Four lovely leg blanks sit on the bench, joinery done, ready for the workshop doors to roll open on Monday. At last, a productive workshop week.
The desk is Red Gum and, because of Australian milling standards, Red Gum simply isn't available in the 60mm thickness these legs need. The obvious solution is to laminate two pieces face to face — economical, quick, done and onto the next stage. But that leaves a glue line right where the shape is cut, visible on the finished leg, and I'm not about to leave an ugly glue line in the name of cutting costs.
Instead I've cut a 45-degree face on two pieces and folded them together to make a chunky, heavy, L-shaped leg blank. The mitre joint places the glue line on the outside corner where no matter what shaping you do, the line will never be obvious. That doesn't sound difficult until you consider that the 45-degree glue faces have to be perfect. Any gap, any light, and you've got a visible seam. And simply cutting the corner off on the table saw leaves anything but a perfect face.
Which begs the question, how can I cut a 60mm wide perfect 45 face? A 45-degree cutterhead for the spindle moulder? Extremely expensive. A giant router bit? Extremely dangerous, and expensive in new underwear. A perfectly angled sled for the spindle moulder and the spicy pineapple[1]? Extremely time-consuming. None of them viable for four leg blanks.[2]
Sometimes being cheap and lazy is the impetus for the right kind of innovation. Fifteen dollars of pine and two hours of tweaking later and I have a carriage that supports each leg half at exactly the right angle as it passes through the thickness planer. Perfect 45-degree glue face, done and dusted, with no wait period, almost no cost, and no fingers harmed in the process.
The chickens are thriving, having almost doubled in size since they arrived. They don't run and hide whenever I approach any more, either. I suppose this means they're growing up. The zucchinis seemed to be slowing down but they're having a renaissance and upon our return from camping we were greeted (assaulted?) by 13kgs of golden glory.
I found myself in possession of a significant quantity of Corella pears, so I made a Corella and Blackberry Crumble with a burnt honey custard for dessert on family dinner night. It was so good I'm making it again tomorrow for Saturday Lunch with the Harpers. Beef has been luxuriating in the sous-vide for 28 or so hours. Another 8 ought to do it.
The first task on Monday is making the jigs for shaping the leg blanks. This is my absolute favourite part of making furniture: fiddling with bits of MDF.
- An affectionate name for the vertical helical cutter that I use for pattern tracing on the spindle moulder. It vaguely resembles a pineapple, and is about the same size. I love this tool. I fear this tool. I think it's important to use these types of tools cautiously 'without undue fear', but this one is due all the fear and caution it rightly gets.↩︎
- On any other timber I would clean the face with a hand plane, but if you know Red Gum, you know why I didn't.↩︎