Tuesday, November 15, 2011

catch up on the chair

Last time I left on the progress side of things I was making slip tenons for the back and seat frame.
Here is the tenon side with checks cut off on the band saw, dialing in very close on the router table.

The last bit of fitting can be done with a file, a bit of sand paper or what have you.
This has to be the biggest joint I've made since my bench!
You may note that the outsides of this joint are proud, beyond flush. This is to make clamping easier, quite convenient.

Cut some stock for back slats, and set that aside.
Turning back to the legs I dialed in the end grain angles. I must say that the O-1 steel blade in the block plane is proving itself as I had hoped! My A-2 would just crumble on Oak end grain. The O-1 keeps on cutting, relatively speaking, this is still Oak here ha.
Anywho, back to the boring machine to cut more twin tenon mortises. This time for the arm to leg joints.

After that was done I was finally free to cut the legs to shape! The arm isn't joined here, it doesn't even have mortises yet. That will be saved for after the legs and stretcher are glued up.
Starting to look more like a chair though!

Pillowing done to the edges of the legs and stretchers I could move on with edge treatment. This is a bit heavier softening than I've done before. A couple reasons. This is a chair which will hopefully see plenty of attention by its owners. Make it soft for friendly and comforting use. Also the sides of the components are flat, no pillowing. I wanted to try to emphasize the pillowing on the edges while still maintaining a squarish look as opposed to the full radius of much Danish Modern pieces.
Pre-finishing comes next for these parts!

Back to the boring machine for back slat mortises.

I decided to use live tenons on these. It could certainly be done with floating tenons, and I may do that on the sofa with a bunch of these to make. I just wanted to make live tenons. It feels like it has been a while. Perhaps I wanted the practice or to prove to myself that I can still do them, but there are some days that you just need more hand/bench work.
It was a gratifying bit of work. Probably the best live tenons I've made in a while, certainly the fastest! I needed that heh.

Still pretty chunky looking. The main frame will lose about 1/8" around the perimeter. Hopefully that and the edge treatment will lighten it up. Perhaps it will all come together in the end. Seen that before.
Yikes, I'm going to have to figure out this seat webbing soon!

6 comments:

Craig said...

Hey Nick,

I like the pillowed profile you put on the legs and stretchers. Works nice with the flat sides. The chair's coming along great!

Craig

Jeff Branch said...

Nice work. I have been thinking about how you use your horizontal boring machine. Seems to work very well for you.

Nicholas Nelson said...

Thanks Craig! If a guy with such a keen eye as you are please, I must have done something right heh.

Jeff, Yes the DBM64 is a great little machine! You should see Craig's though!
http://studiotupla.com/blog/2010/1/17/xy-table-up-and-running.html

Nick Brygidyr said...

i've just entered the world of the slot mortiser, but i dont really know how to use it. who wants to email me some school notes? im looking at nick or craig =D

Nicholas Nelson said...

Nick, did you get that X-Y table for your jointer??

Nick Brygidyr said...

i thought about it and i went with the Laguna slot mortiser, for many reasons. 1. having regular cutting bits, the jointer i would have had to use reverse cutting bits. 2 not having to lug an 80 pound table on and off my jointer every so often. hah. it was a few hundred more for a stand alone mortiser, so i went for it. and it's so QUIET wow, except when you cut, the screeching worried me but im just not used to it hah.

it has to option to lock the side to side mouvement of the table for doweling, it's pretty neat