Arts & Crafts Rocker, Finally Done...

[Derek Arita]

Well, I asked a lot of questions here and got a lot of great answers, so I thought I'd post the finished product. I think the hardest part of this build was forming the rockers, then attaching the rockers to the legs. How do you get a good contact connection between rocker and leg bottom? Anyways, thank you all very much and I learned a lot during the process.
By the way, I made some mods to the original Arts and Crafts plan to suit my particular taste. This rocker is kind of an Arts and Crafts/Mission style rocker. Hope that's acceptable.
http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/8495/f5yo.jpg (http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/833/f5yo.jpg/)
http://img692.imageshack.us/img692/3851/k8c1.jpg (http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/692/k8c1.jpg/)

http://img13.imageshack.us/img13/1687/66rj.jpg (http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/13/66rj.jpg/)

[Frederick Skelly]

Looks great, Derek! Sure its acceptable to tune it to suit your tastes - youre the craftsman creating it. If its comfortable and YOU like the style, thats all that really matters IMO.

Love the figure in the wood. My eyes arent good enough to tell - is it oak, or something native?

Fred

[Derek Arita]

Looks great, Derek! Sure its acceptable to tune it to suit your tastes - youre the craftsman creating it. If its comfortable and YOU like the style, thats all that really matters IMO.

Love the figure in the wood. My eyes arent good enough to tell - is it oak, or something native?

Fred
Thanks Fred! The wood white oak. I did my best to choose my lumber, keeping in mind the parts each board was to be used for. The arms showed the most figure. I think if I were to do it over, I'd make the arms just a bit thicker, to make them look more substantial. I was surprised at how difficult it was to find white oak up here in Northern California. There really are oak trees growing all around us. I'm from SoCal, where you can find just about anything.

[Kevin Bourque]

Looks great. Beautiful color. What did you finish it with?

[glenn bradley]

Wonderful, that came out great.

[Michael Peet]

Beautiful work and nice, clean lines.

[Ralph Okonieski]

Beautiful rocker, Derek ! Very nicely done !

Will you describe your stain and finishing process, please?

[Von Bickley]

That is one beautiful chair....... Love the style and wood.

The only thing that would make it better, is for it to be in my house.

[Dick Mahany]

Derek, beautiful job! The fleck in the QSWO is great. Did you form the rockers with laminations or were they cut from solid stock?

[Derek Arita]

Thanks for the kind words. The rockers were bent laminations of 4, 1/4" slices of quarter sawn...my first exposure to bending. I learned a lot about bending and about using epoxy, which was my savior. I opted for a 2 piece form. Next time I'll try 1 piece, with clamps.
The finish was Trans Tint Golden Brown, in water, which proved very forgiving for this first time user. Trans Tint is an aniline dye. I was warned that using a waterborne poly would cause movement in the water dye, so better to use an oil based top coat, so I used Arm R Seal wipe on poly. Since grain was raised by the water tint, I did 2 coats of poly, then sanded with 320, then 3 more coats.
I had problems with splits in the highly figured wood, so I used 5 minute epoxy to fill and hold down splits and keep them from splintering. It worked well. Like I said, I learned a lot about white oak.

[Jamie Schmitz]

Nicely done. If you want to make sure and not have problems with the dye moving the best thing is to seal it by spraying. Shellac. Also don't forget to stamp your name on the bottom some where-that thing will be around a while and it will help people remember you.

[Derek Arita]

Nicely done. If you want to make sure and not have problems with the dye moving the best thing is to seal it by spraying. Shellac. Also don't forget to stamp your name on the bottom some where-that thing will be around a while and it will help people remember you.

Yeah...I actually have one of those plug in irons. Problem is, I can never really get it to work right. If you don't press it on just right, you get burn marks all over the place, along with skipped letters in your name. Wish they had a fooll-proof one. This time I just signed the seat bottom with a Sharpie.

[mike holden]

Beautifully Done!
Congratulations.
Mike

[Joe Hillmann]

That is a very nice looking chair. I have been thinking of building one similar to that. By similar to that I mean the only curved pieces being the rockers. With the back being straight across and up and down is it comfortable? Also would you mind putting up a picture showing the side profile of it?

[Sam Murdoch]

Looks very nice - lovely wood and crisp details, just needs a Granny to make it complete :)

[Derek Arita]

That is a very nice looking chair. I have been thinking of building one similar to that. By similar to that I mean the only curved pieces being the rockers. With the back being straight across and up and down is it comfortable? Also would you mind putting up a picture showing the side profile of it?
From the side, you can see the seat back rails are curved and the back legs are angled. This is a very comfortable chair. I think you could get away with the back rails not being curved, however the angled rear legs make a big difference, but I'll let those more experienced than I am, chime in here.
http://img703.imageshack.us/img703/1951/9zwy.jpg (http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/703/9zwy.jpg/)

[Scott Barringer]

The more I see great looking projects like this one, the more I'm inspired to try some Mission/Arts & Crafts designs. I love the oak and I've never worked with it. Looks amazing. Great chair!

[Derek Arita]

The more I see great looking projects like this one, the more I'm inspired to try some Mission/Arts & Crafts designs. I love the oak and I've never worked with it. Looks amazing. Great chair!

Cool...thanks. When you do, keep an eye out for the checks, even after machining. When you find them, they are easily controlled with 5 minute epoxy. I had a couple of checks develop on corners, that would have been snags for blankets, hands, etc. I worked in the epoxy and it allowed me to smooth them out very well.
It was my first time with white oak as well. Turned out to be easier than I thought. Also, getting the best figure where I wanted it was gratifying. You'll have fun with it and it makes for a dramatic look.

[Ben Martin]

Derek,

Great looking chair! Do you have a link to the plans that you used? Seems like that would fit the style of the rest of the A&C furniture I build.

Ben

[Derek Arita]

Derek,

Great looking chair! Do you have a link to the plans that you used? Seems like that would fit the style of the rest of the A&C furniture I build.

Ben

Ben, here's a link to the downloadable version...
http://www.amazon.com/Two-In-One-Crafts-Chair-Rocker-Mission/dp/B00286R07K
Be aware that in order to use the templates provided, you're going to have to mess with the % size when you print. I think mine finally printed life size when I was at 107%. There are only a couple of pieces that are templates. Let me know if you have questions. I'll try to help.

[Gus Dundon]

Beautiful work on that. Lovely details. The wood grain looks great.