Reaching Critical Masses...

If you ever need to figure out 30 different ways to say, "Great Job," then let me know. I can direct you to a couple of woodworking forums where almost every project posted receives just such a thing (and very little else).

Can you tell I'm not a big fan of those kinds of comments? Don't get me wrong - I like to hear compliments just as much as the next guy! But non-critical discussion alone does not help me to learn and grow as a woodworker. In fact, a lack of such a discussion can actually lead a woodworker down the wrong path by providing positive reinforcement of improper techniques and poor design.

What really bugs me, though, is that I don't think a lot of people are actually looking for anything other than compliments! Why? I'm not sure. Maybe they don't care about growth? Maybe they grew up playing non-competitive sports and they feel everyone should always be a winner and nothing is ever bad! It is a mindset I think I understand, but certainly don't agree with.

Or maybe they just can't take criticism of their work, constructive or otherwise.

The inability to handle criticism is something I have trouble understanding. But in the pursuit of my Art History degree, I had to take just as many studio art classes as I did art history classes, so that probably has something to do with it. Even though I went to a liberal arts university, our art classes were anything but the happy-go-lucky-everyone-does-great-work variety one might associate with a liberal atmosphere. We had peer critiques of our on-going projects every week and my peers were absolutely critical!

But it was such a great environment for an artist! We had to be fully aware of our decisions in our projects - why we used a certain color, how we performed a technique, where the thought process came from and where it was going. You had to learn to stand by and defend your position, but you also had to learn how to follow good advice! I was exposed to that kind of environment for most of four years. There were many times when I seriously considered adding or switching to a studio major.

It didn't take me long to learn to enjoy that process of peer reviews. In fact, those who didn't learn to work with the process didn't last very long in any of the studio art programs. After college, I was very grateful for that experience. It prepared me for the real world, where my bosses weren't always happy with my work. Believe me - it is easier on the employee and the manager when both understand the definition of "constructive criticism".

Though I am my own worst critic, I miss that peer review process. After looking at the same thing for several hours, it is easy to miss the obvious changes that could positively affect the project. Sometimes it takes a fresh eye to see that. I've tried several different avenues, looking for a new form of peer review, but I don't really think I've been successful - I've joined the local woodworking guild and actively participated in several woodworking forums and websites, but... they don't even come close to the intimacy of 10 people all sitting around a project, viewing it with a critical eye for the purpose of making me a better artist.

A New Record...

No, I didn't run a mile in under four and a half minutes or make a jewelry box (with dividers) in under five.

But I did pick up a new Record 52 1/2D Vise yesterday morning!


















This wasn't really an "expected" purchase, so it did set back my plans to get the Veritas Small Plow Plane a bit, but... it was a deal I couldn't pass up.

See, I was trolling Craig's List the other day and I saw the listing, "Woodworking Vices". I didn't miss the humor in the double entendre. Having already decided to build myself a new workbench in the near future, I've started keeping my eye out for a bench vise. Having done my due diligence in vise research, I knew I was going to be looking for a Record 52 series model.

I noticed the listing contained a photo, so I opened it up to take a look. The image was from a bit of a distance, but it clearly showed two vises standing up on end, leaning against a garage door, the larger one being on the left and the smaller of the two on the right. The caption said, "Large vise - $60, Small vise - $30"

The smaller vise didn't really interest me - I believe it was an unmounted dog leg vise found on European benches and I don't want to mess with trying to install one of them. The larger vise, on the other hand, peaked my interest! It was blue (Record vises are blue)! But that was about all I could tell from the picture, so I shot a quick e-mail over to the seller and asked if there were any markings on the face of the vise.

Sure enough, he responded a little later that it was a Record 52 1/2D.

I did some quick checking on past E-Bay sales and posted a question on one of the woodworking forums I frequent (Sawmill Creek) before I responded with a resounding, "Barring any mechanical defects preventing the vise from working properly, I'll take it at your asking price!"

And then I was left with the job of trying to make the 1/2 hour trip to South St. Louis City without throwing a wrench in the weekend plans (my wife's mom is in town this weekend).

As fate would have it, they had talked earlier in the day (this was on Thursday) and the idea of going to the Botanical Gardens was brought up. "Ching, Ching," says I, as that is just five short minutes from the seller's house, on the other side of Tower Grove park!

"Hey, sweetie, I'd LOVE to go to the Botanical Gardens with you guys! You want me to drive?"

My wife doesn't care for driving too much in St. Louis, so I knew she'd jump at the offer. I guess my excitement was showing on my face, though, because she saw through me like a piece of plate glass.

"What do you want?" she asks.

"Oh, well... I might want to pick up a woodworking vise while we're down there," I reply.

"You already have enough woodworking vices!" she quipped.

"No, no... not a woodworking vice; a woodworking vise! You know, for clamping wood to a workbench, silly! I don't have nearly enough of those yet!"

Oh, my wife is such a joker! You can tell she's really messing with me when she glares through squinted eyes. Times like that, I wish she'd consider taking her act on the road for some comedy sketch group, you know? Man, she'd make a killing!

On Saturday morning, the clouds were out and rain threatened to fall in buckets, which might totally ruin our planned trip to the gardens, but... I was $60 poorer and happy as a clam! Sitting in the back of the car, carefully encased in two brown paper sacks was my new (old) Record vise.

And, in all honesty, another woodworking vice, I suppose...

(vise - n. any of various devices, usually having two jaws that may be brought together or separated by means of a screw, lever, or the like, used to hold an object firmly while work is being done.)

(vice - n. a fault, defect, or shortcoming; a bad habit, as in a horse; also the British spelling of the word vise.)

Speaking of Anxiety...

My mother-in-law is coming into town this week!

(Just kidding, Mom. :) )

Don't you hate it when someone says they're going to do something and then they don't? That bugs me to no end! Which is why I'm a little upset with myself right now. I said I was going to post a picture of the cap wall on the stairs and I just realized this afternoon I hadn't done it yet. Grrrr...

I have the pictures on my camera, though, so I'll try my hardest to pull them off and load one into the blog this evening. If I have time, that is. I do have a few things to try and finish up in preparation for our weekend guest (my mother-in-law really is coming into town tomorrow afternoon - I wasn't joking about that; I was just kidding about it causing me anxiety). My wife had to leave town Sunday morning for work (coming back home late this evening), so I've pretty much been on my own for cleaning up.

I've done a good job with not making new messes, but... I'm afraid I haven't been as attentive as I wanted to be with cleaning old ones and tidying up a bit. I still have a few hours tonight, so I'm not worried. I'll still be able to get some stuff done.

I don't think my wife reads my blog, so I can safely say I have been working on a few other things, instead - things that have been bugging my wife for some time - so I wanted to surprise her by getting them done. For example, the dryer sits to the left of the washer, but the dryer door hinges on the right, so when it is open, it creates a sort of wall between the washer and the dryer. It isn't a big deal to switch the dryer doors around (I used to deliver furniture and appliances when I was in college, so I can switch a dryer door or a fridge door in no time); you just have to make a few minutes of time to actually do it.

I didn't really notice how annoying the whole door thing was until I had to do some laundry this week. (before you say anything like, "Why is your wife always doing the laundry?", keep in mind that I do most of the cooking.)

So I did it.

I also detailed the inside of her car (which needed it) and washed and waxed the outside of her car (which desperately needed it). It wasn't quite warm enough outside to touch up some of the chips with paint, so I'll try to do that this weekend.

And then I did something for myself, too...

I picked up an old Craftsman WorkMate someone had listed on Craig's List for $20. It is in excellent condition and of higher quality than a brand new one you could buy today. It came with the four low profile bench stops, even!

I can use it as a workbench up in the garage now that I've moved my bench into the basement, or if I need it in the basement, then it can be easily transported. I can probably mount a few tools onto plywood bases (miter saw, my other recent Craig's List find of an old crank hand grinder for $25, maybe my slow speed grinder) and then use the WorkMate to bring them up to a proper usable level.

Oh, I almost forgot! I did make some headway on that danged cap board. Specifically, I jointed one of the edges flat, then used my trusty Bosch router and a cove bit to route a 5/8" x 5/8" cove into the side. I ripped it off with the table saw and repeated the process two more times, so I now have three pieces of cove trim. I like having a little extra, just in case; besides, I could always use the leftovers on a box or something, right?

Anyway, now I just need to take off the old board and molding, cut the new board to size, and then attach it and the trim and I'm done! It always sounds easier than it really is, doesn't it? I have to make sure I have the right reveal on all of the edges, I need to figure out how I want to mount the board (screws or finish nails), need to figure out when/how I want to finish it.

Decisions, decisions...

Inactivity breeds anxiety...

I've really been off my blogging game as of late, and I'm not really sure I can offer a reasonable explanation as to why. I was out of town for a while (work), but... not for three weeks! But let me tell you - not writing for three weeks is almost like not going to the gym for the same amount of time! I feel all stressed out and anxious and twitchy...

I think the problem is that I've been inactive, as far as woodworking is concerned, and that means I don't have a whole lot of woodworking to write about!

But that isn't a very good excuse. I have been living and the reason I didn't give this blog a woodworking name is because I also wanted to be able to write about aspects of my life other than woodworking.

For example, last weekend was a key birdwatching weekend here in the St. Louis area. Tower Grove Park is a migration trap and for one or two weekends in May, the local birders have the opportunity to catch sight of some unusual birds for this area. I'm not uber-huge into bird watching, but I'm good at spotting and I'm good at giving directions, so my wife likes me to go along with her so I can help find the birds and then show her where they are (and for the companionship, of course).

I won't bore you kind folks with a long list of birds, but I will mention we saw both the black-billed and the yellow-billed cuckoo within a five minute time period. The black is highly uncommon in this area, so that's noteworthy in itself, but seeing both species so close together was a little exciting, even for me. Oh, and I was about 10 feet from a red-breasted nuthatch (the nuthatch is one of the few birds that can walk DOWN a tree; the white-breasted variety is the most common by far, so Dana was tres excited about seeing a red-breasted one).

What else has gone on that I could have blogged about? Oh, yeah... I turned 35 two weeks ago. I haven't felt any new creaks or aches yet, but they're bound to come. I heard from lots of friends and family throughout the weekend, which made it worth while. And I got a great card with a kilted man on it from a friend of ours from church - I'd love to know where she shops for cards!

My birthday dilema: I have some funds available to me, but I'm not exactly sure what I should spend them on. I'm torn between a more casual kilt I can wear hiking or to non-dressy social occasions or putting it towards a Veritas Plow Plane (w/all five blades).

The first would be a bit of fun to have, but the second would definitely get more use (and would help further my goal of using more hand tools than power tools in my shop).

I guess that settles it, then, doesn't it? The plow plane it is!

(I love how easily I can make decisions like that...)

My primary goal right now, however, is to get some woodworking projects done. Fortunately for me, I have a project that itsn't terribly huge but offers big returns - that danged board on the stairs! My mother-in-law will be in town for Memorial Day weekend and my wife is going to be out of town the Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday before then, which gives me both motive AND opportunity to tackle such a project.

I'll end this blog entry with some free-flow design thoughts about the project. I usually do this on paper - it helps me think through the project and spot potential problems before they come up in the physical world... But I think putting it into a blog entry is a right proper thing to do.

I have, in fact, already started working on it. I pulled the mahogany board out of the basement the other day and sanded out the planer marks with my recently-purchased Festool ROS 125. (I'm still in the break-in period, but so far very pleased with the results!) It didn't take long to get the board nice and silky smooth and I had very little sanding dust to deal with per the Festool CT22 dust extractor.

The next step is to make some transitional cove molding so the cap board flows properly into the wall. Unless I have some unforseen problem, the plan is to cut the cove into one edge of the board, rip it off, then repeat twice more so I have enough molding. After that, I can cut the board to measure and fit it to the top of the wall.

I'll need to cut a notch into the back of it... or do I? Hmmm. I'd already decided to modify the design a little from the existing piece. The current board overhangs each side by an inch or so - such that you can't really even see the transitional cove molding. I was thinking about making the new cap board thinner, so that it comes out 1/8" more than the cove molding on each side. That will make it look more like a finished piece of furniture than a board simply nailed to the top of the 1/2 wall. If I do that, then I probably don't need to notch the back of it to go on either side of the full wall at the full wall/half wall transition.

(Confused yet? It might not be terribly clear, per this is stream-of-thought writing. I'll try to take a picture this evening and add it to the blog for clarification.)

Ok; I've added the picture here. You can see the very top of the board is notched to go around the wall on either side.

The only other issue to deal with is the attachment of the board to the top of the wall. The current board is nailed in place with four finish nails and a swipe of putty in the holes. I don't think that will work for me.

So I was thinking of doing something rather interesting, like attaching the board with screws, but plugging the screw holes with pillowed square ebony plugs. Yeah, I'm a big fan of Greene & Greene...

(This design addition would allow me to carry the G&G style into a new cover for the doorbell box located in that same room, again with mahogany and ebony.)

I suppose I'd stick with my standard finish, which is just General's Seal-A-Cell base coat followed by three or four coats of Arm-R-Seal (semi gloss), rubbed out between coats with steel wool.

Ahhh... it is good to write again. I can feel the anxiety rolling off my shoulders. Sorry for the slight blogger break. I'll try to do a better job of keeping up with it in the future.

Tonight is the Saint Louis Woodworker's Guild meeting, so I don't think I'll make any progress with the project until the weekend. I'll try to find out if our little coup is going according to plan. If so, then I'll have another writing project to keep up with, as I'll most likely be the new editor of the guild's newsletter.

Cup of coffee and a small reality adjustment - $92

This morning I decided to swing by a convenience store on my way to work for a cup of coffee. Pulled into the parking lot - no problem. Got my 32 oz. coffee with exactly three doses of Irish Cream flavoring and three doses of creamer (have I mentioned I'm OCD yet?) - no problem. Paid for my $1.28 coffee with cold hard US currency - no problem. Got back to my truck, put my key in the ignition and started it up to get back on the road to work - problem.

That problem mostly centered on the fact that my truck wouldn't start. In fact, it didn't even turn over once. To quote the terrorist cameraman in True Lies, "Batteraziz!"

My battery was absolutely, totally, and completely dead.

Thank goodness I keep those jumper cables I got for Christmas seven years ago in my truck! Now if I can just find a Good Samaritan to help get a charge into my battery...

To the younger, clean-shaven man in the spotless F250:
"Excuse me, sir, can yo... Oh, you don't have time right now? Sorry to bother you."

To the woman in the Dodge Durango:
"Pardon me, Ma'am, but could you hel... You're in a hurry? Maybe next time, then, ok?"

To the middle-aged man in the black Ford Explorer:
"Good morning, sir, I was wonder... You have to pick someone up in a few minutes? Hey, not a problem. Thanks, anyway."

Can you believe I tried to ask five different people for a jump start and I didn't even get to the point of telling them what I needed help with before they told me they couldn't help? That really bummed me out!

Was it me? Having showered this morning, I knew I didn’t smell. I tried to be polite, like my mamma taught me, so it didn’t have to do with me being rude. Because of guests in our office this morning, I was dressed business casual, so I didn’t think I looked too scary…

Maybe I was just asking the wrong people? Everyone I’d approached so far had been nicely dressed, wearing “office” clothes, driving well-kept vehicles… I expected the complete opposite response from what I got!

As I started a dejected walk back to my truck to call a tow truck for a jump, an unshaven guy in a beat-up old Ford with tattoos on his arms pulled up and jumped out of his truck. He started to go into the store, but I guess he saw the look on my face, because he asked, “Need some help?” I said I just needed a jump-start for my dead battery. He said, “Sure, I can do that. You got jumper cables?”

Two minutes later, my truck was running smoothly, he was on his way, and I was on mine. My way, of course, was straight to the auto parts store (where I had to sit for 15 minutes, waiting for the store to open) to get a new battery.

That gave me plenty of time to think about what had just happened. I was very disturbed by the five automatic responses to not help a stranger in need. It wasn’t that they couldn’t help because they didn’t have jumper cables (which I had) or a big enough battery (I only asked people with larger trucks). Honestly, they didn’t even know I had a battery problem! They all declined to help before I got to that part of my question!

I wonder if any of them, at any point in the day, will even think back to this morning and wonder about the guy who needed help. Will they second-guess their immediate response to NOT get involved and NOT help someone in need? Will it bother them at all? Sadly, I suspect it won’t weigh heavily upon their souls.

In full introspection, I have to ask myself, have I acted that same way before? Were there times when someone obviously needed aid and I didn’t offer it? I can’t think of any off the top of my head, but that doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened. I sure hope it hasn’t. I think I’m a good person. I try to be mindful of situations like that and offer assistance when I can. I will try to be ever-mindful of such situations in the future.

I think what bugged me the most was the automated response to not help before they even knew what I needed. Well, it didn’t really bug me so much as it made me sad… I hope this morning was a fluke, that most people aren’t so unwilling to assist a fellow human being.

Anyway, after 10 minutes at the auto parts store, and a $90.80 charge to my debit card, I was on my way, a cup of coffee in hand and a slight reality adjustment in tow.

(Oh, and a great big thanks to the salt-of-the-earth guy who helped me in my moment of need this morning. I do appreciate it and will be sure to pass on the kindness first chance I get.)

Stirring the pot...

(This entry inspired by a recent blog entry from the Village Carpenter.)

Tonight is my monthly local woodworker's guild meeting. I really enjoy going to these meetings. They allow me the opportunity to meet other woodworkers in the area and see what they are making. Once a year, usually some time in the first quarter, we often have a well-known instructor or woodworker come in and host a weekend seminar. It doesn't ever cost that much, all things considered, and I've been able to learn from some of the greats, like Mark Adams, Frank Klausz, and David Marks. All that for a $25 annual membership fee? Can't beat it. (Ok, the meetings also takes place at the local Woodcraft store, so there is that, too...)

I tend to stand out in our meetings. Most of the guys in our club are 55+ years old, making me their younger by 20 years or so. There are a few other younger guys in the club, so I don't just stand out because I'm young.

I stand out in the group because I'm a rabble rouser. I like to stir the pot and challenge the status quo. I actively take part in meetings, speaking my mind and questioning purpose and intent. I don't do this for the sake of being different; I do it because I see a stagnant group that needs some energizing. I don't quite think the club is on its last leg, but it looks like the general direction it could be headed and I'd like to nip that in the bud.

I have an interest in maintaining the club. Right now, I'm of the younger crowd. Eventually, I'd like to be of the older crowd! I want this club to be around in 40 years so I can sit in the second row and heckle the younger guys and buy 50/50 raffle tickets. But if that is going to happen, then we have to shake things up.

One of the problems I have with the club is that they're very much stuck in the ways they've done things for the past 10 or 15 years. Many of them are far from "embracing" the technical age, though I think most of them do have computers. This keeps the club from being as efficient as it could be.

I have a few partners-in-crime who are a bit older than me, but just as interested in instilling some vim and vigor into the club. We have several ideas we've brought to the attention of the board, but... they don't ever seem to go anywhere. It isn't that they're bad ideas; they're just different than the way things have been done. And it isn't that the board is full of bad people; they're just used to the the way things are. But deep down, I think they do understand the necessity to keep the club current and appealing to new members.

It's interesting to see the mental struggle with some of the officers. They're tired of being in charge. They want to pass on their position to someone else, but most of the older club members don't want to be on the board - they just want to show up, sit in the second row, heckle the younger guys and buy raffle tickets for the 50/50 drawing. The board knows the young guys are the future of the club, but they're not sure about letting us have any kind of control or power. They're afraid of what changes we might initiate.

And with good reason - I'm not really sure how it's happened, but we've lined up one of the younger guys to be the new president. Just as soon as he takes office, we're going to stage a coup on the newsletter (printed out on paper, pretty much a three-page dictation of the previous meeting) and the website and revamp them both, bringing them up to 2008 standards. It'll be XML and PDFs from then on out!

(Can you call it a "coup" if the President is involved?)

Taking over the newsletter will probably fall on my shoulders - it is something the current editor has wanted for several years now (either my hearing is better than they think or their volume control is worse than they think). I've successfully navigated that mine field so far. It isn't that I DON'T want to do it; I do. But I don't want to be tricked into doing it and I don't want to take over the responsibilities of taking dictation on the meeting to reprint into a "newsletter", which is what they want me to do. They also want me to continue sending it out in antiquated form via the US Postal Service.

There are better ways! We can save trees and postage by generating the newsletter in PDF and either sending it to all of the members digitally or just making it available on the website for anyone to peruse. I'll be happy to print out a limited number of newsletters and mail them to anyone who does not have internet access. I think I can help sell this idea by presenting the club with the financials of mailing out 20 newsletters vs. mailing out 150 newsletters

The other major area requiring some work is the website. One of the other younger guys is a website developer - he wants to totally trash the current site and start over from scratch. And he wants to make it more accessible to non-members. That's another road block we're trying to overcome. Some of the current board members think the website should be for members only. The younger crowd thinks the website should be used to attract new members! How can you do that when you can't see what activities are going on with the club? I see a minor need for a smaller, secured portion of the site (member mailing lists, maybe?), but in general it should be open to all, user-friendly, and updated monthly to keep it fresh and new.

This next meeting will be an exciting one. The new president takes over, several other board positions are getting filled with new blood and I get to pull out my big wooden pot-stirring spoon. :)

Wish me luck!

The power of the written word...

Last week, a new smoother found its way to my shop. It will be my sixth workable (I have one or two part-out planes laying about) plane, but being a Bedrock 604 1/2, it currently holds the limelight on my bench. Hopefully, I'll be able to tune it up into a wonderful user.

It actually didn't look too bad upon arrival. A dusty tumble weed, similar to those my youngest cat leaves on the floors, clung tenaciously to the frog adjuster. A coat of grime covered the bed, lever cap, breaker, and iron. The tote looks to be a replacement (either that, or the previous owner figured out some way of using the plane by only gripping the knob because the tote had a clean finish on it while the knob was quite worn). The sole was quite flat, though it could use with a lapping just to clean off some of the grime.

So why are my aspirations so low? Why would I be content with having this wonderful plane as just a "user"? It's one fault - a small, but stable, crack in the left cheek. The patina of the crack leads me to believe it has been there for quite some time.

Regardless of how long it has been there, the crack prevents it from being a serious collector's plane. That means two things to me...

For starters, it meant I was able to pick up a good usable smoothing plane for not a lot of dough. But the other thing it means is that I don't really have to worry about preserving its appearance or messing up its intrinsic value by "restoring" it incorrectly.

I didn't want to do too much to this plane right off the bat. I disassembled it, wiped down most everything with mineral spirits, removed the sticker residue (from the price tag and the indicator showing the crack in the cheek) and scrubbed off the grime with an old soft bristle toothbrush. Next I broke down the iron and chip breaker to check out their condition. They looked good - nothing a little sandpaper and some more mineral spirits wouldn't fix, though I could tell from looking at the blade that it had never been properly tuned.

After removing any gunk from the knob, I wiped on a few quick coats of garnet shellac to bring it back to life and sanded the top of the brass screw caps in the knob and tote to get them shining.

I decided to leave the sides un-lapped for the time being. I'm not sure how much I want to tempt fate by messing with that crack. I actually have yet to lap the sole, though I plan on doing that in the immediate future. I did, however, work on the blade. I started with flattening the back on my 220 DMT diamond stone. Twenty five minutes later, I was still working on flattening the back! I later determined I was able to save enough of the metal filings to reforge them into a spare blade for my block plane...

After most of 40 minutes, I had the back worked up to the 2000 grit water stone and started working on the bezel. That went much faster.

After a final honing on the king water stone, I assembled the plane and pulled out a small board of mahogany to give it a whirl. I still need to mess with it a bit (as previously mentioned, I do want to clean up the sole just a touch), but with very little effort, I was able to get some nice shavings, as you can see...

So I guess you want to know what I paid for it?

This plane was set down on my door step for $47 delivered. Not a bad little deal, if I do say so myself... Looking forward to putting it to good use.

(And much thanks goes to Chris for the quick and sound advice on picking up a sweet deal when I see one.)

(Even more thanks to Clarence for the sweet deal!)

How did I get such a great deal? I wrote some letters. They weren't long letters, and they weren't fantastically brilliant letters, but they were clearly written and to the point. I sent inquiries out to about ten or so tool dealers, letting them know I was in the market for a good user smoother plane and wanted to know if they had anything available that would be useless to a collector but very useful to someone who wanted to actually use it to smooth wood. A week after I sent those letters out, I got the reply from Clarence about my new 604 1/2.

Not a bad result from five minutes of writing...