Cutting boards

From J:

For Christmas this year, I decided to make cutting boards for gifts. End grain cutting boards (Boos blocks, etc) are the best cutting boards money can buy, and they tend to be pretty expensive for good ones. Luckily, they aren't too expensive to make, if you don't count time. They take forever to sand. Anyway...first step, buy some hard maple. Hard maple has a dense end grain structure that isn't very porous so the board won't soak up excess water or food juice too readily. I bought a board of 6/4 (1.5" thick in its rough state) hard maple, about 6 feet long. SUV for the win.

$75 of wood.

Next step: cut up the board. This was a challenge. I built a cross-cut sled that rides in the miter slots of the table saw, lifting the board off of the table so that it can slide easily (and safely) across the blade. Still, this entire assembly (~75 lbs) weighs way more than my lightweight saw (~50 lbs) so I had to be veeeeery careful not to rock the saw on the first few cuts until the weight became more manageable.

Fun fact, my airborne dust filter is a box fan with a furnace filter attached on the intake with bungee cords.

Next, the boards get cut into strips and turned on end. Apply glue (food safe and waterproof) and clamp. Wait 12 hours/overnight. I eventually got better at the clamping and made my life much easier in the finishing step by clamping multiple cauls across the strips during glueup to keep the board flat.

Strip glueup (before I knew to use cauls).

Checkerboard glueup. Really should have used cauls.

With cauls. Eight clamps in use for one board.

After the glue up, I ripped the edges straight on the table saw (this took yet another jig, as the board is longer than the working area in front of the blade on the table saw). Then, it's time for flattening and sanding. So much sanding. End grain is incredibly tough to sand, especially on something as hard as hard maple. The good boards took 2-3 hours of planing with my block plane and sanding with 40 grit, which is basically gravel on a sheet. The earlier boards, which weren't glued up as flat (learning curve...) took longer. But in the end, they look pretty good! I rounded over the edges with the router.

Dusty and proud.

I made different patterns on the different boards. Two are checkerboarded (for a big-and-small board set) some are bookmatched so the grain patterns are mirror images, and some are in strips with the grain facing the same way across the board. For the wifey's board, I used a section of the maple that was knotty and burled which gives some really pretty patterning in the end product. Everything was finished with three coats of mineral oil.

Total project cost: ~$15/board, including consumables and mineral oil. My time is free for family and friends, Merry Christmas!

Christmas Cheer

Ways to tell you no longer work at a Methodist Church but instead work at a Presbyterian Church:

Your boss (a pastor) gives you this as your Christmas gift...

... tis the season!

Plant Stand

From J:

After making the shower stand, I had some aromatic cedar boards left. One of A's requests when I started this whole woodworking endeavor was for a plant stand, so...time to build one!

I wrote out some very detailed plans:

I cut out leg rails at a 10 degree angle for a bit of interest and added some pieces to fix the legs and give some rigidity. The shelves are screwed in to the cross pieces with ceramic-coated exterior screws. Two shelves only, I wanted to leave some room for taller plants on the bottom shelf.

Trying it out for size on the front porch. No finish yet.

I didn't try to hide the screws, they give it a more utilitarian look. Despite my extensive "plans" that I drew up before starting, I actually had to put some care into how big each piece was so that I could efficiently use the wood that I had. I drew out each cut on the actual boards and planned things out well enough that I only had about a 10"x3" piece of cedar left. From boards to standing table only took about 6 hours of work on a Saturday, including breaks, so it was a fast project. Two coats of General Finishes Outdoor Oil later, here's the finished project, living on the patio.

  

Say "hi" to Cyrus the cypress, our new potted plant.

Project cost: ~$50, including consumables.

Project reflections: Fun and satisfying to bang things out quickly, making design decisions (angles on the leg, spacings of the top boards, miters on the supports, etc.) more or less on the fly. Assembly could have gone smoother. In the future I'll make a jig so that the leg assemblies go together better. A great learning experience and some good practice!

 

Nap Time

Going...

 

...going...

 

 



...gone!

Shower Stand

From J:

After I built my workshop, it was time to actually make something. First thing on the list is a new shower stand to replace our current teak one. Don't buy cheap teak online, kids, because you end up with wood that grows mushrooms and rots out at the joints. Time for J to do something about it.

First step: research online what woods are good. Teak, Ipe, lots of stuff is very moisture resistant. I settled on aromatic cedar for a few reasons: the stuff my hardwood supplier has is gorgeous (lots of heart and sapwood streaking), cheap (1/10th the price of teak), and highly water and rot resistant. Can't go wrong, especially for a project that I'm just learning on! So we picked some out.

The lumber shop is good and will joint and plane the boards for a small fee, which is excellent as it saves me from buying a jointer and planer (small shop, and I'm tired of buying tools...at the moment).

Lumber in hand, time to get to work. I decided to do mortise and tenon construction for this project, as it would be a good blend of strength and water resistance (no other, less water-resistant materials to rot away at the joints). In retrospect, this was way too much work and I would have been better served buying some cedar doweling online and using that.

First, I ripped my stock square (~3/4") on the table saw and dimensioned it up using the miter saw for longer sections and the table saw for shorter ones. I cut the tenons where needed on the table saw with a 1/4" dado. For the mortises, I used a 1/4" drill bit to make a hole that I enlarged with a chisel to fit the tenon. This was tough, as the cedar was a bit fragile and wanted to split if I was sloppy. After ruining a few pieces (cough cough, I mean practicing some), I got the hang of it and banged out the rough frame.

For the slats, I ripped some stock to 1/4" x 3/4" and mitered them to fit the shelf opening. I rabbeted the angled frame pieces to accept the slats and give a little lip. The slats are glued in place. All glue is Titebond III, rated for exterior use. With the slats cut, it was time for final assembly! I enlisted A's help to help align things while I glued. The slats were set in and weighted down with my fancy weight set and left overnight to set.

I agonized over the finish choices. I wanted something tough, but the shower will eventually break down any finish (short of a thick epoxy, like a bar top) so it needed to be easy to reapply. I initially leaned towards a spar varnish but settled on an outdoor-blend oil from General Finishes that has mildewcides and such mixed in. No dilution required, just wipe on, wait, and wipe off. Two coats later and water just beads up and rolls off. When this inevitably breaks down it's trivial to just wipe on another coat and refresh the finish, I'm guessing I'll do this 2-3 times a year. I really like how the finish brings out the redness of the cedar, making everything seem much richer compared to the original color, which was a more pinkish color. I'm completing it with some feet set into brass threaded inserts in the legs to keep the end grain out of the water.

Project cost: ~$15 lumber (including my, umm, practice pieces), $15 oil finish (of which I used a tiny amount).

Project highlights: picking out the lumber and choosing which faces to show and highlight the wood's character. Very satisfying and easy finish, as well.

Project lowlights: those angled tenons, and mortises in general in the cedar. A great learning experience but I think I could get a stable piece with less effort using doweled joints.

Woodworking

From J:

My wife was recently gracious enough to park her car in the cold, cold driveway and give me some space to build a workshop, something I've always wanted. My job involves a lot of tools and plenty of workspace to build things and tinker; I love doing it and I wanted to be able to do it at home. She's already blogged a little bit about this, but I want to add my perspective.

First things first: I needed tools to build the workshop (but I needed a workshop to properly use the tools! A conundrum.). As is my nature, I did extensive research online before buying exactly what I needed. In this case, there's really only one saw on the market that met that spec, still accepted a dado, and had a solid build. Hellloooo, Bosch GTS1031.

I also bought some other smaller tools: circular saw (cheapo Ryobi), miter saw (decent Ridgid), brad nailer (cordless Ryobi), router set (Skil plunge + fixed kit). Most of these I bought from CPO Outlets, an awesome website that sells refurbished tools for good prices. Highly recommended. Every tool, including the new table saw, needed some calibration and tinkering to get things to cut straight and in the dimensions I wanted. I also bought clamps...as I've learned, you can never have enough clamps.

Tools procured, it was time to build something! I went to Home Depot and bought a couple hundred dollars of birch plywood (3/4" and 1/2") to make a workbench. Birch plywood, specifically, because it's harder than normal plywood and takes a finish really well. Nice stuff, even the cheapo Home Depot variety. I also bought flowers.

Time to build something! This was cramped and dusty since everything was so disorganized and the plywood sheets are so big. Breaking down sheet goods is not much fun! Cutting complete, I started to build my work bench. It consists of three cabinets mounted onto a torsion box (for rigidity) on casters. The cabinets are built so the table saw will sit in the center flush with the rest of the bench to give some more stability and working surface around the saw, important since this particular saw is so small (it's pretty much the smallest on the market).

Torsion box assembly:

(skips a few steps for brevity)

Complete workbench! This thing is stable as a table, rolls nicely, and fits the saw great. I had to go back and do a little shimming and planing to get everything level to my satisfaction; no surprise, I got better at making accurate cuts as the project proceeded. Learning curve! The nice thing about custom making furniture like this is that it fits my stuff exactly how I want it. The table saw fits perfect, the little extension arm of the table has a nice well to fit in (that doubles for accessory storage), the miter saw fits in its cabinet perfectly, etc. None of these things were by accident, but I'm still amazed that it worked out that well.

Next step was to add some cabinets above the bench. I used some wide Southern Yellow Pine we got from our local hardwood dealer to build the frame, backed it with 1/2" ply I had leftover from the workbench build, dadoed in some adjustable shelf slots, and hung it with a French cleat (AKA 2x4 cut at a 45 degree angle).

For the doors I wanted to get a little creative. My shop is small and I didn't want to waste any surface area, so I built a mitered frame and inset some pegboard into it. The entire door is backed with 1/4" plywood for strength and the hinge is a continuous piano hinge, again for strength. No fear of hanging tools on these, they're solid! Two cabinets, with some shelving in between. I subdivided the shelving to give it some interest and help with my organization. Shelving is pine, again. Nothing fancy here, though I did add some facing to hide the shelf mounts. Utilitarian doesn't mean ugly. Clamps are hung on a 2x4 mounted to the wall. I've also added some pine trim on the workbench to hide the 2x4 framing and protect the plywood edges from chipping.

Final step (for now) was to add some tung oil to the work bench to pretty it up and protect the surface. I cut the first two coats 50/50 with mineral spirits to help absorption and drying time and did the last coat full strength. It seems to be curing nicely, we'll see what else I have to do to finish it off.

 (side note: you can see the 2x4 framing I used to build the tops in this photo. Very cheap and sturdy, hat tip to Norm Abrams for the method)

I still plan to add doors and drawers to help with dust protection and add more storage and organization but this is not necessary. I want to see what my work flow and needs end up being before I modify further.

Final cost for the bench and cabinets: ~$475 ($250 plywood + 2x4s, $200 solid pine, $25 tung oil + finishing supplies), including finishing supplies. Considering the cost becomes a funny thing. On one hand, I could go buy a basic 2x6 table-type workbench for a couple hundred dollars, but it wouldn't fit my saw or other tools like a glove. I could also buy some cabinets for a couple hundred dollars, but they wouldn't have the neat pegboard facing. In the end, custom furniture it awesome because it's, well, custom! I would pay 10x the price to get something like this made. Add in that this is fun and (strangely) relaxing for me to do and it doesn't feel like work at all. Next up: the first thing that I made that won't live in the garage!

The Stockings are Hung

We're finished decorating!

Cue the Charlie Brown music: "Christmas Time is Here..."