Wall Goes Up!*
> 
> So, for a number of reasons, I decided to split our 4-car garage into two halves by putting a wall down the center. This has a number of advantages:
> 
> ...


Ric, you simply must post that Workmate in the "Workamate of your dreams" thread here on LJs. Love it!

And the space you've created is great. Especially coveting your wall A/C unit; it's high on my list as summer approaches as I too built a partition wall last year to separate my woodworking area from the 'general population.' Congrats, and great post!


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## redryder (Nov 28, 2009)

DrPuk2U said:


> *The Wall Goes Up!*
> 
> So, for a number of reasons, I decided to split our 4-car garage into two halves by putting a wall down the center. This has a number of advantages:
> 
> ...


Heated floor….....that's gotta be nice.


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## NedB (Aug 21, 2008)

DrPuk2U said:


> *The Wall Goes Up!*
> 
> So, for a number of reasons, I decided to split our 4-car garage into two halves by putting a wall down the center. This has a number of advantages:
> 
> ...


Catching up on this blog series… one question… did you leave a door in the wall, or do you get in your shop only via the garage door? Thinking that you'll lose a lot of heat if you always have to enter via the big door.


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *The Wall Goes Up!*
> 
> So, for a number of reasons, I decided to split our 4-car garage into two halves by putting a wall down the center. This has a number of advantages:
> 
> ...


There is definitely a door. You can see it in the fourth photo above. 36" steel fire door. And the whole shop is insulated - which in Illinois in the summer is absolutely necessary. I do, occasionally open the garage door, but only rarely.


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*Bench Assemblies and Flattening the Top*

Like many other people putting together a shop and trying to work with wood, I wanted a good bench. I have a nice "machine" bench made of 3 laminated layers of 3/4" birch plywood 8' long on two tiers of metal drawers with a nice 6" machinist vise, but I needed to build a woodworking bench, as it would be useful and building it would be an excellent experience (how little I knew!)

So after reading innumerable articles, I decided I would build the Holtzapffel bench as popularized by Chris Schwarz. I adapted my approach from the Roubo bench in his Workbenches book as it used easily obtained (here in Illinois) Southern Yellow Pine and finessed cutting those huge tenons by leveraging the composite nature of the laminated yellow pine strips.

So I got a mess of yellow pine, a jointer, planer and table saw (see early blogs) and away I went. It went pretty well though I ran into some fun problems for a newbie including the amazing reactive yellow pine and the fact that a 16 foot piece of yellow pine that looked clean would have an amazing number of knots. But I persevered and managed to cut enough 7 foot billets for the top. I then jointed them on two sides, planed and ripped the 20 strips needed for the top. That was a bit of a journey as I had never used a jointer or planer before and there are subtleties to their tuning and operation that, while I read extensively, I learned only through trial and error.

But I eventually got them milled, two or four at a time, glued up and clamped



















And glued up the assemblies and the super assemblies. Eventually, I had an entire top.










I supposed if I was very skilled the sub-assemblies and assemblies would have been clean, flat and aligned so the resulting top would be flat and aligned. Such as not the case with me…  Instead, the various elements of the assemblies were all a LITTLE off- just a 1/32" or 1/16" here and there, but the net net was that the top wasn't flat. I didn't think it would work to try and build up the frame and attach the top with it not flat. So I needed to flatten the top - and the bottom for that matter, since that is where the frame would actually be attached.

Seemed like I had two choices, the traditional, organic method with winding sticks and a plane, or the router/sled method. While I sure want to learn how to use a plane properly, trying to flatten a 24×72" slab with an old plane and my meager (non-existent) skills sounded was more than a little daunting. I decided therefore to try the sled technique, as outlined by Marc Spagnuolo on the Wood Whisperer site.

So I took 2 eight-foot lengths of 2×6, flattened and jointed them, built the sled and flattened the top a la Spagnuolo.



















It worked pretty well, but there were more than a couple of gotchas:

As the the top was only a slab, setting and keeping the rails for the sled to ride on was tricky
Jointing 2 lengths of yellow pine 8 feet long completely flat was a challenge
Setting the router to JUST the right depth so it was deep enough but not so deep as to waste wood was not easy (read: took more than one try)
Controlling the router back and forth (and back and forth and back and forth and …) was not only tedious but tiring and a bit of a challenge
In particular, when the router is pulled back towards the operator it is not going in the "right" direction so it tries to climb and pulls toward the operator. This is hard to overcome, especially for those with no experience with this step

I got the job done, but it was a learning experience. If was to do it again, here are the parts I would change:

Buy two 8 foot lengths of extruded aluminum and screw these to the 8 foot lengths of pine to p provide a perfectly flat, smooth surface for the sled to ride on. Attach them on the outside of the pine, just extending up enough to provide the riding rail while still keeping the pine as the sacrificial edge for the router to bite into
Add a cleat at each end of the sled so that it doesn't shift and is easy to mooch along the rails
Accept that it is a very slow process and that the router needs to come all the way towards the operator BEFORE shifting laterally for the next pass. That way, the climbing part is more or less eliminated, but it means that shifting the sled is a little more awkward.

It's one one the amusing parts of this journey is that after each step in building the shop, the bench, etc. I look back and say to myself "Aha, NOW I see how I should have done this!" Come to think of it, that's how writing software (which I do for a living) tends to work as well…


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## dbhost (Jul 20, 2009)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Bench Assemblies and Flattening the Top*
> 
> Like many other people putting together a shop and trying to work with wood, I wanted a good bench. I have a nice "machine" bench made of 3 laminated layers of 3/4" birch plywood 8' long on two tiers of metal drawers with a nice 6" machinist vise, but I needed to build a woodworking bench, as it would be useful and building it would be an excellent experience (how little I knew!)
> 
> ...


Looking good so far! Bet that's going to make a nice top!


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*Brush Your Teeth!*

Been quiet for a while. Quite busy with traveling and some other non-wood activities. But I haven't been idle. Made some progress on shop tasks as well as some honey-dos outside the shop. Continued working on my Holtzapffel bench - learning a lot about how to use the tools I've got. I have completed the top, legs and stretchers - or least roughly. A little flattening and trimming to do, but I am thinking of that as part of assembling the frame. I'll get to that as soon as I get home, but at present I am on the road again, so have to content myself with virtual woodworking, i.e. Reading about other folks work and planning what I'll do next.

Here's a shot of the current state of the nation:










However, I thought I would share one new lesson that I recently learned: Brush your teeth! Especially if you eat southern yellow pine.

In an earlier blog, I explained that ripping the yellow pine that I got for the bench was proving to be a challenge as the wood was very reactive. Some of it could be ripped but others proved to be a bear. Got a great tip from Nils in Michigan (thanks Nils!) about ripping it halfway through, flipping it over and ripping it the rest of the way from the other side. That worked, but even then it was rather an experience. I would be most of the way through the second rip and the board would split lengthwise more or less along the rip line. And I mean split explosively, like C-R-A-A-ACK! A little unnerving to be honest, but I got through it.

However, once through that I moved on to cutting the billets down to build up the top then legs and stretchers, jointing, planing and clamping. Nothing earth-shattering. But towards the end our son came to visit for the 4th of July. He is a general contractor and an extremely good carpenter and electrician, very skilled and experienced in the shop. He gave me a number of tips which were quite useful to a newbie like myself.

He watched me ripping some of the boards for the leg and was frowning. The saw would start ripping through the board but towards the end it would start bogging down. "Something wrong here", he said. "Shouldn't be anything like that hard. This saw should chew through this like butter."

He examined the saw and said, "There are three problems here. First, this blade that came with the SawStop isn't very good in the first place and now it's bent. Just a tiny bit, but some of the teeth are a little bent."

This probably occurred when I had all the problems with ripping the yellow pine and it grabbing the blade.

"But the other problem you have here is that the blade is dirty. It's all gummed up with pine tar."

He showed me that if you looked really close at the teeth and the gaps between them there were tiny deposits of tar from the yellow pine. Pretty small, but easy to see if you looked close.

So I got a small brass brush and some Zep and spent the better part of an hour scrubbing both the crosscut blade and my Freud rip blade. After that was all done, I re-mounted the blade and Mirabile Dictu! The saw did chew through the wood like butter. What a difference!

I felt kind of dumb - I should have thought to clean the blade but didn't realize it would have such a significant impact. Apparently, the tar wouldn't affect the cut too much initially, but as the blade heated - exacerbated by the drag of the tar - the tar would get hot and sticky, causing more drag and more heat and on and on.

This is normal for any wood, but the yellow pine is so pitchy that it accumulates much faster than with nice kiln-dried oak and maple. As I said, I should have thought of this myself, but to be honest, in all the blogs and stories by Chris Schwarz and others about using yellow pine and how wet it might be, etc. nobody mentioned the accumulation of pine tar and how it has to be cleaned out frequently. So another lesson for the newbie and another shop maintenance task added to the list…


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## GrandpaLen (Mar 6, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Brush Your Teeth!*
> 
> Been quiet for a while. Quite busy with traveling and some other non-wood activities. But I haven't been idle. Made some progress on shop tasks as well as some honey-dos outside the shop. Continued working on my Holtzapffel bench - learning a lot about how to use the tools I've got. I have completed the top, legs and stretchers - or least roughly. A little flattening and trimming to do, but I am thinking of that as part of assembling the frame. I'll get to that as soon as I get home, but at present I am on the road again, so have to content myself with virtual woodworking, i.e. Reading about other folks work and planning what I'll do next.
> 
> ...


Ric,

That's going to be a Great Bench.

Fathers teaching sons is very rewarding.

Sons teaching fathers is priceless, in retrospect. 

Work Safely and have Fun. - Grandpa Len.


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## RaggedKerf (Aug 5, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Brush Your Teeth!*
> 
> Been quiet for a while. Quite busy with traveling and some other non-wood activities. But I haven't been idle. Made some progress on shop tasks as well as some honey-dos outside the shop. Continued working on my Holtzapffel bench - learning a lot about how to use the tools I've got. I have completed the top, legs and stretchers - or least roughly. A little flattening and trimming to do, but I am thinking of that as part of assembling the frame. I'll get to that as soon as I get home, but at present I am on the road again, so have to content myself with virtual woodworking, i.e. Reading about other folks work and planning what I'll do next.
> 
> ...


Ric,
Thoroughly enjoying reading about your progress! Looks like a sweet bench in the works. I only hope mine looks half as good as yours at this point. I will be using hand tools and a circular saw instead of stationary tools, so we'll see. Looking forward to your next entry!


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*A Tale told by an Idiot*

It was certainly full of sound and fury for about 15 minutes, but perhaps it signifies something - like me learning yet another lesson… 

I spent most of the summer since July 4th away from home - in sunny San Jose, California. No, not a vacation, but working away on software, as usual. (Not that I didn't enjoy the weather which was its usual monotonous perfection, but I hate living in a hotel). I finally am back home and taking a few days off. I swore I would get out into the shop and get that bench going. Perhaps not finished, but well on its way.

So I spent the last few days waling away on the legs and stretchers, getting them just right - plumb and square. Then I sharpened my chisels and started hacking the mortises out. I am following Chris Schwarz' Roubo which uses laminated 1.25" strips for the top and the legs and stretchers. Then, by cutting them just so, instant tenons! Works well, though in retrospect I should have been even more careful to keep the "tenon" pieces at 1.26-1.28". This is because I bored out the mortises with a 1.25" Forstner so the tenons that snuck under 1.25 (like 1.23") were just a little undersized. Not a big deal, but I would be more careful if I did it again.



















Did I mention being careful? Well, I bored out all the mortises, then started whacking with the chisel. Clearly, I have more practice to do but I got them all done. All but one. And while testing that one in the mortise, I pulled too abruptly on the stretcher and it zoomed back towards me and hit me a right bonk on the nose. Blood immediately dripping everywhere. Just a small cut on my nose but it's unlikely to improve my looks. At first I thought I might have broken my nose, but it was much more minor than that. Oh well, first shop accident. If that's the worst I have, I'll be very fortunate.

Then today, ah today. Assembly day! Everything was ready! I laid out all I needed; glue, wet rags, sharpened oak dowels, mallet, drawbore pin.










And so I began. All the legs and stretchers were labeled: LR, LF, RR, RF. How could I screw it up? How the gods must have laughed.

I glued up and fitted the first two joints - the short stretcher between the front and back legs. Not perfect, but for a newbie amateur, not bad. I was pleased. Fist pumps and the whole nine yards. I set the first pair of legs and stretcher on the floor and admired it. I then turned to the second. It went just as well and soon I was wiping up the last of the glue and thinking I'd give them a couple of hours to set then do the long stretchers.

I was pleased, checking the fit and angles - everything square and plumb, wow! Then I thought I would check the width top and bottom to see if it was plumb top to bottom. First set of legs, 23 5/8", as expected (supposed to be 23 3/4 originally, but I made the short stretchers a hair short - no big deal). Checked the second pair of legs. What the hay? 23 1/4" ??! How can this be? 3/8" off? Can't be. Stepped back and thought about it, looked again and a horror ran through me.

I had put the stretchers in the wrong mortises on the first pair! The tenons on the tops should have been 90 degrees to the stretcher, but they were parallel! I had assembled it backwards. Dear God in heaven! It was drawbored and glued. All done! And it had been drying for over 10 minutes! Did I say sound and fury? OMG. What to do? Only thing to do, take it apart, like right now!

But how? I quickly sawed off the protruding pieces of the oak dowels, then grabbed my drill and a 1/4" bit and drilled out all four of the dowels, then went to a 3/8" and drilled it out again. Banged against the joint with a 12 oz dead blow hammer. Nothing. Again and again. Nothing. Nice joint, Ric! Strong! So I grabbed a couple of my big bar clamps, which one is supposed to be able to invert and use as stretchers. Never tried it before, but no time like the present! I'm yanking on those suckers like there is no tomorrow, pieces flying all over the shop (meanwhile the oldies station on the radio is playing 'The Last Kiss' by J. Frank Wilson and the Cavaliers - who asked for that?). I get the clamps in and manage to start getting some pressure and Mirabile Dictu! The joint starts coming apart and then I have it off.










One off, but now what? I can't use the clamp trick again because there is nothing to push against. I quickly slam the leg down on the bench top (the bench isn't done and I'm already using it a lot!). I put two more clamps on the stretcher, clamping it very tight to the bench. Then I grab my 5 pound "single jack" (mini-sledge) a piece of pine scrap and start pounding on the leg. One, two, three, four times - hard! And the joint begins to come apart. Again and again and the joint comes free!










Hallelujah! Of course, I have now mangled the joint, at least somewhat, but at least I am not totally screwed. I clean up all the glue, carefully remove the mangled remnants of the dowels and look it over. I actually all looks fairly good. The holes in the stretcher are kind of mangled, so the "draw boring" isn't going to be too effective, but oh well, some extra glue and a clamp should make it usable. Maybe an extra dowel into each tenon. I clean it up a little more, then, armed with 4 new dowels, I repeat the assembly - this time putting the stretchers' tenons in the right mortises… ;-)










The Lesson: Use lots of clear and unambiguous labels! Check everything twice! Think!

So the assembly was more exciting than I intended, but I and the bench seem to have survived. I'll go have lunch now and let it dry for a couple of hours, then try to finish the assembly. Phew!


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## sb194 (Feb 19, 2010)

DrPuk2U said:


> *A Tale told by an Idiot*
> 
> It was certainly full of sound and fury for about 15 minutes, but perhaps it signifies something - like me learning yet another lesson…
> 
> ...


Ric, we have all had that "oh @*&!" moment at one time or another. Glad you were able to get them apart without to much damage. It is looking good, and I can't wait to see it finished.

Sean


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## FirehouseWoodworking (Jun 9, 2009)

DrPuk2U said:


> *A Tale told by an Idiot*
> 
> It was certainly full of sound and fury for about 15 minutes, but perhaps it signifies something - like me learning yet another lesson…
> 
> ...


I loved the title and enjoyed the blog. An remember, there has only ever been one PERFECT CARPENTER and he has long ago left this earth! We've all been there.

Cheers!


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## BTimmons (Aug 6, 2011)

DrPuk2U said:


> *A Tale told by an Idiot*
> 
> It was certainly full of sound and fury for about 15 minutes, but perhaps it signifies something - like me learning yet another lesson…
> 
> ...


The whole time you described the frantic dis-assembly, I had "Yakkety Sax" playing in my head. As for drawing blood in the shop, I'm no stranger to that.


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## 47phord (Apr 10, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *A Tale told by an Idiot*
> 
> It was certainly full of sound and fury for about 15 minutes, but perhaps it signifies something - like me learning yet another lesson…
> 
> ...


You made that same newbie mistake I have done (more than once, sad to say): Dry fit first, THEN smear on the glue! Glad you were able to salvage it, the last time I pulled that boner I didn't notice until the glue had dried; can you say DO OVER? Luckily it was cheap pine that I ruined and not QS oak, but still…


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *A Tale told by an Idiot*
> 
> It was certainly full of sound and fury for about 15 minutes, but perhaps it signifies something - like me learning yet another lesson…
> 
> ...


Thanks for the positive feedback folks!

Well, just to close it out, it all worked out pretty well.










Everything is true and square (amazing!). Now I just have hoist that big boy up onto the top on its sawhorses and make some REALLY big mortises.


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## robdem (Apr 7, 2011)

DrPuk2U said:


> *A Tale told by an Idiot*
> 
> It was certainly full of sound and fury for about 15 minutes, but perhaps it signifies something - like me learning yet another lesson…
> 
> ...


Nice start to the bench looks good . Don't worry there will more moments like this in the shop thats how we all learn and learn from our mistakes.


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*On Yer Feet!*

Well, it's been a long haul, but I can (sort of) see the light at the end of the tunnel for my workbench. After the near-fiasco with the assembly of the frame, I turned to the humongous leg mortises.

First step was to hoist the assembled legs and stretchers up onto the inverted top to mark the mortises. This was not too difficult even though the assembly must weigh 80-90 pounds. A little grunting and angling saved my back and got it up there. Positioned it carefully, clamped it down and marked it.










Then to hog out the mortises. The Schwarz suggested drilling it out with a brace and bit using a 3/4" bit. What was he thinking? In the first place, the brace and bit I have are crappy (the chuck won't tighten worth a dang and it wobbles). But more importantly that's a LOT of 3/4" holes. Given that the mortise is 2.5×5", that would have been *96* holes.










I did the first hole with a brace and bit with a 3/4" auger bit, but then switched to a corded drill with a 3/4" Forstner bit. Then I thought, why the heck aren't I using a 1.25" bit? Switched to that and raced throughout the other three.



















Then it was time to chop them out. Several lessons there (mangled chisel post), mainly don't buy cheap tools. Ironically, the FatMax Stanley chisels did the job and were about the same price as the Buck chisels: Message: Buck products are crap.

But I learned more about sharpening, a bit more about mortises and got the job done. And the frame fit into the top nicely on the second fitting. A couple of the fits could have been a little tighter, but I figure I was just allowing for seasonal wood movement, eh? 










Then I relatively quickly routed the deadman's slot in the top (I kept thinking I would forget in my excitement about getting the top on and left myself little reminders so I wouldn't forget)



















Then I drilled the holes for the pegs (6" deep). I did NOT drawbore the legs into the top for two reasons:

I figured it was overkill as that top is not going to pop off the legs
I was a little uncertain of my ability to mark the point for the drawbore then bore the hole through the tenon perfectly straight with the result to that the "draw" might be the wrong way or worse

So I just drilled them straight through and whanged the dowels in. I didn't glue them either, as suggested by the Schwarz.



















Then I was done! Woohoo! Great celebration, break out a cold one and all that. But… as mentioned previously I live in a semi-rural area with few neighbors and most of them elderly. So I had to wait three days - three days! - til my one able bodied neighbor was around to help me lower that 200+ pound monster onto the floor.

Et voila!



















Now, onto mounting the vises, face and end. Drilling the dog holes, apply a finish and… Well, I'll get there.


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## sb194 (Feb 19, 2010)

DrPuk2U said:


> *On Yer Feet!*
> 
> Well, it's been a long haul, but I can (sort of) see the light at the end of the tunnel for my workbench. After the near-fiasco with the assembly of the frame, I turned to the humongous leg mortises.
> 
> ...


Ric, it is looking great. Can't wait to see it finished.

Sean


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## blockhead (May 5, 2009)

DrPuk2U said:


> *On Yer Feet!*
> 
> Well, it's been a long haul, but I can (sort of) see the light at the end of the tunnel for my workbench. After the near-fiasco with the assembly of the frame, I turned to the humongous leg mortises.
> 
> ...


Lookin' real good, Ric. Great work


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*Clamp Rack*

I haven't been blogging much lately - too busy. But I have made progress on the shop as you will see if you read this and the next blog

I got tired of tripping over my clamps and having them all over the shop. I saw a couple of clamp racks on the web that looked good. Initially, I was going to go with one that was very simple but used a fair amount of wall space. Then I saw one that Stumpy Nubs created. I thought the general idea was good, so I copied his. Actually, I bought the plans for his but there was some sort of delay in sending me the plans so by the time I got them I had already built mine - twice.

The primary change I made was to use 3/4" plywood instead of pine which allowed me to skip all the support members. The one tricky part was making all those cuts for the slots for the bars of the clamps. I remembered seeing a trick someone used to repeat a pattern and I used that. I just drilled a hole in my cross-cut sled whose distance from the blade was the distance from one side of a gap to the same edge on the next gap. Then I just had to cut the first cut in the right place, put the drill bit in the hole I had drilled and kept shifting the board so the drill acted as a template-positioner in the slot just cut. Worked great and was quick.










I don't have a bandsaw so I had to do this on the table saw, cut most of the slot, then drilled the end of the slot with a 1/2" Forstner bit. Worked pretty well, but would have been neater with a bandsaw…










Typical of my motto, when I finished and assembled the clamp racks I realized that I had made them significantly deeper than they needed to be, 7" instead of 4 1/2". So I just cut the boxes down in size. Much better. THEN I realized that I hadn't allowed for the thickness of the top and bottom pieces on the box and the boxes were about 5/8" taller than my clamps. Oops. Disassemble the boxes again and a quick trip tp the tablesaw and fixed.

Then I created a pattern for the hinges and used a pattern-template bit to rout out the hinges. Assembled the whole shebang and wiped some varathane on it and hung it with a French cleat. I made the spacer at the bottom against the wall 1/4" thicker than the cleat so it leans back a tad and keeps the doors closed.

Looks good, if I do say so myself and works great.


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## Peteyb (May 28, 2011)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Clamp Rack*
> 
> I haven't been blogging much lately - too busy. But I have made progress on the shop as you will see if you read this and the next blog
> 
> ...


Good job! I have been needing to build one of these. Can you give some dimensions.


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## Grumpymike (Jan 23, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Clamp Rack*
> 
> I haven't been blogging much lately - too busy. But I have made progress on the shop as you will see if you read this and the next blog
> 
> ...


When I built mine, I followed the Stumpy Idea and cut it out of pine … with all of the support pieces … I made mine to hold 15 clamps to each box, it's a bit heavy and the BORG pine twisted and warped something awful.
Ever try to make a square box out of propellers?? Well the Smallest door sags, but when I build the new shop (in 2013) I will redo this using plywood as you did.
Looks like your shop is comming along very well.


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## whitebeast88 (May 27, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Clamp Rack*
> 
> I haven't been blogging much lately - too busy. But I have made progress on the shop as you will see if you read this and the next blog
> 
> ...


excellent job


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*Holtzapfffel End Game*

Well, it took 6 months from the time I first bought the yellow pine, but I am glad to say that the bench is finally done.

I could write a bunch about all the mistakes I made, stuff I learned, etc., but I won't bore you with all that. Just a few quick comments.

True to form, I made some silly mistakes, like relying on the dimensions in the Chris Schwarz article and forgetting that his legs were narrower than mine so this nicely cut inset for the end-vise was in the wrong place. Not hard to fix.










In retrospect, I should have left drilling the dog holes to the very end when BOTH vises were installed so they were all laid out with both vises in mind. But it all came out well enough.










I made the chop for the end-vise out of some maple I had around. But for the face vise I bought a beautiful piece of 6/4 hard maple. And is it hard! What a bear to work with…










I worked out a careful series of steps to ensure that all the holes for mounting the end-blocks, drill the holes for the vise screws and all that would come out right. And, amazingly, it did. Unfortunately the casting of one of the the thrust-plates from Lee Valley was not machined right and I ended up having to shim it to get the mechanics right. Lee Valley is sending me a new one, but now it means I have to disassemble it to install the new one….

But I did get both vises installed and they work great. The end-vise was really great when I was making the planks for the shelf. I don't have a router table yet, but I just popped them into the dogs with the quick-release vise and rabbeted them lickety-split.










And so it was finally done! A couple of coats of Danish Oil et voila!










Final touch of adding the deadman.










So retrospective thoughts? What would I have changed? Hmm,


If I made another bench, I wouldn't use Southern Yellow Pine. Too soft. But OTOH, if I had used maple or beech it would have cost a LOT more and been much harder for a newbie to work with. So it's fine.
I made the bench 6 feet long. Again, my next bench would be 8 feet but that too would have made it significantly harder too so I'll live with it.
I would have made sure the guys laying the floor in my garage made it perfectly level. The bench itself is, as far as I can tell, true and square, but the floor isn't quite, so I have to have a shim under one foot. Darn it!

But I've learned a lot. Now to actually build a piece of furniture….


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## PurpLev (May 30, 2008)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Holtzapfffel End Game*
> 
> Well, it took 6 months from the time I first bought the yellow pine, but I am glad to say that the bench is finally done.
> 
> ...


sweet build.

As far as the floor goes- even if it was made dead flat, it could still have dropped after a while (drying/subfloor/ground movement). so don't sweat it - just shim the bench so that the top is level and more importantly - stable.


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## brian310207 (Aug 22, 2011)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Holtzapfffel End Game*
> 
> Well, it took 6 months from the time I first bought the yellow pine, but I am glad to say that the bench is finally done.
> 
> ...


Well done.


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

*Up-grading the Dust Collection*

When I first set up my shop, I bought a Delta 50-760 DC. It works well enough, but when jointing and planing a lot of wood the plastic bag fills up fairly rapidly and it is a PAIN to take off, empty and then re-install. Once you get the hang of it, the process is easier but it's never easy and it almost inevitably ends up with a bunch of saw dust all over.

So I decide to invest in a Oneida Super Dust Deputy. By the time I got it, I had realized that the fact that the Delta was mobile was no real advantage. This is a more general realization I had about my shop layout. I made sure everything (except the lumber rack ;-) was mobile, thinking that would give me a lot of flexibility. In fact that flexibility wasn't needed - what was needed was that the various items *could* be moved into POSITION because there were standard configurations of the tables, machines, etc. that I need to be able to have. But mobility per se wasn't required. And this included the DC.

So I decided to de-mobilize the DC and mount it on the wall. This would also allow me to make it higher and put the Dust Deputy underneath it. So I made a french-cleated panel and mounted 2 large heavy arms on the panel. The DC mounted easily onto the arms and I was in business. The top of the 1 micron bag touches the guide rail for the garage door but doesn't affect the functioning of the door or the DC so that's cool.

I then took the 5" wye that came with the DC and mounted two Lee Valley aluminum blast gates on it and I was in business. Here's what the result looked like:










The problem with that was that the whole thing was unsteady and hence hard to switch the 4" hoses on and off the blast gates. So I looked at it again and came up with a new design. This consisted of mounting another french cleated panel to the right of the Dust Deputy. On that panel I mounted a blast gate manifold built from PVC connectors . Turns out that the 4" ID Wye in PVC (Schedule 40) has a 5" outside diameter - perfect to mate with the Dust Deputy's input. And the 4" PVC (schedule 40) pipe has an OD of 4.5" but an ID of 3.98" - a near-perfect match for 4" Lee Valley blast gates.

So here's how I constructed the blast gate manifold:

First I glued up the fittings together. Note that one end hooks to the Dust Deputy's input. The other end is a standard 4" cap. But there is a 4" pipe that is long enough that the cap can be cut off and the pipe extended for DC use elsewhere in the shop (like my bandsaw when I get it…).










I used 2" PVC pipe sawn in half to create "feet" for the manifold so it was very solid when mounted on the panel.










The blast gates were made so they could be mounted so I created mounts with 1/2" MDF. I cut the holes with a jigsaw but in retrospect I should have bought a 4" circle cutter. Just neater and a better fit.










The only real flaw of the blast gates is that they have these useless screws to hold the gate in place. However, the screw's position is such that it is almost impossible to get a hose on onto the flange. Worse, you can't mount the gate onto a flat surface due to the screw's protrusion. So I just sawed it off.










To hold the manifold on the panel I drilled 6 holes through the panel and ran 6" hose clamps around the manifold and the back of the panel. Had to recess the clamp so the french cleat sat properly. But when all cranked down the manifold is held to the panel with great force.










The resulting manifold and panel.










I then mounted the panel with manifold on the wall. It tended to slide on the cleat when fastening and unfastening the hoses, so I ran a pair of 4" lag bolts through the bottom of the panel and into a stud. The result is solid as a rock.










I then hooked up the manifold to the Dust Deputy. One of the gates goes to my jointer, which sits unmoving for the most of the time. Then I switch the hose from my planer or tablesaw as needed to the other blast gate. Since the planer and table saw have to move around to let me park my car in the garage when it snows, there's no need to have them hooked up semi-permanently.










BTW, the blast gate sliders have enough friction such that they almost stay in place without help, so I don't need the useless set- screws. I just use a clothespin clipped to the closed gate to ensure the slider doesn't move.

So it's all done and working great. However, it does take up more wall and floor-level space than I would like, but that's OK. The next DC improvement will be to move the DC and Deputy to the other side of the wall, running the input to the Dust Deputy right through the wall using 4" PVC which will mate directly to the manifold. That will save space as well as reducing the noise from the DC. As the DC and the manifold are mounted by french cleats it is an easy process. And I can raise the DC higher (the garage has 11' ceilings) and the blast gate too freeing up more space at floor level.


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## pintodeluxe (Sep 12, 2010)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Up-grading the Dust Collection*
> 
> When I first set up my shop, I bought a Delta 50-760 DC. It works well enough, but when jointing and planing a lot of wood the plastic bag fills up fairly rapidly and it is a PAIN to take off, empty and then re-install. Once you get the hang of it, the process is easier but it's never easy and it almost inevitably ends up with a bunch of saw dust all over.
> 
> ...


Looks like a good setup. Is that a 1 hp dc? I have a Jet 1 hp and have been reluctant to add a dust deputy for fear the small motor wouldn't handle the increased volume in the system. 
How does it work compared to the stock arrangement?


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## Cory (Jan 14, 2009)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Up-grading the Dust Collection*
> 
> When I first set up my shop, I bought a Delta 50-760 DC. It works well enough, but when jointing and planing a lot of wood the plastic bag fills up fairly rapidly and it is a PAIN to take off, empty and then re-install. Once you get the hang of it, the process is easier but it's never easy and it almost inevitably ends up with a bunch of saw dust all over.
> 
> ...


Nicely done. I've thought about doing something similar with my HFDC. This is excellent inspiration.


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## DrPuk2U (Feb 15, 2012)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Up-grading the Dust Collection*
> 
> When I first set up my shop, I bought a Delta 50-760 DC. It works well enough, but when jointing and planing a lot of wood the plastic bag fills up fairly rapidly and it is a PAIN to take off, empty and then re-install. Once you get the hang of it, the process is easier but it's never easy and it almost inevitably ends up with a bunch of saw dust all over.
> 
> ...


The Delta is actually 1.5 HP. I haven't pushed it really hard like I did when I built my bench and was planing and jointing like made. However, in the use over the past couple of weeks it seems to work well and without any notable strain. I'm hopefully starting a new project (a entry hall bench) soon so we shall see.


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## NormG (Mar 5, 2010)

DrPuk2U said:


> *Up-grading the Dust Collection*
> 
> When I first set up my shop, I bought a Delta 50-760 DC. It works well enough, but when jointing and planing a lot of wood the plastic bag fills up fairly rapidly and it is a PAIN to take off, empty and then re-install. Once you get the hang of it, the process is easier but it's never easy and it almost inevitably ends up with a bunch of saw dust all over.
> 
> ...


Great way to solve a problem


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