The Promise Of Productivity

I have been saving for a big ticket item.  No, I'm not talking about the Veritas marking gauge, though that did set my cookie jar contents back a bit. I'm talking about the Powermatic 701 bench top mortiser.

I pulled the trigger during the recent 20% off sale that most Powermatic vendors participated in.  I purchased my unit from Acme Tools.

I do my homework.  I read blogs, subscribe to woodworking magazines, surf YouTube videos, search forums, and talk with folks.  So, like I always read and see, I put the mortiser on a bench and read the last page of the manual.  I was expecting to see a completely assembled and tuned mortiser when I looked up from reading.

Unfortunately, real life is not like magazine articles and commercial videos.  I have very little experience with mortising machines.  Sure, I've used them in other people's shops, but I have never had to tune, or set one up.  The whole process took me about 20 minutes.

The only 'eventful' part of the set up was mounting a chisel.  Actually, I should back up a step.  Very few merchants that sell the Powermatic mortiser also sell the Powermatic mortise chisels.  I know the Powermatic can be used with pretty much any mortise chisels on the market, but I figured my ignorance might be further compounded with stupidity by purchasing the cheapest chisels on the market from another source.  Being cheap means buying the least expensive chisels; being pragmatic means you spend your money where you're going to get the best value.  With these things in my mind, I picked up the branded Powermatic chisels from Toolbarn.com.  The chisels are my first experience with Toolbarn.com and I was pleased with the service received.

Let's get back to where I started.  The only 'eventful' part of the set up was mounting a chisel.  Powermatic mounts the 5/8" chisel arbor from the factory.  Yet, the Powermatic chisels are based on the larger arbor (I forget the size off hand).  That means Powermatic is expecting customers to use chisels from competitors (!?!).  Swapping the arbor out is quite easy to accomplish and thus ultimately a non-issue.

Time to talk about using the mortiser.  I decided a great test would be to do some of the mortises in my current project.  Aside from milling the stock, I've been using hand tools to build a loft bed.  The loft bed has something like eleventy gazillion mortises.

I crafted all the tenons and used them to outline the mortises.  Since everything was done by hand, cumulative error in every step along the way substantially moved things out of the realm of standard.  The first mortise done on the machine came out great.  I was feeling like a woodworking rock star.  The next mortise kind of elicited the antithesis of rock stardom.  One end was maybe a 16th of an inch further away from the edge of the wood than the other.  Just far enough out to look like a stair step if you use the mortiser.  An important lesson was taught yet again: know when to combine hand and power tool procedures.

Although the mortiser promises to vastly increase productivity for a lot of projects, I still can't get too far away from the tools that have been around a while.

A Review Of Grandpa's Workshop

Lost Art Press has recently released a children's book:  Grandpa's Workshop.  Here is an image of the cover from the Lost Art Press website:

This book is...unusual.  Modern American books for children are extremely generic and sanitized through corporate entities.  The purpose of a modern children's book is to entertain in as polite a way possible.

The story telling tradition pervasive among all of humanity is meant for more than mere idling away the hours around a fire. Stories are meant to teach, warn, develop, and any other verb you can apply to human activity.  Grandpa's Workshop is a story in the human tradition.  This is a prosaic way of saying Grandpa's Workshop does not pull punches in telling the several sub-stories of the book's narrative.

Not since reading the original Grimm's fairy tales have I been treated with a children's story that does not hide real life from kids.  Topics like disfigurement in war and alcoholism are real life topics that occur in the book in an appropriate manner; that is, as part of the narrative and not a contrived focus.  There is also the mainstay fairy tale of good triumphing over evil in the killing of a dragon with joiners tools.

I suppose some nuts and bolts material about the book is in order, without giving too much away, of course.  The narrative surrounds a grandfather and his grandson where woodworking tools and their history in the family comprise some of the sub-stories.  Tools often come to a woodworker through strange means; who'd a thunk reading the stories behind their journey would be interesting?  There is a saw that traveled from America, back to the 'old country', France.  There is also a tool chest that says something different every time someone opens the lid.  Perhaps the most ominous tool looks like a werewolf slaying weapon from antiquity--the besaigue.  I have read and heard Christopher Schwarz say "Don't anthropomorphize your tools; they hate that".  Grandpa's Workshop taps that very human quality to personify the objects around us.

The true stars in this book are the illustrations.  Every page is festooned with brilliant images and imagery.  The cover alone is a visual treat that had to be shared and I hope Lost Art Press does not have a problem with me republishing it.  I started to read the story to my ten year old daughter.  Around page three she demanded to see the pictures for herself instead of me finishing the story.  We never did finish the reading together, but we spent quite some time looking at the illustrations and reading snippets of the action shown.  I'm kind of glad it worked out that way; after all, there are many more bedtimes ahead of us.

Back To Front

Spoiler alert!  The following picture is the completed play train table sans finish:

I am still going to do a write-up of the build process but it will take a while to complete. 

This table was built for a charity auction.  I hope it has a long life full of entertained kids.

There is a point to this post beyond patting myself on the back.  One of my "firsts" in this project was using biscuits.  For years I have created panels by either rubbing glue soaked boards together or using a dowel jig and dowels.

One year ago a fortuitous series of events led to the acquisition of a biscuit jointer.  Some credits and coupons combined with a holiday special from Porter Cable allowed me to buy a 690 router body with free biscuit jointer for about 100 bucks.  It's almost as if they knocked on the door and put a gun to my head demanding I take the merchandise.

The biscuit jointer lay dormant until this project came along.  I figured it was time to break it out of the box and read the directions.

This story is getting too long, so it is time to cut to the chase.  Traditionally, using dowels, I never worried about placement in the joint and my eventual cuts.  It did not occur to me that biscuits are a much bigger defect in the joint.  I bisected one of the biscuits when I cut the large panel into the two smaller ones needed for this project.  A small void was revealed in each panel.

The solution was to mix up some 'wood dough' with saw dust and glue.  I packed the dough into the voids and smoothed the top just like drywall mud.  There will have to be a second application as the sawdust settles a bit when it dries.

Plane Tour

The purpose of this post is really a question.  What planes should I pursue next?  Here are my current planes:

Plane Collection

From left to right: 

• Stanley #5 jack plane with the frog set way back.  I use this like a scrub plane with a very pronounced curve in the blade.  It is currently disassembled because I was playing with my Grace screw drivers.  Code name for this guy is Blackie due to black japaning and black finish on the wood parts.
• Lee Valley rabbet/shoulder plane.  I'm sure it is my skill level, but I find this a tad difficult to use.  I keep promising myself to one day buy a spare blade and make one myself, just for the experience.
• Stanley #5 jack plane, named Guido.  This is the first plane I bought years ago.  A previous owner scribed his name in the heel, "Guido".  I have used this plane more than any other with the possible exception of the sweetheart block plane.
• Small plane in middle at top.  Sweetheart block plane purchased at Woodworking In America, 2010.  I put a Hock blade in it and it works almost by telekinesis.
• Larger plane under block plane.  Lee Valley bevel up smooth plane. I kind of regret buying this plane.  It is the most expensive in my kit, yet I've only used it a hand full of times.  Between Guido, and the sweetheart block plane, this guy does not get much use.  But I'm not getting rid of it.
• Stanley #7 jointer plane.  This is a fairly recent addition to the collection.  I picked this up at a flea market for 25 bucks--definitely a lucky find.  Actually, the seller was tickled pink that I was putting it back to work and not on a shelf.  The shavings in the photos are from using this plane on building the train table (see previous two posts).  For the first time on a jointer, I curved the corners of the blade back a bit.  I had a *ankle* of a time trying to get a cross member square on four sides; OK, I admit it, the darn thing still ain't square.
• Finally, another Stanley #7 jointer.  I've had this for a while.  There is a small crack in the bottom at the mouth.  I have never put it to serious work on boards or panels because of the crack.  I keep the blade sharpened dead square and use this with shooting boards exclusively.  Wow, just wow, what all this mass can do in a shooting board.

Here is another shot of just the bench planes. 

In the computer world, this is like asking which is the best Linux distribution, but here goes.  So, folks, tell me what planes I should be saving and/or searching for now?  I do mostly small furniture projects, but lately I have been drawn to case clocks.  Here is my project calendar, which will probably change before I finish typing this post:  loft bed (twin size) for a girl, king size head board, small wood tool box (based on the school box from The Joiner and Cabinet Maker), wall rack for the inside shop tools, small case clock (quartz movement, wall mount), and tall nightstand tables for the king size bed.

A Wish Fulfilled

Cue the Angelic Choir. 

Veritas/Lee Valley ran a free shipping special recently that I could not pass up.  I've complained before about my lack of a quality marking gauge.  Finally, at long suffering last, I bought the Veritas dual marking gauge.

I've used this marking gauge about a half dozen times at trade shows and mooching from fellow woodworkers.  I have recommended this to others based on scant experience, yet remarkable performance.  Now I have put my money where my mouth is.  I may do a formal review of the device after using it for a time.

I Sinned In The Cathedral

I had to make two small panels for a wooden train play table.  You would think that gluing some planks together would not generate much controversy, but you would be wrong.  There are actually three camps when it comes to panel glue up. 

The first camp is the Power Tool Brigade.  Their well ordered encampment is segregated by regimental colors of muted yellow, battleship grey, and verdant green.  Other lesser companies lend their guidons and pennants to the landscape.  In lockstep unison they declare that panels should be chosen strictly for appearance in the final product.  The panel manual has standard procedures for a machine to subdue all possible wood grains.

The second camp is filled with the Hand Tool Knights.  Their tented pavilions snug the undulating countryside disturbing the native flora and fauna in the least way possible.  Retainers and vassals surround each pavilion according to their pledges of fealty.  Through oral tradition and a small body of written work, the panel philosophy is shared:  panels should always be assembled with grain going in the same direction.  Uniform grain means uniform labor to the tools.  The wood will sing for itself to the right soul.

The third camp is shrouded in mysticism and indeed is more cult than camp.  The Samurai Ninja Templars offer what at first glance is the same advice as the Power Tool Brigade, that panels should be chosen based on appearance.  The difference is in the selection process.  Those ascended to the SNT ranks painstakingly commune with wood seeking out the perfect form it would like to participate in.  Their deep insight into the tools and medium instill the certain knowledge that they can coax the form out of the wood no matter what grain problems exist.

My sin is that I could not commit to one of the camps.  I chose the orientation of panel components based on appearance.  However, I don't own machines wide enough to subdue a glued 20" panel; nor do I have enough mad skills at hand planing to deal with wandering grain patterns.  I ended up with two panels that were a real bear to plane.  The goal was for a surface that showed hand planing in order to 'prove' hand made work.  Let's call it "80% planing".  The end result is more like 60%.  On the plus side, my block plane got one heck of a work out trying to cure my ills.

Here is the panel that gave me the most trouble.  I know there is not much detail in the web version of the picture.

The ultimate solution was sand paper.  More on the train table in future posts.

Dammit, Jim! I'm a doctor not a carpenter!

Several years ago I made a child's play table with a wooden train set for a charity auction.  Aside from scout derby cars, it was my first 'public' work.  At the time there were some joinery challenges I had not faced before.  I took my time and produced a passable product.  The play table was a big hit at the auction.

Fast forward to the present day.  I've been asked to make another table for this year's auction. The original design is old hat by now so I decided to make a few upgrades for more aesthetic appeal. 

Unfortunately, familiarity really does breed contempt.  Last night I was preparing the boards that will eventually become the end panels of the play table.  Not even ten minutes into the project and I cut the wrong two inches off a board that had a knot in it.  My stupidity is costing more money and time as I have to replace the board I screwed up.

Too bad I'm not really a doctor because then I could afford a real carpenter to ghost write my projects.  Now I'm off to find a new board.