How to make a wood toboggan Part 1

So, it has been a while since anything new was posted, but tonight I submit a post for your discriminating taste in wood working blogs.  First off is my newest brain child, actually the thought came to me 3 years ago but has since taken a hiatus. Steam bending for the purpose of building a toboggan. When we had our first snow fall here in Cowtown the inspiration hit me like a hard packed snow ball.  Both kids needed to get outside this winter and enjoy tobogganing like I did.

Making jigs has never been a real passion of mine but I did make three of them for this project.
While I am waiting for my Earlex Steam Generator to come by dog sled, I set myself to making the bending form.  Spruce plywood(the cheapest grade you can buy) was purchased and cut to make a 10" diameter bend. The width of the slats will be 2 1/4" wide so three pieces of 3/4" plywood were sandwiched together.  Now the dilemma was how to cut a curve the full width of the form. I do not own a band saw, however I have a router with one straight cut bit and one flush trim bit. I removed the plastic base plate that the router came with and attached the base plate to a scrap of laminate hardwood using good old double sided tape.

Drill the holes to match the spacing on the base plate and counter sink the holes. Attach the laminate to the bottom of the router and mark back from the straight router bit the radius you require. Secure the one end of the router and base plate to the form. Ensure the router is free to rotate around a pivot screw. You can change the position of the pivot screw to accommodate your desired curve.  Make sure you install stop screws in the form to contact the laminate in order to provide stops at both ends of the arc.  Make several passes through the arc increasing the depth each time. When you have hit your maximum depth, detach the router and flip the form over. Insert the flush trim bit and use the existing curve to guide your router as you cut the other half of the form.

Cutting the support brackets is easy just drill a hole through a pair of plywood blocks. When you straddle them across the form, insert a matching dowel to go through both pieces. Insert a scrap of wood that is the same thickness as the wood that you will be bending plus a wedge under the dowel and secure the support brackets. Next post regarding this toboggan will be on the steam bending.
Stay tuned...



Steam bending jig for a toboggan.  Mk I

 





The modified wood bending form Mk.II
Note : the latest version of this form does away with the two FA clamps at the bottom of the picture.



 

 

This update on the steam bending project reflects the modified wood bending form as seen in the above picture. Some observations on this process : Always leave the wood in the steam box longer than the minimum. The rule of thumb floating around is one hour for every inch of thickness.

I am now using 25 min. for 1/4" thick wood. The extra steaming time in this instance may reflect the kiln dried state of the wood at rest(before steaming).  The wood feels a lot more plastic when its bent around the form. The extra time in the steamer does not hurt the wood. The wood needs to be supported by a couple of cauls especially at the start of the bend and mid point through the form's circumference. See above picture for placement of the cauls.

 

 The drawback to using the form as I had originally built it is that the wood will expand along the width quite significantly will being heated and saturated with water.  If the form brackets are spaced out to accommodate the wood in an at rest state, they wood will be too wide to fit after steaming. This creates pinch points in the wood as it is bent around the form and the wood will crack.

One way to reduce the amount of spring back after you bend the wood , is to leave the piece in the form for as long as you can.  Essentially the bent wood MC should be as close as possible to the MC of the wood before it was steamed. I leave my wood in the form until the wood is cool to the touch and then remove it and use painters masking tape to retain roughly a 10.5" diameter in the end of the curved slat.

One note on the clamps in the form : this video explains how to make a speedy clamp.



 



Salvaging a gynasuim bench part I

Gooday ! Today's post begins the series on a bench that I am working on. When I was in school there were several of these benches used in the gym. The benches are made from oak and and 12' long by 9 1/2" wide. Four plywood legs were secured to the seat and with a single piece of 3" wide oak tying the legs together on the floor. A small crack in the seat rendered this particular bench scrap.

My guide line for using this hardwood is to leave the holes and dadoes in the wood that were left from screws, bolts and legs. I want the new bench to look like it was made using salvaged wood, but not like I just slapped the boards together.

I am using all the oak to make a new bench based on the White Water Shaker Bench that was featured in the Winter 2009 issue of Woodworking Magazine( before it became Popular Woodworking)

Jointing the apron board

• Step one: scrape off all the gum wads on the boards. In this picture the boards that will become the aprons are edge jointed using hand planes. Repair cracks in seat board with glue.

You might notice the blue holdfast in the foreground, click here for an explanation.


Salvaging a gymnasium bench  part 2

After milling the boards to the correct thickness and size , I assembled the bench with square nails.
This is my first project with square nails and it was a good lesson for me. Square nails probably work
better in wood that is "greener".  All wood hardens over time and maybe more so with oak.

The wood did split in a couple places and part of that was incorrect installation of nails and part old wood.  I found that countersinking the pilot hole was very good to seat the nail flush and minimize splitting.  Take a 1/8" mortise chisel and relieve the hole edges in line with the grain.

Beware of old glue lines in salvaged wood. Sometimes the glue lines will give up when fastening the boards together.

The next step is sanding and finishing.
 

Making a raised Diamond panel

Here is my first kick at the can on making a diamond panel. This video explains my thoughts on this project and new theory for diamond panel part deux. 

UPDATE : I think this pattern would work for a diamond panel that had equal sized diamonds on it.
The layout here would have panned out if the diamonds were smaller.

More hand saw sharpening......



One antique Canadian rip saw

This post is the second in a series I am publishing on hand saw sharpening. Now I know what what you are thinking, "why is the saw post on this blog and on not Arm Strong Tools?".  I don't have a good reason for that suffice it say the saw posts will remain here. Okay, enough jibber jabber - here is the meat and potatoes of what transpired tonight.

My new favourite rip saw , a 25 " saw manufactured in Canada by Shurly-Dietrich-Atkins. identified as having 5 1/2 ppi at the factory and Shurly-Dietrich-Atkins named this saw the Maple Leaf No. 152.  I don't know how to date this saw so if someone has some info I would love to hear about it.

Sharpening this saw proved to be a little easier because the teeth were very coarse and in pretty good shape to begin with. I followed along with Tom Law once again and took this cutting tool through the steps of jointing,shaping,setting,filing, and side dressing.

Eager to see this saw in action, I cut a 1" piece of fir and watched as the saw dust spilled off the saw teeth. Saw dust is a bit of a misnomer in this particular job. The "saw dust" should not be dust at all, rather very tiny chips of wood that you can see with your naked eye. If there is real dust left after a cutting operation the saw teeth are dull.

This is now a good sharp saw that will cut in a straight line.

Cutting my teeth with Tom Law

Gooday !   Happy Canada Day !  Or if you are old enough to remember... Happy Dominion Day

So this past Friday night found me in my workshop, I had finally bought two saw files and was ready to get to work sharpening an old rip saw.  My saw vise had been ready for working action for some time and now I was going to take it for a test drive.  Earlier in the year I bought a 26" D-8 Henry Disston and Sons rip saw - now I was going to learn how to tune it up.

 The instructional video I purchased was hosted by Tom Law. This is a good DVD. The video contains good instructional content with demonstrations of an automatic saw sharpening machine and a dedicated machine for punching out new teeth. I wished I had him in the workshop in person so I could ask some questions.

As the night was getting later I was having some mixed results with my saw teeth. I need a lot of practice. I was literally cutting my teeth by shaping the teeth of ol' reliable(my saw). Overall, I had fun eating the best landjaeger and listening to Mr. Law and pushing my new file across some really old tool steel.

 My work is not done on this 8 point saw by any means ,(notice I did not include a close up picture the the teeth!) I will be going back and finishing the job. My saw vise will be modified to accommodate a saw from either end.

Stay tuned....

Dining room arm chair

This chair took a very long time to repair - mostly because I lost interest in it from time to time.However it is finished now!  The chair was disassembled, scraped clean, and repaired or made new parts as required.

Dining room chair is restored.

Most of the original wood is butter nut, and it had a plywood decorative piece in the back. The back of the chair has the same shape except I bought a piece of ash to make a new one. Ash is remarkably similar to oak in texture,colour and workability.  The front and rear pieces that connect the legs were reproduced using rock maple that I had in the shop.

The stain that I used was Varathane Wood Stain - Dark Walnut no.269 with a wax top coat.
As you can see in the picture the different woods reacted differently to the stain. The butternut wood accepted the stain with ease but the rock maple didn't care for it too much. The overall effect is pleasing to me even though irregularities are present with staining.