Next in the series of reviews of DVD’s from the SmartFlix Woodworking University, this time I review the DVD: Router Joinery by Gary Rogowski. This DVD is one of many DVD’s produced by Taunton Press for Fine Woodworking.
This DVD highlights the use of what is arguably the most versatile power tool in a woodworking shop, for joinery tasks. Rogowski is a well-spoken teacher and in this DVD he clearly covers most all of the basic information necessary to get started using the router for various joinery tasks used to make furniture.
Included in the DVD are discussions on the various types of routers and their uses as well as descriptions of the cutting action of the tool and how it can be safely used in both free handed and router table orientations. Simple animations show the cutting action of the bit as material is cut using various techniques. Rogowski covers standard cutting and climb-cutting operations and when each should be used. This information is definitely valuable for the novice user of the router to understand in order to avoid possible accidents with the tool.
Rogowski illustrates various joinery techniques including: dados, groves, rebates, half-laps, mortise and tenon joints (with both traditional and loose tenons), and through and half-blind dovetails using simple commercial jigs. In this age where woodworking gizmo’s are available for nearly every possible job, Rogowski’s demonstration and use of a no frills router table made from a single piece of melamine and a single board fence is particularly refreshing. The techniques that he shows for making and adjusting joinery on this simple router table are well worth the rental fee of the DVD. Also shown are some other simple jigs used for mortising and dadoing operations with the router.
While no router DVD would be complete without showing the cutting of dovetails using a router and jig, it is notable that Rogowski uses probably the most simple of jigs available for his demonstrations of both through and half-blind dovetails. In doing so, he illustrates that perfect dovetails can be achieved with simple tools and a bit of attention to setups while testing in scrap wood.
For anyone new to the router and interested in exploring its potential for making furniture joints, this DVD would be a good starting point to become educated. The router is a versatile tool and with some basic knowledge and simple setups and jigs, a great deal of furniture joinery tasks can be accomplished both safely and extremely accurately.
Don’t forget, if you are a new customer and interested in renting these DVD’s, SmartFlix has offered readers of The Craftsman’s Path a $2 discount coupon for your use. Simply use the coupon code: CRAFTPATH when you check out!
Tags: dovetails, half lap, mortise, router joinery, tenon
The arms for the chair start with two rectangular blanks about 5 inches wide. These blanks needed to be roughly shaped before the outlines of the actual arms can be cut out at the band saw.
The shaping process for the arms involves two steps. The first step utilizes a jig that facilitates cove-cutting a grove diagonally along the length of each arm blank. This cove cut removes stock that will eventually become the area that your arms rest in when sitting in the chair. The second step of shaping the arms will occur when they have been attached to the chair and more stock can be removed and the curves can be faired into the legs. Before doing any cutting, I first marked the outlines of the arms on the blanks so that I could see their eventual orientation and not get confused while performing the following steps.
The jig for the cove-cutting at the table saw is a rectangular box with an angled portion that rides against a fence while transporting the arm blank over the table saw blade. The angled piece allows the blank to travel, top face down, across the blade so that the resulting cove is cut diagonally through the length of the arm blank. These cuts were done in a slow and methodical manner, raising the blade about 1/32″ – 1/16″ for each pass over the blade. The jig was moved across the blade slowly to allow the blade to cut the cove as smoothly as possible and to also allow the significant dust to be cleared. Even with this technique I stopped every few passes and used the shop-vac to clean the dust remaining on the table top. The jig has handles with threaded rod through t-nuts to clamp the blanks in place as well as a handle to help push it through the blade. I also used a Gr-ripper push block for added control and security. The jig flips over and the handle reverses for the alternate arm to be cut with a reverse orientation of the diagonal cove. The first two pictures show the right arm being cut and the last picture shows the left arm.
Once the cove cuts were completed I again traced the outlines of the arms onto the blanks (albeit a carefully due to the now undulating surface of the arms). Then the arms were band sawed to shape and sanded with the oscillating spindle sander to remove the band saw marks along their edges. In the picture you can see the rough shaped arms after cutting and sanding.
The other step that I completed at this time was to glue up stacks to the rockers. These stacks consist of rocker strips and are located at the points where the front and rear legs will contact the rockers. The stacks serve to elevate the chair above the rockers an additional distance as well as to provide material for shaping and fairing curves from the rockers into the legs. This was a bit of a tricky operation as the stacks wanted to squirm away while they were being glued. I again used the same rocker clamping caul to distribute the clamping pressure to the stacks.
Tags: arms, band saw, cove cuting jig, cove cutting with table saw, rocker stacks, Sculpted Rocking Chair
With the band sawing of the rear legs completed and the head rest holes drilled I set out to shape the rear legs and to band saw and shape the front legs.
Some of the shaping of the legs could be done with a round-over bit in a router table however, because of the irregular curves of the legs some round-overs required a unique fixture to be used with the router. This fixture is the donut-shaped piece that you can see in the picture. The donut allows for the tight curves near the leg joints to be rounded over reasonably well.
I first completed the round-overs on the flat faces of the rear-legs with a 5/8″ RO bit at the router table. Next I moved to the router fixture with the same bit and proceeded to round over the other edges (all except the inside long edge). This operation was a bit tricky and required a good deal of attention to stay safe and to achieve good results. Noting the direction of rotation of the router bit (as it related to the curves) was very important so that areas would not tear out during the routing operation. I needed to always make sure I was routing down-hill or I stopped short of the bit exiting the piece. I kept my hands a good bit away from the spinning bit and in some instances avoided routing all the way to the ends of the stock to avoid any chances of kickback or over cutting.
Because I did not route to the ends of the work pieces on all edges, there was some cleanup to do with a spokeshave , rasp and file. The ends of the legs will ultimately be shaped to final dimension when they are attached and faired to the rockers and arms at a later stage in the chair build. However, there were also other areas in which the round-over bit was not able to do a complete job and/or where areas needed to be blended to create a flowing curve. This hand shaping was actually quite enjoyable. There’s something very organic about shaping wood by hand with these kinds of tools – it establishes a real connection with the material and form that you are creating.
Once the shaping of the rear legs was completed I moved on to the front legs. The first step was to trim the bottoms of the legs at an angle (~8 degrees). Then, I was able to lay out the leg outlines from a template for band sawing. The front legs were band sawed to follow this outline and then a secondary curve was free-handed to define the final leg thickness. After the legs were marked, they were band sawed again being careful to maintain a square cut while accounting for the irregular surfaces of the legs.
I followed a similar process to shape the front legs, using the same router fixture and 5/8″ RO bit. However, due to the smaller size of the front legs I used a quick clamp (minus the soft rubber pad) to hold each leg from the center at the leg joint in addition to holding one end with my hand so that I could stay safely away from the router bit. A similar bit of hand shaping was required after the rough router work. With all of the initial shaping done on the legs I put them into position for a test fit. It is starting to look like a chair!
Next up: Creating and rough shaping the arms
Another in the series of reviews of DVD’s from the SmartFlix Woodworking University, this time I review two profile DVDs: Sam Maloof and Tage Frid from Taunton Press. While these DVD’s do not solely contain content on woodworking technique, if you have any interest in what goes on in the shops and minds of two of the great woodworkers of our time, then they are certainly worth a look.
Sam Maloof
This DVD is a profile on Sam and includes insights on his life and work. He covers a good deal of information on how he approached designing his furniture as well as taking the viewer through a lot of the actual steps to create one of his famous chairs. Interspersed within segments of work in Sam’s shop are vignettes of the extraordinary house that he built and a good deal of the furniture and artwork within it.
This DVD does not disappoint if you are considering building a chair in the Maloof style. Sam takes the viewer through building the seat, executing the specialized “Maloof Joint” and some of the process for shaping parts of his famous rocking chairs. He covers both aesthetics and function in his discussions.
If you are anything like me, just hearing Maloof talk about his work and watching him in the shop is an inspiration. Profiles such as this one offer a unique glimpse into what motivated Sam the woodworker to build what he did and how he did it . Maloof was a generous man and that comes through clearly during the time you spend with him while watching the DVD. We are fortunate to have this record of his life, techniques and work.
Tage Frid
In this DVD, Tage takes the viewer with him into his shop as he completes several projects. Along the way, Frid demonstrates his methods for sharpening, creating a keyed-miter joint, doing half-blind dovetails and veneer work. Watching you will be surprised at the simple techniques he uses to do complex work.
In addition to the woodworking techniques and tips that he shares, Frid speaks about his approach to designing several pieces of furniture that you see displayed in his home. He walks the viewer through the subtleties of some of the design elements of each piece as well as his rationale for creating them.
While the video is a bit dated and it has very simple production qualities, it is easy to look past those trivial things into the mind and spirit of a true craftsman. It is easy to understand why his techniques have been revered for so long – simple and efficient are the perfect words to describe them. You may or may not like the style of his furniture however; his techniques and insights into furniture design are definitely worth a look.
Don’t forget, if you are a new customer and interested in renting these DVD’s, SmartFlix has offered readers of The Craftsman’s Path a $2 discount coupon for your use. Simply use the coupon code: CRAFTPATH when you check out!
Tags: half-blind dovetails, keyed-miter joint, Maloof joint, rocking chair, Sam Maloof, Tage Frid, veneering
Next in the series of reviews of DVD’s from the SmartFlix Woodworking University, this time I review the DVD: Forgotten Hand Tools by Christopher Schwarz.
This DVD is one of several done by Schwarz in conjunction with Lie Nielsen Toolworks. I have previously reviewed another in this series: Coarse Medium and Fine, here at the blog.
This DVD discusses tools that have largely been forgotten and fallen out of use in most of today’s woodworking shops. These tools include Hammers, Gimlets and Cut Nails, Draw Bore Pins and Hand Saws for ripping and cross-cutting.
Schwarz opens with a good tutorial on the use of Hammers, Gimlets and Cut Nails in toe-nailing applications for furniture. He discusses how these techniques were used for many years in some antique furniture that is today regarded of the highest quality, thereby dismissing the notion that the techniques are either too crude and/or somehow technically inferior. Schwarz demonstrates simple techniques for toe-nailing a shelf into a dado in a case side. From the demonstration it becomes apparent that this technique is both easy and physically strong.
Draw-boring is a method of pinning a mortise and tenon joint that has the advantages of having superior strength as well as eliminating the need for clamps in the assembly operation. In the DVD, Schwarz demonstrates draw-boring of a mortise and tenon joint and the use of a simple draw-bore pin for prepping the offset holes prior to inserting the draw bore pin. In addition, he covers possible problems in this operation and their solutions. A simple and inexpensive approach to creating a shop-made draw-bore pin is also covered.
Finally, Schwarz speaks to and demonstrates the use of hand saws for cross-cutting and ripping operations. He notes that these are operations that do not require significant accuracy (as the cuts are later cleaned up by hand planes) but act as gateway skills for more demanding sawing operations such as cutting dovetails. The demonstrations are done with vintage hand saws that Schwarz notes are widely available and inexpensive. He uses a shop made saw bench to put the work in a proper position for efficient sawing making quick work of both a cross-cutting and ripping operation in a pieces of rough hardwood. During these cuts, Schwarz purposely goes off his lines to discuss methods for easily correcting the cut.
Schwarz is a good teacher and his information is both thorough and accurate. The video quality is typically good as in other Lie Nielsen DVD’s. Also, as an added bonus, included on the DVD are articles from Schwarz from prior publication on the tools as well as the shop fixtures like the saw bench. For anyone interested in the tools and techniques covered, this DVD would be a good choice to quickly get up to speed on their use.
Don’t forget, if you are a new customer and interested in renting these DVD’s, SmartFlix has offered readers of The Craftsman’s Path a $2 discount coupon for your use. Simply use the coupon code: CRAFTPATH when you check out!
Tags: Chris Schwarz, cross-cut saw, cut nail, draw-bore pin, gimlet, hammer, hand tools, rip saw, SmartFlix
