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My favourite - The Glue-up. Somewhere under all those clamps is a table... I hate glue-ups, especially when the glue sets in about half its usual time because of the high temperature in the workshop. I really need to invetigate glues more I think. Anyway, I was going to be all controlled and glue up the two leg and stretcher assemblies first, and then glue them together with the remaining two stretchers later, until I realised my mortises were going to get full of glue squeeze out, so I went for the hectic option instead. |
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Meanwhile, chamfering the undersides of the tops using a pencil gauge to mark the limits of the chamfer. 1"/25mm in and 0.5"/12mm from the top. I did most of the grunt work with the low angle jack set fairly coarse than cleaned up cross grain with the skew block and long grain with the BUS. Once I got the knack of judging the right angle it went pretty quickly. All done before breakfast and more to show for it than a pre-breakfast run. |
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I like to mark "significant gift" pieces with a coin of the year I made it; in this case I departed from that a little and acquired two 1955 sixpenny pieces to mark the 50th Wedding Anniversary. My 3/4" forstner bit gave a just-so fit, with a dab of epoxy just to make sure. |
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After completing the finishing on the underside of the top, I positioned the legs in relation to the top by eye, popped in the buttons and marked through the screw holes with a bradawl. Then removed the buttons and leg/stretcher assembly, drilled the pilot holes, replaced the leg/stretcher frame and buttons and lined them up. #8 1 1/4" brass screws were just the right size, waxed to aid their passage, and driven with a rather nice cabinetmaker's screwdriver of the right size. |
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The underside all done. |
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Yet more shellac on the tops... As I seemed to have been wiping on endless coats of shellac, I thought I might as well record doing that too. I made up a rubber rather like one for French Polishing; cotton waste wrapped round with cotton rag to make a firm, smooth surface. Then I just flood the shellac onto the pad, let it soak in a moment and then wipe on. Somewhere or other I read the technique is to act like you're doing a sort of practise plane landing. Coming in to land at the far side... |
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...skim along the surface or runway and then take off again. All in one movement. It's not a bad way of remembering the technique really. The key thing is to remember to wipe round the edges after the top or you can get nasty drips... |
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Some time later... and once again I have infinite trouble taking completed project pics. I think they look better than this "in the flesh", but you get the gist. |
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