April, 2010: jn3 Current Projects, part 4

Here is my mother's small television stand for her small television. I installed it Saturday afternoon. The space on the left side of the stand is reserved for her cat, Lucy, so she can look out the window.

This is a very simple design. The wood is red oak. The joinery was easy to cut on my router table -- just a rabbet on each side piece, and then I reinforced the joint with two dowels on each side.

The finish is three coats of tung oil, followed by three coats of satin polyurethane.

The back is two pieces of 1/4" plywood. the short piece is at the bottom, recessed into the box 3/4" and is overlapped 1/4" by the larger piece, which is mounted on the back. This provides a way to snake the wires out the back without seeing anything behind the unit. And I don't care for big round holes in the back if they can be seen easily.

And that's pretty much all there was to it. So far, however, Lucy has remained uninterested. When she shows some interest I'll see about getting a photo.

April, 2010: jn3 Current Projects, part 3

So, the television stand will be installed this weekend. In the meantime I've been working on those candle holders. I'd be done with them by now (and the television stand would already be installed) but my wife's doctor found a blood clot in her left leg and she spent the last three days at Arlington Memorial Hospital in Arlington, Texas. Never fear... all is well now, or as close as can be expected. She is taking blood thinners and is expecting to go back to work Tuesday, April 26.

Here's the progress I have made on the candle holders, including two which are nearing completion:

Every woodworker you ever meet will agree that you can never have too many clamps. If I had more small and medium sized clamps like these I could glue up more candle holders at the same time. That would be spiffy!!!

These will be finished in a couple of days. This summer I will be building several bookcases for my wife's classroom. That project, among others, will occupy much of my time in the shop over the next few months. I just can't wait to get started.

April, 2010: jn3 Current Projects, part 2

The newly designed candle holders are being prepped for some "mass" production. I need some variety to test whether the design is viable so I'm building 13 more of them with different woods. I'll be using red oak, black walnut, yellow heart, curly maple and spalted pecan in various combinations, and then the buying public will determine which ones are best. Here are the blanks for this project. Once all of them are glued up and trimmed to size I can run them all across the router table one after another.

Also, I finished the stand for the small television et al that will be placed in my mother's kitchen. It is made of red oak, finished with three coats of tung oil and three coats of satin polyurethane. It has only one shelf. The television will sit on top on one end. There will be a phone and a DirecTV box either on it or under it, and there's room for her cat, Lucy to sit on top and look out the window. The back was built in two overlapping parts with a space between so all the cords can snake out the back and not be seen.

April, 2010: jn3 Current Projects

I'm working on two very different projects at this time. The first one is a shelf, built to order to go in my mother's kitchen. It will hold a small television, among other things, and she had very specific size requirements. For one thing, it had to be large enough so her cat, Lucy, could sit on it if she so desires.

The second project is a new series of candle holders I'm building out several different types of wood. I'm using black walnut, purple heart, curly maple, yellow heart and red oak in various combinations. The ones you see here are curly maple with purple heart, and black walnut with purple heart. I think the effect is a good one and I expect to move several of these through my shops and at the craft fares this summer.

The unifying feature of both projects is the new router table. I used it to cut the joints and to round over the edges for the shelf unit, and to round over the edges on the four candle holders you see here. I plan to rout a cove profile on some other candle holders in this series, and I may use an ogee bit on some more.

Router Table: Part 7

A quick note up front: The bronchitis is completely gone. The slight rib pain lingers. I'll live.

The table, as reported earlier, is finished to the point where I can use it. Storage to come later, and I'll be able to use the router table to help mill up the parts for it.

I finished the fence as well. Here you can see it from the front. It is mounted to the table saw fence, and I'll be able to use it from either side of the bit by simply turning it around and mounting it to the opposite side of the table saw fence.

I built in the dust collection. There is a channel inside the fence, connecting the opening at the bit to a flexible hose which leads to the "Y" near the floor and then to the vacuum hose itself. I blocked off the other half of the channel inside the fence.

I shouldn't have any major static electricity issues with such a short run of PVC/flexible plastic tubing. If that assumption turns out to be wrong I can always add some grounded copper wire to the system to carry the charge away. For those who don't know, static charges in a dust collection system can be extremely dangerous; a spark generated inside the hose can ignite the wood dust and cause an explosion.

Here is the sacrificial face mounted to the fence. It splits in front to allow access to the bit (I may be over-explaining this for some of you, but others are unfamiliar with the tools of the trade and how they operate). I'll mill up another face with no split and just run a bit up into it to make the opening. I'll have use for both. Also, I think I want to build a much longer version of the split fence to use for jointing the edges of my stock. I don't have a jointer in my shop. If I get one it will need to be a bench-top model because I just don't have room for anything bigger.

Here you can see how the face is attached to the fence. T-bolts run through the fence into the slotted holes in the face. I can slide the face left and right, positioning it where I need it, then tighten down the knobs to secure it in place. If I need one side to be proud of the other (that means one face will protrude farther forward than the other, useful if I'm taking material off of the entire edge of my stock), all I have to do is add some shims behind it and tighten the knobs down, capturing the shims between the face and the fence.