Cutting curves in thick wood w/o bandsaw

[Justin Green]

I'm building a Shaker-esque bench and have the leg vise chop just about done, except for the shaping. It's about 3" thick. I've mortised in the guide rail and I will soon drill the holes for the Benchcrafted hardware. I don't have a bandsaw (or know anyone with one), and I want to curve the top of the chop similar to the shaker bench designs.

I had considered using my miter saw and sawing it to a 45 and then shaping it the rest of the way with a rasp, but being 6.5" wide, it doesn't fit. It looks like I may have to stand it vertical and run it through the table saw, or more likely sawing off pieces with a hand saw. I also could theoretically make a series of passes with a router. In any case, it seems like without a bandsaw, I'm in for a lot of rasp and sanding work ahead. Am I missing anything?

[David Posey]

It only has to look good, it doesn't have to be machined to any precise tolerances, so I would do it with a hand saw and just take a series of cuts to bring it close to round and then shape it with abrasive tools until I was happy with it. You might also use a wide chisel to do some of the work in between. Just make sure you lay out your cuts so that you can keep the saw fairly straight over the width of the piece.

There is no way I would risk running that verticlaly through a table saw. That sounds like its asking for a visit to the ER.

[Justin Green]

Yeah, I really want to get away from using the table saw, period. That's my least favorite option, although I would have clamped it to a sled to hold it vertically. I shudder thinking about that option, though. It's only 6.5", I might have a go at it with one of the hand saws. A belt sander is the other option, but I don't have one of those, either. This soft maple is harder than what I'm accustomed to sanding (poplar and pine), so I've prepared myself mentally for the work, ha! It took me an hour last night just to chop the mortise for the guide!

Thanks of the suggestions!

[Jim Koepke]

Am I missing anything?

Do you have a hand plane and chisels?

It is amazing how easy it is to make an outside curve with these.

Just remember to work toward the center from both sides.

jtk

[Justin Green]

Do you have a hand plane and chisels?

It is amazing how easy it is to make an outside curve with these.

Just remember to work toward the center from both sides.

jtk

Oh, I didn't think about that... Yes, yes I do have plenty of planes and chisels. Sharp ones at that (sharper than my saws, for now)! I'd prefer the neander approach anyway. So sort of like planing a raised panel - just planing cross-grain to a line, albeit a curved one. This I think I could do.

[Jessica Pierce-LaRose]

I'm assuming you're talking about a huge round-over like in the image of the shaker bench here (http://www.benchcrafted.com/Benchbuilding.html) on the benchcrafted site; (the second image down on the right-hand-side, with the drawer pulled out)

If that was the case, I'd do the following -

1) Mark out your desired radius on both sides with a compass or dividers, or the bottom of a can of beans or whatever.

2) Knife that line fairly deeply to prevent tear out in the following steps

3) Mark a 45 degree angle on the sides, using a pencil or knife. Get as close to the arc as you're comfortable sawing.

4) Use a square to mark the continuation of that angled line across the face and top of the chop, to give you a visual reference while sawing

5) Saw down using a hand saw. I'd use a fairly coarse panel saw for this, as you're going for speed.

6) Depending on how much material you've left behind, repeat 3-5, adjusting the angles, to get yourself closer

7) If you've got a fair amount of material to remove, or your knife lines aren't super deep, use a chisel or block plane to add a slight chamfer to the edges, right up to your knife line to prevent tear out

8) take a coarse set jack plane, and working across the grain, get close to the curve, you'll remove material a lot faster this way and rasping or sanding

9) get as close as you can, and then smooth up, either sanding, using a scraper, or using a finely set plane or spokeshave going with the grain, arcing from the face into the end grain. Skewing and working diagonal makes the effective radius larger and easier to follow the convex curve You could also use a broad chisel for this step.

[Justin Green]

Here's a peak at the progress as of a couple of weeks ago. I've since finished the rail for the sliding deadman. The base is sitting on top of the future top. It will be about 9' long before end caps and about 28" wide. Top is currently about 4 & 1/8" thick soft maple. Dog hole strip is ready to be cut to length once I get back to working on the top.228556

[Jessica Pierce-LaRose]

That's looking great, Justin. Make sure you share when you're finished!

I would love a bench setup like that, but realistically, I know, having puttered around working on my bench since September, give or take, that if I tackled something like that, I'd be dead before I finished it . . .

Also, 9 feet? That also makes me jealous. I'm not sure my workroom is even long enough for a 9 foot bench!

[Zach Dillinger]

Joshua has it right on. I'd be sawing as much waste away as possible, then paring back with a very sharp chisel. Careful work with the chisel, a little sanding, and you should be good to go.

[Justin Green]

That's right, Joshua, similar to the one on the Benchcrafted Shaker bench. I'm kind of using that bench, and Norm Vandal's bench, as inspiration. We're planning on building a new house in the next few years, and I talked my wife into letting me build a separate workshop, so I thought I'd go ahead and build a larger bench. I wanted the top to be 4" all the way across, and I was worried about the Benchcrafted design holding up to racking (or wracking?) without some stout legs. So I'm putting 3x4 legs at three corners and the leg vise leg is 3x5. The sliding deadman rail is 3" thick and mortised into the front legs. The legs will be lag bolted into the back panel and face frame similar to Norm's design, and hopefully the 4" wide tennons going into the top will provide some anti-racking stability. I was surprised at how solid the lap joints made the face frame, but being poplar, I didn't want it supporting that much weight. There are two 6/4 maple boards I've set on top that are temporary, but the base is proving to be stouter than I anticipated.


I have a habbit of taking on what are probably overly ambitious projects for my skill level, so I already have quite a few hours into the bench. Things like chopping mortises in the maple take me a long time, but I'm getting better. To top it off, I'm left handed, and keeping the leg vise and tail vise from accidentally ending up on the wrong side of the bench has been suprisingly challenging, lol. You can see in the picture a second dog hole strip behind the first where I misread a mark and cut a dog hole where a leg tenon was supposed to go, grrrr... If anyone in Texas is looking for a soft maple dog strip with the square dogs already cut, you're more than welcome to this one.

Anyways, I digress.

I have marked out the radius with a pair of dividers, and will have the start of the curve market straight across on the face of the chop so I keep it even... I will either take the saw approach or try to plane most of it away. That way I can still hear the radio and keep all of my fingers!

[Michael Peet]

You can see in the picture a second dog hole strip behind the first where I misread a mark and cut a dog hole where a leg tenon was supposed to go

Man, I was wondering what that was. I must have spent two minutes staring at that pic trying to figure it out, lol.

Looking good, Justin.

Mike

[Justin Green]

My photography skills are even rougher than my woodworking skills :)