Some Vacation!

Starting tomorrow, I will be resting easy for 5 days, a stack of woodworking books at my side, people bringing me food and drinks, friends visiting me, no dishes to wash, no laundry to clean, and no dogs to walk.

What's the catch?

It's a "vacation" at our local hospital, following surgery. Sheesh, the things a gal has to do to get a break from work!

Just wanted to let you know that I won't have computer access (my worst fear come true), so I won't be able to comment or post for a little while.

Have a great week!
Kari

Wharton Esherick Museum

Yesterday, we toured the Wharton Esherick Museum, located in Paoli, PA. Esherick, known as "the dean of American craftsmen" was born in 1887 and began his artistic career as a painter. From there, he took up carving, woodcuts, sculpture, and furniture-making.

I knew nothing about Esherick prior to the tour, but learned that he was a major influence in the woodworking styles of Wendell Castle, Sam Maloof, and Art Carpenter.

Unfortunately, visitors are only able to take photos outside the complex. Images of his work and shots of the studio interior that are included in this post were found online and on postcards. But they are nothing compared to seeing the pieces housed in his studio, and the studio itself, in person.

I was awestruck. Seemingly every inch of the studio's interior had been touched by his hand. The first thing you notice is the crazy, curved, out-of square angles of the structures. Even the roof lines of his studio and lumber storage building were purposely made to look like caving-in barn roofs.

Inside are furniture pieces that defy traditional woodworking tenets, perhaps because he approached woodworking as an artist, with no formal woodworking training. One dining table's surface was built with three boards, none parallel to one another. Two figured planks had been sawn in half from one board, but rather than bookmatched, were flip-flopped, so each half of the crotchwood flame faced one another from opposite corners. Then the entire table top was cut into a kidney-shape.

There were lots of free-form, organic pieces, but also angular, art deco-inspired pieces. The wall panels were placed in ray patterns; the kitchen floor was made of irregular-shaped pieces of wood that fit together like a jigsaw puzzle; and the spiral staircase used an actual mastodon's tusk as a hand rail.

It was torture to not take photos. But our tour guide said a book is in the works, showcasing Esherick's pieces, and set for release in the fall of 2009.

Esherick forged all of the hardware in his studio; his favorite tools were his broad axe and band saw; he used an enormous variety of hardwoods; and his finishes of choice were tung oil & boiled linseed oil.

One piece, a large fold-down secretary, reminded me of Adirondack twig furniture. Instead of using actual twigs, however, he carved leaves and twig shapes over every surface. And this I had never seen before: the rails of the cabinet doors ended not at the stile, but continued further to form handcarved barrel hinges.

The museum tour was well worth the entrance fee (only $10). And navigating the too-small parking area and the fact that they don't accept credit or debit cards were minor inconveniences.

I left completely inspired. And you can't put a price on that.

Photos include his studio (the building with the stone foundation), the gift shop (the log cabin that formerly housed his lumber), and his workshop (the blue buildings, in which his daughter now lives, and which were not part of the tour).

Furniture fit for a General

Last April, I read an article in Woodwork Magazine about Joe Cress, owner of Logan Creek Designs, and maker of reproduction Civil War Campaign Furniture. Until then, I never knew there was such a thing.

Over a decade ago, Joe's interest in the Civil War prompted him to visit the Virginia Military Institute, which houses some of the furniture he now replicates. Captivated by one piece in particluar—Stonewall Jackson's field desk—and a chance encounter with the museum's executive director led him to where he is today: a maker of "products belonging to three generals, all under license".

Among those products are Robert E. Lee's Camp Chest, J.E.B. Stuart's Field Desk, and Stonewall Jackson's Deathbed.

On his website is a downloadable pdf file of the Woodwork Magazine article and samples of his work. Of particular interest in the article is the fact that Joe purposely adds subtle inaccuracies in his pieces at the behest of places like the Smithsonian Institution. This, in an effort to derail people who try to pass reproductions off as original.

Joe lives one state away from me, in Virginia. I'd love to drop in on him someday and hopefully he'll agree to an interview. Maybe it would help persuade him if I dress in period costume. Anyone know where a gal can get a bustle?*

*Is anybody else totally creeped out by that last photo?

Sliding Dovetails

Here is one way to cut the groove for a sliding dovetail.

Mark the depth of cut with a marking gauge on both edges of the board. Lay the dovetail piece on top of your work surface and trace the bottom of both sides of the dovetail. Transfer that line to your depth of cut line on both edges.

Now you can see where to position the dovetail on the edge of the board so you can trace its angle. Trace this angle on both edges. Connect these lines across the face of the board and this shows you where to start cutting.

The dovetail plane I used cuts a 16º angle. Bevel a 2x4 at this angle to use as a fence to guide your saw. I keep finger pressure on the sawblade so it stays tight against the fence. Saw down to your depth of cut mark and chisel out the waste between the saw marks. Slide the dovetail into the groove....and you're done!



Because the sliding dovetails on the sawbuck table are so long (25"), I'm not comfortable with this technique, so I'll show another way to cut sliding dovetails in a future post.

Cheap Therapy

Not getting to work in my shop for a week, and I turn into my friend, Scott.....grumpy.

So today, Independence Day, I get some shop time. Next step in the sawbuck table project is to build the table top. I ran out of curly cherry, but have a huge stack of stickered and rough-sawn plain cherry in my garage. The boards are gorgeous and will darken quickly.

However, yours truly, while having spent a great deal of time and care stickering & stacking the boards to allow them to dry (I bought them 2 years ago, freshly-sawn), forgot to put weights on the top boards. That resulted in twisted and cupped boards.

So far, shop time is making me grumpier.

The boards are too wide to face plane on my 6" jointer, so I reached for a plane that gets little use, but sure comes in handy when you need it.....a scrub plane.

Scrub planes have curved irons that quickly remove deep, scalloped chunks of wood, enabling you to knock down high spots and correct twists in boards with little effort. After which, you can run the boards through your planer or switch to a less agressive plane.

An added benefit: you can deflate your bad mood. Plowing through wood and seeing thick chips fly out of the plane's mouth is a real tension-reliever.

And I'm happy to report—the grump has left the building.

Woodworking in America

Only THE handtool event of the year! Registration is open today so don't delay. I suspect tickets will be gone before you can say "Lie-Nielsen Bench Plane." Hope you can go and if you do, please say hi if you see me. I'll be the one with the stupid grin on my face....

Woodworking in America Link

Sharpening a Dovetail Plane

Abe Lincoln once said "Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe."

Well, I spent 6. 5 hours on Saturday fiddling around with the blades on the dovetail plane and got pretty good, but not perfect, results. The blades were easy—too easy—to sharpen. Too easy, because I realized they had not been heat treated. That's fine if you're working with pine, but to plane curly cherry meant having to resharpen blades that were being nicked by the hard wood and which dulled quickly.

Rather than take the time to heat treat the irons in order to produce a clean dovetail—I'm terrified of propane torches and need to spend several days working up my nerve to use them—I forged ahead with planing them, and resolved to make scratch stock to clean up the tearout.

To sharpen the plane blades, the backs first needed to be flattened. I used drywall screen sitting atop a sheet of glass, but you can also use a sheet of coarse sandpaper clamped to a known flat surface, like a cast iron table saw or jointer bed. From there, I polished the back on 1,000 grit and then 8,000 grit waterstones. A veritas gauge helped maintain the bevel angle while sharpening it on the 1,000 grit stone, followed by the 8,000 grit stone.

Sharpening the side bevel was a little trickier. It was rounded over, so I first flattened it with a file and then used 1,000 and 8,000 grit slipstones to polish the bevel.

Scratch stock is very easy to make. The trick is to make sure you polish both sides of the metal as well as the edges. You want very square edges. I rough-shaped the profile with a hacksaw, used a grinder to finalize the shape, flattened the edges with a file, and used an 8,000 grit waterstone to polish all edges. It only took about a half hour to make, whereas, had I elected to heat treat the blades.....well, let's just say, this being two days later, I'd still be trying to bolster my courage.

Dovetail Plane

I purchased a double-bladed dovetail plane from Clarence Blanchard of Fine Tool Journal some time ago. Clarence assured me that while the plane is not a showpiece, it is a good user...and he was right!

My current project has sliding dovetails that attach the top to the base. I have cut sliding dovetails only

once before with just a saw and chisels, so I've been looking forward to dusting off my dovetail plane and using it for the first time. Without any sharpening or honing, you can see in the first & third photos how well it cuts pine. Pretty impressive! It will require some sharpening, however, for the curly cherry —a harder wood with ornery grain—that I'm using for the sawbuck table.

The plane is double-bladed to accomodate reverse grain on a board's edge, but since the pine cut so easily, I sheared both sides of the profile (using both blades) without removing the board from the vise or changing my stance. I don't know if that's the "right" way to use the plane, but it worked great.

In the last two photos, arrows are pointing to the areas of the blade that do the actual cutting and the only areas that will need to be sharpened.

The dovetail joint has been around since the ancient Egyptians, 5,000 years ago, but I do not know when sliding dovetails were first introduced and when dovetail planes were first developed. If you happen to know, please email me or post a comment (Gary—nudge, nudge). I'd love to have more information.