Ash Bowl

 A few years ago, my daughter asked me to make her a fruit bowl. I'm still working on that one. I kinda suck at turning bowls, and as that project was not going so well, I decided I needed some practice before continuing. So, I dug out some old bowl blanks that I rough cut from the very first batch of logs that I ever sourced off the internet. These ash bowl blanks have been sitting around drying for about eight years. I ended up giving this bowl to my daughter to tide her over until her nice cherry fruit bowl gets finished.

 

Totally Cherry

         It has been more than two years since I have made something- like, actually made something, not just modified or laser etched it, but actually crafted it with my hands from scratch. The Rogue Cthulhu dice boxes were probably the last thing I really made. 

        Not gonna lie, things have been rough. Rogue Cthulhu has been retired. My gaming days have come to an end. Book of Shadows, my store, has been shut down. The building was badly vandalized and it did not make economic sense to make the repairs needed to stay open. My mental health continues to struggle. I can go weeks without leaving the house or even getting dressed. So, at this stage, for me to make something is a major achievement. But, I sold a rune set on Etsy today, and I think that gave me a little spark of energy. 

        It's not quite finished yet, but it's close. This is a hand turned wand made from locally sourced cherry wood that I seasoned and milled myself. There is going to be a crystal point embedded into the tip (where the hole is), but other than that, it is done. I was a little surprised that the piece came together with little difficulty. This is probably the first time I have touched my lathe in three years. It isn't perfect, but considering how out of practice I am, it's pretty good.

        I love this batch of wood. The color is very pleasing. Even the sapwood is nice. I've got quite a bit of it, so I expect I'll be doing a lot of projects in cherry in the future. Now that the store is closed, I'm going to have to focus more on online sales in order to have any income. My needs are small, but I've been bleeding money for the past two years, so it's either make internet sales, or get a straight job, and I'm a little too old and jaded for that! 

        I have a couple more wands that I started years ago, and got them to about this same point and never finished them. I think I'll try to make a couple more, and then add the tips to all of them at once and post them in a batch. I was just so excited to have accomplished something in the workshop that I had to post it, finished or not. 

 P.S. I'm not dead yet. 

Three More Wands

A few weeks ago, I got back into making a few wands on the lathe. They turned out pretty good, and I was happy that I finally got to use some of the wood that I had been drying. I wanted to capitalize on that momentum, so I cranked out a few more.

The smallest one is made from "Tree of Heaven" (Ailanthus). It is basically considered a "junk" wood, because it has wide growth rings, contains a lot of water, and cracks and twists horribly when drying. It's also kind of a boring ugly color. Not good for much from a woodworking standpoint. But I have a bunch of it and I was eager to see how it turned. For smaller items like this, it's not too bad. Certainly usable, if not particularly pretty.

The middle one is more of that elm I worked with the other week. These were some of the first boards I slabbed and dried. It doesn't have a particularly interesting grain pattern, but it has a nice warm color and it turns well.

The bottom one is a piece of recycled oak. I'm not really thrilled with the way the handle turned out, but someone might like it.

 I think I need to start doing some different designs. I feel like I'm in a rut. My wands are starting to all look the same.

Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo

It's been almost two years since I've made a wand on the lathe. I made about twenty wands, and then I got sick of them and started making pendulums, and then I built the Roubo workbench, and then I didn't go back to the lathe for a while. I've been kind of missing it, but the workshop has been a mess and there have been other things going on. Yesterday, I decided to throw a chunk of poplar dowel on the midi-lathe and see how it felt. Just to see if it came easy or if it came hard. Turns out, it came easy.

I turned that chunk of poplar dowel into a short wand in about a half hour, and it didn't turn out half bad. No plan, just free form. The night was young, so I thought, why not make another one? This time I wanted a nicer wood. I don't care much for poplar. It is soft, has an ugly color and uninteresting grain (IMO). I pulled out a piece of walnut from my storage rack, but then I put it back. I wasn't feeling quite up to that yet. Then I decided to have a go at one of the pieces of elm that I had slabbed and stacked to dry last year.

I hadn't made anything yet from any of the lumber that I cut last year. This would be the first piece. I cut a 2" strip from the straighter side on the band saw and chucked it up in the lathe. It doesn't cut too bad.

Though the original board had a little bit of color to it, the final piece seems a little drab and the straight grain doesn't excite much, but the greatest appeal to me is that it is the first piece to be made from wood that I gathered, cut from a log into a board, and dried in my workshop. Watching it go from tree limb to finished piece is kind of satisfying (even though it is a year long process).

... baby steps.

2x4 Roubo Style Workbench Lathe Stand (part 2)

The Roubo workbench lathe stand is all finished and now it is time to start mounting the tools onto the top. I plan to mount the large Harbor Freight lathe, the small Harbor Freight lathe, and maybe some other smaller things as well, if I have room. I'll also be needing to make new lathe tool racks that I will probably mount onto the ends, like I did with the metal cart. I could transfer the old racks, but they were a real pain in the ass to mount to that cart, so until I decide what I want to do with the cart, I think I will just leave those racks there for now. It will be easier to just make new ones for the workbench.

On to mounting the large lathe. The mounting holes are kind of hard to get to, so I thought it would be a good idea to make a mounting block, which would be easier to handle for mounting to the bottom of the lathe frame, and then screw the mounting block down to the table top. This plan had several advantages. First, the aforementioned ease of mounting. Second, it raised the lathe up another couple of inches, which allows for easier cleaning under the lathe frame, allows some hand access to the under side of the ways for adjusting the bottom nut on the banjo (tool rest arm), and finally, it puts the lathe closer to the same height it would have been when it was mounted on its old metal legs.

 I cut two 10" long sections of 2x10 to use as mounting blocks. I positioned them under the lathe and marked the hole positions. Then I drilled them through on the drill press. The heads of the bolts that I use for mounting these blocks to the lathe will be on the underside of the block, so I have to countersink a hole for the head of the bolt and a washer to fit into.

The ends of the bolts are stuck up through the mounting holes in the lathe frame, and torqued down with nuts and lock washers. This firmly attaches the mounting block to the lathe frame, but the lathe can still be slid around to whatever position on the table I want.

Once I choose the right location, I drive several 3" deck screws down through the mounting block and into the table top. Should I ever decide to shift the position of the lathe (or unmount it), I can remove the deck screws and move the lathe without fussing with the mounting bolts or drilling new holes.

.So, here is the large lathe, all mounted up. Next comes the small lathe, which will be mounted to the opposite side of the table.

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 The only mounting tabs on the small lathe are where the little rubber feet attach, so I had to remove those. But then with no feet, the motor hits the table because it sticks down lower than the bottom of the frame, so that means I need mounting blocks for this one as well.

 I made these mounting blocks out of scraps of 3/4" MDF, and just screwed straight through the mounting holes, through the blocks, and down into the table top.

The final tool to mount was my Work Sharp 3000. It is what I use to sharpen my lathe chisels (and hand plane blades, and wood chisels...).  I may squeeze a bench grinder on there too. We'll see.

After I got the Work Sharp 3000 mounted, I did decide to try to add the bench grinder too. That way all my sharpening options would be in the same place as the lathes. So, I had to unmount the Work Sharp and re-orient it to make the bench grinder fit.

OK, one last thing to do- casters. This thing weighs a metric ass-load. The large lathe alone is about 100 lbs. The small lathe is probably 60 lbs. or more. I'd guess the whole mess weighs somewhere around 350-400 lbs. With everything mounted, even lifting one end is a chore. My intention was to mount two casters onto the side of the legs at one end. Then I can tip it up from one end, and move it like a wheelbarrow. This is the same trick I used on my great grandfather's workbench, and it works just fine for that.

 While fixing the caster to the side of the legs, I needed to lift the end up a little so I could get to the lowest set of screws, the ones closest to the floor. I had to use a 2x6 as a lever to lift the end up high enough to get the floor jack under it.

This thing is heavy as FUCK!. There is no way the wheelbarrow trick is going to work. Maybe if I added some handles I could do it in an emergency, but I think I really need to find a better way to move this thing. So, it's back to YouTube to search for videos of DIY retractable tool bases. Luckily I am not the only person to face this problem, so there are quit a few designs out there for caster bases with lever mechanisms that lift the tool or workbench up onto the casters when engaged, and then lower it back down onto its legs when disengaged. Now I just have to decide which design will work best for my needs.

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I had planned to wrap this post up with the completion of the lifting casters, but they are not done yet, and I don't know if or when they will be. I am taking a break from blogging for a while. All of my current projects have been exhausted and my life is such that I am not producing anything at the moment. I have no idea if or when I will be back. Thank you all for reading this blog and letting me share my projects with you. I hope you enjoyed them. Good bye.  -Marx



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2x4 Roubo Style Workbench Lathe Stand (part 1)

About two years ago, I bought a small wood lathe. I had always wanted one. When I was setting it up, there happened to be, just floating around the workshop, a small metal cabinet on casters that seemed just perfect to set the new lathe on. So, that's where I put it, and that's where it has been since it was unboxed.

Shortly after starting with wood turning, I started getting interested in woodworking in general. I watched a lot of YouTube videos about woodworking and wood turning. A LOT of videos. One of the first wood working projects I got interested in building for myself was a Roubo style workbench. Andre Jacob Roubo was an 18th century French craftsman who, literally, wrote the book on woodworking in his time (actually, it was a five volume set). However, before I got started on the epic workbench build, my mother passed along to me her grandfather's workbench, which was Roubo-esque and had an antique metal-jaw vise already on it. So, I didn't really need to build a workbench after all.

But recently, I got a new lathe. A much larger one, which will allow me to turn larger items.

One of the problems I have been having with my small lathe, and also my ShopSmith when used as a lathe, is excessive vibration when turning a blank that is out of balance. One thing that will help to stop this vibration is to have the lathe firmly bolted down to a heavy stand. My midi lathe is not bolted down to the metal cabinet it is on. It just sits there. And although the ShopSmith looks big, it is not really that heavy. I even have a problem with it wanting to scoot across the concrete floor while I am turning, just from the pressure I apply with the chisels.

As you can see from the picture, my new large lathe has its own metal stand, but the stand is not very heavy or sturdy. I expect that if I were to put an unbalanced bowl blank on this lathe, it would vibrate like crazy. This brings me back to my desire to build a Roubo style workbench. The one thing that really defines a Roubo style workbench is that it is heavy. It's heavy and solid and stable, exactly what is needed for woodworking and exactly what I need from a lathe stand. So, the Great Roubo Build is back on!

 Now, I don't have much money to spare at the moment, partly because I have been buying a bunch of tools on Craig's List lately. So, The Roubo workbench/lathe stand will have to be made on the cheap. Luckily, I have been watching a few videos on just how to accomplish this. I have a stash of 2x4s that have been sitting in the basement of my store for the past 20 years. They were part of a dividing wall that I took down when I moved into the building. They were nice and straight, so I kept them. I just never got around to using them because they are full of nails and screws. They've been sucking up space, cluttering up my basement ever since. It's time they had a new life, as a workbench!

I needed to know if I was going to have to buy materials for this project, so before I started building anything, I started mocking up a design in SketchUp. SketchUp is a great little program. I am ashamed to say that I have never really taken the time to learn how to use it. So, I had to watch a few tutorial videos before I got started. This was really my first time using the software, or really in making a 3D model for something. I don't usually even draw up plans for my projects, unless they are particularly complex or there are critical measurements, and then I usually just sketch something crudely and make some measurement notations.

As you can see from this screen shot, I am planning on making the workbench wide enough to mount both lathes to it. I figure, the more weight, the merrier. Fortunately, there are a community of people who make SketchUp models and upload them for others to use, so there were already models of both of my Harbor Freight lathes in the repository for me to download. This helped me figure out the spacing and how large my stand needed to be in order to fit both lathes comfortably. All I had to draw was the workbench itself. As soon as I can figure out how to upload it, I will link to the SketchUp model I made for this workbench, so that you can see it in more detail, or build one for yourself.

I wanted this workbench to be strong and heavy as hell, so I designed it with triple thick 2x4 legs, a 28"x60" laminated 2x4 solid wood top (with a 3/4" plywood replaceable surface), a lower shelf (so I can have storage, or add more weight), and laminated mortise and tenon style joinery. I briefly toyed with the idea of making the legs removable, but with all the vibration this thing is going to experience, I decided I would rather just have it be as solid as possible, so all the joints are glued. The lower shelf frame is integrated into the legs with mortise and tenon. The legs are integrated into the table top with double mortise and tenon, and with the exception of the plywood being screwed down (because I wanted it to be replaceable), everything is held together with wood glue. There are no screws or nails anywhere in the joinery.

I say mortise and tenon, but I didn't cut any mortises or tenons in the traditional sense. It was all done with the the way the 2x4s are overlapped as they are laminated together. It's sort of like a double mortise and tenon, and sort of like a double lap joint. Maybe more like a bridal joint. I don't really know what it should be properly called, so I'll just call it a mortise and tenon.

So, here is how it was done.

I drug all the 2x4s up from the basement of the store and hauled them over to the woodworking shop (my dad's old workshop). Then, I went about the laborious task of pulling out all the nails and screws so I could re-use the wood. There were a lot of nails and screws. A lot.

 I managed to reclaim quite a bit of good wood. I am hoping to buy as little materials for this project as possible, and if my calculations are correct, I should have just enough reclaimed wood to finish it, minus the plywood for the shelf and table top, which I already have on hand (though it's not reclaimed).

 I started cutting all my pieces to length on the chop saw, starting with the short pieces. I have pretty much exactly the right number of long pieces I will need to make the table top, so I need to make as much use of the shorter pieces as I can, for the legs. Aside from helping to finalize the design details, figuring out how many of what sized pieces was one thing that the SketchUp model was really helpful with.

 I wasn't originally planning to, but I thought it would be a good idea to run the pieces through my new planer. Having smooth flat sides will help with the glue-up, and although it's not that important for the table top, the leg assemblies need their pieces to be exactly the same thickness in order for everything to come together correctly. In hind sight, I should have planed them first, then cut them to length.

.Because the joinery is being accomplished by overlapping the pieces as they are laminated together, the entire workbench can be made from straight 2x4s cut to specific lengths, with the exception of one notch that needs to be cut into four of the leg pieces to accept the leg stretcher. I cut this notch by taking multiple passes on the table saw and then cleaning it up with a chisel. I should have taken this opportunity to try out my new dado blade stack, but I was too lazy to change the table saw blade. If there were more notches to cut, it would have been worth it, but with just four... meh. This method works fine. At least I got out the table saw sled instead of just free-handing it (which can cause dangerous kick-back).

 Next came the dry fit assembly of the legs. My plan is, to make the two leg assemblies (one pair of legs and a stretcher each) and then sandwich the planks for the table top in between them. Almost all of the joinery will happen in the leg assemblies.

 By the way, that's my Great Grandfather's Roubo style workbench that I am using as an assembly table. It is also made of 2x4s and plywood, though the 2x4s are oak and its top is made from laminated sheets of plywood and then topped with 1-by dimensional lumber, where as my top will be made from laminated 2x4s, with a plywood topper, and its legs are attached with large bolts, where as my legs will be glued joints. I had to give the legs a bit of a tightening when I first got it, and the top needed smoothed out with a hand plane and refinished with some boiled linseed oil, but it has held up nicely for being over 60 years old.

 OK, back to the build.
 Satisfied with the dry fit, I made sure the legs were square to the top planks before gluing everything together. Those white pieces of MDF with the two holes cut in them are my corner square jigs. The holes are for clamping through.

 I originally thought I was going to glue up all three layers of the leg assembly at the same time, and then clamp it all together in a big multi layered 2x4 sandwich and wait for it to dry. But trying to get everything positioned correctly was difficult enough doing it one layer at a time. I ended up doing about one and a half layers at a time, clamping it and waiting for it to dry, before coming back and continuing with the next layer. It took about two days (and most of my clamps) to glue up each leg assembly.

The leg assembly is technically three layers thick, but as I was gluing them up, I decided to add one of the planks of the table top to the top of the stack to finish off the mortise and tenon joint. So, the top side of the leg assembly is four layers thick.

 Those notches are where a short stretcher that will connect the two leg assemblies will go.

And here are the two assemblies together. Just imagine more 2x4s stacked side by side across the top, and a couple of smaller stretchers connecting the legs at the bottom, and you are almost there.

 Since I ran just the two wide faces through the thickness planer, the short faces were not perfectly straight, so after the leg assemblies were dry, I used a hand plane to smooth them out nice and flat. Well, flat enough for government work anyway.

Here, you can see a nice close up of how that mortise and tenon joint fits the leg to the table top.

 OK, time to glue up the table top. The only thing I have that will clamp the table top for glue up are those cheap pipe clamps from Harbor Freight. The plan was to turn the leg assemblies upside down, lay them on top of those pipe clamps and stack the 60" 2x4s in between them (with glue). Before gluing, I cut my 60" table top planks to rough length, leaving them a little long so that lining them up perfectly would not be critical. I will trim them to the correct length later. I also ran each of them through the thickness planer so that they had nice smooth flat sides for good glue adhesion.

I had to rest my pipe clamps on 2x4 scraps because they were not all the same brand, and so they didn't rest on the floor at the same height. So, I rested the pipe itself (which is a standard size) on the 2x4 scraps so that each pipe clamp would be level with the floor.  I strapped a level to the side of the leg to help keep the legs in square, and used a ratchet strap to pull the legs together as needed (I ran out of pipe clamps).

 Here, I have cut and added the 22" 2x4 stretchers to the bottom of the legs. They fit like a glove;  another way I could tell that everything was reasonably square.

You will note that there are pipe clamps positioned on the top and bottom of the table top. This is to help ensure even pressure. If you only put your clamps on one side of a glue up like this, you will get uneven pressure on the top side and the bottom side, which will result in cupping. This is also true for gluing up panels. 

Although not in the original plan, and probably unnecessary, I decided to add a couple of stretchers to help brace the bottom shelf, just in case I decide to put something heavy on it for more stability.

It was tempting to use screws to affix these stretchers, but I was kind of amused by the idea that up until now, I had not used any metal fasteners in this build. So, I decided to use butt joints with glue between the long stretchers. However, a butt joint, especially one made with end grain, is inherently weak, so once that was dry, I reinforced that weak butt joint with oak dowels pegged through from the outside. 

 I started off using 1/2 inch oak dowel (which was overkill), but I didn't have enough of it to do two pegs per joint, so each one got one 1/2" and one 3/8" peg. Once the glue was dry, I cut and sanded the rough dowel ends flush. I retroactively added the additional stretchers to the SketchUp model, but I didn't think it was worth the effort to add the dowel pegs.

 Before turning the table over, I took a moment to smooth out the bottom of each leg, and add a chamfer, with the belt sander (which I also did not add to the SketchUp model). I should have made the chamfer a little bit smaller. I hope it doesn't interfere with putting on the casters.

Once the pipe clamps were removed, I could flip the table over and get a good look at my handy work.

 As I mentioned, the table top planks were cut long intentionally. Now all I have to do is strike a line across the end with a straight edge, and trim the table top flush with the legs using the circular saw.

 But the circular saw won't cut all the way through a 2x4 tipped up on its end, so I have to finish the cut with a hand saw. I always hated using hand saws, until I discovered Japanese style hand saws. Don't get me wrong, hand saws still suck, it's just that Japanese hand saws suck on the pull stroke instead of the push stroke. Much easier.

 The table top actually came out about as good as I hoped it would, but of course there was always going to be some unevenness, because the 2x4s weren't planed on their short edges. So, I started smoothing out the top with a hand plane.Then I moved to the belt sander, and then I finished up with a little more hand planing. Wow, what a difference.

 We're almost done! Time to add the plywood top and shelf. I cut the 3/4" plywood for the top with the circular saw and a straight edge. I cut it about a half inch larger on each side, than the laminated table top, because I wanted to cut the plywood square, and I figured the laminated top would probably be a little off (it was, but not by much). Having the plywood slightly bigger, would make positioning it easier.

I did not glue the plywood to the laminated top, because I want to be able to replace it if necessary. So, for the first time in this build, I used deck screws to attach it- pre-drilling and countersinking each one.

 I gave the plywood top a quick sanding with the belt sander, mostly to take off any splinters and round over the top corners. Then I gave it, and the legs, a quick coat of shellac. I don't plan to paint or polyurethane this workbench, but I wanted to give it a modicum of protection. I can always paint or finish the bench later, if I think it is necessary.

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I was a bit unhappy that the table top needed to be more than 24" wide, meaning that I could not get both the topper and the lower shelf out of one sheet of plywood. It killed me to think I would have to cut up a second $35 sheet of 3/4" plywood for the lower shelf. But, as luck would have it, I found a scrap of 3/8" plywood in my sheet goods rack from when I did a recent bathroom remodeling project for my mother. It was almost a perfect fit. I had to trim off about four inches from one end, and about a half inch along the side. Huzzah! Then I needed to cut out notches for the leg posts.

 The lower shelf wouldn't fit into place from the front, and only barely fit in from the side. I hadn't really thought getting it in there was going to be a problem. I got lucky. I mean, it just fit in there. Once in place, it was screwed down with decking screws.

OK, so that's actually the end of the build process for the main workbench. The workbench is technically done at this point. But that's not quite the end of the project. We still need to mount the lathes and I think I might do something a little fancier with that bottom shelf, maybe some drawers or cabinet doors. At the very least, I need to transfer my chisel racks from the old metal cabinet. I also need to add some casters so this thing can be moved around. Unloaded, I estimate that the workbench itself weighs somewhere between 150 and 200 pounds. Once the machines are mounted, and especially if I do any drawers or cabinets on the bottom, this thing will end up weighing over 400 pounds.

I was originally going to make this all one post, but it is getting really long already, and in the past couple of days I have had several idea for improvements, like adding drawers to the bottom, maybe a lifting mechanism for the casters, not really sure what all I might do yet, so I think I will just let the basic workbench stand alone as a post, and then add my equipment and upgrades in another post.

BTW, the real world workbench did end up differing from the 3D model just slightly. Because of planing the sides of the 2x4s, they ended up losing a little width, so I ended up with one more 2x4 in the real table top than is in the model. This made the real table top end up a little over 28 inches wide, compared to the 27 inches of the model.  No big deal. I didn't cut my stretchers or bottom panel ahead of time, and I measured the real workbench to get those measurements instead of relying on the model for them, so it wasn't a problem. If you download the SketchUp model, juts be aware of this, and just use the model as a guide, not an exact technical drawing.

Until next time...


See Also:

2x4 Roubo Style Workbench Lathe Stand (part 2)
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