360" of housing dados in progress by hand tools for Becksvoort's 15 drawer chest

 Little by little (summer has other obligations) I've been working on Beckvoort's 15 drawer chest.  From a construction perspective, it contains a lot of housing dados.  I sat down and added them up and came up with a total of 360".  That's 30 feet!  I like making housing dados by hand with a chisel & mallet and then a router hand plane to get the bottom flat.  I am keeping track of the hours so I will have an update when it is done.  The dado's are 1/2" wide by 1/4" deep.  I say half inch wide but I custom fit the width to the specific piece so it is a tight fit.

One of the side boards developed a bow while cutting the dados.  It's most likely due to some stresses in the wood.  Wood is organic and it can move.  The bow is 5/32" over four feet.  I am almost certain I will be able to clamp it out.  I am not worried about it.  A few years back, I would have been.  I guess I've just done enough bigger things at this point and have a feeling what can and can't be tolerated.  We shall see on the dry clamping.  If it doesn't clamp out, I will deal with it then.  All of the layout was done prior to the bow so that is working in my favor.

In Becksvoort's piece (image of final piece from the Becksvoort's Lost Art Press book Shaker Inspiration - well worth purchasing in my opinion), he uses sliding dovetails.  I'm guessing since the sliding dovetails are on both sides, it was likely done with a machine router.  I don't own one and I haven't yet practiced making sliding dovetails by hand.  I didn't want this to be the piece to practice this on.  As such, to add some mechanical permeance to the side joinery to the bottom and midway through, I am using a through wedged tenon.  I like this joint and have used it on the back of drawers.  I don't need to worry about the top as this is dovetailed in and as such is not as reliant on glue.  I am sure the glue would be more than adequate.  However, I do like to have some joinery that is mechanical in nature so that when the glue fails in 200 years, something else is keeping it together.

Little by little I am getting there.  Given the number of pieces to be involved in the glue up of the case, I will likely do it stepwise rather than all at once (too stressful).  I've been thinking my way through how to do it best.  By best I mean easy.  Given I am a hobbyist, speed of glue up isn't important.  If it takes me a week (or even two) to get the carcass glued up, it doesn't matter.  I'm at least two months out if I had to guess before I will get there.  Lots of other things to do other than housing dados before I can glue up the case.  I am very much enjoying this build.  Wish I could spend a bit more time on it each week but am balancing all the other responsibilities in my life.  All good problems.

What's Old is New Again - Transitioning from Premium to Vintage Tools

 When I started woodworking in 2016, I really knew very little and lacked a lot of confidence.  Yet, money was tight as well.  I didn't want to use vintage tools as they might have needed to be tuned up and I simply had not idea how to do that.  I wanted tools that would work so if there was an issue, it was me and not the tool.  I decided to go with vintage tools and sold my beloved 1990 5.0 L 5 speed LX Mustang to make it happen.  

LieNielsen once a year comes to the San Francisco Bay Area and puts on a tool show and has other vendors.  What I really like is that the instructors there, from and hired by Lie Nielsen, don't push the tools.  They let you use them and answer any questions you have.  As such, there is a lot of teaching at these events.  The byproduct is that folks but tools.  I left with a solid set of tools the first year.  I confirmed I really wanted to woodwork as much as I thought I did.  I went back in subsequent years and have bought more tools.  Their tools work well and I was happy I was woodworking.  

So why, 7 years into woodworking am I changing?  It all has to do this inexpensive No 4 Craftsman plane I bought from Hyperkitten about 3 years (dates are a bit fuzzy in my mind) into my woodworking.  I put it on a shelf and six months or a year later I finally got around to getting it ready for use.  It cost $25 or $30 and it looked like it was basically never used.  The plan was to camber the blade to use it as the initial plane to remove the bulk of the wood and then use the LieNielsen tools.  By doing this, I could preserve the sharpness of the planes that take the final shavings.

I did this (and still do this) approach.  It works well.  As such, the lowly No 4 Craftsman plane has touched just about every project.  Also, it probably gets more use in my hand that my other planes.  At some point, due to frequent use, I started to like this Craftsman No 4.  It went from like to love to it being my favorite hand plane.  If the garage were on fire and I could only grab one hand tool, this Craftsman No 4 would be it.  I'm quite serious about this.  Some of the things I became to like was its lighter weight than my premium planes.  I liked the simply O1 tool steel and thinner blade.  The plane worked very well.  As best I can tell, just as well as my premium hand planes.  I mean this.  Oh, no doubt the Lie Nielsen is more refined and has tighter tolerances.  However, the shavings and surface on the wood is the same for both. 

This has gotten me to think, if I like this vintage plane so much, how about other vintage tools?  Well, over the years, between HyperKitten (best place I think to buy good user tools), Jim Bode, Timeless Tools and Treasures, and EBay, I have built up a collection of vintage tools.  I'm not sure why I bought them (other than to have them) as at the time I had no intention of using them.  If some of the greatest furniture ever has been made with vintage tools, what would I discover by using them myself.  So, I have decided to use vintage tools. How vintage is vintage?  

I'm going to go with what I have right now.  The Stanley hand planes and the Marple chisels are likely 1930s (a guess as I'm not an expert).  As for the saws, the Disson dovetail saw is from 1850 and the others are in the range of 70 to 100 years old.  I prepared the backside and sharpened the chisels.  I took apart the No 5 and No 3 hand planes, flattened the soles, flattened the back of the blade and sharpened it.  I prefer using my No 4 Craftsman with a highly cambered blande, then No 5 to get all straight then No 3 to smooth.  As for the hand saws, Tim Plavin for reasonable fees sharpened and set up the ones I had and purchased some other vintage ones I needed.

I'm all set and have started using these tools.  No, I'm not selling my LieNielsens as I like them.  Also, I'm not replacing everything I have as that would be expensive.  Over time, maybe a switch to woodie hand planes, maybe I stick with the vintage ones I have, maybe I go back to the LieNielsens.  For now, I just want to use the vintage ones I have and see what I think about them.  So far, I like them but I will use them for a year or two and then see what I think.  That Craftsman No 4 didn't win me overnight and I want time to see what I think of these.  I'm guessing I will probably like them very much.

For One Board, I Will Do It by Hand

 As part of the initial stages of the build for Becksvoort's 15 drawer chest, I need to thin down my 7/8" thick wood.  When I had a lot of boards to do, I used a planer.  I could have used the one I own (DeWalt 735).  However, I had access (because I was taking a class) to the Mount Diablo's Adult Education woodshop.  They have nice tools.  I think it took me all of 20 minutes to get this wood to desired thickness.  It would have taken many hours by hand and I wouldn't have enjoyed that much work.

Having said that, it doesn't mean I won't or don't want to thickness by hand.  I like being able to confirm from time to time that I can indeed do it by hand.  I just want to have a ton of donkey work to do.  As I was cutting up the boards, I realized that I needed to glue up some boards to get to the desired thickness.  No problem in doing that.  However, one of the boards I needed to use (for a different stash of wood I hadn't planed to use for this project) was 1/16" wider that the rest.  I could have wheeled out my DeWalt 735 but for one board, that seemed like a hassle.  As such, I did it by hand.  Took all of 20 minutes by hand.  I don't think between getting the DeWalt 735 out, hooked up to dust collection, running the piece, and putting everything back in place would have been much faster.  Plus, I got some good exercise.  As such, sometimes doing it by hand (for one board in this case) is just as quick.  For the initial batch of boards, hands down using the mahine was faster and appreciated.  To me it isn't either or for woodworking.  I do mostly prefer to use hand tools but will use machines when it makes sense or suits me.  Having said that, I really only have three machines in my garage, a band saw, planer, and mortiser (for if I have a lot to do).  A dril press is really the only other tool I think I want to get.  Time will tell.