In The Shop Notes

Thursday, June 8

CD End Table - Day 6

Note: I tried 3 times last night to post this entry and it was refused each time. I'll try again this morning. This was yesterdays post: Wednesday, June 7th.

I started off this day by putting my early morning session (5:30 to 8:00) into working on some bids that have piled up. Didn't get any completed because I need more details from the clients, so I e-mailed them and set the bids aside for completion later.

In the workshop I began by discovering an error in the grid work that forms the front of the cabinet. The center drawer holes are 1/8" wider than the outer drawer holes. So I stopped the time clock and re-made the horizontal grid parts and made note of the error on our working plan. I'll have to adjust that so it won't happen again. I'm not sure how it didn't get caught before.

Once the client's time clock was started again, I resumed the work I had planned to do today. First I cut the small pockets into which the ends of the drawer slide rails will fit: 9 in the front grid, 9 in the pack panel rails, all perfectly aligned so the drawers will be square to the case.

With that done I was able to apply glue to the mortises and tenons of the back panel, assemble that panel and clamp it up. Of course I checked it for 'square': 1/32" off of perfect -- close enough that it's not worth trying to "rack" the panel to correct it. Then I glued and clamped the grid work. Both of these assemblies will need to set up over night before I remove the clamps.

So I took the time to do some cleaning up and putting away tools that will not be needed again. I believe Marie has a project she wants to be working on this evening, so we'll need some work space for that anyway.

Since things are taken apart again, I didn't take a progress picture today, but if you are interested in more pictures and construction details, copy and paste this address into your browser:

www.smokymountainwoodworks.com/InTheShop/CD_End_Table/index.php

This is an article that was written during the construction of a previous 9 drawer CD End Table. It's not as in-depth as some of my more recent articles, but it gives you an idea of what's involved.

Time to grab some dinner, so we can get on with the evening projects.

Till tomorrow...

_____

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Tuesday, June 6

CD End Table - Day 5

Today was a good, productive day; we've finally reached the point where visible progress is being made.

The morning was spent cutting mortises in the casework stiles, cutting grooves for the panels to fit into on all stiles and rails, and fitting the tenons on the back rails into the mortises on the back stiles.

Lunch time.

I spent the afternoon sanding the five panels to 150 grit (much easier to do it now than after they're encased in the framework), fitting those panels into the side and back assemblies, cutting the rabbets in the rear of the side panels to house the back panel, and cutting and fitting the half-laps in the grid work parts that will form the front of the table.

A progress photo is available at http://www.SmokyMountainWoodworks.com/InTheShop/CD-End_Day5.jpg

See you again tomorrow...

_____

avast! Antivirus <http://www.avast.com> : Outbound message clean.

CD End Table - Tenons

Once again things got busy yesterday evening and I neglected to post the daily notes, so this is for yesterday, Monday the 5th.

The morning session was spent surface planning the 4 half-panels we glued up last week to 3/8" thick, jointing the inner edges and gluing them into full panels for use in the case sides. Then we set up the tools to cut tenons.

The afternoon session was used to cut tenon shoulders on the band saw, then cut the tenon cheeks on the table saw using a tenoning jig.

I had a little time left over so I went ahead and laid out the mortise locations on the back panel stiles and set up the drill press with the mortising attachment so it will be ready to use in the morning.

'Nuff for today, see you tomorrow.

_____

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Thursday, June 1

CD-End Table - Trimming Parts

I'm still trying to get the hang of this new Blogger e-mail interface. It allows me to post these messages by sending an e-mail instead of logging into their web site and using the control panel -- which has been VERY slow and often unreliable in that the message I'm trying to post occasionally veers off into never-never land because something somewhere times-out. This method of posting seems more reliable, but it wraps the text lines arbitrarily so I have to find the right line length to set in my e-mail client so it works out properly here.

Yesterday we roughed out all the parts we'll need for the casework of this CD End Table. This morning we re-sawed the billets for the side and back panels and glued up the first half-panel. While the glue was setting up, we surface planed and trimmed all the 7/8" thick pieces (case rails and stiles mostly) to exact size. That killed the morning session.

After lunch we got two more half-panels glued up and trimmed the �� thick parts to finished size. We�ll wait to finish-trim and assemble the pieces for the top plate until just before we�re ready to install it. That way if any of the pieces decide to twist or warp, they�ll do so *before* we use them in the top plate

Tomorrow id my day to spend at Treasures Of Appalachia, being shopkeeper, doing bookwork, including the payroll for the month.

Till Monday�

_____

avast! Antivirus <http://www.avast.com> : Outbound message clean.

Wednesday, May 31

CD End Table - Stock Prep

Yesterday I spent the day surfacing the boards I'd pulled into the shop to acclimate. The rough-sawn surface makes it difficult to see the grain patterns, so planning the boards just a bit to reveal the surface makes it easier to decide which boards will become which parts. Today I will begin cutting the boards into rough-cut parts blanks. Being Month-End, I had to take some time this morning to run statements on our web site maintenance customers. This evening I will close out the books for May and run the needed reports. In addition to this we are projected to have another record high temperature this afternoon which may drive me out of the shop again, we'll see. I'll stick it out as long as I can. Marie bought a dorm-size refrigerator at a yard sale and put it in the shop so we can keep cold bottled water and Gatorade on hand. That helps. I'm posting this morning instead of at the end of the day because I'll probably forget again. I've gotten out of the habit lately. I'll have to work on that. Till tomorrow...

_____

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Thursday, May 18

Tea Chest & Stuff

This past weekend was the first annual Pickn' Plantn' & Plowin' festival at Treasures of Appalachia (serves as our storefront as well as an outlet for the works of almost 50 other artists) and that consumed most of last week and all weekend. Now that it's over I can get back to work.

During the festival one of our two drawer tea chests (in hickory) was auctioned off via e-bay and the Treasures web site as a fund raiser for Treasures, which is a non-profit corporation. It sold for a disappointingly low amount, but that's life on the auction block I guess.

We are also building another two drawer tea chest, this one in walnut for Lauren. It's almost done now. I haven't been taking and posting photos partly because we've already done that with a previous chest and partly because I just don't want to take the time to do it again.

Between rebuilding the new Treasures web site (www.treasuresofappalachia.com) which crashed a while back, destroying the database that drives the product catalog, and working on the new version of the Smoky Mountain Woodworks website AND building furniture I don't have much time to spare. But it's going well and we're getting great comments on the Treasures web site. The new SMW site will be a while yet before it's ready to go live -- VERY complex and needs quite a bit of custom programming.

It is my goal to get this new SMW site to a point where it will allow our visitors to play 'what-if' with our products. By this I mean that as they select the various options like type of wood, hardware choices, stain/no stain, the site will offer updated pricing based on the cost of the materials involved. By tying this function into our materials inventory database we can automatically keep the pricing on each product accurately updated. This should ease the number of e-mails we get from people saying, "I like this piece. The price you show is for oak, how much is it in cherry?" etc.

Of course we will still be dealing with the folks who find us listed in a directory somewhere, never bother to look at the web site but e-mail us with a flurry of questions -- most of which are answered by the web site. But that's life.

Till next time...

_____

avast! Antivirus <http://www.avast.com> : Outbound message clean.

Wednesday, May 3

Eng Gdn Bench Day 16

Work day begins: 5:30 AM I do apologize for being so remiss on my note keeping over the past few days. Many things have been going on, and I simply run out of time before it all gets done. Construction on the first bench is now complete and I will begin the finishing stage today. If you check the construction article (Title link above) you will be able to see what the steps to this point have been. This morning we sand. It’s not exciting or glamorous or even particularly interesting to watch, so don’t expect lots of pictures. There were a couple gaps that I decided to fill before oiling, just to be sure rain water doesn’t work it’s way into the wood and promote decay. While the filler was drying I took care of some office chores. Lunch Time All the finish sanding is done. I didn’t have to go real far with this piece – just to 120 grit – because the oil finish we’ll be applying needs to penetrate the wood. If we sand it too fine, the pores clog up with sanding dust and prevents the oil form soaking in. Besides, we’re not going for a high gloss shine anyway. Workshop closes: 4:00 PM I spent the afternoon hand applying the oil to all surfaces and working it thoroughly into all the corners and crevasses where rain water might want to collect. After the whole thing was covered with oil (which required rolling the bench over to get the bottom side) I went back over it with a pad made from soft cloth and buffed the whole thing. This picks up any excess fluid which may have pooled up or started a run, and spreads it out to any spots that may be a bit thirsty yet. Now it has to sit for 18 to 24 hours for the oil to cure. One coat is all it needs for now, we can apply another in 30 days if we feel it needs it, but we’ll have to go fetch the benches out of the churche's therapy garden to do so. They are anxious to get the benches in place. I spent some time cleaning up the shop, cleaning and putting away the finishing equipment and tools. This is not billable time and is not counted in the figures below. Nor is time spent waiting for stuff to dry. Now that this one is completed, we will deliver it so I have space in the shop to assemble the other one. It will be the same process, so I won’t bother to post a blow-by-blow account. I will post again when it’s done and we’re ready to get started on the next project. Billable Man Hours: 1.75 Billable Materials: ½ quart outdoor oil. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Thursday, April 20

Eng Gdn Bench Day 13

Work day begins: 7:00 AM We’re having a thunderstorm this morning so I can’t boot up the computers, so instead I stay in bed a while extra. Spring time in these mountain often starts the day with a pre-dawn storm, then it clears up and turns into a beautiful day. God is just watering his garden. Lunch Time The weather hasn’t cleared up, in fact at the moment it’s hailing – which is very LOUD under this tin roof. This morning I got the 26 back slats made and got some of them sanded. Workshop closes: PM This afternoon I finished sanding the back slats, and the upper and lower back rails for both benches. Then dove into “Fussy Fitting” one back assembly. There was a fair amount of fitting to do… many of the tenons were just a bit fat. But that’s OK, better then too thin. Billable Man Hours: 7 Billable Materials: All materials used were cut-offs from previous steps. Nothing new billed. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Wednesday, April 19

Eng Gdn Bench Day 12

Work day begins: 5:30 AM My ‘pre-dawn’ session is being spent catching up on my technical journal reading and pondering the Treasures web site debacle. So much work, just gone in an instant; do I really want to put all that work back into it? Maybe not. Some portions of the data are more important to the continued success of the gallery, those need to be replaced as quickly as possible, but many of the products that were listed didn’t seem to garner much traffic. I’ll use the sites’ traffic logs to decide which were the most important. Lunch Time I cut the mortises in the front rail for the tenons on the seat support, then changed over to the ½” chisel and designed a jig to hold the lower back rails to cut the mortises at a 12½ degree angle. I found a couple of telephone messages from customers saying that they tried to e-mail us and the messages were returned as undeliverable. So I cut my lunch break short and took some time to look into that. Workshop closes: 3:30 PM Joy O'Hare called: she’s having trouble with her computer and needs some help. Sigh… MORE computer troubles. I also have to take the truck and go pick up Marie after she turns in her rental car, then we have to make a trip to Morristown. So it’s time to get cleaned up and changed. But I did get most of the ½” mortises cut in the back rails. Billable Man Hours: 3.25 Billable Materials: none To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Monday, April 17

Eng Gdn Bench Day 11

Work day begins: 5:30 AM Over the Easter weekend, I managed to destroy the database that drives the Treasures Of Appalachia on-line store, and have been attempting to recover that data ever since. The early morning was spent discussing the problem with tech support at my hosting service. Without going into detail, the news is not good. I’ll have to rebuild the database that took me 4 months to build the first time. Once I see Marie off, I eagerly head for the workshop – where there are NO computers. Lunch Time I spent the morning roughing out parts for the 4 center seat support rails and the seat slats, fussy fitting the end assemblies and doing some sanding. Just as I was heading back to work the phone rang: is was Phyllis in California. She’d seen that we had a 12 drawer CD End Table available for immediate shipment, and wanted some details… since the web page that was supposed to give her that information was “having some issues”. (A result of the blown-up database.) So I e-mailed her the pictures and information she needed. Workshop closes: PM This afternoon I rough cut the 4 seat support blanks I made up this morning, and trimmed and planed the 10 seat slats. This evening I’ll write up today’s article and post these notes, then try to figure out if it’s going to be worthwhile rebuilding the Treasures product line database. Billable Man Hours: 6.5 Billable Materials: 32 bf 4/4 white oak. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Time out

Had to take a couple of sick days here. It wasn't pretty.

Eng Gdn Bench Day 10b

Work day begins: 5:30 AM So what’s up with the Day 10b, isn’t this day 11? Yes, technically it is. But yesterday half the day got blown away by weirdness so I only got half a day’s work done. Today the insurance man is coming by to impress upon me the importance of having health insurance. That will, in all likely hood take some time. So, I’ll count this as the second half of yesterday as far as the production schedule is concerned. Lunch Time I got the remaining mortises cut, the tenons trimmed and pieces test fitted for one whole end frame. It looks good and fits well. I was afraid that there was going to be a problem (again) with the angle on the back of the arm piece, but once I got all the parts assembled and drawn together, everything fit quite nicely. I guess ‘ol Norm knows what he’s doing after all. ;-) (The plan we’re using as a starting point for these benches is from Norm Abrams and the New Yankee Workshop.) Workshop closes: 5:30 PM The insurance man didn’t take up too much time, but Mom e-mailed to say that her drain is stopped up and they don’t have a plunger, could I help? So I walked down the hill to help out. I got another end frame trimmed and fitted. And a third underway. Billable Man Hours: 4.25 Billable Materials: none To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Monday, April 10

Eng Gdn Bench Day 10a

Work day begins: 5:30 AM The early morning was spent taking care of some chores on the Treasures of Appalachia web site. Just before breakfast I went out to start a fire to warm the shop because it’s still pretty chilly in the mornings. However, things then went weird on me. The entire morning ended up being spent dealing with stuff and fixing peoples problems. None of which had anything at all to do with our woodworking, but other projects that we are affiliated with. And a couple had nothing much to do with anything… they just happened to call me. Lunch Time Time for a quick lunch, them I’m leaving the phone in the house and heading out to the workshop. Workshop closes: 5:15 PM I got most of the mortises cut in the front and rear legs this afternoon. These monsters are tough to do even with a mortiser: white oak is tough, hard wood and getting the chisel to penetrate for a ¾”wide, 1¾ deep cut requires lots of pressure. If the chisel/bit set makes it all the way through this project, it will be junk when I’m done. Billable Man Hours: 4.25 Billable Materials: None To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Friday, April 7

Eng Gdn Bench Day 09

Work day begins: 6:30 AM Looking into a glitch with our computer network took some time this morning, but now I’m off to the workshop. Lunch Time This morning I roughed out the pieces I need for spreaders and seat supports. The spreaders were then trimmed to finished size and have the tenon shoulders cut. The seat supports are just roughed out. Workshop closes: 4:00 PM This afternoon I finished cutting out and shaping the seat rails (for the ends) and cut the tenons on the seat rails and the spreaders. I’ll take care of the seat supports next week when I’m ready to install the long rails. Right now I’m working on building the end frames. At this point I would normally set up the drill press to cut mortises. But Marie is wanting to make some stump candles tomorrow, and will be needing the drill press as a drill press. And there isn’t enough time left this afternoon to do more than make the change-over and tune the set-up. So I’ll wait to do those things until Monday, then I can get after the mortises once the machine is set up. So I’m closing up a little early in order to pick through the cedar branch pile for stock suited to stump candles. It’s supposed to thunderstorm tonight and tomorrow morning… might as well keep the stuff we’ll be working with dry by taking it inside now. Later on, I’ll do the construction article and post these notes. Have a good weekend! Billable Man Hours: 4 1/2 Billable Materials: 5.5 BF White Oak 3.5 BF Red Oak To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Thursday, April 6

Eng Gdn Bench Day 08

Work day begins: 7:00 AM It’s quite chilly this morning, so I’ve gone out to build a fire and warm things up a bit. While I’m waiting, I’ll take care of some bills and banking that need doing. Lunch Time This morning I got all 12 of the laminated parts belt sanded to finished shape and then sanded again with a random orbit sander to take out the cross-grain scratches. Workshop closes: 5:30 PM I spent the afternoon laying out mortise locations and cutting the tricky tenons on the back side of the arms. There was also a small glitch in the design – an angle that wasn’t going to work out right where the back of the arms meet the back support. I had to redesign the pattern and modify the parts. Luckily I caught it before the tenons were cut on these parts. This evening I’ll work on several bids that are waiting to be done and posting these notes and the construction article. Billable Man Hours: 6.75 Billable Materials: none To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Tuesday, April 4

Eng Gdn Bench Day 07b

Work day begins: 6:30 AM Checking e-mail and getting the daily stuff started. It’s chilly this morning, may have to build a fire to knock the chill out of the shop. We also have some special activities today that will interrupt the normal flow of the day today. I’ll have to run into Newport for a short time this morning, then go back again this evening for a couple of longer meetings. That will mean a shorter than normal day in the workshop. Lunch Time Spent most of the morning on errands and odd jobs that popped up. Seems odd jobs breed odd jobs. Workshop closes:400 PMI got all the screw hole plugs trimmed off, and the twelve laminated parts band sawed to rough shape and surface planed to 2 ½” thick. Now it’s time to sponge out the truck cab (Zadie lost her breakfast in there this morning), get cleaned up, and head back into Newport. It will be a long evening, and tomorrow I’m in Treasures again as shopkeeper. Thursday I should be able to put in a regular day. Man Hours Billed: 2.5 Materials Billed: None. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Monday, April 3

Eng Gdn Bench Day 07

Work day begins: 5:30 AM The folks who bought our old Blazer showed up this morning to try to get it running. Didn’t work, but it took up the morning. Lunch Time Spent the morning keeping an eye on the fellows in the driveway messing with the Blazer and applying wood filler to the cracks in the long rails. Workshop closes: 6:00 PM Made up 120 tapered screw hole plugs from cut-off pieces saved so that the plugs would match each piece closely. Plugging the screw holes in the laminated parts used up 104 of them. This evening I’ll get things caught up on the blogs and work on the web site some more. Man Hours Billed: 2:30 Materials Billed: 104 3/8” screw hole plugs. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page

Thursday, March 30

Eng Gdn Bench Day 06

Work day begins: 6:30 AM It’s chilly this morning, but will warm up quickly, so there’s no point in building a fire. I’ll just take care of some office work during the early morning. Lunch Time I’ve got the blanks for the 6 long rails roughed out and surface planed to thickness. Workshop closes: 4:30 PM Spent the afternoon trimming the long rail blanks to finished size and cutting the tenons on each end. Man Hours Billed: 5 Materials Billed: 36 b.f of 8/4 white oak. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Eng Gdn Bench Day 05

NOTE: Blogger wouldn't let me in to post this last night, so it's a day late. Work day begins: 6:30 AM I’ve got someone coming to look at and possibly buy our old Blazer today, so I’m going out early to fetch some gasoline, charge the battery and make sure it starts up. Now we’re going to continue making back legs for these Garden Benches. Lunch Time I got one leg blank cut, drilled, glued together and clamped. Then had to go chasing after Zadie, who climbed over a fence and took off. Workshop closes: 3:30 PM This afternoon I got the last back leg blank built. Just in time too – I’m out of the special screws, and the waterproof glue that I’m using on these. Both are on order, just haven’t arrived yet. I’ve also been tinkering with the Blazer – it doesn’t want to start. No need to go into all that here. But that fellow didn’t show up either. This evening I’ll be working on the web site; sweeping out the dust bunnies and getting things set up to install the new shopping cart system. Man Hours Billed: 2 Materials Billed: 8 bf white oak, 22 #8x1.75” assembly screws. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Monday, March 27

Eng Gdn Bench Day 04

Work day begins: 5:30 AM I have some e-mail to handle, a bid to get started on and several days worth of project notes to get caught up on. I’ve been remiss in keeping up with this blog and the project article, so I have to get things caught up this morning while the workshop warms up. It looks like the rain and snow that has plagued us for the past week will not be a problem today: blue skies and a predicted high in the 50s. It’s chilly this morning though. Catching up a little, I’ve gotten the 4 arms glued up, cut to shape and sanded and 3 of the four front leg blanks glued up. I’ll glue the 4th this morning once the shops’ interior temperature gets above 50 degrees so the glue will work properly. Too cold and it will not set up hard enough. Then I’ll get started on the back legs. But now I need to get busy formatting photos and writing. Lunch Time The power went out for most of the morning, so I got precious little done. It was out long enough that even the battery back-ups on the computers wore out. I was *forced* to take the dogs for a walk on this beautiful day. Workshop closes: 5:15 PM I got the boards for all four rear legs surface planed, and one cut into billets for the rear legs. These are a little trickier than the other parts so far because in order to get all 3 pieces from the same board (thus attain better color matching) they have to overlap so I can’t just cross cut the board on the table saw. I lay them out on the board, then use a saber saw to cut between the parts to “chunk” up the board into manageable pieces. I got the first leg blank drilled, glued and clamped. Man Hours Billed: 4:15 Materials Billed: 16 bf white oak. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Eng Gdn Bench Day 04

Wednesday, March 15

Eng Gdn Bench Day 02

Work day begins: 7:00 AM This morning I’m arguing with the new wireless network I installed yesterday afternoon to replace the Ethernet cable network we had in place before. This will allow much more flexibility as we expand my domain, for the notebook computer can now be taken anywhere in the facility and have access to the main file server and the internet without having to run cables first. Yesterday the thing was working flawlessly. This morning none of the computers will admit to being part of a network. After considerable counseling, however, I’ve got them all talking to one another again, and it’s time to go out to the shop and get started. Today we’ll be making patterns for this bench. Lunch Time Making progress. Because I’m working from what’s called “A Set of Measured Drawings”, there are no full size patterns, only scale drawings on a gridwork to help lay out curves. It’s up to me to translate the little drawings into full scale patterns. I use thin plywood, usually scraps of BBP left over from past projects, to make my patterns. I draw each part on the plywood, then cut them out – very carefully – and sand them smooth. I usually apply one coat of lacquer to the pattern, then draw in the lay-out details like mortise locations, tenons, screw hole locations, etc with an ink pen and label each part with a felt tip marker. If I did this with ink on bare wood, the grain in the wood would suck the ink into it and cause “fuzzy” lines. Sealing the wood with lacquer prevents this spreading. When the ink has had time to dry thoroughly, I give each part a couple of spritz coats of lacquer. Because lacquer thinner will dissolve most inks, a heavy coat would cause the ink to spread and bleed into a splotchy mess. But a couple of spritz coats, with a few minutes between to dry will fix the ink in place and avoid the mess. It just takes practice to get it right. Workshop closes: PM Because this item will be added to our standard offerings, we hope to be using this pattern set again and again. Therefore we will not be billing this customer for the time and materials used in making the patterns. Man Hours Billed: 0 Materials Billed: None To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Tuesday, March 7

6 Dwr CD Chest Day 11

Work day begins: 6:15 AM Performing scheduled computer maintenance this morning, then back to web site maintenance before heading out to do the final inspection on Jon’s CD Chest and packaging it up for shipping. Lunch Time The chest is packaged and the label run, just waitin on the payment to schedule a pick-up. Back to web site maintenance. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Monday, March 6

6 Drwr CD Chest Day 10

Work day begins: 7:00 AM. The weekend turned out to be quite busy, and I didn’t get into the workshop at all – other than to pull and store the white oak we’ll need for the next project. So, we’ll be doing the staining on this chest today. If the weather is dry and warm(er) today, we may be able to shoot the lacquer this evening. Lunch Time. I spent most of the morning staining the chest. First I had to remove the drawer fronts from the drawer boxes because the boxes don’t get stained. Because it’s cooler and damper than what is ideal for staining (the weather dude is predicting snow showers for this evening) it took longer than normal for the stain to take hold. Where I would usually allow it to set for 5 minutes, took around 15 minutes before I could wipe the excess off and get the right color. But it’s done. I’ll have to check it occasionally to see that we don’t have little droplets bleeding back out of the grain, but otherwise the workshop is closed down until the stain cures and I can shoot the lacquer. This afternoon I have plenty of web site maintenance to keep me busy, so it won’t be wasted time. The stain is dry to the touch, so I’ll go ahead and shoot the lacquer this evening, that way it will be ready to package up in the morning. I can’t ship until I get confirmation that the e-check used to pay the balance has cleared the bank, but at least it will be ready to go as soon as that happens. Workshop closes: 6:30 PM. A quick clean-up of the gun and brushes and I’m outta here until the air is more breathable. Back to the web site maintenance. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Friday, March 3

6 Drwr CD Chest...Holding...

Work day begins: 4:00 AM I have a lot of Web site work to do this morning, so I’m getting an early start. The shop is all cleaned up and the tools put away. The drop cloths are in place to protect the equipment, and the finishing supplies are at hand. We’re ready to go as soon as the balance due is received. Why don’t I just go ahead and stain the chest? After all, we know Jon is still out there: he has been following along through the illustrated article and has told us how much he’s enjoying watching the process. Because it’s a rule. There is a policy that was written up by our legal beagle, approved and enacted by the head honcho, and posted to the web site for all to see that says we don’t stain an order until it’s paid for. And there is a reason for the rule: we’ve been taken in before. There is a 9 drawer CD End Table sitting in our gallery that was built for a gal who was in constant communication with us. She wanted it stained a rather unusual color, but because she was so gregarious, I didn’t think anything about it and went ahead to complete the project. But when it came time to settle up, it all fell apart. Now we have this piece that -- had it been finished natural or some color other people are fond of – would have been sold by now. But because it’s pink, it sits there. People comment on the lovely style and the quality of the workmanship, but it just sits there. Unfortunately there have been other times where I felt someone was trustworthy and it ended up costing us money. I’m just a soft-hearted sucker I guess. So, I’ve been admonished to follow the rules. They are there for a reason. Since I can’t be out in the shop making sawdust (because we’re in “Finishing Mode” and have to keep it clean) I’ll spend my time working on the web site and other assorted chores this morning. This is Friday. I like it when it works out that we’re ready to finish on a Friday. That way if payment comes through quickly, we can get the staining done Friday, let it set over the weekend to cure thoroughly, and shoot the lacquer Monday morning. Usually we can still package up the piece and have it ready to go out Monday afternoon. But if payment doesn’t come through right away (sometimes people are just too busy or need to transfer things around a little) the weekend gives them a couple of days to get their ducks in a row without costing us production time. When finishing day comes on, say… a Tuesday, then we can give up one day to waiting but if that doesn’t work out then we have to set that project aside and get started on the next. We’ll come back to the one to be finished when we get to a convenient stopping point to set up for finishing again. Eventually we will enlarge the workshop to about 3 times what it is now, and the expansion will include a “clean room” devoted exclusively to finishing. Then we can put a completed project in there, get started on the next right away and still be able to do the finishing whenever the conditions are met. Well, I’d better stop yammering and get to work. Since no work was done on the chest today, this will not count as a “Day” on the roster. I did get word from the money folks that the payment I’ve been looking for has been initiated, but has not cleared the bank yet. But if I get any time this weekend I believe I’ll go ahead and get the staining done anyway. We have a pretty heavy schedule already, but I’ll see if I can’t eek out a few hours. Time to wrap it up for tonight… I’m tired. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Thursday, March 2

6 Dwr. CD Chest Day 09

Work day begins: 7:00 AM We won’t be needing to fire up the heat stove this morning, it’s already 62 degrees outside, and another beautiful day is in the making. Yesterday I spent the day at our gallery, Treasures Of Appalachia, in Cosby where several of us got the place cleaned up, and opened for the 2006 season. This morning it’s back to woodworking as usual, and we’ll be completing the drawer installation. Lunch Time This morning we got the drawer boxes routed, sanded and installed. Everything fits quite well, nothing but minor adjustments were needed. Workshop closes: 5:30 PM This afternoon we got the drawer fronts made, routed and sanded, installed the knobs and mounted the fronts to the drawers. That pretty well completes construction. That means it’s time to ask for money – which is what we do when we’re ready to begin the finishing stage, especially in a piece that‘s to be stained. We’re coming down the home stretch now. This evening I will be writing up the daily article episode and posting that and the pictures, then doing some work on our new web site. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, .which is available from my profile page.

Tuesday, February 28

6 Drawer CD Chest Day 08

Work day begins: 6:15 AM Marie has some early appointments this morning, so we’re getting at it early today. A bunch more spam e-mail this morning. so I spent a little while tweaking our mail filtering rules to help take it away before I have to waste time on it. Lunch Time This morning we got the parts for the 6 drawer boxes made. That doesn’t sound like much, but it’s actually a fair bit since we started with a rough sawn 5/4 poplar plank. Workshop closes: 5:15 PM All 6 drawer boxes are completed and await finish sanding and installation. This evening I have to take care of month-end books, invoicing web clients, and some web site maintenance chores that came in during the day today. Tomorrow is March 1st, and we will be re-opening our Gallery, Treasures of Appalachia, for this years season. I will, therefore be out all day. The girls will be here o keep an eye on things, but they don’t get much accomplished when I’m not here to direct them.  To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click this entry’s title. (Blogger seems to have disabled embedded external links) If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, which is available from my profile page.

Monday, February 27

CD_Chest_6 Day 07

Work day begins: 7:15 AM I found another bid request this morning, but this on is a simple request: a TV Tray Table, so I was able to whip that out with no trouble while the workshop was warming up. Lunch Time This morning I’ve gotten the base shoe molding shaped, mitered and installed, and got the top plate trimmed to size, routed and sanded. I had to take a little time before leaving for lunch to fix the propane furnace that keeps the shop from freezing up overnight. I found it shut down when I went in this morning, although there was still propane in the tank. So I took it apart, blew the dust out and checked it over. The problem turned out to be a thermocouple line. It’s working again. Fortunately it didn’t get cold enough this weekend to ruin the finishes and glues. That would have been bad. Workshop closes: 4:00 PM This afternoon I made and attached the mounting blocks that hold the case top to the case, then mounted the top plate and sanded it for finishing. The case is now complete. Tomorrow we start on drawers. This evening after I work up the pictorial article for today’s work, I have some web site stuff to do and some computer-network maintenance to perform. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click the title above. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog, which is available from my Profile page.

Friday, February 24

CD_Chest_6 Day 06

Work day begins: 7:00 AM Got another inquiry about a Deluxe Sewing Cabinet this morning, so I’m taking time to answer his questions while the shop warms up. Lunch Time I spent the morning disassembling and reassembling (with glue) the three main panel components we built yesterday. Workshop closes: 5:30 PM This afternoon I finished the casework joinery, cut the mortises for the T tracks, and assembled the case to test fit, then did it again with glue and clamps. There shouldn’t be any problems with the glue not wanting to set up due to cold… it’s been 85 degrees out there most of the afternoon. That was partly due to the bright sunshine and mid 60 degree weather, partly because I didn’t want the fire to die down too much while I left for lunch, so I tossed a couple scoops of coal into the stove. Whooee does that stuff put out the heat! And when the roof is hot from the sunshine, the heat doesn’t just sneak through the roof like it does when it’s cold. I probably could have let the fire die out, but at the time it was still pretty chilly in there. Dan, the fellow who was interested in a sewing cabinet, placed his order this morning so I need to process that this evening -- a very pleasant chore -- as well as working up the photo article and running the weekly reports so Marie will know which bills she can pay this weekend. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here. If you enjoy this Daily Shop Notes blog, you will also want to look at our Doug Bob blog.

Thursday, February 23

CD_Chest_6 Day 05

Work day begins: 7:00 AM The wood stove is going, and there’s not much in the e-mail this morning. Chris, a programmer I’ve hired to help with the upgrade to our web site, is making good progress with the conversion. I’ll be entering all our information into the database soon. Lunch Time I got all the panel grooves cut into the rails and stiles, and have cut the mortises in the stiles for the left hand side panel framing. Workshop closes: 5:00 PM This afternoon I got the mortises cut on the other side panel, and the back panel. Then trimmed and sanded the panels and test fitted them into the completed frames. Looking good! Now it’s time to format the pictures, write the text and build the daily page for the pictorial article on this project. Then I’ll take care of any bookkeeping and e-mails that need attending to, and call it a day. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here.

Wednesday, February 22

CD_CHEST_6 Day 04

Work day begins: 7:00 AM I’ve got a fire started to chase the cold out of the workshop, but while I’m waiting for it to warm up I’m chasing a worm. It was detected by my weekly virus scan. Apparently our Norton Internet Security software failed to detect or block it’s entrance into our system, but my weekly scan with Avast! turned it up. Slippery bugger, but I finally managed to manually delete it and I just got a clean scan with Avast!. I don’t think I’ll be renewing my Norton subscription. Time to go make sawdust. Workshop closes:4:00 PM Today I got all the pieces glued together to make up blanks for 4 side panels, 2 back panels the case top and the blank for the 6 drawer fronts. I also got the grid work for the front made and glued together. I had a little time left over, so I did a little cleaning up To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here.

Friday, February 17

CD Chest – 6 Day 03

Work day begins: 7:05 AM I’ve got a fire going. It’s raining but warm this morning, so staying warm won’t be such a challenge today. This morning we will begin construction of Jon’s CD Chest. Lunch Time I’ve got most of the casework parts roughed out. I also got Wayne’s stopper rack boxed up and ready to ship. Since it’s going USPS, I’ll have to run that into town tomorrow instead up putting it on this afternoon’s UPS truck. Workshop closes: 4:15 PM This afternoon I got all the case framing parts cut to finished size, re-sawed and planed the pieces to make the side and back panels. Then I did a little cleaning up and putting away. This evening I need to get my notes in order and put together a shopping list so I can buy what’s needed when I go into town tomorrow to mail Wayne’s stopper rack, and I have some bookkeeping to do, then I need to get the progress article caught up so I can post these shop notes. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here.

Thursday, February 16

Stopper racks complete

Work day begins: 7:05 AM I’ve got a fire going. It’s warmer this morning, so staying warm won’t be such a challenge today. Nothing much in the e-mail, so I’ll occupy myself with some bookkeeping and Admin chores while the shop warms up. Lunch Time I discovered a problem with the custom stopper rack and have to re-make it. At this point I have the body cut out and glued together and the shelves milled and sanded. I’ll install the shelves after lunch. Workshop closes: 4:00 PM Wayne’s stopper rack is done and ready to ship. I’ve got a little bookkeeping to do and I’ll call it a day.

Wednesday, February 15

CD_Chest_6 Day 02

Work day begins: 7:15 AM This morning I have some bookkeeping to do and will finish up the re-design of our 6 Drawer CD Chest to suit Jon’s requirements. I completed re-doing the drawings last time, no I just have to take off the parts list . It will be warmer later on and through the afternoon, so I’ll get to work in the shop a little later on. Chelsea will probably be around, but I don’t expect to see Dolly; she’s been pretty unreliable lately. Lunch Time I’ve pretty well got the CD chest design worked out, and have another set of shelves glued onto a bottle stopper rack body. Workshop closes: 5:00 PM The 3rd stopper rack is assembled, all three have been drilled for pins and Jon’s rack has been pinned and sanded. Time to send him a note. I also went over the CD cabinet design one more time and feel it’s ready to start production. But that will wait for tomorrow. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here.

Valentines Day

Yesterday, Feb 14th, was not only Valentines Day, but Marie's birthday as well. Yes, it's true, she was born on Valentines Day! And rightly so, for she is a true sweetheart. So it was my turn to whisk her away for a day of fun and celebration. Therefore the shop was closed.

Monday, February 13

Stopper Racks continue

Work day begins: 7:00 AM It’s cold this morning: mid 20s, and we got quite a bit of snow over the weekend. The snow may work out to be an advantage as it tends to insulate the workshop roof and help hold in the heat. At least until the heat from inside melts the bottom of the snow and it slides off. The work order for the day includes working some more on the bottle stopper racks that we started last week and re-drawing the design for our 6 drawer CD chest to accommodate Jon’s requirement for drawer size. Once I know what size the parts will need to be I can start picking lumber from the standing stack in the shop and cutting billets. Workshop closes: 4:15 PM So far I’ve gotten all three stopper rack bodies glued up, pegged and sanded, milled the 3 self sets and back straps, and glued one shelf set glued and clamped to it’s rack body. Now it’s time to re-work the design on Jon’s CD Chest.

Thursday, February 9

YESTERDAY (2006-02-08)

Yesterday was my 50th birthday and Marie decided that we should close the workshop and celebrate my having been around for a half century. She’s the boss! We had beautiful weather and enjoyed a road trip to Sevier County where we had lunch at the NASCAR Café – always a unique experience and took in the Ripley’s Aquarium. Because of our involvement with the Cocke County Tourism Council, the Tourism Director got us a pair of free passes. We were particularly fortunate in that Sevier County – normally bustling with tourists – was practically deserted. Traffic was very light, and the attractions we visited were so empty it was (almost) like having a private tour. The aquarium is something to see! We picked up a couple new DVD movies, and watched one at home that evening. After we got home, it started snowing, and we got our first real snowfall overnight. It’s just beautiful this morning.

Tuesday, February 7

Cabinet_Doors Day 01

Work day begins: 4:15 AM We had a dog party earlier this morning and I haven’t been able to get back to sleep, so rather than laying there staring at the ceiling I’m up and getting some things done. In a couple of hours I’ll go out and start a fire to warm the workshop. I pulled lumber for this project – and Jon’s CD chest -- last week; some very pretty red oak. My task is to make 3 doors to go on a kitchen island. Tommy will do the finishing, I’m just building them. I’m waiting for some info from Tommy right now, so I decide to start on Wayne’s stopper rack while I’m waiting. These are both small projects that I can get out quickly before getting started on Jon's CD Chest. Besides; I have to rework the design to accomodate his drawer sizes. Lunch Time The morning session was spent milling the stile & rail stock to size and making sure it’s good and square. Workshop closes: 4:30 PM This afternoon I routed the inside profiles on the rails & stiles – this includes the fancy joints at the corners, milled out the billets for the raised panels, jointed them and glued & clamped them. They will set overnight to let the glue harden well before I start working them. This evening I’m working on the SMW web site and handling some correspondence. Now that this is all done, I’ll post these notes.

Yesterday -- Intermission – Work day begins: 7:00 AM Being that I’m between projects, I’ll take care of the loose ends that have been piling up before diving into the next one. That means a trip into town this morning, doing some bookkeeping, and a few phone calls. I’ll try to arrange delivery of Iliff’s chair – I need to get that out of the shop so I can get started on the next project… and getting paid would be nice too! Lunch Time I’m nibbling on some left-over pizza as I keep after the Treasures tax paperwork. I had to stop for a bit and fix my scanner/copier. Got the chores done in town. Managed to get hold of Iliff and make arrangements for payment and delivery. Tommy will be showing up soon for some help working on a special project. I have to get this tax stuff finished before then. Workshop closes: 3:00 PM Tommy’s project took only a half hour to complete, and I’ve got the chair loaded in the truck. I’m heading out to catch Iliff at his office in Newport before he leaves for the day. I connected with Iliff and got the check. Marie won't be done with her stuff for a while yet, so I am sitting in the Community Center hot-spot with our notebook computer uploading new pictures to our web sites. It’s going well… 5 times faster than I could do it over my BellSloth dial-up connection at home (on a really good day, 50 times faster than on a bad day at home.) When I finish here I’ll go pick up Marie and we’ll head for Parrottsville to deliver Iliff’s chair to his Ranch House. It will be late by the time we’re done, so we’ll stop for dinner on our way back. A few more details to finish before bed. Our I-net connection is bad tonight, can't post the notes. Will try again in the morning.

Friday, February 3

Day 08 of Mission Rocking Chair Work day begins: 7:00 AM We won’t need a lot of heat this morning, it’s 53 degrees outside this morning – but the weather report is for a possibility of show showers, so I want to get this done early. The first coat of lacquer is on and I’m waiting for it to dry so I can scuff sand it. I sent the girls away this morning because lacquer fumes are deadly and they refuse to wear respirators. I have scuffed and re-coated the chair. Time to Abandon Shop and give the lacquer a chance to harden up good before we handle it. So it’s time to break for lunch.

Workshop closes: 3:45 PM I spent part of the afternoon pulling red oak, poplar and walnut off the lumber piles for the next few projects. After closing up the shop I’ll go on with updates needed by several web site clients. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here.

Thursday, February 2

Mission Rocker Day 07 Work day begins: 7:15 AM I’ve got a fire going to heat the shop and have checked e-mail: mostly junk this morning. Today we’re going to assemble the parts we’ve spent the last six work days making. If no problems rear their ugly head, we should easily accomplish this today, and have time to clean up, put up and vacuum the workshop so we can spray lacquer tomorrow. Lunch Time I’ve got the majority of the assembly done, but now must pause to allow the glue to set up sufficiently to hold when I proceed to the next step. So this is a good time to break for lunch.

Workshop closes: 4:45 PM Everything is assembled and the finish sanding is done. We’re ready to spray lacquer tomorrow. Well, almost, I still have to vacuum the shop and tack-off the chair. No point in doing those tonight as there is a lot of dust in the air that will settle out overnight. We’ll do that first thing tomorrow – while the shop is warming up to a workable temperature for lacquer. I did get all the tools put away before closing up, so it’s just the wood dust we’ll be dealing with in the morning. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here.

Wednesday, February 1

Work day begins: 7:10 AM We’ve got the start of a beautiful day. Quite cool this morning but headed for a high in the mid 50s. A fire is going in the workshop heat stove, and I’ve checked e-mail. Today will be spent sanding. That’s pretty much it; just sanding. All of the parts we’ve made need to be sanded with 100 grit paper, then sanded again with 150 grit. It’s important to get most of our sanding done now because of all the tight spaces that will make it difficult to do after assembly. It’s also easier to knock the sharp edges off now. So that’s the mission for today. ‘Taint glamorous, but it’s got to be done and done well if are to get a good finish. Workshop closes: 4:45 PM Sanding is complete. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here.

Tuesday, January 31

Work day begins: 7:15 AM Just a little e-mail to handle this morning, including a bid request for a custom doll house display table. A fire is going out in the shop, so we will be warm despite the grey, cold, rainy morning. The radio says the rain may turn to snow as temperatures drop off during the day. Today we’ll take another stab at completing and fitting the tenons on Iliff’s rocking chair. Lunch Time Things are going well. The back assembly is trimmed and dry fitted. This is the most complex assembly. No great challenges or disappointments so far.

Workshop closes: 4:00 PM We got all of the tenons trimmed and the dry fitting done. The whole chair fits together nicely, and I see no problems to correct, so I’ve knocked the chair back apart and tomorrow we’ll proceed to the first sanding. Now I need to go update the project article and post these notes. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here.

Monday, January 30

Work day begins: 7:00 AM This is Day 5 for the Mission Rocker project, and today we will be cutting the long tenons on the seat rails and fitting them into their mortises in the legs. But first, I’m replacing the florescent tubes in most of my light fixtures. We made a supply run to Morristown on Saturday and found a good deal on good tubes. I made a mistake when I set up this workshop: I needed to add A LOT of light fixtures and didn’t have a whole bunch of money to spend on good florescent fixtures, so I bought a whole mess of ShopLight fixtures – because they were cheap. Hey, a florescent light fixture is a florescent light fixture, right? Wrong. The problem is that the tubes made to go in these fixtures are only 25 watts. Two tubes per fixture means it only gives out 50 watts of light, which is kind of dim. Regular tubes are 40 watts, 80 watts per fixture – much better. But most regular tubes say right on the box, “Not for use in ShopLight fixtures”, and if you use them anyway, they light up well – for about a week, then they burn out. Replacing them every week is costly. Lowes had some 40 watt tubes that say “For use in all florescent fixtures”. So I bought a bunch of them and will give them a try. I would have been better off to install good fluorescent fixtures as I could afford them than to get in a hurry and try to light the shop adequately all at once on a shoestring budget. I have since learned that if I choose fixtures with an electronic ballast, I can avoid the problem of the lights flickering and putting out low light levels in cold weather. Once regular ballasts warm up they work just fine, but in severe cold, this can take hours. Electronic ballasts however provide full power to light the tubes even in the cold. I was in the process of replacing the tubes when the power went out. That’s why I’m spending so much time blathering on and on about light fixtures. With no power, there’s not much I can do. It’s dark in there. But our computers have battery back-ups to protect them against power outages and I can type by the light the screen gives off. We get a lot of what I call power blips: the power goes out for a second, then comes right back -- just enough to mess up the alarm clocks, telephone, VCRs, and our computers if they’re not protected. Sometimes, the power will go out for a longer period, but usually not more than a half-hour. Today is one of those longer periods. If it runs true to form, it ought to be coming back any minute… And there it is: almost exactly a half hour. So, it’s back to work for me. Well, this turned out to be one of “those” days. I’ve had visitors dropping in all day long. One of them wants me to make the doors for a large kitchen island that he’s building for a client, so we spent a considerable amount of time discussing design details, trying to match stain, and producing a sample board for a color for which I had no sample board on hand. I was setting up to make 10 stain sample boards for a fellow in Massachusetts, so this was good timing. The power went out again this afternoon, then kept popping in and out – totally flubbing up any chance to get anything done with power tools. But I did get to finish the stain boards. In the afternoon there is enough light coming through the side window to see by, and all of my finishing was done by hand and with aerosol cans of lacquer -- no sprayer required. Then a weather front came through with a vengeance: very strong winds that were making the girls really nervous, so I relented, closed the shop early and we all went in the house. Workshop closes: 4:30 PM I have a few small web site chores to tend to, but they won’t take long. Then I’ll post my notes and head for the shower. We’ll just have to go for a do-over on Day 5 of the chair. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here.

Friday, January 27

Work day begins: 6:15 AM Getting an early start to work some more on this shopping cart problem. The problem seems to be exclusively with PayPal, all other payment forms work fine. The easiest solution would be to give PayPal the boot and not accept that payment form any longer. It’s quite cold out this morning. So I have to go get a fire going in the workshop if we are to work out there.

Today I got all the mortises cut and most of the tenons made. Still have to cut the tricky tenons on the ends of the aprons, but all others are done and ready for final fitting. Workshop closes: 4:00 PM I’m still working on that PayPal bug in the Treasures shopping cart. I’ll work on that until dinner time, then quit and watch a movie with Marie. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here.

Wednesday, January 25

Work day begins: 6:45 AM

Today I spent the day roughing-out the blanks I’ll need for parts. To start with I cross-cut the full length boards into smaller, more manageable pieces sized according to what part I planned to make from them. Then I surface planed the chunks to the proper thicknesses, edged the boards and rip sawed then into slightly oversized pieces; one for each individual part. I also jointed, doweled and glued up the seat blank. Tomorrow I will begin on the process of actually producing finished parts. This afternoon I also did some more work on those cherry trays that are in for repairs. They should be done now, as long as sawdust didn’t get into the fresh polyurethane. And I did some photography work on a couple of new products for the Treasures store. Workshop closes: 4:00 PM It’s a little early, but this is a good stopping point… and my back is still bothering me from re-stacking all that lumber yesterday. So I’ll go get my notes together and ready to post and work on web site stuff for a while. To view the detailed construction article on this piece, click here.

Tuesday, January 24

Work day begins: 7:00 AM Today I needed to pull the Hickory I’ll be needing to build Iliff’s rocking chair. But the hickory is buried under some Chestnut Oak, so I need to move that off to get access to the Hickory. I have been planning to put the Chestnut Oak on top of a short pile of Honey Locust, across the aisle from it. But I also need to stash some Aromatic Cedar in that stack, and the cedar is not going to be used for anything for a long time, so it needs to be on the bottom. That means moving the locust off first, then stacking the cedar and re-stacking the locust back on top of it. That occupied the morning. After lunch I opened up the Oak & Hickory pile and moved the Chestnut Oak over on top of the Honey Locust. Then I found Cherry, White Oak, Walnut and Poplar mixed in that pile as well. Rather than leave this a “mixed” pile, I decided to put these woods where they belong… might as well do it right. But that meant pulling the concrete blocks and sheets of tin off of most every pile in the yard, sort these boards into the proper piles and put the lids back on. That took most of the afternoon. Once I finally got down to the Hickory I selected the boards I needed and carried them into the shop. Here they will stand vertically for a while to see if they will tend to curl or warp. I saw a tag on the pile stating that this lumber had been stacked on 09/23/2004, so it should be good and dry and I don’t expect it to do anything unruly.

Then I dug around in my patterns cabinet and located the template set for our Mission Rocker, sorted the templates out by thickness of stock and double checked to be sure I had enough stock standing by. I occupied the rest of my afternoon with a little cleaning up in the workshop. Workshop closes: 5:00 PM I have an assortment of web site maintenance chores to get caught up on this evening, I’ll get to those right after dinner. But first I’ll try to post these notes.

Monday, January 23

Intermission Work day begins: 6:44 AM The previous project has been completed and delivered, but before I dive into the next I’m going to take some time to tie up some loose ends. I have a couple of TV Trays that came in for repairs. These folks said they just love their tables, use them daily and will be lost without them. I want to get them done quickly so I can send them back. I also have some bookkeeping to do this morning. And, the first step of any project is pulling the lumber I’ll need, but it’s raining again this morning. It’s supposed to clear up and be nice tomorrow, so that’s one more reason to use today for catching up and cleaning up. It’s a good thing I didn’t go pull lumber the first thing this morning. I would have pulled oak for the quilt curios that are next on the list. But I got a message from Marie letting me know that there is still a problem with those, so I need to go on to the next project. That would be the hickory rocking chair for Iliff.

The repairs on the trays are just about done. I want to put one more skim-coat of poly on these just to be sure, then they’ll be ready to box up and send back. Workshop closes: 5:30 PM This evening I’m going to proof-read and tweak the article we posted over the weekend covering construction of the Kitchen Island we just delivered. Then it’s off to bed for me. These rainy Mondays wear me out even when I don’t do much.

Thursday, January 19

The Final Day Today was spent reassembling and testing everything. But first the early morning was spent trying to re-establish communications with our e-mail server. That was an adventure!

It all looks good to us. I had to wait for help to arrive before rolling the thing back over on its feet – it’s a little too bulky/heavy for me to do this alone. Workshop closes: 6:15 PM This evening I will be working on the pictorial article on this project, although I will not be able to post the latest pictures until this weekend when I have access to a reliable connection. BellSloth is still very slow and fluky. Then I’ll work on some bids. We have several piled up to attend to. Tomorrow I will wrap the island for delivery. Since Jim & Ruth live not too far from here, we will deliver it to them ourselves this weekend. So my next posting will be on Monday. Have a good weekend!

Monday, January 16

Work day begins: 6:45 AM Heading out to build a fire in the workshop heat stove. After breakfast and seeing Marie off on her appointed rounds I got started dismantling the completed island in preparation to staining. Then, vacuumed the shop well and laid newspaper out over my work spaces. Then we begin staining the all the parts. This will take most of the day. The drawer fronts, drop door and self are stained and looking good. I’ll let them set up a bit during lunch then should be able to safely move them aside to make room for the cabinet doors. Afternoon break time and the doors are stained and drying -- just the casework to go.

All the staining work is done, now it has to sit overnight and cure. Hopefully there will be enough residual heat in the shop to hold out for a few more hours. The curing process stops when the temperature drops below around 45 degrees. It’s around 60 degrees in there now, but the sun is going down and the outside temperatures will drop off quickly. Workshop closes: 4:00 PM This evening I will attempt to work on the Kitchen Island article. I may have to build the web pages here and wait to upload the files until next Sunday when I can sit in the Community Center’s Internet hot spot to upload them. We’ll see how it goes.

Friday, January 13

Work day begins: 6:30 am Going out to build a fire in the heat stove, it’s chilly and damp this morning. Rain is coming in later on. It will be a good day to be working in doors. I have some e-mail to answer while the shop heats up. Several inquiries, and an invitation to go to Hawaii to go lumber shopping with Stew. I’ll have to decline that I’m afraid… just can’t get away this year. Pity. This morning I’m making the raised panels for the doors. Then I’ll test fit them into the rails and stiles I made yesterday. If all is well, I’ll glue the frames together (with the raised panels inside). Should get that done by lunch. Lunch time. All went well and the doors are glued up and sitting in clamps. After lunch and a mail run I’ll remove the clamps, route the outer edges and sand the rails and stiles. I sanded the panels before gluing up the doors. This afternoon I installed the hinges, hung the doors and built the baffle above the trash can. This completes construction. Tomorrow I’ll take some time to put things away and clean up. Then Monday I plan to begin the finishing stage. Shop closes 5:30 pm. This evening I'll continue to try to update web sites. Our internet service from BellSloth has become pitifully slow: less than 1 kps of data throughput most times. taht makes wen site maintenance difficult

Thursday, January 12

Wednesday

Workday begins: 6:00 am

I’ll try getting my notes started this morning, then maybe I’ll remember to send it this evening. I’ve been unable to post my notes using the on-line Blogger form because of the extreme slowness of our internet connection. Since a couple of week before Christmas, this has been a problem and no one seems to know what the problem is.

Posting messages via e-mail is an alternate method that seems to work OK, except that I can do no formatting and embed no links or photos.

We are looking into the problem.

Today will be a mixed-bag of a day. We have to be back at Lowes for the official grand opening at mid day, but I plan to work in the shop before and after. That’s my plan.

This morning however, I need to get some urgent web site updates done. And I found this mornings’ e-mail to contain a new order to be processed, and another bid request to get started. I’ve been working on those.

Change of plans. – I have to go to the post office to ship out this order we received from on-hand stock. Then, Marie tells me, we have an appointment with the Tourism Director prior to the grand opening at Lowes.

When we’re done at Lowes, we’ll be heading to Sevier County

So…

Wednesday

Work day began: 7:00 am

Yesterday I set up the rail & stile router but set and routed some test pieces. Using the test pieces I calculated that the finished length and width for the door frame parts needed to be, trimmed those parts to their finished dimensions and routed the fancy grooves and ogees on the inner edges.

These details not only accept the raised panel that will go into them, but make it so that the ends of the rails mate up with the profile on the stiles for a good strong corner joint using a modified stub tenon. Except that the top mortise cheek is shaped to lay against the roman ogee.

You see this joint in most professionally made doors with profiles edges. Flat panel, square edged doors can use a standard mortise & tenon joint.

The results were good and all four doors came out well.

Then I used the completed frame to measure the precise size that the filler panels need to be and trimmed them to that size.

Finally, I set up the monstrous panel raiser bit in the router table and installed the auxiliary fencing. The bit is to large that it won’t fit inside the regular fence.

I’ll work on that phase tomorrow.

I had to quit a little early to get cleaned up, retrieve Marie and get to the Pre-Grand Opening party at the new Lowes in Newport. Marie was representing the Tourism Counsel and asked me to escort her.

Work Day Ended: 3:30 pm

Tuesday, January 10

Finally

The router bits that I’ve been waiting on finally arrived, so I spent the afternoon building set-up blocks and auxiliary fencing for the router table.

This morning I worked on web site stuff and bookkeeping – closing out the year 2005. I should be about ready for the tax man now.

Also got word from Jim on his stain preference, so I could get started staining the carcass and drawer fronts. But of course if I do that, I can not do any woodworking until the stain is set. We’ll see what the weather is like tomorrow to see which I work on first.

www.SmokyMountainWoodworks.com

Your source for quality, custom furniture

Yesterday

Monday morning I went out to the shop and cut a 45° chamfer around the top edge of the butcher block. I’ve never liked big hard square corners, but a round-over didn’t fit in this piece either. Since the drawer fronts and door panels use a straight bevel décor, the chamfer “fits in” better.

Afterward I was starting to work some more on re-stacking lumber but threatening clouds moved in. I decided to stop that project and put things back together before I got caught by rain with all that lumber laying out in the open.

I went inside to work on web sites and wait for the UPS truck – hoping that those router bits would show up.

They didn’t. Sigh. But I did hear from Jim with is stain selection that evening.

Friday, January 6

Work day begins: 7:00 AM Time to go fire up the heat stove, then will check and handle e-mail. Shop Opens: 8:00 AM This morning I continue the sanding: take the butcher block top down to the next grade, then do the casework as well. The top will go two more grades, 150 & 220, but because of the stain, I’ll stop at 150 for the case work. If I sand too fine, the stain will have too few places to lodge and the color will be too light. Most stains don’t actually penetrate the wood. Aniline dyes do; their molecular structure is so small that they actually sink beneath the surface of the wood and produce a wonderfully life-like appearance. But they are available only in a few colors that must be combined to create custom colors, they are supplied in powder form that it extremely concentrated, therefore mixing is done with measurers that are the size of a grain of rice. Their results – when properly used – are wonderful, but they are quite difficult to use, and can be dangerous. Normal pigmented stains consist of small globs of color suspended in a carrier. The carrier evaporates, leaving the globs to lodge in the pores and fissures of the wood. In most woods, the grain consists of alternating bands of early wood and late wood. The early wood is what is produced during the fast growth periods of spring and summer. It is usually lighter in color and a bit more porous. The late wood is the slow growth wood produced in the fall and winter. It is denser, harder, and darker. When stained, the more porous early wood offers more places for the stain globs to lodge than the harder, smoother late wood, so the natural light–dark pattern of the wood is generally reversed in stained wood. To the trained eye, this looks quite un-natural. Sorry for the side trip, sometimes I just flip into lecture mode. Before I sanded the case work, I rolled it upside down and installed the leveler blocks. This included drilling small holes through the bottom of the cabinet floor so the levelers can be adjusted from above with a small screwdriver.

That is about all I can do until the router bits for making the doors arrive. They were shipped a couple of days ago. It is possible they could arrive this afternoon. Workshop closes: 12:00 PM Normally I’d use idle time like this to work on another project, but since this project is taking up all the available space in the shop – it’s not a large shop – I have no space to work on anything else. So I’ll go work on posting more inventory to Treasure’s new web store.

Thursday, January 5

Work day begins: 7:00 AM Handling this mornings e-mail. I see lots of messages in there, we’ll see how many are really anything

Today I am trimming the completed island top to finished size and sanding. Lots of sanding. Workshop closes: 5:10 PM I'm going to bed early tonight, I don't feel well.

Yesterdays posting

Work day begins: 7:00 AM I need to take care of a little on-line banking this morning and look in on the e-mail. Shop Opens: 8:00 AM This morning I will be smoothing down the halves of the island top using a surface planer.

The top has been surfaced, jointed and glued together. After the glue sets up I will be able to do the finish trim across the ends and it will be ready to begin sanding. I got the thumbs-up from Jim last night: the pulls I found are a match, so I spent the rest of the morning making a lay-out guide and drilling mounting holes in the drawer fronts for the pulls. I won’t actually mount them until after these pieces have been stained and finished. When I got back from my after lunch walk, I inspected the island top and saw that the two halves had slid about 1/4" out of alignment, so the ends are nowhere near flush. I could trim them flush again, but the top would be 1/32 inch shorter than I planned. I had left a little for the final trim, but not enough to cover this. Then I noticed that I had -- somehow -- managed to put one of the halves into the clamps upside down. That's bad. That’s very bad. It throws the grain color scheme off entirely. “Well”, I thought, “I'll just break them apart and do it again... It's only been a couple of hours, the bond can't be that strong yet.”

I laid a couple of thick bar clamps on the floor, laid the top across the clamps with the clamps under the outer edges. I then proceeded to stand, then jump on the middle of the top, trying to pop the newly glued joint apart. No go. That Titebond III wood glue is really tough stuff! I'm going to have to run the monster through my table saw to separate the parts so I can glue them back together the right way. As Winnie The Pooh would say, "Oh bother!" OK, the booboo is fixed and all is right with the world once again. Workshop closes: 4:53 PM

Tuesday, January 3

Work day begins: 6:48 AM Checking e-mail, I find 4 inquiries to handle this morning. Shop Opens: 8:00 AM This morning I will apply the finish to the stain sample boards I made up yesterday and get them ready to mail out. The rest of the morning will be spent gluing up the other half of the island top.

The other half of the top is glued up and will sit in clamps overnight. I lacquered the drawer box, installed the slides, and attached the drawer front. The drawer is now complete. Of course, I’ll have to take it apart again when I stain the casework. There is no more I can do this afternoon. Tomorrow I’ll plane the top pieces, joint them and glue them together. Workshop closes: 3:55 PM The rest of the afternoon and this evening will be spent working on web site stuff.

Monday, January 2

Work day begins: 5:28 AM I’ve got a lot of reading to catch up on, and some files to upload yet, so I’m getting an early start. Hopefully now that the holidays are over the reliability of our Internet connection will improve. During the holiday period our computer would connect at a speed of 47 to 52 K/sec but our data through put typically averaged 0.32 to 0.47 K/sec (about 1/2 of a K on a 56 K modem). This meant that the connection would time out before we succeeded in transferring files or even get our e-mail to send and receive. It’s been very frustrating. Shop Opens: 8:00 AM It’s about 60° degrees this morning, no need for a fire, but it is raining, so I’ll get nothing more done on my lumber stacks today. Just as well, though, Jim’s hardware has arrived so I can resume assembling the island. First, though, I need to produce some stain boards. Both Jim and Stew have requested samples, so I might as well get those done before I stir up a lot of saw dust. Then I’ll work on jointing the parts for the butcher block top of the island and begin the gluing-up process.

It’s quitting time and I have half of the butcher block top glued up. I’m gluing just one half at a time because that’s all that will go through my planer at one time. Once both halves are glued up and surface planed to exactly the same thickness, I’ll joint the two halves and glue them together. Workshop closes: 5:00 PM This evening I’ll be printing out newsletters for all the Treasures artists, stuffing them into the envelopes that already contain their paychecks and inventory summaries and getting them ready to mail out tomorrow. If I have some extra time, I’ll continue working on the new Treasures On-Line Store, as I still have almost a hundred items to post.

Already one of the nations leading importers of other people's trash, Michigan is now no longer protected by restrictions on new landfills, thanks to the Republicans who control our state legislature. Once again the worlds largest body of fresh water, the Great Lakes, is being treated like a toilet bowl. 2Farticle?AID=/20051231/METRO/51230073">