Low boarded bench for mudroom

[Scott Winners]

I am kinda at 6's and 7's here, but I am going with it. I have a plank of 4/4 American Beech 14 1/8 wide by 93 inches long. My younger boy wears a 13.5 American sized shoe. He is 31 years old and still hasn't "grown into" his feet. I want my son to feel at home and not a freak when he comes to visit. One thing I can do, as Dad, is provide a bench in the mudroom wide or deep enough to take his shoes too without him having to feel like some kind of freakish individual leaving his enormous shoes on the floor of my mudroom.

The 14 1/8 inch beech plank I have is the widest plank of North American hardwood I have seen in a, well, decades. I am using it, full width, to honor both my son and the tree.

I find myself choosing between Chris Schwarz's _Design Book_ 'Low boarded bench' and the 'Boot bench' in _By Hand and by Eye_ from George Walker and Jim Tolpin.

I am going to kind of "mash-up" advice from both to make the best bench I can. One problem is Chris suggests using a plank species that 'doesn't move much in service,' but NA beech moves more than white oak in service. The finished bench, if it moves enough in service, may pull itself apart and end up in my BBQ pit where American beech is useful (if expensive) on poultry, good on shellfish, decent on wild caught salmon, and decent but mild on beef for those unfamiliar with smoked meats.

I am leaving room in this post for a moderator to someday paste in a pic of the finished project. I am going for the "intermediate level" in Chris Schwarz's lexicon where there is a bunch of hand planing required to make this surface flat and that other surface flat and pretty, but with respect to the proportions identified by Walker and Tolpin.

I do have, and should explicate, a great deal of respect for the old guys like 'Steve' who have a bad knee and decide daily if they have the juice to drop a fight of stairs, do some woodworking, and have enough juice left over to climb a flight of stairs rather than call the fire department to carry them home (upstairs one level). There is a bunch of disputable stuff in here, but the folks who keep trying and keep fighting are my heroes, my guides, and hopefully my (if I don't give up) future. I do want a single level forever home, but I have limited interest in pulling laundry detail for my similarly aged wife without significant infilling from the Holy Spirit to guide my thoughts and memories.

First step for me is to prep a shooting plane. The finished project is going to have a relative acre of exposed end grain. When you enter the door of my home, you are going to see something like 24 inches of exposed end grain first, and then the rest of the mudroom bench. I am leaning towards 1:1:1 linseed oil/ paint thinner/ polyurethane as a high wearing finish. I am going to use a high knob #6 as my shooting plane, with a PMV11 iron honed to 8k diamond.

I am curious to know how many k diamond stone I need to pull a wire edge off my back bevel without disturbing the flat grey iron back Lee Valley shipped to me.

Once I am done with this fool thing, the mods are welcome to move this thread to the projects section, with a pic of the finished project (that I am leaving room for) in post one.

It is now December in Alaska. I am going to take a beech plank > 102 inches in length and greater than 5.5 inches width out to my driveway pad to rip to width using an electronic apprentice. This will otherwise be a hand tool 'only' project, but really a hybrid. The finished surfaces will be hand tool only; hopefully no sand paper baby Jesus as we prepare in Advent and celebrate during Christmastide your time on earth as a mortal man.

I pray for both 'Steve' and Derek to have a blessed holiday season. I will knock this bench thing out as fast as I can. I have a full time job. The last time I worked general med/surg charge RN in Fairbanks,(yesterday) 9/20 patients on the floor were younger than me, 11/20 were not. May the Peace of Christ that surpasses all understanding (or whatever higher power) be with you both and with you all (all y'all) during this blessed season.

Love to all, malice to none.
Scott

[Mel Fulks]

Beech moves more than some other woods , but was commonly used for woodworking bench’s. There was a lot of it and it’s just-right
for benches high and low !

[Scott Winners]

Getting to be midday here, I go back to work tomorrow for three in a row; but just playing in the shop as much as I want today.

This is a picture of a picture in Chris Schwarz' _Design Book_. It does show the pieces of the thing I am building, but I am going to moosh the proportions around here and there.

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The big wide plank I have is going to become the legs at each end and the actual seat surface, with about 6 inches left over for scrap. The board has three knots in it, but I can make two of them go away by ripping back about 3/8 inch.

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For the width of the front and rear planks I am going to use a proportion of the total height rather than an arbitrary inch width. At this point I need to commit to a finished seat height, as one of the front or rear planks needs to come out of the middl-ish of this end of the 6.5 inch plank.

What I am saying is the target finished project part is going to have two eyes in the grain, connected by cathedral patterns. To get the eyes more or less on center I am going to have to rip both edges of this part, maybe even a little bit off plumb.

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At this point I name 17 inches as the finished seat height. I am going to go sprinkle some blue tape on my rough boards. I am going to go do something else for a little while. Later today, if I remain happy with my decision, I will drag my rough stock and an electronic apprentice out onto the driveway.

[Jim Koepke]

This is a picture of a picture in Chris Schwarz' _Design Book_.

Glad you posted this image as Chris Cchwarz' Design Book isn't in my library, By Hand & Eye is.

This looks like what some call a "Five Board Bench" with a shelf.

Similar ones were made in my shop in the past to sell at a Farmers Market.

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This is actually a "six board bench." The top is hinged and the sixth board is set into the front and back rails to provide a small storage space.

The project build can be seen here > https://sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?214308 < There are some helpful hints included and the link to the Charles Neal video still works.

My feeling is, with a little planning you will not have to worry about movement. For the most part your grain is all in the same direction. Where it isn't, on the front and back rail, The pilot holes for the cut nails can be drilled a little oversized to allow for vertical movement.

One thing not mentioned is when using cut nails, they are placed in a vise and a cold chisel is used to raise a few burrs towards the tip to give them better holding power.

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The blue tap was put on the chisel to cut down the reflected light.

jtk

[Scott Winners]

Well, it is minus 2 F out in the driveway today, about -18.9 C. I am just not feeling that ambitious today, so I got working on the two side planks.

Having selected a finished seat height of 17 inches, I went ahead and made up a "standard" handspan out of a piece of furring strip, 8.5 inches long.

So the height is two hand spans, the length is going to be 6 handspans -> 51 inches. From the front it will be one thing tall and three things wide. The problem is my wide plank is going to be 13.75 inches wide. I could rip it back to 2/3 of 17 inches, about 11 and a quarter. That would give the end view a proportion of 2w:3h; but the shelf would not be wide enough for my son's enormous shoes.

I got to be judicious sprinkling ones and threes around the front, cause the end proportion is still going to be 14:17.

Either way, my dividers and sector got an indoor workout today.

[Scott Winners]

I think I will end up cutting an angle other than 45 degrees on the bottom corners of the side planks. I did make up a template in parchment paper. I am pretty happy with the two planks pictured, one has very strong cathedral pattern I am not going to be able to conceal.

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The other side plank I have been staring at for too long. I think I am going with this gentle river, with the visual center of the larger eye formation about 1/3 from one end, and the minimum, the visual center of the area between the two eyes about 1/3 way in from the other end. I think it looks relaxing, without looking overdone or forced.

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I am going to have to work around some mill damage on the back side of this plank. I want to be sure of angle cut and leg spacing before I cut this one to length.

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Right now I need to get something to eat.

[Scott Winners]

I woke up reaching for my calculator this morning. I didn't get it on the first try, but the proportion of the end of the bench was interfering with my sleep.

If I start with a wide plank 13.75 inches and make the end view "a square and a quarter"; then I could say 13.75 x 1.25 = 17.1875 inch seat height. I feel a lot better about this.

Also, it occurs to me today I should be proactive in case the footnote police stop by.

The design I am starting from in this project is the 'Boarded Bench' in Chris Schwarz' design book. I said that already. I haven't had to type up my own bibliography since before the turn of the century. I used to be good at APA format, I bet they changed that around in the meantime, here is my best shot:

Schwarz, C. (2019) _The Anarchist Design Book_. Chapter 21, pp 368, Lost Art Press, Covington, KY.

There are three books in the "hand and eye" series, I am using the least expensive of the three for the smooshing around of Chris' dimensions.

Walker, GR & Tolpin, J (2015) _By Hound and Eye_, Lost Art Press, Covington, Ky.

I know Megan Fitzpatrick has (or had) a user ID here, though I haven't seen a post from her in at least a year. I hope to someday work my way up to the more sophisticated projects in the Hand and Eye books, but I ain't getting no younger.

[Scott Winners]

Pretty good progress today. I got just about all my chores done to be ready to go back to work on Monday.

I got all the stock rough cut to length, and jointed. I now have a reference face and a reference edge on all but one of the side planks. The last side plank is going to be cut out of the plank I have at an angle to the reference edge on the s3s board. The offcuts are going to the BBQ pit either way, I am just trying to get that center flowing grain pattern a little more level across the finished project.

Plan for tomorrow is to rip my three wide pieces to width, and the one side plank with a reference edge to width, and cut the other side plank out on four sides. But I can start with the circular saw in the driveway at like 10 AM, because my mundane chores are done. The wide pieces are trying to cup on me, so they will go under as much weight as I can put together after they are ripped to width. I left my leg pieces plenty over long, but I am not interested in planing a 7/8 board down to half inch to make it flat.

I did plane up two scrap pieces, nailed them together with three different kinds of old timey nails, and slapped on some linseed oil. I found some linseed oil with minimal additives here in town, but it takes about a week to dry at +70dF and 10-30% RH. I am going to try some other finishes on tomorrow's offcuts.

Besides other finishes, I expect to spend some time on the sideplanks tomorrow after the wide boards are stickered and weighted.

[Scott Winners]

I should mention the shoe shelf is TBD, to be decided. I don't have enough wide plank to do that. I could glue up some more narrow Beech, but I don't want to. My current idea is to use some figured beech for front and rear shelf lips, maybe about 2.75" wide, and then build like a grid or grill or diamond pattern inside them in narrow white pine. I don't have that problem yet, but I would be willing to use something durable like polyurethane on the (high wear) shelf surface since it is likely to be a contrasting wood.

I am ecstatic with my low angle bevel up Veritas plane on hardwood end grain. Lord of Goshen this thing is cool. I am running PMV-11 with a 30 degree secondary bevel (at guided 8k diamond) on a 12 degree bedding angle... It is like having Obi-Wan in the shop with me saying 'this is not the surface you are looking for.' Swish, swish, Obi-Wan smiles.

I don't have to pick today, but I think using wrought headed nails will catch on somebody's pants someday. I do like the roseheads, leaning towards the clout style over common.

[Scott Winners]

So again with the 0dF/ -18C driveway. I spent a bunch of time today cupping a coffee mug in my cold hands so I could get back out there and make another saw cut, but I am just about to the point I can do everything else indoors.

The wide planks did relax a little bit when I ripped off the knotty edge. The worst one is cupping close to 1/8 inch, but I can squeeze it to flat with my arthritic old man hands. I have them stickered up under some heavy stuff and I will see if I can find some more 4x6 tomorrow. Those are going to stay in timeout until everything I can get done without them is done.

I did rip the two long edges on the piece I wanted diagonally out of the piece I started with. One of those long skinny triangular scraps has already had its night of passion in my BBQ pit. And I have finally found a tofu recipe good enough to make a second time. 250 grams of tofu in 5/8 dice, spoon over 2T soy sauce, 1 T fish sauce and 1 t Worcestershire. Be gentle when spooning, as the apices of the cubes are pretty fragile. Soak about 30 minutes, air dry about 30 minutes, then bake at 350dF for about 45 minutes. As expected the beech smoke flavor on this item is not really detectable, but it would have been a pleasant serendipity if it had been.

[Kent A Bathurst]

...a tofu recipe good enough to make a second time.

This week's sign that the apocalypse is upon us.

[Tony Wilkins]

This week's sign that the apocalypse is upon us.
Making people eat tofu sounds post-apocalyptic!

[Scott Winners]

I am at the point where my reluctance to run a build thread here is well and truly upon me. What I am facing today and tomorrow is why I didn't want to start this thread. But there is no point in being disingenuous about the process either.

Today, I drug my jointer out onto the driveway (at -20C) to make three passes on one edge of one board. But it was warm enough to snow, and it did snow on my in and out feed tables, so I 'lost' a bunch of potential production time doing preventative cleanup on the jointer. I took one of my plane irons all the way back to the bench grinder because the secondary bevel was 1/3 of the total bevel.

I did make a practice class A cut on the scrap end of one of the side planks, and find I need to sharpen my carcass saw again. Last time I sharpened my carcass saw I recognized I was running out of tooth set, so I may have to set all those 14 teeth per inch when I do that. I also think I can make a shooting board more perfectly square than the one I have, so I might as well do that before I make the final class A cuts to bring the side planks to finished length.

I am also going to make a saw guide out of quarter sawn something for when I get to making class A cuts on the ends of my 13.75" wide parts. So I need to make a new set of bench tools that can serve as bench hooks and shooting boards for stock wider than 14 inches.

And I need a saw for the class A cuts on the wide planks. I have one, 26" plate, "Warranted Superior" button on the tote, 5 bolts, sure looks like a Disston, with a Craftsman imprint on the plate. It is a good straight saw. 11 teeth per inch, 13 degrees of rake, 18 degrees of horizontal fleam, none of vertical fleam, a basic cross cut recipe for fine work from Pete Taran. But it only has 7 thousandths of total set on the teeth, 3.5 thou per side. i am going to have to joint it and set it to perhaps more like 10 or 12 thou total, then sharpen it, and then be ready to proceed.

And the linseed oil on my first nail up is blotchy. Thus, the practice class A cut to generate more scrap. I am feeling fair confident that the finish I want is going to be surfaces planed to guided 8k diamond, I am going to try an isopropyl wash at this point to reveal planing flaws, then a pollisior, then 1-2 coats of plain linseed oil, then wax #31 (3 parts beeswax, 1 part carnuba from Don's barn dot com) buffed to a fare thee well. If the grand kids chew on this piece they will get some fiber in their diet, but no deleterious health effects. I got to figure out why the linseed oil is blotchy, so I cut another scrap.

I should be able to get rid of all three pictured pin knots from the side planks, the two on the right will go away on a square scrap, the one on the left will be on the corner of a triangular scrap.

I did go to one homestore today, no 4x6 made it off the rack into my truck. I will visit the other local tomorrow.

And, I got through my weekly allotment of rice and beans, boneless skinless chicken breast, and tofu, yesterday. Today is baby back ribs day, smoked on apple and cherry. I used "surprised spouse" dry rub. It is a permutation on "Southern Succor." In a bowl place 1/2 c paprika, 1/2 c turbinado, 4 T salt, 2 t cayenne flakes. In an electric spice grinder place 2t dry mustard seed and 1/4 c black peppercorns. At 0400 push the button on the electric splice grinder and hold it down until you hear your spouse screaming at you. Button time should be less than five seconds, there ought to be some intact peppercorns still in the spice grinder working bowl. Mix all that together, and proceed as usual (if sheepishly) with the cook.

Obviously I am not banging this bench out as fast as I can. I would like to also say I am not trying to make this as complicated as possible. What I am trying to do is make this piece as well as I can. I want it to be the best thing I have ever made, and a spring board to making more better things in the future. There is a crap ton of sharpening involved, a crap ton of planning, a crap ton of planing, and a crap ton of time.

Someday I will be starting a new project and looking sideways at the shooting board I am going to build tomorrow.

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[Scott Winners]

I feel like I had a good day, but I am doing ground work. What I recognize about my journey is I am still in learning curve, with no idea how far I am from peak.

First I went to both home stores. I looked at all the 4x6, nothing came home with me. I did take apart and resticker and restack my wide planks. They are down to about 1/16 of cup now, I restacked them cupped side up instead of bow side up. I don't want them complacent with their current station in life, and I want them flatter. This will probably be ongoing.

I got as far as I could with the surfaces on my new scrap with the tools I have. Not happy. I reached for my card scrapers (journey thingy) and realized the card scrapers are not as sharp as I can make them. So I need my metal working vise to file the existing curl off, but there isn't room for that vise anymore on my metal working bench because I have now the bench grinder up there with my sharpening stones.

I found a 40" long scrap of 10 inch wide 8/4 poplar in my scrap cart, but I didn't have a saw as sharp as I could make it to cut the poplar clean...

I have a hunch this doesn't ever end for anyone trying to improve. I have a couple dozen vintage saws. I have sharpened most of them, but have never been able to set any of them. What I have been doing is measuring and recording the set and just using them as sharp saws with whatever for set.

Now was the time to set and sharpen the 11 point saw I mentioned yesterday. I dug through my library of saws and found one with 10 thousandths of total set on it. I clamped that one up in a vise and dialed in saw set to match that set, then set the teeth on the 11 point saw I want to use, then jointed those teeth, then sharpened that saw (I was having fun today, promise), and made a few test cuts.

For the first test cut I pulled a 3-4-5 triangle off the end of a 2x "4" without doing any math. Second I pulled 10 inches off my 40" poplar so the seat of my next shop stool is on the scrap cart, and I used the 10x30 8/4 poplar to make a Moxon style mount for my mechanic's vise so I can sharpen my card scrapers first thing in the morning. The 'EE' stamp on your construction lumber and mine stands for 'eased edge' and I hate that mark at least as much as you do. I own work gloves. Why are the mills selling me air and keeping the sawdust?

I also put a second coat of Linseed oil on my nail test scrap pieces. They are less blotchy but not good enough.

Tomorrow needs to be a rest day for me as I have charge of the infectious disease unit M-T-W this coming week. It is a lot of steps, a lot of calories; and I need to cook some food to eat.

On my to do list, I need to see if there is a diamond plate at higher than 8k grit. It should be cheaper than a Veritas Low Angle Jack Plane if there is such a stone. I was able to re-prove to myself today that 8k (guided) diamond is a delightful surface on SPF, and on poplar, and on edge grain of NA beech. On end grain of NA beech, a low angle Lee Valley plane with 12 degree bed and 30 degree secondary is a dramatically (to me) better surface than PMV 11 bevel down in a Bailey at 45 degrees total cutting angle with a downward facing 30 degree secondary. I don't know why 42 degrees total versus 45 degrees total makes such a big difference, but it does make an easily observable difference in my shop with my things. And I am still not happy with face grain on NA beech with any of my things- but I can take another crack at my card scrapers in the morning.

I did pick out from my scrap cart the pieces for my next bench hooks and shooting board. However, day time high was -23dF today, about -30.5C. Too cold to snow, but I just didn't have the gumption to drag my jointer and planer out onto the driveway pad to get started with that sub project.

One thing I might do in the morning is see how much of Don's #31wax I can melt into 300 sqin of poplar surface and order a lifetime supply while Don is still selling.

Oh yes, pictures.

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[Jim Koepke]

Looks like your having a little fun even with the cold temps.


I used the 10x30 8/4 poplar to make a Moxon style mount for my mechanic's vise so I can sharpen my card scrapers first thing in the morning.

Being able to mount a metal working vise is a handy endeavor. At least three different set ups have worked well in the past. Since mounting a metal working vise on its own bench, the only set-up still in the shop is for a saw vise.

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jtk

[Scott Winners]

Looks like your having a little fun even with the cold temps.

jtk

Yes I am. I was stroking the inside faces of my sawtill this morning (one word in old thread title here), and I asked my self "how did the ancient ones do this with limited technology?" Well, I am the old guy and I got a satisfactory surface on face grain of beech with 4k diamond as my finest stone. I checked my journal of mistakes (as well as the old thread) but it has to be cabinet scrapers. Scrapers are the tool I had then that are dull today, so I am chasing that one down.

FWIW I did have the mechanic's vise and my sharpening station on my metal working bench before. But I use the bench grinder more than the vise, and there wasn't (sad face) enough room on that bench top for all three. Someday I will have a big enough sharpening station for all three of those and my 1x42 belt sander, but today is not the day.

I wasn't happy with the end grain of the through dovetails on the sawtill project - so I painted the outside of the case. Now I like my end grain, so I am pretty sure I need to get my card scrapers back in order to be happy with face grain on beech.

I'll plan to check in again sometime Thursday afternoon.

[Jim McCue]

I like the boarded bench and it is on my list of things to build. I was thinking white oak as I expect it to be exposed to weather. I've never worked with white oak before.

Chris Schwarz has an older article about a similar bench called White Water Meeting Bench. I looked for it now from popular woodworking and the pictures don't work but maybe you can find it. I do have pictures I took from a library book. It looks similar but the rails are narrower and there is no bottom shelf.

I think I will go with a mix between the two, with wide rails but no bottom shelf. I like the idea of cutting a notch for the rails to set into but that's a decision to think about later.

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[Jim Koepke]

I like the boarded bench and it is on my list of things to build. I was thinking white oak as I expect it to be exposed to weather. I've never worked with white oak before.

Chris Schwarz has an older article about a similar bench called White Water Meeting Bench. I looked for it now from popular woodworking and the pictures don't work but maybe you can find it. I do have pictures I took from a library book. It looks similar but the rails are narrower and there is no bottom shelf.

I think I will go with a mix between the two, with wide rails but no bottom shelf. I like the idea of cutting a notch for the rails to set into but that's a decision to think about later.

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Jim, that is the quintessential 'five board bench.' The rails are what keeps the bench from wobbling end to end and also supports the seating platform.

One thing done on my construction was to add dados to the rails where they attached to the legs. This makes a bench less likely to get the wiggles.

jtk

[Cameron Wood]

Looks like fun, if chilly.

I made one a while back, & sold it for too little. I may make more as I have lots of pine boards. Just screws and plugs, but I thought the proportions were good.

The bottom stretcher is strong because it is fastened two directions.

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[Jim Koepke]

Great looking bench Cameron.

jtk

[Cameron Wood]

Great looking bench Cameron.

jtk

Thanks!...

[Scott Winners]

I like the idea of cutting a notch for the rails to set into


One thing done on my construction was to add dados to the rails where they attached to the legs. This makes a bench less likely to get the wiggles.

Highly highly appreciate the dado discussion.

One thing I did on my "shelf for canned goods" down in the projects section some time ago was attach strategically located corner blocks to the individual sheets of plywood. When it was time to glue up the carcass, I was able to dry fit and clamp up all the case pieces pretty quick, as the pieces - with glue blocks already in place- were more or less self guiding.

And this is honestly the most intimidating part of this project. As planned in "The Design Book" this project is 5 pieces of s6s lumber that have to be glued up perfectly square with no grooves, no dadoes and no guide blocks. On the one hand I don't want to buy a doweling jig or a biscuit jointer, but I also don't feel the need to become some sort of glue-up/ clamp-up sorcerer-druid-wizard.

If I cut a 3/8 deep rabbet along the top inside edge of my side planks, that would leave 4/8 inch (one half inch) of quartersawn beech edge grain as the 'visual frame' on my 13.75 inch seat plank. I am pretty sure I am going to do this. I have the technology. That will give me two guide edges on each of those two 51 inch glue joints. They will be much easier to clamp together correctly in the wet moment when my IQ is down 50 points. And it will better show/ exaggerate the width of the single wide seat plank.

I can likewise cut dadoes in the side planks to accept the leg planks, while maintaining more or less continuous grain from up one leg, across the seat and down the other leg. I am probably going to do this.

The remaining question in the dado series, is should I cut a dado to let each leg plank up into the bottom face of the seat plank. The advantage would be the leg planks will be somewhat constrained (at one end) from cupping. The disadvantage would be needing to use smaller nails through the seat plank into the leg planks to constrain the seat plank from cupping.

I am probably overthinking this, but it keeps me from going bat-poop when managing the medical sequelae of methamphetamine addiction at my day job.

I have remembered how to sharpen my card scrapers. I am now fingertip happy with my finished surface on beech scraps.

I have started my new set of bench tools (hooks and shoot board) for wide stock.

Next up will be to drop my new bench hook/ shoot board system for wide stock in the shop made tools section, then make a scale model side plank to cut test 3-4-5 triangles in and run that all the way through final finish before screwing up anything with the two roughed in (full size) side planks I have.

No pics tonight.

[Scott Winners]

A little progress today. I had no interest in making the new bench tools, but I have a smallish Beech plank that was made into a scale model side plank. I haven't actually measured the plank, but it is two thirds of seven inches wide. I did have to derive that with my sector so I could make a "seven inch handspan" out of some furring strip. So the thing in the pics tonight is (carry the one) approximately an 82.35294118% scale model of the full sized thing. Big enough to use full size tools, but sized just right so I didn't have to rip the plank to some arbitrary width.

Once I had my 7 inch module all pretty, all the dimensions are either multiples of 7 inches, or twelfths of seven inches found on the sector and transferred with dividers.

The first pic shows most of the layout. I laid out a fullsized rabbet in the top of the plank, so taking away 3/8 inch from the top view, and 7/8 deep to swallow the entire seat plank. I think on the real thing I will make this rabbet a tiny bit deeper than the thickness of the seat plank so I can plane down two half inch wide strips of edge grain, rather than have to plane the 13.75 wide seat plank to meet the two half inch strips. There is a pencil line in the knife wall to start the through dado for the visible face of a leg plank. The drawn on 3-4-5 triangle is about as big as I want to go. On the full sized item I will have minimum 2 1/8 relish on the lowest nail going through the side plank and I don't want to go any smaller relish with a bigger triangle cut out.

Notice also the pad under the holdfast. I'll get back to that in a jiffy.

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So there is a bunch of ways to make rabbets. I do have the LV/V skew rabbet plane with a PMV 11 iron in it. I find all moving fillister planes to be a little bit fussy, my skew rabbet is named after the highest maintenance girl I ever dated. 3/8 x 7/8 x 102 inches in Beech is just not happening. I did use my Lee Valley/ Veritas router plane to make the knife marks for the rabbet, I am very happy with that tool.

Once you have your knife lines you could chisel the whole thing out.

I am using guided saw cuts to make these, as 1) I seem to have facility sharpening saws and 2) the offcut when I am done sawing can go the BBQ pit.

So next pic is my setup for making the 3/8 deep cut 7/8 back from the top edge of the side plank. The rip saw I have that I can push in this cut is filed 8 point rip with 11 degrees of rake. It is pretty nonchalant in the cut. I have another 8 point rip with 10 degrees of rake and 12.5 of fleam (it is in the Leonard Lee sharpening book) that only has .006 total set on it. I am going to sharpen both of these before the big show and take them up to maybe .010 total set.

My saw guide, as pictured, is poplar, nominal one quarter by 2. Kinda flexible. I think for the next round I will clamp the guide on at the ends of the cut, drop the holdfasts, and then slide some shims in between the holdfast pads and the saw guide to keep the guide in position.

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Making the 7/8 deep cut is going to be a bugger. One parameter to keep an eye on here is the vertical distance between the tips of the teeth and the bottom of the tote. If I want to use a guide all the way down, I need 7/8 of vertical plate for the cut, plus whatever for the guide height. Clearly this would be child's play with a table saw; but I don't want to own or use a table saw. Likely I will start with a fairly tall guide as reference surface, and then use a shorter guide once the cut is well established. I am very likely to make this saw cut a bit scant and then clean up with a shoulder plane that doesn't have a moving fillister on it. As below.

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I didn't actually cut out the entire rabbet. Nor did I cut the actual through dadoes for the leg planks, those are old hat to me now; but I got everything laid out and figured out how to make the various cuts. So victory. Next up, with the piece shaped, surface prep. I will sheepishly admit I did all of my end grain shooting free hand. I may have to answer for that someday, but it looks pretty good to me. The edge grain was cleaned up with a #8 Bailey, the face grain met a #4 Bailey after dancing with #8. Then joinery, then card scraper. I did use an old foam sanding block to relieve the edges a tiny bit.

I really really really do not want the first coat of linseed oil to look blotchy. I am planning on two coats of BLO, but if the first coat looks blotchy I am already across the Rubicon. Once thoroughly scraped I did find two darker spots in the surface, sort of 8-9 o'clock relative to the eye in the grain. I spot cleaned those with isopropyl, then wiped down the face, edges, and ends with more isopropyl. Entirely wet with isopropyl this is the color I want, the tone, but the surface is very flat/ matte.

Tomorrow I will shave off the raised gran with a light card scraper pass, and consider a bath in hot soapy water if the dark spots near the eye are still evident.

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Someday, when I am tired of looking at it, I will plan to attach some coat hooks and put this scale model sideplank on Craigslist. In the meantime, I am not done fooling with it.

[Scott Winners]

I spent a big chunk of time trying to see how sharp I could make my card scrapers. I noticed part way through the day youtube kajillion-aires invariably reach for what looks like maple when displaying their card sharpening prowess.

So I pulled a stick of maple off my scrap cart. My current finding is among beech, maple, red oak and white oak; maple is the easiest to sharpen a card scraper for. I was not expecting this finding as on the turning lathe maple is a little bit precious about keen edges on turning tools. Tonight I pulled some hickory, some ash and some cherry to get a better handle on this rabbit hole while I am down in it. Once I have my act together I will test on walnut as well. I hardly ever use walnut, but I do have a scrap big enough to place the wood on an eventual continuum.

One thing I did do today was build a wooden guide so I can hold the file perpendicular to the face of the scraper and have a square edge. I do still insist I was doing pretty OK freehand; but putting this into service saves a bunch of time- and wear and tear on the stones. Just in one day of sharpening card after card it has saved me more time on the stones than it took to make the file guide. I meant to make my kerf a little bit deeper than half the width of the file for optimized grip, and when the exposed faces of the file are worn out I can flip the file in the kerf and wear it out again. When I first test fit the file in my kerf the file was secure and perpendicular, so I put it directly into service without double checking the depth.

One thing to keep an eye on. When I put some bow in a scraper in use, at my shop, the center of the edge wears away faster than the ends of the edges. So for some of mine, when I held them up against a straight edge and looked for gaps, I found some gaps.

Back to durance vile tomorrow for three in a row. Next planned update will be Wednesday evening.

[Scott Winners]

I am still deep in the card scraper rabbit hole. I will probably start a separate thread about card scrapers when I am through this.

On youtube, of the ones I have seen, I think Brian Boggs is the place to start. His video runs 20-22 minutes, but he is an outlier for very very square stock prep, he goes straight to bubinga off the burnisher, and he demonstrates a couple things to do with a card scraper I had never thought of.

What I am trying to do (it is kinda working) is press my fingers on the back of the scraper, instead of both thumbs; so mine is bowing parallel to the edge instead of perpendicular to the edge for stiffness. I do have to draw the scraper towards me in this configuration. It is maybe ambitious, and edge life is appallingly short on painted wood, but the results are pretty pleasing. I am trying to improve the smoothness on an already flat surface without degrading the pre-existing flatness.

I did also buy perhaps the ugliest cedar chest Lane ever made on CL for $24. The exterior front, top and sides seem to be painted the color of diseased goose poop, with gilt trim. Tonight I am working on the grey interior milk paint and red stain. 1974 called and left a voicemail while the item was in the back of my truck.

In the moment I need a cedar chest for heirloom textiles. My card scrapers are working better on unfinished beech then ever before. When I build a new chest for heirloom textiles, the cedar bits will be clip board sized pieces that can be taken out, run through a planer and put back into service without having to screw around with the interior of the emptied chest.

Not sure when I will update this thread again with actual progress on the low boarded bench. I got two rabbit holes open now. But my chores are done and I don't go back to work until Monday. If I don't have anything else to say, I will plan to update on rabbit hole progress Sunday evening before I go back for three more in a row.

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[Jim Koepke]

On youtube, of the ones I have seen, I think Brian Boggs is the place to start. His video runs 20-22 minutes, but he is an outlier for very very square stock prep

Is this the one? > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uf0UEVPSJUI

jtk

[Scott Winners]

I feel like I have had a pretty good run in the five days off I have had that end in about 30 minutes.

I got the card scraper rabbit hole closed, I made new bench top tools for wide panels; both new threads here. And I pushed a scrap through two coats of linseed oil with no blotches on the face grain.

So I got a couple new rabbit holes open. My 'goal' is for this project to have a 2 inch finish, and that may not be reasonable.

Within the boat building community, at least some builders rate a finish by distance, how close to you have to get to see a flaw in the finish. My first boat had on it about a 6 foot finish. That is to say it looked pretty darn good from 6 or more feet away, but closer than 6 feet you could start seeing flaws.

This 51" bench, when it is done, is going in front of a 64" wide south facing window; we move around within the home, and Mr. Sun moves around outside the window.

So I am kinda thinking about maybe a 12 inch finish, and I am not even that good today.

My planned finish is make it beautiful with bench planes, then clean up with card scraper, then burnish the show surface with a pollisoir. Then two coats of BLO, then wax.

I have mentioned my burnisher, a pollisoir from Don's barn dot com in previous threads, there is going to be a picture of one here. Besides burnishing a surface to make even smoother and more reflective the wonder of God's creation, a pollisoir also magnifies every planing and scraping mistake left behind by fallen sinners like me.

So I am going to have to regroup and reconsider. I did not take a picture of this scrap off the scraper. I went over and over and over this piece after card scraper from multiple angles with multiple light directions with naked eye, bifocals, 5x magnification and 7x magnification. I could not find a flaw on the surface. So I got after it with a burnisher, and it looks like a donkey with a bad attitude.

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There is no oil, no wax, no poly on this surface above. No sand paper. Just planed smooth, scraped, burnished, and it looks (from 3-5 feet away) like the south end of a north bound camel with a digestive disease.

So here is a new rabbit hole. I also notice the end of my scraped boards are rounded over from the scraper, sort of like small scale planer snipe. Thankfully my final pieces are still a bit over long, but my 7/8 scale side plank is already cut to length.

So one thing to do is going to be planing and scraping, but not burnishing, the back side of this short scrap to see how that looks.

I went ahead and put two coats of BLO on the face and edge grain of my small scrap (no blotches YAY) , and four coats on the end grain; all in the course of a couple hours. I am going to have to let this be for a few days and try 'some' more BLO on the end grain before I reach for wax.

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You can maybe kinda sense the roundover from the card scraper in the above pic as well.

Here is another pic of what I DO NOT WANT to see from two feet away when I am headed for my flip-flops in summertime to head out the front door. This is simply unacceptable, but it was not visible under 7x magnification before burnishing.

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One thing I should measure is the distance between the bottom of my seated butt and my seated eyeballs. This pic, with a gratuitous burnisher from Don's barn dot com, is an otherwise acceptable but ready for wax view to me, for this project.

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I would take this opportunity to encourage all users here trying to improve to keep an eye on both the Neander section and "General Woodworking and Power Tools" and the projects section, and the finishing section, and anything with the keyword 'pre-finishing.'

On the one hand it may very well look like I am eating my very own rump roast, but I have not yet destroyed (or damaged) any of the pieces that will end up on the final project. I am not worried about blotchiness in my finish anymore. While I am willing to back down from a 2 inch finish, I am still looking for a twelve inch finish for this thing. Maybe 8 inch. Or 6 inch. On the one hand I got 20 other projects on my build list right now, but I am also done building stuff that I could have done better.

I am pulling 12 hour shifts on 25-26-27, let's see where I am 12-28 PM.

[Scott Winners]

Well, 12-28 was overoptimistic. I may have something to say 12-30 evening before I go back for 'next week' which is going to be brutal. After 12-28, I will plan to update on 01-13-24 or so.

I only have one observation. You know folks that know that they should be in the ER today, but wait until tomorrow because "today is a major holiday." Coming up on three decades of experience, the number of times I can think of that the foregoing was a good choice for the patient to have made is zero. And I got handed the manly pink clipboard of the charge nurse on 12-26. I feel like I got beat on like a rented mule.

The upcoming major holiday is heavily associated with beverage ethanol... Let's go see what Mike Allen is doing, shall we?

[Scott Winners]

I did get some shop time today. I started with the B side of the camel diarrhea board. I am pretty confident the visible flaws in the finished scrap a couple posts up are places where the plane passing overhead slowed down and then sped back up.

Today I started with my #3, made a mess, stepped up through #4 and #5 and was finally getting good passes with my #6.

Once I had it flat with no planing flaws in it I went straight to card scraper for smoothing. Then with great trepidation I burnished half of it and looked over the whole surface again. I couldn't find anything wrong, so I burnished the whole thing and got two coats of linseed oil on it. And two more coats of BLO on the pictured end grain. We'll see how the end grain looks with a few more days drying time, but it is possible.

I think (I do not know, just trying to make sense of what I see) I think when I was using a card scraper to remove planing flaws, I was creating a visually smooth surface. A measurably flat and smooth surface. A surface that was flat and smooth to touch. But I think I had a flat/ smooth surface of variable density or variable compressibility, and running the burnisher over it re-revealed the planing flaws.

Today I got a board with no blotch in the oil and no visible flaws that I left behind, from two inches, light from any angle, magnification from zero to 7x.

There is no wax on top of the BLO yet. I could be back at the drawing board in tears in a few days.

I did also glue up a new planing stop today. It brings the end of the board I am planing about 8 inches back from the end of my bench - but I won't have to reach as far over the hub of my leg vise to reach the end of the board. To me this is a marginal gain, but the marginal gains are aggregating. I clamped it down where I wanted it, square to the bench face, and drilled from below using the existing holdfast holes as drill guides.

I work with a bunch of new grads. Bear with me. Every once in a great while I get a new grad with prior military experience. Those prior military new grads usually pull me aside after about 2-4 months on the job and ask "How do you do it?" Those ones I can take to a quiet room, observe a moment of silence and intone "Slow is smooth, but smooth is fast." That line is like a lightning bolt for that group. But for the civilian kids, it takes them about 6 months to notice the old guy is getting stuff done before 1100 they can't do in their 20s at all. And they have never heard about slow being smooth but smooth being fast. So I talk to them about the aggregation of marginal gains, usually in December when they are finally ready to hear it.

This guy on youtube is an engineer who cooks as a hobby. He is French. He lives in Paris. He does have an accent. His English is dramatically better than my French. I have emailed this link to 5 new grad RNs in the last 3 weeks, and I am looking for 2 more pretty soon. The underlying concept can be applied to anything you want to do better than you are currently doing. If you are intrigued, give him 3.5 minutes. The final flourish requires that ALL of the ground work be done correctly in advance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35jq07YhKGE

PS: I will be WAY further along in my next build before I start another build along thread. See you 01-13-24.

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[Scott Winners]

Today, 01-13, was my first day with >45 minutes in the shop since 12-31-23 when I clocked in at 0700.

These 2 things are past tense, mag is 5x.

[Scott Winners]

I have been focusing on my 7/8 scale future coat rack; with an eye towards having the full scale bench as 'pre-finished' as possible before glue up. 5x again.

[Scott Winners]

At the end of today, I think my off the iron surfaces are pretty good, but I don't care for the look of linseed oil on NA beech (test piece) compared to hemp oil on NA beech in my finished sawtill. So I need to go buy some darn hemp oil and get back to work.

Again, my apologies for starting a 'build along' thread too early. I start another 7 of 12 hour shifts in 10 calendar days on 1-14. I will plan to update this thread again on 01-28, but I am done screwing around with sharpening and prefinishing and should be ready to roll out the TNT on 01-28.

Of the two attached pics, one was taken with overhead fluorescent and no flash, the other with no light other than (likely) LED flash. Which oil you prefer on whatever workpiece you got is a subjective thing. There is no 'best.'