Hooligan Guitar Build Day 2

I was able to take some more time in the shop tonight and get the body cut from the blank.

I did have to spend some time with the hand plane bringing the blank flat.  I am super happy with the joint.  You can’t really tell where the joint is unless you look REALLY close.  I really love my hand planes.  It is a great work out.  I got everything nice and flat and to the thickness I wanted.  I was really worried about the weight when I picked up the blank but as I cut chunks off of it thing began  to really lighten up.  I think once I take a chunk out for the electronics on the back that will help even more.  I’m debating some comfort contours.  I’ll have to think about it some more. 

Here is the the blank all glued up with the cut out of the guitar from the plans.  If I had not mentioned before this guitar design is from Chris over at http://www.eguitarplans.com he has some great plans.  I have two of them and will be purchasing several more.  He has at least 3 or 4 other guitars that I want to build. 

 

 

 

 

 

Here is the blank after some progress on the band saw.  I took off big chunks around the outside of the guitar body.  This made it a little easier to cut in the curves.

 

 

 

 

 

Here the blank is at the final rough cut.  There are lines that I will sand to on the plan.  To do this I am using the spindle sander that my brother got for me.  I love that thing.  I can’t wait to build more guitars and I haven’t even finished this one. 

 

 

 

 

 

Here is the body sanded to shape and size.  I am extremely happy with the way it is turning out so far.  I think it is going to look awesome.  I am thinking that it is going to get painted.  There are just a few small blemishes that I don’t really want to show through, so now I need to figure out what color I want.  Anyone have any ideas?

Have a Great Day!

 

Technorati Tags: Guitar Build,Guitar,Hooligan,eguitarplans.com,woodworking

Guitar Build: Day 1

Well I finally broke down and started the guitar build.  I took a baby step.  I got the body blank glued up.  The board was 2” thick and the guitar will end up being 1 3/4” thick, so I spent quite a bit of time planning it down in the power planer.

Here is one side of the the body.  It is going to be a 2 piece Mahogany Body.  It is great looking wood.  I am still not sure if I am going to paint it or do some kind of tint on it.  I guess I will see once I get the body cut out and sanded.  It has good enough grain that I think it will look good but it might just get painted.  Who knows.  Some of you might be wondering what the half triangle is.  It’s a carry over from building furniture it helps me orient the piece, which in this doesn’t really matter as it’s a two piece glue up and I had pretty much oriented the grain like I wanted it anyway.  It’s just habit. 

 

Here is the first pass through the planer.  On the side what you can’t see are some markings that show me what direction I wanted the faces to be and what ends I jointed.   

 

 

 

 

Here is the blank all glued up.  I will let it dry over the next 24 hours.  Once the blank is dry I will hand plane it down to the final thickness.  I left it slightly thicker than it needed to be so that I could hand plane it down even as my planer is only a 12” and this blank is 16" wide.  Hopefully I did a good job and the seam will not be overly obvious. 

I’m glad I finally took the step and started the build.  I have a long way to go and a lot to do.  Once I have the blank cut out I will start on the neck blank and get that going.  I have lots of parts to order over the next little while.  I figure it will probably a couple of months to build this.  I want to take my time and do this as best I can. 

 

I hope you will follow along as I build my first guitar. 

Have a Great Day!

 

Technorati Tags: Woodworking Wednesdays,Guitar,First Guitar,Electric Guitar

Shop Block so I got a new tool

So the last couple of days I have had what I consider shop block.  My mental state has just not been in the game the last couple of days.  I think part of it is that I am scared to start this Guitar Build.  It’s all new to me and that scares me.  I don’t like the unknown.  I seem to go through this each time I undertake a new type of woodworking.  I’ll spend the next few days finding excuses not to start the project and then another few days looking into more detail thinking I am prepping my self.  I guess this is my process.  I know this about myself and I accept it but at the same time this is such a huge project for me I am even more scared at this point.  I have high expectations and want to have this turn out well but at the same time I am realistic and know that it will not be the “perfect” guitar.  I have to get my mind right.  I’m getting close.  That’s part of the reason I spent some much time cleaning up the shop and also will continue to clean up.  I really want to have things very organized so that I can focus on the guitar and building it.  Also when I have shop block I will take on smaller projects to reassure myself that I do have some skills and it helps me realize that what ever that current project and form of woodworking is that I started in the same spot as I am now with guitars and know that I will improve with each one that I build.

 

Anyway….  Now onto the new tool.  I have been turning for a couple years and thought I would eventually upgrade to a larger lathe well that day was today.  I found a killer deal on a Harbor Freight Lathe for $85 and couldn’t pass it down.  It is lightly used and should be a lot of fun. 

 

Maybe playing with this will help me to get my Shop Block taken care of. 

Have you ever experienced shop block.  If so let me know how you over came it?

 

Have a Great Day!

Technorati Tags: Woodworking

First steps to a healthier shop

This weekend I took one of the first steps to a healthier shop.  I found a shop air purifier on Craigslist for $20. I have been looking at them on and off for a while and they can range from $100 to $300 or more so it’s been one of those things that I put on my get to list.  Well for $20 if it works half way decently it’s worth the money.  Now I just need to get it mounted to the ceiling so that it can do it’s job.  Maybe tomorrow night.  Tonight I spent the majority of the evening cleaning the shop and it’s still looks horrible.  I am going to spend the next several days trying to get things cleaned up and reorganized.  I have really let the shop go over the last month or so and it was getting difficult to walk around and there is no way I could paint the Jelly cupboard with the amount of sawdust that was in there and would be kicking around.  I still have a lot of dust to clear out and a bunch of reorganization.  I have said on this blog that a clean shop is a safe shop and a safe shop leads to a healthy shop and a healthy woodworker.  I finally listened to my own advice again and couldn’t take it any more it was time to clean.  So hopefully during this week I can get the shop organized cleared up finish the couple things on the Jelly Cupboard get it in some paint and out of the shop and move on to our WIWW nightstand.  I wish I could do this full time and crank out plans and designs and tutorials for you but alas this is a hobby and unfortunately they sometimes have to take a back seat to life.  Plus it is REALLY tough to tell Grover Jr. that I am going out to the shop and not let him come out there because I am going to be using the table saw.  Tonight was great because he Loves to play use the shop vac.  He isn’t playing he is helping Daddy.  Actually he really does a good job.  He gets a lot of the saw dust where it should be. 

Speaking of G.JR.  I can’t tell you as a parent how awesome it makes me feel that he has an interest in woodworking.  We bought a small little project for he and I to do and he is begging to put it together so we will be working on that this week as well.  I love my time with him I only hope that as he grows and becomes a teenager that he will keep the interest in woodworking and it will be something that he and I can share for the rest of our lives. 

Okay ladies…  I’m calling on you.  Once we have this WIWW Nightstand build complete what can I help you learn?  Are there other types of woodworking that you are interested in other than building furniture.  Turning or Scroll Saw.  There are all kinds of things that are out there.  In addition to building furniture I also do Pen turning and scroll saw work, both are a ton of fun and require much different skills but both require lots of concentration, both of these allow me to kind of go into my own little woodworking world and relax.  They are much more artistic in nature than just building a cabinet or a table, not that you can’t get artistic with a table.  Anyway post some comments on things that you want to learn and I will do my best to help you in your journey whether its me showing you or even pointing you to online/offline resources on the particular subject.  Okay enough for tonight.  I got a little long winded tonight. 

Have a Great Day!

 

Technorati Tags: woodworking,safety,shop,family,health

Jelly Cupboard Update 2

I had a little more time to work on the Jelly Cupboard and was able to get the door hung.

I need to put some cross braces on and get the punch tin done.  Throw on some Milk paint and I am done.  I am looking forward to completing this.  It’s probably one of the more complex projects I have taken on so far.  Then we will be on to the WIWW build.  Hoping to go get the wood for that tomorrow.  Once that’s complete I will be focusing on the guitar build for a little while.

Should be interesting.  I am thinking I am going to do a little video of that as well.  Who knows, with this being my first one and not being sure of my ability.  I honestly feel a little crazy taking on such a project at this point in my woodworking journey, but I have come to the realization lately that there are sometimes you have to stop trying to learn and spend time doing.  I also find that in that doing I tend to learn significantly more than I would have just reading about it and really if you don’t start the project you can never know if you can accomplish it and learn and become better.  My only worry is that it will play like crap.  I care what it looks like but I would rather have a good/great playing guitar out of my first one than one that plays like crap and looks great.  If it looks like crap I can fix that.  If it plays like crap I can fix that to I will just be a little more disappointed in my abilities.

I guess my take away from this for you is that if you want to do something and supposed “Talent”, “Skill” or worry that you are getting ready to screw up some beautiful Mahogany and Maple are standing in your way.  Kick them over, bust up in that joint like you own the place and get to work.  A master craftsman didn’t become a master craftsman by sitting and looking at books, videos or the internet all day, he became a master craftsman by doing it.  It doesn’t matter if that Craftsman taught himself, went to school or learned it from a friend or family member he/she ultimately had to put tool to wood and make something.  So lets get out there and build something. 

Have a Great Day!

Technorati Tags: woodworking,jelly cupboard,philosophy,guitars

Miter Saw Tuning

Drum roll please…………

I did it.  It’s done all the pictures are done for the Miter Saw tuning post.  I can’t believe it. 

 

Okay So here we go. 

First and foremost when you start this process :

PLEASE READ, FOLLOW, AND UNDERSTAND THE USE AND SAFETY INSTRUCTIONS FOR YOUR SAW AND ALWAYS WEAR YOUR SAFETY GLASSES AND I RECOMMEND HEARING PROTECTION.

MAKE SURE THAT YOUR SAW IS UNPLUGGED DURING THE FIRST SEVERAL PARTS OF THIS TUTORIAL.

Okay now that I have that out of the way.  Seriously please take care of yourself and watch what you are doing. 

Squaring the Blade to the Fence:

You will need a speed square or some kind of accurate square that you can check 90° and 45°.

Make sure your saw is set and locked at the 0° take your square and lay it on the table to check for 90° make sure the it is flush against the fence.  You are looking to make sure there is no gap between the square and the blade.  Make sure that you don’t put to much pressure on the blade as it can cause it to deflect. 

 

 

Now once you feel that the blade is square find a piece of scrap wood and and make a cut with the widest side laying flat on the table.

 

Part of the reason I included a video here was to show some safety precautions.  When you are making your cut you want to start the saw close to the the material make a slow and steady cut through the wood.  Once you have made the cut leave the blade in the down position and let the blade come to a complete stop.  This does a couple of things.  It reduces the risk of you sticking your hand in there and trying to grab the wood.  It also keeps you from possibly causing the blade to catch the wood and at best chipping at worst possibly throwing the piece at you or across the shop.  You will also notice that I keep my hand on the piece through the entire cut, I also as the blade is slowing slide the “non waste” side away from the blade.  I don’t know if this is good or not it’s just something that I gave gotten in the habit of doing.  In my mind it helps keep the blade from catching the piece as well. 

Now once you have made your cut get your straight edge out and align the two pieces against the straight edge.

You will notice that I have labeled one part with a T(top) this is just for orientation.  Now take the one piece and flip it over 180° on its top. 

 

 

 

 

Now you want to check for any kind of gap between the two pieces. 

 

 

 

 

Fortunately for me I don’t have any gaps in my pieces so I don’t need to adjust the saw.  For this cut.  If you do need to adjust this please refer to the manual for your saw.  Typically there are bolts that will allow you to adjust where the saw stops.

 

 

 

Checking the 45° Miter Setting:

Just as we did with the 0° setting take your square and set it to check for 45°.  Again make sure not to press to hard against the blade and keep the square flush to the fence. 

 

 

 

 

 

Take a try square or a combination square and check the miter for square also check to see there there are no gaps in the miter itself.  We are looking good here no adjustments needed.  If you need to make adjustments refer to the manual for your particular saw for adjustment details. 

 

 

 

Checking Bevel

Like checking for square set the saw to 0° and make sure you are still square.  Now take another piece of scrap and place it on edge and make your cut. Once again take those pieces and align them against a straight edge and the flip one piece like you did before and check for a gap.

Hey guess what.  I have a gap.  I will be spending a little time adjusting this.  Again if you have a gap here refer to your manual to on resolving this issue.  Now I need to go find my manual. 

 

 

 

 

You will want to perform a similar cut when you put the blade on a 45° Bevel.

  Take your piece on edge and cut a 45° in this piece and another and set up the miter similar to what we did here:

 

 

 

 

  Again make sure to check for square and gaps and refer to your manual. 

 

 

 

 

Sorry to keep telling you refer to your manual but each saw is just enough different that it is important to refer to yours so you can adjust your saw accurately. 

I hope this helps you in setting up your saw and providing a little bit of safety and usage guidance.  Please feel free to ask me any questions or if you would like to see any other photos please feel free to let me know. 

After making the adjustment needed you should have a very accurate saw that will allow you to make nice square cuts and will allow you make the nightstand with ease. 

Have a Great Day!

Technorati Tags: Woodworking,miter saw,tuning,tutorial

What am I doing?

I am currently reading Make Your Own Guitar by Melvyn Hiscock.  I am prepping myself as best I can for my first guitar build.  This is hopefully the start of a Career.  I’m hoping that over the next 10 years I can develop my skill at building guitars and make a Full Time career of it.  It’s a tough business to get into especially competing with the Big dogs out there but I still believe there is a good market for Custom Built and Hand Built Guitars both Acoustic and electric.  Like most things I have decided to just teach myself at least in the beginning.  I’m sure I will take some classes down the road but for now it’s full steam ahead. 

Tomorrow night I plan to go into the shop and finally knock out the post on Tuning a Miter Saw.  I hope to have that up tomorrow night or Thursday.  Once that post is done I will start on the WIWW Nightstand build and start the post with that.  I want to break up each section into it’s own post so you have a step by step guide to building the nightstand.  Sorry it has been taking so long on this.  I know I got everyone all excited with the Series.  I had some really great responses.  April is about over and all of my commitments are mostly taken care of so I can spend some time focusing on the series and getting it done right for you. 

On a side note….   In a jonesing for something woodworking I tackled a new type of woodworking tonight.  Well not so much new as it was adapting some current skills into producing something else.  I am excited about it and will post about that as well in the future but for now it is going to be a closely held secret.  I think you will find it interesting as well.  Tonight was mostly prototyping and figuring out how I wanted to do things.  I still have a lot of figuring out to do on the project but think I am well on my way. 

I also got to spend sometime in the shop with Grover Jr. tonight.  We had a Parent/Child Project that we completed tonight from Home Depot.  It was a little shelf kit with the number 20 Home Depot Car.  Pretty neat.  If you want to spend some quality time with you son or daughter I highly HIGHLY recommend the Lowes Build And Grow Program.  I took Grover Jr. to one a few weeks back and we built a Kaleidoscope.  There was just something very cool about spending sometime with him just the two of us sharing something that I love with him and seeing him enjoy it. 

Here are some pictures after a successful morning of building.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He is a trip.  We never could get him to stop making faces.  I really totally so don’t know where he gets it from.

Have a Great Day!

Technorati Tags: Woodworking,WIWW,Women In Woodworking,Guitars

Added Simple Forum

I have added a simple Forum Feature to the blog.  I have added a couple of categories.  I’m just trying this out.  If it takes off great if it dies so be it.  It’s really hopefully a place for you to talk to each other and ask questions and ask me questions. 

To access the forum just click Forum at the top of the page in the navigation menu.

Please keep all discussions civil and please no profanity and flaming of other people.  My Parents read this blog.  :)

Lets keep all discussions to the topic of the forum. 

Have a Great Day!

 

Technorati Tags: Woodworking,Forum

Sneak Peak of the first WIWW Project

 

 

I hope I have you interested.  This is going to be a simple coastal style nightstand.  We will use a few basic tools.  The Tools we will be using will be a miter saw, Kreg Jig Jr. and a speed square or a framing square.  I plan on using dimensioned lumber from Lowes/Home Depot. 

If you are not familiar with what dimensioned lumber is it is lumber that is precut to a certain size for example 1x3, 2x4, etc. and is what in the woodworking world is called S4S or S2S.  This means surfaced on four sides or surfaced on two sides.  Essentially what happens is each side is cut to be made square to its parallel or opposite side.  We want to use this type of wood to cut down on the tools you will need to have to make this and any other projects.  By making the sides square when you join the boards of the table top they will fit closer together and you will have fewer gaps.  There are tools and techniques that you can use to virtually eliminate any gaps between the boards but that is a post for the future. 

I am working on getting the materials list together for you soon.  I will also before we get started on the actual building go into miter saws a little bit more in-depth.  If you don’t have one or don’t want to purchase one there are other options to building this table.  You could also use a circular saw or a jigsaw, however if you are planning on building several projects I highly recommend a miter saw.  I will get my thoughts together on this and post this soon. 

 

We are looking forward to this and wish everyone success.

Have a Great Day!

 

Technorati Tags: Women in woodworking,woodworking,kreg jig,nightstand

Jelly Cupboard Build Day 3

I spent a few hours in the shop tonight and got some things accomplished.  I was able to get all the all the dados routed out for sides.  These are my first ever dados.  I did okay.  They are a little loose in some spots and a little tighter in others.

I clamped the two sides together and marked the dados and then routed.  One thing I stared doing to improve the dados after the first one was to cut on the inside of the of the lines and make micro adjustments.  I kept a scrap piece of the shelf to test fit in the dados to make sure I had not over done it.   I also had to rabbet the back of each side so that it will accept the boards for the back that will be attached.   Here are a few pictures of that the back looks like.  I spent a little time dry fitting the frame together and was pretty happy. 

 

 

 

 

I stuck a level on it just to check it and see if it even came close.  I am pretty happy with it of course it doesn’t really make a hill of beans at this point since it is just being dry fitted but there is potential there.  Hopefully in the next day or so I can get things glued up and assembled.  I cut the face frame pieces to short so I had to re-cut them.  Glad I tested that out before I glued or nailed anything together.  Shouldn’t be to much longer. 

I also wanted to let everyone know about another project that I am going add to the list before a few others.  I am hopefully going to be working with a local primitive store to build some shelves benches, etc.  Here is a picture of one of the designs that I am going to build for them.

I would love to know what you all think.  It’s a single bowl shelf.

 

 

Have a Great Day!

Technorati Tags: jelly cupboard,furniture,primitive

Jelly Cupboard Build Days One and Two

I started the build on the Jelly cupboard last night.  Here is a picture of what I hope the end product resembles.

I am planning on painting it.  I am going to use milk paint we are going to use Sea Green.  Which isn’t so much green as it is a bluish, grey green.  My wife will be doing the punched tin.  If anyone has any experience in punching tin please let give me your tips and tricks.  She(we) have never done it before and I have a good idea how I am going to do it but I wouldn’t mind some expert advice.  Last evening I only had a short time in the shop but it was enough time to get both sides of the cupboard cut and glued up.  Here is my stack of wood that I will be using.   I used a biscuit jointer again to join the sides together.  I don’t really think they add much strength to the joint but it sure does make aligning the boards a whole heck of a lot easier. 

These are the slots that the biscuit saw creates.

 

 

 

 

These are the biscuits installed in the board you put a biscuit in one half of the joint and then place the other half on top and align the board you have a little play each way with the boards. 

This is the first side of the cupboard, rinse and repeat for the second.

Tonight I spent some time milling the rest of the lumber.  Here is the stack of milled parts labeled and ready to be assembled.

One thing that I am going to do with this piece is trying a Ship Lap joint on the back.  Tonight I ran some test pieces to see how the joint worked and looked.  This is what that joint looks like.

 

With this joint I will only attach the top and bottoms of the boards to the back of the cupboard and this will allow the wood to expand and contract through the seasonal changes and moisture changes, plus it just looks really cool.  Anyway that’s all for now.  I will update you as I go along.  If you have any questions please feel free to shoot me an email.

Have a Great Day!

Technorati Tags: furniture,jelly cupboard,country,woodworking,Ship Lap Joint,Biscuit jointer