'A culture medium for a medium culture'

Some things and some stuff. You weren't there, man. Mostly projects, mostly wooden. Maybe some other junk, I dunno.

[regeis]

So, after a good long while (don't ask how long!), I've managed to saw through the huge walnut slab which'll make up my long stretchers for the bench. I used a B&Q 'hybrid' hardpoint saw I inherited from my dad, because I've yet to obtain the files and saw set I'll need in order to sharpen my older, nicer saws. Temptation to send them off for sharpening is growing, but I do like to do everything myself.

Anyway, my arms are aching, but the cut was pretty straight (albeit with an uneven kerf), and the timber is ready for squaring up and the marking of tenons.

A nice detail to note is that because the walnut is laminated from a bunch of smaller pieces, some great details have been revealed, like the spalting in the close-up above. Basically, the wood was at some point infested with mould or fungus, then the wood was dried and processed before rot could set in properly. The result is some beautiful black lines in the wood.

Now... should I square them up tonight or give my arms a rest? Hmm... dinner first, then I'll decide.

[regeis]

So, it's been a while!

I'm sorry that it's taken me so long to update this, but life has a nasty habit of getting in the way. I'm back now and making intermittent progress with my workbench build!

Above, you can see the fruits of my labours so far; several of the many mortises I'll need to cut for this project. I'm really happy with how I'm doing on these, given that they're the first I've ever chopped!

I began by marking them out neatly, then tried two methods: drilling the waste out then clearing the sides with chisels, and just plain chopping the mortises with chisels (well, actually the drill wouldn't budge, so I only managed to drill one hole before I chopped the rest. I obviously need a 14" brace rather than a 10").

Needless to say, the straight chopping method won out, but it's still pretty tough! It took me roughly half an hour for each of these mortises, and that's a loud, sweaty half hour (sorry neighbours! No mortise chopping on weekends. Message received!).

Anyway, I'm making progress again and I couldn't be happier about it!

More updates to follow.

[regeis]

ROBOTS OR DINOSAURS?

Robot dinosaurs: engineer out the being extinct, engineer in lasers.

[regeis]

“They have fled from the true America, the America of atom bombs, scalpings, hip-hop, chaos theory, cement overshoes, snake handlers, spree killers, space walks, buffalo jumps, drive-bys, cruise missiles, Sherman’s March, gridlock, motorcycle gangs, and bungee jumping. They have parallel-parked their bimbo boxes in identical computer-designed Burbclave street patterns and secreted themselves in symmetrical sheetrock shitholes with vinyl floors and ill-fitting woodwork and no sidewalks, vast house farms out in the loglo wilderness, a culture medium for a medium culture.

Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash (1992)

[regeis]

I need a workbench. I've been telling myself this for some time; my planing board is an alright stop-gap, but it's not sufficient for the long term. I've been through several designs (including a monstrous split-top design which would likely not have fit in my room), but the other day I found a picture on Chris Schwarz's blog 'Lost Art Press' which inspired a complete rethink.

The image is of an old french(?) bench which is falling apart, but has an important feature: its top is only just over a foot wide. In Chris Schwarz's book 'Workbenches: From design and theory to construction and use' (a tome I'd recommend to anyone intending to build their own bench), the width of a bench is not the most important factor; if you want to plane large boards, you can make an outfeed table or just sit on it lying on the floor (I know, I've complained about that exact thing before, but sometimes it's necessary).

I fired up sketchup and came up with my design. It's not wide (just over a foot), but it's 5ft long and is made up of 3.5" thick sapele timbers for the frame and 3" thick laminated walnut (which I picked up on discount from a kitchen supply shop). The whole thing will likely be built using tusked tenons and the top will be indexed via dowels, so it'll break down into about 5 pieces when done.

I'm going to install a leg vise using czech hardware I bought at Dieter Schmidt's fine tools in Berlin (wonderful shop... I drooled) and attempt to recreate one of the chain-tensioning systems I've read about online (possibly using cable... experiments!). The planing stop is on the right-hand side on my design (rather than the left on the pictured bench) because I'm left-handed.

This is going to be a long process, but it'll be worth it in the end; I can feel it.

[regeis]

A lot of my friends LARP; if you don't know what that is, asking google may help you make sense of a lot of what I say.

One of my friends wanted to play an arbalist at Empire, a LARP ran by Profound Decisions which runs four events a year and is absolutely huge. I said I could build her a crossbow, and she agreed to pay me what she thought it was worth when it's done, including materials costs.

The bow cannot pull more than 30lbs at 15", and will fire padded foam bolts which fly like a balloon filled with porridge might. So far, I've shaped the two laminations for the body and built the roller nut (catch mechanism) as well as the trigger lever (tickler).

I still need to make the bow (I'm cutting down a kid's fibreglass bow until it pulls the right weight), the tickler needs to be thinner, the body laminations need to be planed flat and the spaces for the tickler and nut need to be routed out, but it's shaping up.

The timber is sapele (african mahogany) bought from B&Q when they had a sale on. They didn't know what timber it was, but I managed to find their sustainable forestry paperwork online, so was able to source the species.

[regeis]

I got hold of this beautiful Disston ripsaw at a flea market in town a couple months ago for £7 (examples have been known to go for £80 or more). It's far, far older than me and had a bunch of surface rust and discolouration on it. I've cleaned it up with white spirit and a scourer, removing the gunk, and sanded and oiled the handle. It's lost its etching on the blade, but the brass badge remains on the handle, and it's a beautiful saw which I'll make good use of once I've sharpened it.

[regeis]

Using the photos I'd accrued of various planing boards, I started out on my first project. I made numerous mistakes, which began with poor timber selection (that slightly gammy-looking 2x4 in the garage is a terrible choice, but it was what was available at the time), lack of proper tools (I was at home, and my tools where back up at uni, on the other side of the country) and not marking out my plans with a knife (pencil marks?! Heresy!).

I started by cutting the boards to length, then gluing them together using a pair of ratchet straps as clamps (not ideal, but like I said: no tools). The glue-up went surprisingly well, and I went on to smooth the board with the pair of planes (usefully, a jointer and jack) which I'd bought the day before at a car-boot sale. The irons weren't sharp and were nicked in places, I'd never tuned a plane before (though I'd read about it), and I didn't have a planing stop (I ended up using the bottom of the back doorframe, which was serendipitously the right height), but damn: it felt good to be working on something!

After about half an hour of sweaty, tiring planing and jointing (using the kitchen work-surface as a reference to see if the board was flat), I had a flat top for my planing board. I went on to make a pair of legs (also planed flat) and used a combination of saw and router plane (also purchased a few days before) to clear out the rebates. They were rough, and only just fit, but I made sure to make them slightly too small and planed the legs for a tolerance fit, so they were solid, damn it!

After glueing the legs in and waiting overnight for the horribly awkward ratchet-clamp setup to do its work, I used a brace and bit (old brace, new bit) to bore out the 3/4-inch dog holes in the bench; when I get some bench dogs, these may come in handy!

The bench was complete, I was exhausted, the floor of the laundry room was covered in shavings.

But I felt goddamn amazing.

I may have just finished building the shittiest, shoddiest planing bench the world has ever seen, but damn it, it was MY planing bench which I'd made with my own two hands, and that was the best feeling ever. It was level and it was solid (it supports me jumping up and down on it, at least), so it does the jobs it's supposed to do.

That's enough to make me happy, for now.

[regeis]

Planing boards.

About a year ago, I decided I wanted to take up woodworking. I've always wanted to build things, and enjoyed doing so (Citadel miniatures were my first crafty love, and for the last few years modifying Nerf guns has been the focus of my building attentions. Don't ask. I'll explain one day, maybe, if you're lucky).

I accumulated some tools, mainly from car boot sales and my parents, but I swiftly realised that I was lacking three things that I really, really needed for this hobby:

A surface to work on: The only surfaces available to me were the floor or various tables and worktops which would either risk the ire of my parents, were too flimsy, or both. Last time I checked, the floor doesn't have vices, dog-holes or really all that much going for it in terms of woodworking (unless you're japanese, in which case go right ahead).

Time to build things (I'm a biomedical sciences student, so I rarely have time for anything. On top of that I got involved with a couple of student societies, one of which I'm president of now... there goes all my spare time). That'll change soon, but that's another story.

Some wood to work on: Timber is expensive, heavy and difficult to get hold of in any decent quantity (that isn't industrial-scale) or quality. Working on that one but again, that's another story entirely.

I took some inspiration from the japanese for the first problem; they use small planing benches for many of the jobs that can't be carried out on the floor (which in japanese workshops is one big, flat hardwood surface... so kind of like sitting on a huge workbench), and if they need to do something like planing, they pull their tools towards themselves, taking the force into their crossed legs (which hurts, by the way...).

These are the pictures I used as inspiration for my planing board. I'll add the pictures I took of that process next, and you can see just how shoddy something made by someone with no hands-on experience since secondary school CDT can be when they have no decent workspace or surface, and their tools are on the other side of the country (*sigh*).