Thinking Outside of the, half-blind, houndstooth, imported, spalted hardwood totin', Dovetailed Box

You Never Know...

Right?

Penicillin, gravity, marsh-mellows.....all kind of 'just happened' didn't they? Walking down a straight path leading you to some bright and shiny, safe haven ahead; great. No worries, perfect. A classic you might say...
Working wood, I sometimes fall into this fuzzy place as I'm sure most of us do. A happy and familiar area of the waiting room where we do things a certain way.

"Well, we've been doing it this way for years...right?"

Wrong.

Working along side, how shall I say, a 'well seasoned' gentleman a few years back and watched in disbelief as he butchered or maimed one thing after another with no idea at least from my end of the pull saw, the fundamentals of a wood shop, I came to some startling conclusions. No wheels re-invented, only a better picture of the wood shop I was working in. He didn't mean any harm and wasn't really hurting anyone, other than the potential of injuring himself; binding wood through table saws and removing safety guards and fences from anything and everything that could have used one. He had been doing it that way for years, proudly positioned over these great old machines his father built from pieces of farm tractors and toaster ovens.

"Must be alright then...right?"

Wrong.

If something seems like it could work in another way, try it.
If it seems potentially harmful, don't.
Wait.
If a light goes on in the back of your mind and you think, hm mm....I wonder if....then do it. Or, at least try it. If you're short for time or your boss is watching from across the work shop then grab a pencil and write it down, and then at each weeks end, go through your 'shop notes' and review. Oh yeah, I wanted to try to do that, this way. Maybe I can try it over here on this piece from my off-cut pile.
With a level head and thinking through the steps, safely, set-up and experiment with tools and techniques.
Follow instructions when-ever you can, and try to understand where you'd like to go.
I usually find myself thinking this way when I'm faced with a challenge and need to use a tool in a different way. For example, this past week I was test fitting a six-foot rabbet joint (named Harvey)that was just a bit too tight for the application. I needed to take a little off the edge. No worries, I grabbed my Skew Angle Block plane, adjusted the iron and the fence and went to it. Not a minute into it I was seeing some tear-out and needed to change my direction of attack. In a perfect world I would have simply reached for my, 'left-handed' version but alas, I, the simple craftsman cannot afford such luxuries of having a left and right version of the same tool. So I tried turning the piece over, end for end, arse over kettle. No luck. In my earlier wisdom I affixed the piece being rabbeted to it's mating piece which happened to be the rail on a bed. O.k. so I couldn't plane it from this way and I couldn't plane it from that. What to do?

"Another, potentially, more expensive tool could have solved my dilemma, right?"

Wrong.

What happened next was an instinctive motion of looking across the rabbet on a horizontal axis and simply turned the plane on it's edge.
"Whoa...Never thought of it like that before..."
Of course; so simple. I used the plane on it's side edge with it's fence ridding high up in the air; proudly peeling off those beautiful shavings of walnut. It worked like a dream. What a revelation and I was indeed walking down that exciting and slightly dangerous, path less travelled. Maybe this isn't a great example of, thinking outside of the box but, I'm trying to demonstrate that there's more than one way to shoe a horse. Or is it beat a horse? Or is it beat a 'dead' horse?
Well, you get the point and I sure do hope you're all enjoying yourselves this week during the exciting and action filled "Wood Workers Safety Week 2008"
Seriously, it is or at least, was this past week. Check it out and play nice with the other wood workers.
Cheers!

TOOL STORAGE UPDATE

"Well, I've never been a religious man, but it seems as though I've been building an Altar lately..."

The Tool Chest from a few weeks back has found a great home for itself on the floor in front of my full size Tool Cabinet. Funny how it fit so nice there? Coincidence?
Tool storage is something every wood worker should consider; it's a great way to practice a new set of skills or maybe trying out a new design idea. My scrap wood and off-cut pile is getting smaller...Next items are a traditional Saw Till that should nest perfectly on top of the Tool cabinet and after that, a Shaker style Plinth for the Tool Chest to stand in. It'll have two more drawers in the bottom for extra tool storage. Always thinking ahead you know...
Cheers!

Keepin' it Together...

New Poll asks readers which fasteners they use most...

After receiving our best feedback to date with the last Poll, I've added a new one today for all of the Working Wood readers out there. 'The Poll', for those who don't actually realise you can scroll down the page via that little arrow over there at the lower right hand side of the screen, is a weekly updated section of the site where devoted readers will answer questions directly related to their wood working preferences. Go ahead now, scroll down and look for it there on the bottom right side. Make your voice heard! Vote...Besides, it's a great way to see if you're working on 'The Road Less Travelled' or simply following the norm. (And no, not the New-Yankee type of Norm )
Today's topic deals with your most used method of attaching or fastening wood together. Do you use Hand cut joinery or store bought dowels, cut nails or cast Bronze screws? Time tested methods are all over the place for you to refer to, all you have to do is take look around.

A Fastener for Every Application

It seems no matter what it is you're building there's a special way of 'keepin' things together'. Maybe you're building a small side table and all of the components are held tightly together by accurately cut hand joinery. Bridle joints and dovetails, aprons cleanly mortised into the legs. A little glue perhaps? Ahh now, which kind will you use my boy? Fish glues or Hide, Polyvinyl Acetate Glue (PVA) or Fast curing Epoxy? Let's leave the glue types for another day and actually look at the different mechanical fasteners used. So, the small side table, with it's apron mortised into the legs. Did you draw bore the tenons, pulling them together for a tight fitting joint that will probably be around for someone else to dissect in 100 years? If you did you use a dowel, where did you get it? A scrap piece or off-cut, left over form the same project? Driven like a pile driver, down through a dowel plate, shearing off the edges making a rounded wooden cone to draw things together. Maybe a store bought dowel of a different species to accentuate the contrasting wood types being used. No dowel? No problem; a cut nail is not only historically accurate to alot of period style pieces, it's a great way to use a mechanical fastener without having to spend the time to cut fancy joinery. A gimlet in hand and twist in a pilot hole, you're done. Simple butt-joints, grooves or dadoes as well can safely be fused together with nails; driven in at opposing angles they can be as strong as any other fastener I can think of.
Maybe you subscribe to the cordless drill and screw methods of work. A 22 Volt, super-charged, impact driving wrist-breaker that can sink 4" screws into hard Maple all afternoon! Perfect! If that's what works for you then all the power to ya! Besides, you'll need the power to keep that thing running. I actually use screws in a lot of my work depending on the project. Take the Cherry Kitchen cabinets I recently finished; pocket holes and yellow carpenters glue all over the place. Did I use them in the small five-drawer table I recently made from Birds Eye Maple and Black Cherry? Of course not, it would have taken away from the piece and stood out like a sore thumb. Nails could have been used for sure, but I chose to join everything with beautifully cut joinery and glued things together. I could always go back and add some dowels later if need be. I don't think it will be necessary but it's nice to have the option.
A little trick I'll share with you here involves using screws during set up and finishing off with dowels. I'll explain further...

Borrowed from the Boat Shop

Having a background in wooden boat building, I've been aware of different techniques used to fasten wood together and expect it to withstand all sorts of harsh environments. Much more than any other piece of furniture I've designed; unless it's being installed on the deck of the Titantic, I don't think we have to worry about the same forces reacting to a dovetailed cabinet as say a traditional North Atlantic Dinghy. When manipulating wooden planks to conform into the tortured twisted form we see as a finished boat we sometimes will use screws like small clamps every few inches along a seam. After sufficient drying times on what-ever type of bonding agent was spread into the joint, once dry we remove the screws and fill the holes with wooden Bungs or an Epoxy mixture. This works well especially when working alone and can't seem to find a way to fit that third hand around a piece to hold it together while the glue dries. Clamps are great, don't get me wrong, but sometimes they simply won't do the job required. So a wood screw driven through like a spike down into a railway tie. Just long enough, until everything sets and then slowly back it out. Never drive them deep enough to damage the surface fibers of the wood grain when removing them. Another thing to consider is where to place them; keep things symmetrical and pleasing to the eye. And now what to do with all of the screw holes? I use the Miller Dowel System to fill them in. The smallest size dowel they have is a great size to fill a #8 screw hole. Carefully pre-drill the already existing screw hole left behind with the appropriate drill bit supplied by the Miller Dowel System. They offer a few different wood species and three different size dowels. When you're done, all you see is a smartly placed dowel along a seam or joint. No one will ever know you were filling a screw hole made during the 'clamping-up' stages of building. A great way to hold difficult glu-ups or anywhere you may want to use a dowel instead of a nail or screw. Let me know how it goes.



The Miller Dowel System is available through mail order from Lee Valley Tools.