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Text of the page (random words):
g in a small space i often think about woodworking in a small space in part because i am older and think that at some point i may be forced to downsize from my three car garage i also think about it because my sons like many other younger people live in major metropolitan areas in unbelievably expensive houses with one car garages one of the great strengths of hand tool woodworking is that it works so well in these circumstances woodworking in a small space certainly works best if it is centered on hand tools i definitely think that a moravian portable workbench is the way to go it is the consummate design if portability and compact storability are priorities and right up there even if they aren t i am also a big fan of tool chests particularly in shops that aren t climate controlled i like to reserve wall space for shelves and windows the bench and chest would store away easily and quickly in an extremely small area the problem with a hand tool only workshop as far as i am concerned is that it requires laborious and tedious manual stock preparation that i don t want to do mainly because i am lazy and impatient specifically i avoid long rip cuts resawing and planing to thickness by hand i reject the assertion by some prominent woodworkers that relying on machines for these operations numbs the mind and destroys the soul i want machines to do this work for me and think of them as mechanical apprentices if you like to do these things by hand my hat is off to you i don t what big power tools would i not live without if at all possible even in a very limited space three in order of importance a very high quality bandsaw i had a mediocre one from a major manufacturer that i rarely used then i sold it and my tablesaw and got a good one that i use a whole lot it is just so incredibly versatile it s quite safe and it takes up only about 4 square feet of floor space if i had just one big power tool this would definitely be it i think it s worth it to spend the money to get a really good one if you can 3 hp excellent guides close tolerances rigid yes one like this is expensive but it is a lifetime tool a good lunchbox planer yes you can plane everything by hand but i don t want to and buying lumber planed to the right thickness is far too limiting it isn t absolutely essential because you could resaw with the bandsaw and then finish plane without too much trouble but i d still like to have one mount it on a cabinet and you have room for storage below a lunchbox planer is good enough a basic drill press i could definitely do without a drill press but i really like it and find it handy for a lot of things they take up very little floor space doesn t have to be real big or real good a benchtop one mounted on a cabinet that housed the planer below would be fine these three tools on mobile bases would store in a dozen square feet of floor space just think about how extremely compact this entire highly capable workshop would be when not in use two feet in front of the back wall of a one car garage would do it for the bench the chest and the power tools i could be quite content in a workshop like this i wouldn t even need the planer and the drill press but i would be very reluctant to give up the bandsaw it s true that the hand tools and these three power tools add up to a fair amount of money and the hand tools should come first all of them together cost a lot less than many people spend on other hobbies i could still have fun with only the hand tools i find this very encouraging hobby woodworking is in decline in part because people have limited space and the skills aren t taught in schools anymore make it as easy as possible posted by andy at 1 02 pm 5 comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest wednesday december 12 2018 the completed windmill yet another tangent with the propeller finished i made a very basic windmill to attach it to and accommodate a vane to point it into the wind it felt like something was missing but the moving scenes of whirligigs don t appeal to me so i cast about for something different yes another dubious brainstorm walking up the sidewalk one night i noticed the solar powered lights along it aha i cut off the stem and attached it to the middle of the windmill at the balance point so the weight wouldn t matter i really like it the light shines through the blades and looks like a beacon people seem to believe that it is powered by the windmill an illusion i like it is 7 in the air at the front of my driveway so it really stands out i am hoping that white oak with several coats of spar varnish will hold up to all the rain we have here so how does it perform pretty well could be better the bronze bearings and thrust washers work very well offering minimal resistance the blades are rectangular and a more aerodynamic shape would be better the main thing though is that i made the blades quite narrow for aesthetic reasons compare them to the blades on the lawn ornament i have that turns so well they have much more surface area looks like about double i think this is the major issue i like the looks of the narrow blades so well that i am willing to put up with it posted by andy at 7 40 pm 1 comment email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest tuesday december 4 2018 windmills v 2 dissatisfied with my first effort to create a wooden windmill propeller because it took a strong wind to get it turning and was clunky i decided to do some research and i learned two things for a windmill apparently the shape of the blade isn t all that critical because the main benefit of an efficient airfoil is reduced drag for a given amount of lift long story drag increases with the square of velocity and the propeller won t turn very fast second the pitch of the blades should apparently be quite low it appears something around 10 degrees is about right i needn t have bothered with the research because i could have just walked into the front yard this little thing made of plastic and nylon fabric spins like crazy in barely perceptible winds the blades are very thin and they are affixed at about an 8 degree angle at this point i had a brainstorm the angled slots that whirligig makers use don t seem like a great idea to me more something that takes advantage of a dado blade and a tablesaw jig they aren t suitable for an eight bladed propeller i dimly recalled a windmill i made as a small child with tinkertoys why not just drill holes in the hub and use a short dowel to attach the blades i cut out a round hub with a holesaw then drilled eight evenly spaced 3 8 holes around the perimeter then i created a flat on a part of some short 3 8 dowels that i would use to affix the blades doing it this way allows you to easily attach the blades at any pitch angle you want this one minute video shows it turning up with a fan set on low about 6 away since my camera records at 30 fps and the blades appear stationary at speed i think it is turning about 225 rpm the main thing that appears to hold it back is that the bronze bushings are 252 and the stainless steel shaft is 242 so it starts to shimmy a bit this is fast enough anyway i m satisfied with this so i m going to move on to the next step if i were going to experiment further i would try different pitches to determine experimentally what angle works best i would also use my spokeshave to shape the blades into a better airfoil which would produce modest improvement via reduced drag i think this method works pretty well with hand tools it s definitely a challenge to drill the holes accurately and i might try to come up with some sort of fixture if i make more hubs a hole saw works with a brace or an electric drill posted by andy at 9 28 am 3 comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest tuesday november 27 2018 holiday gifts 2018 each year we try to give friends and family a small handmade item along with an oregon product this year we decided on hazelnuts or filberts the us is the third largest producer of filberts after turkey and italy and virtually all of the us crop is grown in oregon i wanted to help the local farmers out because hazelnuts are caught up in the trade war that meant that some sort of small dish or box would be a nice item to accompany the hazelnuts but i have grown tired of making and giving dovetailed boxes one day i got one of my infamous brainstorms i went out to the firewood pile and selected nice looking douglas fir pieces with a wide live edge then i split them out with an ax so they would be approximately 3 deep and 6 8 wide cut about 12 long this would form the outside of a box i jointed the bottoms flat but left the split edges and long sides as is to create the bowl i hogged out a lot of the waste with a large forstner bit which gave me nice rounded corners then i used a chisel and gouge to remove the rest of the waste with a wiped on finish they re done these obviously don t suit everyone s taste but i like them they are quick easy and fun to make so a dozen isn t a big deal i have come to dislike the commercialism of holiday gift giving and think a handmade item better reflects the spirit of the season however modest i made this for you is special posted by andy at 7 27 am 3 comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest wednesday november 21 2018 videos from some interesting craftsmen this post is going to be a little different because i want to share some videos from some other craftsman one of which is woodworking and one isn t the first is the engels coach shop in montana he restores or reproduces heavy horse drawn wagons makes wooden wheels etc right now he is making very heavy wheels for some spanish cannons from puerto rico they shipped him a large pallet of mahogany and he is making every piece of them from scratch using hand tools and machines many of which he designed and made himself it is absolutely fascinating to see how he does it here is one of the videos in the series about installing the felloes he is a very straightforward guy who shows you how he does his work step by step the accuracy he achieves with basic tools and machines is amazing to me the next one isn t woodworking but instead is by a retired guy in upstate new york near where i grew up whose retirement hobby is to recreate a line powered machine shop driven by steam here is a video in a series about restoring a vintage steam engine this is a subject about which i know almost nothing but it is fascinating to me and i really look forward to his videos i hope you enjoy these as much as i do posted by andy at 9 10 am 1 comment email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest tuesday november 13 2018 windmills i have seen a number of videos about whirligigs recently and they got me interested in creating something similar i m especially interested in the windmill portion of them from what i have seen whirligig makers start by making a hub with slots cut in it to hold the blades some say that 35 degrees is the best angle so that is what i used i wanted 8 blades so the slots are narrowly spaced to make it i cut out an octagon used my bandsaw to define the slots and then chiseled out the waste i chose long thin blades thin for looks and long for more surface area presented to the wind here s what the propeller looks like it is 22 in diameter and way overbuilt the blades are 5 16 thick which makes it heavy and therefore difficult to start because of inertia i m going for a traditional windmill look rather than a whirligig so that s why it is much larger than normal because of the weight i needed a stout shaft so i cut off the head of a 1 4 stainless steel bolt and epoxied it into the back of the windmill the propeller shaft rides in some little bronze bearings i found before someone else says it this isn t an efficient windmill it s primarily decorative and designed to look good to my eye this was confirmed when i tested it with a fan the blades are quite thin because of it s mass the propeller takes a while to spool up but this inertia also keeps it running at a fairly constant speed in a variable wind it runs surprisingly true and doesn t seem to be grossly out of balance the bearings are new and i don t want to lubricate them until after i apply finish so i suspect it will turn more freely in use this windmill would be great if i lived on the coast but i d like to come up with one that would turn in a light wind it needs to be lighter and the blades can be thinner by half wider blades would be better because they have more lift but i like the look of the thin blades i did some research and it appears that the 35 degree pitch isn t right because the blades stall in light wind surprising to me at least is that scientific research shows an angle more like 5 degrees to be optimal the latter presents a whopping 22 more frontal area to the wind this creates a construction issue because the adjacent slots won t clear so some new way of making the hub is necessary a 4 bladed windmill wouldn t have this problem but i like the look of 8 blades i have an idea although this is starting to feel like my stool saga in my defense i did end up with a unique design that works very well posted by andy at 10 25 am 2 comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest wednesday november 7 2018 stickley sideboard part 5 when i put the stickley sideboard aside last spring the carcase was done and i only had the drawers left to make with the arrival of fall it was time to get back at it as i wrote in the last post the drawers went well and it was time for finish i made this for my son and his wife and they prefer dark stains they re not my cup of tea but the original was dark so i didn t object dark stains are tough because they show every imperfection and tend not to absorb evenly at least that s my experience pre stain conditioner is recommended but i like the color differences that result from not using it so i didn t here s the result building this piece only increased my respect for stickley and ellis there are many small details that i didn t appreciate until i realized how they contribute to both form and function posted by andy at 6 37 am 5 comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels stickley sideboard friday november 2 2018 trombones and dovetails when i was in high school i was a very good trombonist but not a great one i had plenty of talent and a good instrument but i didn t practice consistently take the summer off and it feels like starting all over in the fall i have this same problem with dovetails i don t cut dovetails often enough that i retain muscle memory and top of mind feel for what i am doing and i find it very annoying to spend time practicing every time i want to i was facing exactly that issue as i prepared to make the drawers for the stickley sideboard by 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