Things are starting to come together now. With the seat blanks complete we began adding parts. First we needed to bore holes in our legs for the stretchers. Not an easy feet with compound angles intersecting round surfaces that are unique at each corner of the seat. The layout of these mortises takes 5 times longer than the actual drilling but once you put the auger bit to wood, your pulse rate quickens just a bit. With the under carriage complete, it was time to glue and wedge the legs into the seat. Then it was on to cutting bridle joints for the rockers and making sure they were co-planer and level so the chair will rock without walking. Like most things in Windsor construction, a few simple techniques come into play to ensure a seamless fit between rocker and leg with no math and heavy thinking.
With one day left in class, I must admit I really enjoy working with all of these vintage tools. It makes me think about ditching some of my modern hand tools for their vintage brethren. Then I think again and pull out my Lie Nielsen spokeshave to remove tearout on my spindles.
“Saw with the power of a thousand camels”, eh? Well I’m not sure how camel power (CP) translates into horse power (HP) but it looks like all you’ve got is a one SP (Shannon Power) drive unit.
You guys must have lost several pounds each in sweat when doing the glue-ups here. Making sure that all of the co-planers really were. Had my eyeballs bugging out of my head at the thought of trying to do that.
If you can use winding sticks then you can get all these surfaces working in concert. The beauty of all this is even if you have reamed some of your holes a little out side the resultant angles then you can bring it all into harmony during the rocker mortising.
I figured that was the purpose of the dual framing squares that you and Roy were playing with. Even so, trying to get them stable on the legs and/or stretchers still had to be something of a challenge. Although I suspect that Roy had a few tricks up his sleeve that he was surreptitiously conveying to you there.
It took a few days for you to post the last couple days at Woodwright’s School. I was a little bit worried that something happened to you on the trip back! Glad it turns out that you just hit the wall from working so hard lol. Nothing beats a solid week of woodworking but working multiple days for long hours at a workbench can be a lot like hard work, really hard work. The kicker is that there is always a little bit of homework to do even after. I really like how the chair is looking, but really concerned that the class will be outta my league for a couple years. How much skills minimum would you recommend before signing up for that class?
My delay was a mixture of exhaustion, after hours fun at the City Tap behind the school, and an obligation to my wife to not completely ignore her in the evenings. If I wasn’t worried about fitting the chair in the car, I believe I could have finished the chair entirely (sans milk paint of course) so I don’t think this class really would generate that much homework. I don’t think any previous experience is really necessary. Elia assumes nothing in his instruction. I’d bet you are more than capable of completing this class.