Woodworkers Club of Houston

 August 2020 Projects

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Jack Bailie - My Tex-American flag to hang outside by the from door.  My first attempt at relief carving. The star block is basswood.  I tried carving pine and poplar without much success.

Chris Farquhar - This is a small project my wife asked me to make. Each Wolf silhouette is 12" tall; made from 1/2" thick Pine; painted in White Gloss and Black Gloss paint. Took about a week to make. I got the idea from seeing a metal silhouette on a wall.

 

Rick Space - This is called ”Captivating the Past” - It is cut out of pecan slab. It is actually 4 different patterns added together. It is painted with acrylic paints.

David Janowitz - My first two baseball bats.  These have pretty much everything possible wrong for actual use as bats.  First, the grain was not carefully chosen for straightness.  Second, one of them is spalted, which is pretty, but further weakens the wood.  One is actually from a branch, and likely to warp.  Both are of Water Oak, which turns poorly, and caused terrible chatter on a long spindle turning like this.  (I desperately need to make myself a steady rest.)  Oak is also much too dense, and the bats are too heavy, and it is also much more brittle than the usual ash or maple.  Thankfully, these are for display purposes only, and the couple that ordered them wanted them made from their own tree that was cut down.  Unfortunately, it had already been cut into small pieces, and I had little wood to choose from, but managed to make it work for these. 

Anyway, here is a bar top I made for a neighbor.  He had an old walnut stair banister, and some big ash boards.  Jointing the ash, at 11" x 2" x12' was challenging, and fellow member Michael Siegel saved me by helping.  It really took both of us, one feeding the wood forward, the other holding it down, to flatten it.  Thankfully, flattening the top surface was much easier in the big planer, which of course is self- feeding, so I was able to do that solo, using infeed and outfeed supports.  Cutting the second edge on the table saw was also easier, but on a 12' long board, required an extra clamp to keep the fence from wandering.  The glue up was easy but I needed lots of clamps.  I did not match the stain color for the ash very well, even mixing two colors.  The color is close, but the shade is much too light.  Finally finished off with 5 coats of Minwax Water Based Spar Urethane, gloss, applying very fast with a painting pad.  The finished bar is two ash boards plus the walnut banister, and is 20" x 1 1/2" x 11'.

 

Lon Kelley - Made these layered bowls from maple, walnut and mahogany. The problem was that someone mounted them in the lathe crookedly, and they almost beat me to death trying to get a tool into them. They had at least an inch of runout.  

Mike Hardy - Cherry and ash small wall cabinet. 23" x 11.5" x 4.5" with hand cut through dovetails and tenons. The back is ship lapped ash painted with black milk paint, and everything else including the drawers is cherry. The basic design is from Mike Pekovich's book, "The How and Why of Woodworking". It is finished with four coats of Waterlox

Hugh Parker - First box: Walnut and maple box. Lid opens toward the sides and hinged on brass pins. The top ends are not rounded on the bottom sides.  This keeps the lid from opening all the way.
Box is lined with red felt. 

Second box:  It is all cherry with a drawer and an inside tray.
All cherry with red felt lining.

Denis Muras  - First, a Matchbox car garage. It is 36" W x 34" H x 14" D. Is it made from 1/4" Baltic birch plywood. I had someone who met me at the HCCC event in February contact me about making it, She saw it on Etsy and was afraid it may not fit in her SUV.

Second, A Dollhouse from Wink-Wood. This dollhouse is from Toymaking Plans. It will be used for a special ed class for a teacher friend.

Third, A church wellhead cover. A friend in Sealy, the previous owner off Andy' Anderson's Sealy house, wanted a cover for the wellhead on their property, it is just outside their barn porch. Weldon's wife animate that is look like a church. They will be applying decals for the windows. It is framed from treated 2x4 and covered in Hardi-Plank and will not blow away in a hurricane.

Fourth, Here is a fun project. This hot rod truck is based on the funny car Dodge Lil' Red Wagon.  Mine is made from poplar with various woods for highlights. The plans are from Toymaking Plans. He has the plan as a regular van/truck, cargo van and passenger van, take you choice.... 

Steve Procter -These photos show the doors, three part crown and mirror frames. The doors are made from custom ordered pre-hung solid core doors, to which I added molding. There are two types of molding-inner and outer. It took an hour for each door, both sides to apply the molding making all those miter cuts and pin nailing. There are 4 doors-two to enter the bath, and two to access the closet.

The crown is a combination of purchased egg and dart architectural plastic crown, a base of plywood and a panel molding. There are a lot of miter cuts, especially for the returns.

We originally had three large beveled glass mirrors, and decided to reuse just two, but put them in frames for a more finished look. I purchased egg and dart picture frame molding to make the frames. There is an insert of ¼” plywood to get the back flush with the edge of frame, and then another piece to bind the wood frame together, given the weight of the beveled glass is a lot more than a painting. Steel “L” brackets hold it to the wall.

Other features of the bath, not shown, are a glass enclosed shower with porcelain and marble tile, a pedestal tub with a chandelier above and a toilet room with the same crown molding. The floors are porcelain and are heated. We had to raise the floor to match the new wood floors in the master and closet, so took advantage to add heating elements before tiling. 

Next month I will show the master closet. The cabinetry is mahogany.

Sonny Lawson - Title = Table saw offcut cabinet.  This is a modified version of a Rockler plan.  It's made out of 3/4" baltic birch plywood.  The drawers are made with kreg jig butt joints and KV drawer slides.  I added a dust port and 4" hose that connects to the saw. The design allows you to dial-in the height with levelers and it also has wheels to easily move around the shop.  It's finished with Watco clear danish oil and polyurethane/wax on the top .  Finally, I don't have to use an adjustable roller to catch long boards off my table saw!

         
All photos and descriptions submitted by individual members.

 

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