Fresh Shavings in Bavaria!

Spargelzeit in Bayern

This time of year is great.  Fresh asparagus, potatoes and ham.  Yummy!

Yesterday I was having some problems chopping mortises.

Well, the problem is that banging on a mortise chisel in the basement storage room of my apartment building is likely to get me evicted.

Lucky thing.

My progress yesterday consisted of marking out all of the mortises for the legs on my Shaker side table and chopping out one and a little bit of the other one on the same leg.  Then it was quiet time in my building and I had to stop all the racket.

Last night, while laying in bed not sleeping, it occured to me that I marked all the legs the same.  In other words, I marked out each leg to take the mortise from an apron.  That's OK for the dining table I made last, but this table will have a drawer in the front.  Only two legs need mortises like that on each side.

Duh!

When I got home from work, I was worrying about these legs.  I have two that the grain is dead perfect gorgeous.  These were supposed to be the front two.  The rear legs the grain runs out a little bit.  Only the back legs get apron mortises on both faces.  I figured I had a 50/50 chance that I did it right.

I didn't.

Now the options are to either change the leg orientation or leave the orientation and insert a patch.  The patch shouldn't look too bad, as it will be covered by the front drawer.

But I'll know it is there.

What do you think?  Please take a moment and answer the poll at the right side of this blog.

At least I only screwed up one leg so far.

Build the Milkman's Mortise Gauge

I had a whole day to waste in the shop today.  My plan was to finish up the base of my Shaker side table, as it has been three weeks since I got to do anything to it.  Weird how life can get in the way of your shop time.

I used my new mortise gauge that Jonas sent me.

Milkman's Mortise Gauge

It worked fantastic for laying out the mortises on the legs.  I started chopping mortises, and immediately got a guilty conscience because I was making so much noise in the storage room of my apartment building.  We are allowed to pound nails and drill holes except from noon until three in our building.  But really, pounding mortises is LOUD.  

I came up with a system that would work holding the legs to my sawbench, and I could do it outside. 

Perfect.

Except it was now past noon, and I thought I probably should wait until three before pissing off not only my building, but the whole neighborhood.

Instead, I decided to build a replica of Jonas' mortise gauge.

Unfortunately, I left my camera in Garmisch again, so you'll have to live with these pics from my phone.

This thing was a blast to make.  I finished it, but wound up with no more time for chopping mortises.  Perhaps next week.

I bored holes in the stock with a brace and a 1/2" bit.  The practice I got doing dogholes on my workbench paid off.  These were pretty straight.  I went halfway through, turned the piece over and finished the hole from the other side.  A little rasping with a rattail rasp and that was done.  The center bit was cut out with a coping saw (I couldn't figure out how to get the blade out of my turning saw, it would have worked better), and cleaned up the saw cuts with some floats.

The best part was making the dowels for the movable rods.  I had never made dowels with a plane before, and was looking forward to it.  It is just like making chamfers with a block plane.  Once they would roll on the bench, I finished the dowel with some sand paper.

I chose to make the two rods from contrasting woods, because another blogger, Kees, mentioned he sometimes forgets which gauge he is using and messes up the mark.  Perhaps this will help.

The wedges I basically copied from the original.  I accidentally cut the middle wedge a bit short and am thinking of doing that over.

The cutters are some steel nails I had in my stash, that had some black enamel on them.  I ground them down until I couldn't statnd it anymore (they are still a bit long).  They are sharpened on one side, and installed so each post has a cutter with the sharpened side facing opposite directions.  Something I didn't think about is countersinking these nails, as the heads stick out a bit.  If you put the gauge close to the stock, the nail sticks out and interferes with the wedge.  It still seems to hold, though.

Lastly, I burnished all of the pieces with my polisoir, and then finished with DICK wax.  I think this stuff is fantastic!

Oh, and I call it the Milkman's Mortise Gauge because Jonas is the guy who took pictures of his dad's portable bench and sent the photos to Chris Schwarz, who has made this bench go viral.  Perhaps the gauge came from the same guy!

Overall, I am pretty happy with it.  I will probably make another one now that I have some of this figured out.

A Brilliant Gift

My buddy Jonas at Mulesaw posted some pictures of a project he was working on.  I immediately zeroed in on what I wasn't supposed to be looking at and asked about an interesting marking gauge he had on his bench.  He posted a bunch more pictures of Danish tools that he had in response to my querry.  This looked like a brilliant marking gauge, so I kept bugging him about it.

Jonas' marking gauge, courtesy Mulesaw.

My guess is he got tired of me pestering him, so he sent me a spare gauge he had that was of the same design.

I really wasn't looking for a handout, I thought it looked like something that I could make.  

Today there was a package from Denmark sticking out of my mailbox.  I have to say, I probably wouldn't have figured it out from the photo, but I think it is still something that could be made.

I have never seen a gauge of this design, although I get the impression from Jonas that they are relatively common.  It is a great design.  

My impressions are that this will make a nice tool.  I think it can be adjusted easily with one hand, although my guess is you have to be careful to keep the setting on the first post while adjusting the second.  I also think that while it can be used with the cutters pointing the same direction, that it is intended for the cutters to point away from each other.  The flat side of the dowel engages better with the wedge this way, and the fence is deeper for better registration against the stock.  Two seperate swipes will be required to make both of the marks.  This is OK, because these two cutters are so far apart that your marks will surely show past the tennon if you mark mortises this way.

I will use it for a while and give a detailed review.  For now, here are some detailed photos.

Ready to use.

All of the parts of this gem.

Each arm has a flat side opposite the cutter.  I think this helps the wedges keep the arms fast.

Each cutter has a knife edge.  These will be easy to sharpen.

The wedges.  The cutouts keep the small wedges from falling out when loose.
This is what I couldn't comprehend from Jonas' photos.

The stock with a brass wear plate.

As you can see, the center wedge is much thinner than the movable arms.

Back side of the stock.

Look Ma!  I got it back together (the second time).

Full Monty

Close up of the front.

Extreme close up of the front.

The back side with wedges.

Easy to adjust with one hand.

This seems to be the easiest way to use it.  Flip it over for the other mark.

Thanks, Jonas!  I plan to use this tool as my main mortise gauge.

Joining the Elite Hot Hide Glue Club

Today I joined the ranks of the uber-snobbish club that uses hot hide glue.

This stuff is so hard to use, and requires such expensive specialty equipment, none but the very elite class of woodworkers can use it.

I got a glue pot at a local specialty store.  This thing is high tech, and is specifically made to be used with a special glue container.  I rescued one of these containers from the trash.  I don't know why anyone would throw such a treasure away.

Hi-Tech Hot Glue Setup.

I got a package of hide glue at Dictum.  It was less than five Euros, but don't tell anyone.

Hide Glue from Dictum.
It should stay good forever, as long as it stays dry.

I tested the fancy glue-pot to see where I had to set the thermostat for the proper temperature for glue.  Luckily, if I turn it all the way up, the pot warms the liquid inside of the glue container to just shy of the recommended temperature.  This works fine, and this also means that there is no danger of the glue getting too hot by accident.

Thermostat.  If I turn it up all of the way, the temperature is just right.

I made a test run by following the directions that came with the glue.  Start with twice as much glue powder as water, slowly heat while stirring, and when it is up to temperature, add more water until it is the desired consistency.   I used a heaping spoonful of glue granules and one spoonful of warm water.  It seemed to mix great, and it thinned out as it got warm.

When I added more water, I accidentally added about ten times what I meant to, so it turned out a bit thin.  However, I tried a rub joint with two little bits of scrap I had laying around, and it seems to be holding just fine.

Test joint, glue seems plenty strong.

Everything cleaned up nicely, too.  A bit of soap and water, and all is ready for my next glue-up.

My Five Most Popular Posts (So Far)

I know you all would like to read a little self-indulgent narcissism,  so here we go.

It is humbling to consider that there are people all over the world reading my blog.  This post makes 96 posts to this blog.  Let's take a look at the five that seem to have generated the most hits.

#5 - Experiment: Let's Blow Up a Panel! 

 

I wanted to see if I could replicate a failure of a table top that was posted on reddit.  A woodworker there had built a table in which the top had split and cracked.  I thought the culprit was that he had glued in a cross batten that was attached with a sliding dovetail.

To test my theory, I made these two panels, and attached a cross batten with only three screws.  One of the panels received glue on the cross batten, one did not.

This post was fun because I got to throw out my theory of what happened for everyone to see.  In hindsight, it might have been good to wait until I had several weeks worth of photos to show the progress all at once, but I thought it would be fun to do this series in real time.

FYI, eventually the glued panel did fail, it bowed so much when the panel dried that there would be absolutely no way it would have survived on a table top.  The unglued one was fine.  All this in about three weeks!

#4 - Essential Tools for Newbies: Part V - Proper Bench Chisels

 

This post was one of a series on the tools I think should be in a Beginner's Tool Kit (BTK).  My general philosophy is that one shouldn't have to skimp on tools, one should just be picky and get a few really good tools.  When I started in hand tools I didn't know how to discriminate from true "must haves" from the gimmicks.  Oh, also, you shouldn't have to take out a third mortgage to do it.

With chisels, I think that rather than spend good money on a starter set, just pick up a pair of premium chisels that will last forever.  These two Lie-Nielsens will run about the same as a set of six plastic handled junkers.

There is a lot you can do with two chisels, and it is easier to keep two chisels sharp than it is twelve.  Later on you can pick up other sizes if you find you really need them.

I have been working with these chisels since about December when I wrote the post.  99% of my chiseling can be done with one of my two chisels.  Every once in a while I find I might need one that is narrower, but honestly, I think the only reason I might have pulled one of the others from my chisel roll in the old days was because it was the sharpest one.

Don't fall for thinking you'll save money, because you'll eventually buy premium chisels anyway.  Save the money and start now.

#3 - Money Can't Buy You Skill

This post surprises me that it is my third most popular post of all time.  I didn't have my camera that day, so the photo is a recycled one, and what I wrote about really isn't all that impressive.

What I did was build four try squares of my own design.  The "design" was that it was constructed with a lap joint, rather than a bridle joint or a mortise and tenon.  I started building squares this way because they could be easily built using my BTK.  I had made several of these before this post, and got very comfortable using my chosen tool kit to make decent looking lap joints.

The point of this post was to test if there was a difference between using my BTK and using fancier tools.  I made two with my BTK and two with the "proper" tools from my tool porn collection.  What I found out was unexpected.

I found out that since I had been using only my BTK for making lap joints, I had gained a level of familiarity with these tools that I didn't know I was missing.  I didn't save any time or make joints that looked remarkably better.  I think the fact that I had a timer going actually made my work more sloppy.

Moral of the story:  one needs to spend a lot of time with any tool to learn that tool.

#2 - "Mouldings in Practice" - A Non-Traditional Review 

This was a tongue-in-cheek review of Matt Bickford's book.  Along with a rehab of an old rabbet plane I had knocking around in my shop.

The reason this post is my all time #2 post is because Christopher Schwarz linked to this post on his Lost Art Press Blog.  This is one of my early posts, and having a plug to my site from CS totally wrecked my stats.  It took a long time before one of my other posts finally surpassed this one not too long ago.

Even though I was joking a little, I am serious.  You really should read this book.

Incidentally, this rehab turned out awesome.  This plane works better now than it probably ever did.  In a following post, Matt Bickford linked to a video I took of my very first rabbet cut freehand.  That post took a long time to fall off of this list, too.

It was a real ego boost to be mentioned by some of woodworking's heavyweights.  I am extremely grateful and honored.

#1 - Essential Tools for Newbies: Part II - Sharpening

 

This post had been out a long time before it took over the #1 spot.  I think that sharpening is a mystery to a lot of woodworkers.  I have to admit, I spent a lot of money on all kinds of different stones, jigs, and gizmos before I settled on this system.

Essentially, this post reflects that while it would be nice to have a dedicated sharpening bench, there just is no way in my tiny shop that I'll get one.  Surprisingly, I get perfectly good and fast results with the pictured setup.  The only thing I have added since this post is a hand-cranked grinder that I am just figuring out.

This is basically the same sharpening technique advocated by Christopher Schwarz and Tom Lie-Nielsen, with the exception that I clamp a cheap, plastic cutting board to my bench to protect it and provide a stop for the stone to rest against.

This set up is in my BTK because if your tools are not sharp there isn't much chance you will be successful with hand tools.  It happens that this is an effective and economical sharpening strategy that works.

There you have it.  Looking back on these posts gives me a feeling of accomplishment both in blogging and woodworking.  I love to blog because it helps me think, and blogging has helped me become a better woodworker.

Essential Tools for Newbies: Revisiting the Bevel Up Jack

Last December I wrote a series of blog posts about what hand tools a beginner should first focus on.  There are a lot of list of "essential" tools out there, and making sense of them for someone new to hand tools can be daunting.  I have seen some lists of tools that every woodworker "must" have that would have scared me off of hand tools if I had seen it before I got started.

My thoughts are that one should start woodworking with the tools you already have, along with some truly essential tools for woodworking.  In short, my list includes only the following tools, which I think make a great place to start:

• Some kind of sharpening process (I like waterstones)
• Jack plane
• Ryoba saw
• Pair of decent bench chisels
• Marking tools including a layout knife, marking gauge, square, and a pencil

This seems a bit simplistic.  I'll admit that it is.  However, you can use these tools to build some cool stuff.  My recommendation is to start with these and once you get good at them, you'll soon find out what other tools you need.  Hopefully, you will find out that there are even more tools you don't need.

I had intended to build some real furniture using only these tools.  Yes, I did build several projects using only my Beginner's Tool Kit (BTK), but I have yet to get a furniture build completed.  Jonas from Mulesaw stole my thunder a bit by building a dovetailed sea chest (with canted sides, secret compartments and self-made hardware) using only the tools that happened to be on the ship he was on at the time.  This included only a Stanley #3 smoother, a hacksaw, a powered hand planer and a few junky chisels.  Trust me, it is possible to do fantastic things with just a few tools.

Made with a hacksaw, duct tape and chewing gum by Jonas.

Moving on to the actual subject of this post:  since I have written this series I have used my Veritas Bevel Up (BU) jack plane with the stock 25 degree iron for all of my planing tasks, almost exclusively.  My jointer and smoothing planes have rested comfortably in the bottom of my tool chest since then.  I only used a vintage (new to me) scrub plane on my current project just the other day.

My overall impression:  This plane works like crazy.  I haven't really missed the others.

BU Jack it use.

Handplane monogamy has not been the sacrifice I thought it would be.  In fact, it is quite liberating.  Not having to spend time choosing a plane, or for that matter, not having to keep four or five different blades sharp is a big benefit.  Focusing on just keeping one iron sharp makes it feel like I am being a lot more productive.

The secret is in the BU jack's versatility.

Ninety percent of what you need a bench plane for is one of three things:  rough work for removing a lot of material, flattening, and smoothing.  Let's go into how the BU jack performs in these three tasks, as well as some others.

 

BU Jack as a Fore Plane

A fore plane is one of the first planes I use on a board straight from the lumber yard.  After sawing a board to rough dimensions, I will use a fore plane to remove all of the fur and get things sort of flat and square, taking the board down to near final thickness.

Traversing my bench top.

Adjustments needed 

Open the mouth wide.  On the Veritas model I have, it just takes a twist of the front knob to loosen the mouth, and the knob pushes forward to open the mouth. It takes about a half a second to do, and I am back to work.  Once the mouth is open, the blade can be advanced for a heavy cut.

 

How to do it

From a rough board I always start by making a couple swipes along the back edge to create a chamfer to prevent spelching, or blow out.  Then, I will traverse along the whole board, planing across the grain.  After a few passes across the grain, I will switch to a diagonal pass, followed by another diagonal pass 90 degrees to the first diagonal pass.  If at this point, there still are some low spots that haven't been touched by the iron yet, I will start the process over.

Once the whole face is clean, I will check the width and along the length with a straight edge to see if it is flat, and use winding sticks to check for twist.  The board does not have to be perfect at this point.  If there is a major flaw, it might be quicker to fix it at this stage.

 

BU Jack as a Jointer

After your board is roughed into shape, you will want to make it perfectly flat on it's faces and edges.  The Veritas BU Jack is 15" long, which is a bit short for a traditional jointer, but with a bit of care you can get excellent results.

 

Adjustments needed 

Retract the blade and tighten the mouth.  The finer the cut, the more accurate the results, but the longer it takes.  One benefit of the versatility of this plane is you can start with a medium setting and make it fine once you start getting close to finished.  It wouldn't hurt to run your iron over your honing and polishing process before jointing.

 

How to do it

If your board still looks a bit rough after the fore planing process, you can start on the face with more alternating diagonal cuts.  I wouldn't do any traversing at this point.  Alternate diagonal and with-the-grain passes until the deep gouges are removed.  Once the face looks perfectly flat, check with your straight edge and winding sticks.  Your face might start looking like it is ready for finish at this point, but don't pay attention to that.  We are looking for dead-nuts perfectly flat reference surfaces.

Once the reference face is done, we mark it and move to a reference edge.  I will take my time planing this edge as it is easy to mess up.  Once the plane is taking full length and full width shavings, I can check my progress just like before with a straightedge and winding sticks.  If I am satisfied, I will next check with a square to ensure this edge is perfectly 90 degrees to the face.  It often is not.  To correct this, I will move the plane over to the high side of the edge and take a full length shaving with just the edge of the plane taking a shaving only half the width of the edge.  I use my fingers as a fence to ensure the width of the shaving is consistent.  After this, I will take a full width shaving and check my progress.  It should be better.  Continue this way until the edge is perfectly 90 degrees.  This edge is marked to keep track of the reference edge.

Now that there is a reference face and an edge, I can use a marking gauge to mark the final dimensions of the remaining face and edge.  Now it is just a matter of planing down to the line.  If there is a lot to take off,  the mouth can be opened and the blade advanced for a thick cut like in the first step.  When I get close to the line, I change everything to a very fine cut and move to the line.  When it disappears, it is done!

 

BU Jack as a Smoother

This plane makes a pretty big smoothing plane, but if you were careful in the flattening steps, this plane can be made to work nearly as good as any smoother.

 

Adjustments needed 

It is not a bad idea to touch up the blade on polishing medium.  Hopefully, after this step the wood will be in good enough shape to apply finish, so our best edge is useful.  Set the blade back to a very thin cut.  I like to close the mouth to as tight as I can get it without it touching the blade.  One alteration I did to my blade was to round over the sharp corners on a course stone.  It just takes a couple rolling swipes, and instead of a sharp corner, the blade will have rounded edges.  This helps avoid plane tracks during smoothing, and I haven't found that it has any negative side effects during roughing or jointing.

If you really want it to be a smoothing monster, hone a 50 secondary bevel on your blade, or drop in a dedicated 50 degree blade.  There is not much that this plane (with a total 62 degree angle) will not be able to handle.

 

How to do it

I will take my time and inspect every part of the surface.  There likely are some plane tracks or tear out left over from the jointing process.  These fine cuts should take care of those.  I look for wispy paper thin shavings as a sign that things are working correctly.  The final test is if the surface meets your exacting standards.

 

Other Things in Which a BU Jack Excels

Shooting

Nothing squares end grain as easy and fast as a plane with a shooting board.  This easily made shop appliance needs to be in every shop.  With this appliance, perfectly square end grain is a sure thing, every time. The real secret to shooting quickly, is to get better at crosscutting.

Jack on a shooting board.

Adjustments needed 

Sharp.  As always.  If your end grain has a line or two after shooting, it means there is a ding in your cutting edge.  A quick couple swipes on a polishing stone might be enough to give you a perfect cut.  A medium cut with a medium mouth opening should work fine in most cases.  I only ensure that when the plane is laying on it's side that the blade is perfectly 90 degrees to the bed of the shooting board.  Contrary to popular belief, the plane's side doesn't need to be square to the sole for this to work.

 

How to do it

This plane was born to shoot.  Indeed, I purchased this plane for the sole purpose of shooting.  It was a happy accident that I found out how truly versatile it is.

First, I examine the board to ensure I know which is the reference edge.  This edge will always go against the fence of the shooting board.  Next, I make a little relief cut or a chamfer on the edge to prevent blowout.  There are a lot of ways to do this, but I find it quick and easy to shave it with a chisel.

Proper technique involves holding the piece against the fence with one hand while moving the plane with the other.  Don't try to use the handle, a more effective grip is holding the side of the plane with fingers wrapped around the lever cap.

 

Tapers

Before and after

I never cut a taper with only a plane before just a few days ago.  I am currently working on a Shaker side table in cherry which has tapered legs.  As per instructions in the DVD, I used my jack plane to cut them.  Christopher Schwarz uses a vintage Stanley jack plane to cut them.  I was able to do it with my BU jack, as well as joint and finish the cut.

 

Adjustments needed 

I set the plane up the same as I would for roughing.  As I get closer to the line, I make adjustments to take a finer cut by retracting the blade and closing the mouth.

 

How to do it

I started the cut just like in CS' DVD:  I start with a short stroke off of the end of the leg.  The second stroke is started a little farther back.  The next a little farther, and so on.  When I get near the mark for where the taper starts, I start over.  I think it is important to check the taper cut is square to the reference face every once in a while.  If the cut goes off, you can easily remedy it using the same technique described in jointing.

 

Chamfers

I normally do chamfers with a block plane.  If one doesn't have one (because this is your only plane), the BU jack does an excellent job.  This plane, after all, is just a giant low-angle block plane.

 

Adjustments needed 

It depends on how big your chamfer is.  For a big one, start course, and set to fine as you get close.  For a small one you can start fine.

 

How to do it

I like a grip where my fingers from the hand that is holding the front knob are on the underside of the plane.  My thumb goes right behind the front knob.  I then use my fingers as a fence, which holds the plane at a specific angle to the piece being chamfered.  After a few strokes, I check the end to see if the angle is where I like it.  After a few correcting strokes, I plane down to the mark.  If there are multiple identical chamfers to cut, I count the number of strokes it takes and do the same on all cuts.  They should all look similar.  If the chamfer is fat on the ends and skinny in the middle, I take a few strokes out of the middle only until it evens out.  Then I continue with full length strokes.  This is a sign that I am not planing evenly.

 

Plowing Grooves

OK, the BU jack cannot plow grooves.  I was just checking to see if you have read this far or not.


In conclusion, a BU jack plane truly is essential if you do not have dedicated planes that can do all of these other common tasks.  I have also found that using this plane exclusively has really allowed me to get to know this plane.  I think I can do twice as much with this plane than I could when I originally wrote the BTK series.  My guess is I am not even using it to half of it's potential.

Perhaps you have found other uses for a BU jack.  What are your experiences?

Progress