Sawdust Is Life

Another Chair Idea…

Jeremiah — Fri, 17 May 2013 04:26:49 +0000

Just a quick sketch of a chair idea I had today. Canvas seat suspended between 3/4″ steel shafts. Bent lam sides, probably ash.

Christmas in April – Festool Domino 500 Q-Plus

Jeremiah — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 16:56:56 +0000

If you follow on Facebook or Twitter, you undoubtedly know that I won one of the random drawings Festool did a couple weeks ago for $750 in Festool bucks. I decided to use that towards the purchase of a Domino 500. I’ve wanted one for years but the price kept holding me back. Well, only having to pay 1/6 of retail I could swallow and the UPS man dropped it off today. This video is just a quick unboxing of the tool. When I get a little more time to play with it, I’ll probably do another video – even though there are already about a thousand videos showing the Domino basics

A Little About Festool Sanders…

Jeremiah — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 07:12:29 +0000

Just a quick little video I did for a Festool contest…

WIA Pasadena 2012 – Who wants to go to Sam Maloof’s shop?

Jeremiah — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 19:01:25 +0000

I bought my ticket for the Pasadena Woodworking in America conference a couple weeks ago. As I was planning my drive out and some of the other things I want to see while I’m out there, I discovered that the Maloof estate is just 45 minutes from the Pasadena convention center. I checked the Maloof Foundation’s website and the have docent-led tours Thursday and Saturday afternoons. With all the classes I have scheduled for Saturday, Thursday is the only real option for me to take a tour of this place.

Yesterday I emailed the Maloof staff to inquire about the tour and they said tours are typically done at 1, 2, & 3pm Thursdays and Friday for $10 per person but if you have a group of 10 or more, you can get a custom tour at a different time for $15 dollars a person. I’d like to put together a group tour for anyone that can get to Pasadena a day before the conference. Maybe we can carpool for those that are flying in. I’ll be driving to the conference and I will have room for 2-3 people in my car.

If you’d be interested in this, let me know! jeremiah at sawdustislife.com or sandflea at gmail.com.

Woodworking in America 2012 – Pasadena

Jeremiah — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 04:10:31 +0000

Ever since Popular Woodworking announced the first Woodworking In America conference I’ve wanted to go but something always got in the way. Either I couldn’t get the time away from school or work, or my budget didn’t cooperate – there was always something.

Well, fast-forward to this year. This time around there will be a WIA conference within reasonable driving distance of my home in Utah (about 11 hours according to Google Maps). Also, I started a new job about a month ago with a more flexible work schedule and a little better pay. These all came together to make it finally make it work. So earlier this evening I registered. I struggled for a while trying to decide which classes I’ll be attending. I’m still not completely happy with my class schedule. I kinda wish Sunday would be a full day; then I could take all the classes I want.

As it stands, this will be my schedule:

Friday, October 12

9:30 – 11:00 The Rake’s Progress – Roy Underhill
11:00 – 12:30 Make Your Own Simple Hand Tools – Yeung Chan
2:00 – 3:30 Carving an Acanthus Leaf – Mary May
4:00 – 5:30 Bentwood Lamination – David Marks

Saturday, October 13

9:00 – 10:30 Dovetails from Philly to Bermuda – Charles Bender
11:00 – 12:30 Classic Joints with Power Tools – Yeung Chan
1:00 – 2:30 Arts & Crafts Details – Robert Lang
4:00 – 5:30 Double-Bevel Marquetry – David Marks

Sunday, October 14

9:30 – 11:00 Build a Sawbench in an Hour – Chris Schwarz
11:30 – 1:00 The Furniture Style With No Name – Chris Schwarz

It’s not a perfect schedule, I’d like more time to wander around the marketplace and I’d like to get a class with Glen Huey & Adam Cherubini. I may end up splitting time between a couple classes, I dunno. We’ll see.

I’m also thinking about trying to visit the Sam Maloof estate. I’ll hit the road right after work on Wednesday. I’ll probably stay the night in Mesquite, NV and then drive the rest of the way early the next morning with the goal of checking into my hotel in Pasadena around 1:00pm. From there I want to head up to the Maloof place. According to their site, they have tours Thursdays and Saturdays, but since I’ll be in classes all day Saturday, Thursday is really the only option. I don’t know if that includes being able to see the shop or not, I imagine there may be some insurance issues with that. Can’t hurt to ask though.

Sunday afternoon, after the last class with The Schwarz I’ve got a friend to visit near LA and then high tail it back to Utah for work Tuesday.

I’m thinking about filming the journey and putting together some sort of summary video at the end. We’ll see. Are you going to WIA WEST? If so, lemme know. I’d like to meet up with as many of my online shop mates as I can while I’m there.

Making a Retirement Boat Paddle – Part 1

Jeremiah — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 06:25:08 +0000

In a lot of military units there are traditions of preparing a piece of gear commonly used in their specialty as a gift for a departing member. In the Marine Corps Force Reconnaissance community, the traditional gift is a boat paddle that is then decorated with the rank and ribbons of the departing Marine and there is usually some sort of plaque affixed to the blade of the paddle.
I spent about 9 years in the Marine Corps Reserves, so I feel like I understand the sentiment that goes into one of these. I have an uncle currently serving in the Marines (we’re very close in age) as a jump instructor and he spent many years in the Force Reconnaissance community and most of the Marines he works with came from Force Recon. One of the Marines he works with is getting ready to retire in a few months.
Normally, when one of these paddles is prepared, the maker just gets a nice maple or ash paddle from a boating store and goes to work. In this case, since I was a Marine and I fancy myself a something of a woodworker, my uncle asked me to make the paddle (this is our third collaboration for a project like this).

I find the making of paddles to be a very enjoyable process. Since it’s mostly for decorative purposes, there isn’t really a right or wrong species to use. With these Marine paddles I like to make a lamination of bloodwood and yellowheart because the Marine Corps colors are red and gold. Usually I just go with one strip about 1/2″ wide of one species and surround it on either side with a thinner strip of the other species (maybe 1/4″ or so). This time I wanted to dress it up a little more so I made several strips of both species and various thicknesses. This lamination is then surrounded with some other species. Last time I used birds eye maple. This time I’m going with walnut that is about half heartwood and half sapwood which I think will make for an interesting look.

At this point, the whole thing has been glued and clamped and needs to be cleaned up. While I let that finish drying, I next need to get the template ready. The plan for that is to use some 1/2 MDF, mark out the required dimensions, finesse the outline with some French curves and then cut it out with the tracksaw and bandsaw and then clean it up on the spindle sander.

Once the template is complete I’m going to attach it to the blank with double stick tape, cut the majority of the waste with the band saw and then use the router table with a bearing-guided straight bit to get it really close to the shape of the template. Once that is done, I’ll go after it with my Festool RAS sander and my spokeshaves. Stay tuned for more…

As a teaser, here’s a couple shots of our first paddle. This is the one made with birds eye maple, bloodwood and yellowheart.

An Experimental Design with Experimental Finishes

Jeremiah — Fri, 25 May 2012 06:28:45 +0000

***Note – This is a post I wrote a year ago and never got around to posting it***

My favorite Tom Selleck movie is the 1990 classic, Quigley Down Under. Selleck plays 1800′s sharpshooter Matthew Quigley who travels to Australia to work for Alan Rickman’s Elliot Marston to shoot dingos on his land. As most of Alan Rickman’s characters turn out to be, Mr. Marston is something of an evil bastard. I don’t want to spoil the entire show, but at one point Quigley and Marston are discussing the rifle Quigley brought and the conversation goes something like this:
Marston: Aaah. The legendary Sharps.
Quigley: You know your weapons. It’s a lever-action, breech loader. Usual barrel length’s thirty inches. This one has an extra four. It’s converted to use a special forty-five caliber, hundred and ten grain metal cartridge, with a five-hundred forty grain paper patch bullet. It’s fitted with double set triggers, and a Vernier sight. It’s marked up to twelve-hundred yards. This one shoots a mite further.
Marston: An experimental weapon with experimental ammunition.
Quigley: You could call it that.
Marston: Let’s experiment.
This somewhat sets the stage for a desk I just finished building. For the last year or two my main computer has been setup on the bar just outside our kitchen. My patient wife has finally had enough of all the ‘stuff’ that gathers around my computer and ordered me to move the setup to the basement. The problem was I didn’t have a desk or table that I could set up the computer on. When I mentioned that, her reply was, “Well, you’ve been looking for an excuse to not work on those plantation shutters, so build one.”
I had my marching orders. Build a desk/table as fast as possible and move my computer gear to the basement.
I went out to the shop to consider my options. As part of the above mentioned infernal shutter project I have about 100 bd ft of 6/4 poplar on my racks. Having not really used poplar for any furniture in the past, and feeling too cheap to make a run to the lumber dealer (disgraceful, I know) I decided to borrow from my shutter lumber and make this new desk.
Still feeling cheap, I started designing the table in SketchUp to use as little of this lumber as possible. That led me to my first experiment in this project – the idea of resawing the poplar to glueup the panel for the table top. Now I know what you’re probably thinking, “You’re going to resaw a 6/4 board for a table top? Do you want that table top to collapse as soon you set up your computer on it?”. I picked an 8″ wide board that had a nice color streak on one edge and ripped it in half then jointed and planed it, as well as a 4″wide board so I could end up with a 24″ wide top. After all the milling, the planks ended up about .492″ thick. The glueup went great. I ended up with a top that had a nice bookmatched section down the middle and was really flat. That got me thinking the table base would benefit from some hidden cross braces to help distribute weight on the table.
Again, using this same 6/4 stock I started milling the legs. They ended up as 1 3/8″ square. Much thinner than most of the legs I have made in the past but I really didn’t want to go buy any 8/4 or 12/4 stock. Besides, the thinner legs matched the thinner top. I went with mission’y-styled aprons, and with some mortise and tenons, the base was assembled. This brought me to the second experimental part.
After seeing a poplar table made by Bob Rozaieski over at Logan Cabinet Shoppe and seeing how the poplar turned out with some dark dye I decided to try some General Finishes water-based stain. After sanding to 180 grit with my beloved Festool ETS 150 I applied the stain a rag. First two mistakes. After the stain dried I realized I had forgotten to pre-raise and the grain and resand and the surfaces were all fuzzy. Also, applying the stain with a rag didn’t work so well. Too bad I didn’t read the instructions that said it’s best to use a foam brush. So, I resanded back through the stain, back to 180 then sprayed a light mist of water over all the surfaces, let it dry overnight and then lightly sanded it again with some 180 by hand. Then I grabbed a foam brush and restained the whole thing and then wiped off the excess stain with a barely-damp rag.
Now things started looking better.
For the third experimental portion of this project, I decided to stay on the water-based theme and spray the entire project with some water-based poly. I started with a can of GF water-based poly but ended up having to finish with Minwax water-based poly because I didn’t buy enough GF. I quickly realized that I should have waited till I had some smaller needles for my Earlex. I sprayed the whole thing with my Earlex and a 2mm needle and even with the flow dialed all the way back I still got some orange peel. Not the fault of GF, Minwax or Earlex. My fault for not checking for the recommended needle size. Oh well, it still turned out decent.
With all the finish work done, I attached the base with z-clips and the screwed the cross piece to the underside of the table top. I did make sure and widen the outside holes on the cross piece so that any seasonal expansion wouldn’t fight with the screws too much.
Next I moved it into the house.
Since I built the whole thing with a lot thinner stock that I would normally use I decided to stress test the table and see how well it would hold up. I climbed up on the table and laid down and it didn’t even squeak. For some of you that might not seem like much of a test, but keep in mind I weigh in at about 270 lbs. I’d say that’s pretty good for a table top that is a hair under 1/2″ thick. It’s at least good enough for all my computer crap.

***A year later the table is holding up pretty well except for the poly. I’m not positive, but I think the GF has held up fine and it was the Minwax that failed. Not positive, and not sure why, but that’s my suspicion.

Protective Maintenance – Wood Workers Safety Week 2012 – Part 3

Jeremiah — Sun, 06 May 2012 20:12:47 +0000

In the Marines (and I assume the other branches of the military) there is a term that inspires true hate, sadness and wishing your EAS (End of Active Service) date was closer – PM or Preventive Maintenance. My shop has the same dread-inducing acronym, but with a little different meaning – Protective Maintenance. I’m not talking about sharpening chisels and plane blades (though I’m not a big fan of that activity either), I’m talking about the joys of sweeping, emptying the dust collection bags and vacuum bags and replacing filters – those pesky things that have to be done to keep tripping hazards out of the way, to keep our protective equipment running at peak efficiency.

Since I don’t use my shop full-time, it’s sometimes hard to know when certain maintenance tasks need to be done. A couple weeks ago I noticed the primary filter on my air cleaner looked like it had been hit with a fire extinguisher because it was covered with so much sawdust. That got me thinking that I needed to develop some process for remembering to clean or replace the filters on my shop vac, dust extractor, air cleaner and respirator. It’s easy to think these aren’t safety related tasks, and maybe they aren’t in the short-term, but in the long-term I think they are. Especially in regards to the air cleaner and respirator. If the filters can’t keep the air clean then we’re going to breathe that crap in which we all know (I hope), is bad for your lungs in the long-term.

To help me remember to stay on top of this, I made use of my Google calendar and created an event that repeats every six months that is set to send me a text message, an email, and an on-screen popup to remind me to go switch out these filters.

Now when it comes to keeping things orderly and clean, I think the risk is more obvious. It’s easy to trip and hit into things. I don’t use the calendar for this. Instead, I use a tip Tom Iovino had on Wood Talk Online a while back. He said every time he goes to the shop he puts away 5 things. I’ve tried to incorporate that same habit. At first it was difficult to do so I posted a reminder written in bright colors. That has seemed to help.

Just remember folks, the safer we are in the shop, the less chance we’ll have some sort of accident which might keep us out of the shop. So if we stay safe, we get more shop time and who doesn’t want more shop time?

Ring the Bell, Please! – Woodworking Safety Week 2012 – Part 2

Jeremiah — Wed, 02 May 2012 22:44:18 +0000

For those of us that use a lot of power tools we also generally (I hope) wear hearing protection. When we have our hearing protection on, we, of course, can’t hear as well – that’s the point. While that is a good thing in most ways, it can introduce certain dangers.

In my case, I’m one of those silly folks who it’s bad to try to startle. Not because I’ll have a heart attack or wet my drawers, but because my automatic reaction when startled, is to turn quickly with a balled up fist directed at whatever touched me. Not only would I rather not bop someone unintentionally, but what if I was routing the edge of a table top or pushing some awkward sized piece of lumber through the table saw. Try as I might, if I don’t know someone is there, fist and/or tools will fly. That’s just my reaction. I really hate surprises. Not cool.

Now I’m sure not everyone reacts in this way. You may not wig out and try to start a brawl when you’re startled, but startling someone using a power tool is a potentially VERY dangerous thing to do. So what do we do to reduce the chances of flying power tools?

1. Education & Communication. In my case, my shop is detached from the house and is next to the patio where my kids like to play. Periodically I make sure to explain to my children and my wife the dangers of power tools and what can happen if someone using a power tool is surprised or startled. This way they know not to rush in and give dad a hug, as much as dad likes hugs.

2. Raise the alarm! So now my family knows it’s dangerous to startle someone using power tools, but what if you need to get their attention for some reason? Time for dinner, the house is on fire, zombies are attacking – you know, the usual suspects. There needs to be a way to safely get my attention. Here’s what we did:

Depending on the time of year and the time of the day, I close the garage door on the shop. One thing to do is just knock really loud and wait for me to respond. If I leave the shop door open they know to just stand at the opening of the shop and wave. That change in shadows from outside the shop usually gets my attention. Then I can shut down the tools and see what’s up.
The other thing we just started (I haven’t installed it yet, that’s for this weekend) is to use a door bell next to the shop door. The one I bought I found at Home Depot and besides just having an annoying buzzer, it also had a red light that blinks when the door bell is activated. I’m naturally a little hard of hearing but even more so when the planer is getting its fill of whatever I’m running. I think this will work out pretty well. The idea for the kids is ring the bell and then wait a minute or two. They understand that if I’m running something through the table saw that it may be a moment before I can respond. I’ve also told the kids that if they can’t hear a power tool running and the door is shut to just give a loud knock or (soon) ring the bell. I’ve told them in this scenario I’m probably in the middle of a glue up so I won’t be able to open the garage door, but I’ll yell back to give them the all clear to go ahead and open the door.

What do you do to make sure you don’t throw your router through the ceiling?

Know When to Quit – Woodworking Safety Week 2012 – Part 1

Jeremiah — Wed, 02 May 2012 01:33:24 +0000

Thinking back on nearly every close call and actual injury I’ve had in the shop, and there are more than I care to admit; I can almost always point to not being focused on what I’m working on. Usually it’s because I’m just too sleepy to be safe around power tools. With my work schedule that is an unfortunately common thing. The tough part is knowing when it’s time to hang up the apron and go take a nap and sometimes it’s even tougher to make yourself actually do that.

Here’s my little check list to help me know when it’s time to head inside for some rack ops. Sorry, old Marine term. That’s what we used to call it when it was time for a nap without actually saying nap time cause that just doesn’t sound tough. I always called it sleepy time cause I didn’t care if people thought I was tough or not. Anyway….

1. How many caffeinated beverages have I had? If I have had more than one or two caffeinated wonders in this single shop session and I’m looking for more – chances are it’s nap time. If there is a growing pile of Rockstar cans in my cutoff bin, it’s definitely nap time.

2. Where did I put that? While it’s common for me to forget where I put my tape measure or a pencil, if I find that I am losing more things than usual then it’s nap time.

3. Fractions? We don’t need no stinking fractions! Occasionally, if I have been in the shop for several hours I try to do some random math in my head. Usually dividing fractions. Nothing that would require Einstein’s assistance, but also not something like what is half of 1/2? Not quite going to cut it. If it takes way too long and I forget the numbers I started with, well, then it’s nap time.

4. I can hear the garbage truck. Occasionally I find myself in ‘the zone’ and things are going well and I totally lose track of time and next thing I know, the sun is coming up. It’s not a common occurrence, but it does happen. I take that as a sign that I have been in the shop too damn long and it’s time for a nap. Especially if I have to take the kids to school.

5. I hear the same song again. If I am working alone in the shop then chances are I have the ipod connected to my shop radio and it’s on shuffle. My playlist is pretty extensive so if I hear the same song twice, then I’ve been at it too long. Nap time.

6. I hurt myself. If ignore all of these and I catch another piece of plywood in the gut, I take that as a sign that I’ve been in there too long and it’s time for a nap and probably a change of skivvies.

Maybe some of those work for you. Maybe they don’t. Regardless, we need to be aware of the signs that we’re just not alert enough to be around our tools anymore that day and that doesn’t just mean power tools. My fingers have plenty of scars from where a chisel or a marking knife decided my lack of tattoos was too boring and they needed to leave a mark. It’s better to enjoy a good restful nap, and have a project take longer than desired than to try to pull an all-nighter and add a visit to the emergency room.