Wooden Play Stove Restoration – Part 1

Wooden Play Stove before restoration
~ Brad ~ 4 Comments

I’ve been hinting for some time that I am restoring a wooden play stove for my daughter, but I haven’t had the time to sit down and actually work on it, let alone write about it!

I believe that I’ve shared some background before, but not knowing where you are coming into this, I’ll share a bit here as a refresher.

When my wife was younger, her dad had a ShopSmith, which is something of a Swiss Army Knife for woodworking. It can become a table saw, a lathe, a drill press, and a number of other things.

It’s quite the versatile tool, so long as you know how to set it up.

Well, one of the more memorable creations that was born of this snazzy contraption was a wooden play stove that he made for my wife when she was a kid.

Long story short, we still have the stove and it’s been on my project list to clean it up and give it to our daughter. It’s not done yet, but here’s what I’ve done so far… Continue reading →

My toolbox just got a little bigger

Old Woodworker's Toolbox
~ Brad ~ 2 Comments

I recently had the opportunity to travel to Portland, OR on business and was able to see some family while I was there, including my mom (hi mom!)

Since my mom is aware of my growing interest in woodworking (after reading my blog of course 🙂 ), she mentioned that she had an old box of tools that had belonged to my great uncle. My great aunt had given them to my mom, presumably in case my dad or I were interested in them.

Upon hearing the word ‘tools’ I immediately jump to the conclusion that there is a rinky dink little cardboard box with some old rusty open ended wrenches and a some brad point drill bits or the like. Boy, was I in for a surprise! Continue reading →

Avoid This Disaster with Hide Glue | Lost Art Press

~ Brad

Reading this I thought it really applied to some of the glue ups I have done. I always find myself without enough time, or with glue oozing out from places I don’t really want it.

Using hide glue, as Christopher Schwarz suggests, seems like something worth experimenting with if I need to do a big glue up, or just in general use.

From Lost Art Press:

The only time I feel like I’m a Deep South Bible salesman is when I try to convince people of the merits of hide glue. I’ve spent years honing my case for this glue, which is perfectly designed for furniture makers.

Among younger woodworkers, it’s an easy sell. But for people who have been using yellow or white glue for a decade or two, it’s typically hopeless.

And so I present to you these four photos that show one of the glue’s many merits.

Today I’m tidying up the carcase of a tool chest that is bound for a customer in two weeks. And I found an ugly film of glue that has squeezed out under the top skirt. I’d missed it because it had been obscured by the bar of a clamp.

No worries. I get a small bucket filled with the hottest tap water and fetch a toothbrush…

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Source: Avoid This Disaster with Hide Glue | Lost Art Press

Copying Paul Sellers’ Dovetail Template

Dovetail template after paring with chisel
~ Brad ~ Leave a comment

Dovetails…

The word itself incites thoughts of fancy wooden boxes or complex joinery.

“Wouldn’t it be soooo cool if I could make dovetails?”

This is a question that many a woodworking supply company has answered by selling myriad dovetail jigs. Oh, and not to mention all the extra jig templates you can buy for the jig to make your machine made dovetails look, well, not so machine made.

Don’t even mention hand cut dovetails. Oh my. (thank you, voice of George Takei inside my head…you make my writing so much more interesting to read aloud.)

Well, I’m here to challenge that notion that you seem to think you lack the skills to perform such a seemingly impossible task. I’m here to show you that it’s actually fairly quick and easy to both layout and cut dovetails that function and look nice, and definitely don’t look machine made. (wait, is that a good thing? …yeah, definitely) Continue reading →

Split-Top Roubo Inspired Workbench

~ Brad ~ 13 Comments

Every woodworker needs a bench, whether its a 8 ft long french workbench with full through dovetailed joinery and a deep brown colored wenge end vice, an old dinner table, or even a stack of pallets, a bench is what lets you to do what you do…nothing more to it. I have read many articles detailing what type of bench feature you need to do X, Y and Z, and in the end, it comes down to just needing a sturdy flat work surface and the rest will follow suit.

For me, the stack of pallets wasn’t quite cutting it anymore (for some unknown reason). Especially since it tended to wobble around when I would do just. about. anything. I needed something better, and after learning that it is somewhat of a right of passage for woodworkers to make their own bench, I thought that would make a good first ‘official’ woodworking project. Continue reading →