Current Work

I haven't been spending quite as much time in the shop since the challenge table was completed. What I have been working on is getting finish on the other projects which are ready for it.

First up is the nightlight since we don't want Snowflake to be a teenager before he gets it. I'm finishing it before I assemble it. I've got stain on all the parts. Next up is the finish coat. I'm going to go with polyurethane for that. I should get to this on Monday.

I've also done a little final sanding on the wall cabinet. I've also decided one of the doors needs a slight adjustment - it's rubbing on the bottom. That'll be a round of planing. Then I'll stain the walnut panels on the doors and the shelves which are also walnut. I think I'm going to finish it off with shellac.

Next up will be the foot stools. I've found a recipe for grain filler that uses pumice and boiled linseed oil. I've got the ingredients, just need to find a time to try it out. The grain needs to be filled because the hickory has open grain. Stay tuned for progress and pictures.

In class (Thursday nights till mid July) I've been working on hiker boy's advent calendar. Last week I remilled/recut the wood for the case. The design of this was still evolving at that point (I finished it last night) and when I first cut the case parts I forgot to leave room for drawer handles inside the case. Last night was more milling and a little bit of cutting.

• planed the stock for the drawer fronts
• jointed, planed and cut the stock for the door stiles and rails
• I may have to repeat this since some of the pieces sprung into a lovely curve after cutting
  
• jointed, planed and resawed (explanation below) stock for the drawer sides

Resawing
When looking for a thin piece of wood there are basically 3 options - buy thin lumber which is expensive, plane a thicker piece which can waste a lot of wood, or resaw which maximizes the use of the lumber. Basically what a woodworker means when they saw they resawed a piece of lumber is that they cut the wood into thin strips. A lot of times this is done on a band saw which has a blade that is a loop (think rubber band) with teeth on one edge. This can also be done on a table saw - usually by raising the blade to 1/2 the height of the wood and running the wood through twice. Or a combination of table saw and band saw can be used - run it through the table saw to get most of the wood cut away and finish up on the band saw.

The reason the band saw is the preferred method is the blade is much thinner so there is less waste. But because the blade is thinner it is harder to get a straight cut. It's a trade off and there are lots of products to help.

Since the piece I was resawing was not very wide (2") I just cut it in one pass on the table saw. Yes, I used a push stick! Next time I'll run the cut pieces through the planer to even them up.

On tap for next week -

• recutting the pieces for the door frames
• cutting plywood panels for the doors, drawer bottoms and back
• milling and cutting pieces for the drawer supports/dividers

Lots of Progress

I have been remiss in not posting about all of the progress I've made in the last month of so. Here's a recap by project.

Wall Cabinet
The wall cabinet is ready for finish.

Foot Stools
The foot stools are ready for finish. I've been wondering about how to fill the grain, since the hickory has a very open grain pattern. While looking for something else in my stash of saved woodworking magazine articles I found one I'd saved on non-commercial grain filler. One option is to use pumice and boiled linseed oil. I've had a box of pumice sitting on the shelf for years (for use as a sanding agent when finishing) so I bought a can of boiled linseed oil. I'm going to give this a try before adding finish to the stools.

Night Light
Ready for finish. The panels look great (pictures soon). I'm going to apply finish before I glue up the box, so I have more control over the finish. I need to get this done ASAP since Snowflake made his appearance 3 weeks ago.

Hiker Boy's Advent Calendar
I've got the plan sketched out and started cutting the parts during my last couple of classes. I've got the sides of the case ready, although I may have to check that I left room to affix the back.

CD Holder
Adjusted the height of the dividers. It's ready for dadoes and rabbets.

Challenge Table
This has been garnering most of my attention. I started to include a report here, and then realized that it make this post extremely long. So, I'll post about that separately.

Oops

I have a number of projects that have been started but not finished. I'm trying now to reduce the backlog, so a couple of weeks ago I pulled out the pieces for a wall cabinet I started a couple of years ago (yes years).

The cabinet is 22 inches tall and about 18 wide. The pieces pictured here are the sides. Today I glued up one of the doors (I would have done the other but I don't own the right combination of clamps for that.) Then I turned to the case. After cleaning up the back, I set out to cut the shelf pin holes with the handy dandy jig I own. At which point I should have turned my brain on.

The jig has two sets of holes - one for cabinets with inset doors, and one for cabinets with face frames. I decided that the inner set was too far in, and the outer set was too far out. So I used a piece of scrap to move the jig a little closer to the front edge. It was only after I had drilled most of the holes at that distance that I remembered that the doors will be inset. And the holes I had just drilled were too close to the spot where the doors will be. As it turns out the inner holes were the ones that I should have used in the first place. So I redrilled the holes. Then I pulled out my plug cutters and cut a dozen plugs to fill the miscut holes.

The good news is the holes will be on the inside of the cabinet and won't be obvious.

Oh and the other good news is that I got to spend a really productive afternoon in the shop.