technique and process

Hope Chest Drawer Case

Below is a group of photos of some details of the construction of the black walnut drawer carcass and the drawer fronts for the cherry and walnut hope chest.  Please click on any of the pictures to view larger.

The lower web/ frame for the bottom of the drawer unit, it is constructed of white oak with the front (visible) rail being walnut.

The drawer case with the web installed with tongue and groove

The main chest rests upon the drawer case

Flattening walnut drawer fronts with a jointer

A forged bench hook (I learned from Peter Follansbee)

The flattened and drawer fronts ready to be marked and cut to length

The drawer fronts wedged in their spots to see how they look.  Also the dividers have been installed with stopped dovetails.

Gessoed Door Panels

Over the past week, the white oak panels  for the painting cabinet were gessoed using a traditional cooked recipe of rabbit skin glue, and ground calcium carbonate.

The panels dry fitted in the doors.

The panels with the  masking removed.

Gessoing the panels.

The thickness of about 12 coats of gesso.

White Oak Painting Cabinet

A dovetailed painting cabinet  in quarter-sawn white oak.  The tree grew along the Van Horn Branch just south of Boaz, Kansas, until it’s bank gave way.  The panels will be gessoed and receive an oil painting.  The cabinet is only dry fitted.  It will not be glued up until the panels are fully prepared.  In order to eliminate the center stiles of the frame and panel doors, the inside inch and 1/2 is a full tenon into the rail, while the rest of the panel will float in the customary grooves.

Hope Chest

Pictured below is the beginings of a hope chest in cherry and walnut, primarily.  The pictures depict the joinery of the upper case of the chest, which is cherry, and will lit atop a narrower walnut case with a row of drawers.

Here the dovetails have been cut and the piece is clamped together in order to mark precisely the corresponding pins.

cutting the pins with a dovetail saw…

cutting out the majority of the waste with a coping saw…

chopping out the rest of the waste with a paring chisel…

the board with pins cut out on both ends…

the case dry fitted.

Chair Repair

Repairing a hickory and oak chair that was brought to me with a broken front leg.

Riven white oak leg, turned on the lathe then bent green in the form.

Marking the tenon on the top of the leg.

Splitting the waste from the tenon with a chisel.

Cleaning up the tenon with a rasp.

Workbench top with the leg and tools.

Drilling the holes for the stretchers with a brace.

The chair with its new leg.

Copper Engraving Progress

Here are some more pictures of the engraving process, and the second proof as work continues on a small copper plate of Walking Man observing and drawing a comet.

Engraving lines in the copper using a burin.

Detail of a small curl of copper being plowed up by the burin.

The plate after being inked and rubbed for printing.

The printed proof of the plate- revealing the progress thus far.

Bald Cypress Bowl and More

Cypress bowl on the lathe.

Same bowl on the bench.

A few other shop pictures…

A white oak chair leg for a repair job, being bent in a form.  The leg was turned and bent while green.  You can see my first failed attempt.

flattening a walnut half for turning with a fore-plane