Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Woodworking 103 (2) and Weather

Terry just left for Savannah, GA and her mid-year SAGA meeting of the executive board. She's driving down in her little yellow Aveo. Normally such a meeting is held in the home territory of the president (that would be Terry) but due to our somewhat remote location ("out in the boonies" some might say) and the winter weather conditions of north-central PA, they opted to hold their confab in Savanna where it will be a balmy 70 degrees later this week.

Meanwhile, it was back into the single digits on the thermometer here at the Aerie this morning. It was a mere 7 degrees at 7 AM with clouds scooting out of the north at a fair clip. Luckily that hasn't translated into much of a surface wind...yet. Could be worse. It's only around 3 degrees at one of the farms near the Bolt Hole. And, since it's usually colder at the BH, it's probably below zero there.

Yesterday morning's temperature was in the very low teens but rose all the way up to 23 degrees at 2 PM. And we had sunshine, too. Must not have been very warm sunshine, however. Plus the winds were blowing around 20 mph. Not exceptionally strong, but very, very steady and that made it feel a good deal colder when I went out to fill the bird feeders.



I picked up a 1/8 inch round over bit for the router. Of course, Arnot only carries the best brand (Freud) so it cost me. But, being carbide tipped, it should last me a long, long time.

I ran all the long slats through the router to round off the upper edges. and then laid them out to be glued up. That's when the fun started.

Most of my clamps are for lumber that's a little bit larger than 1/4 inch thick and 7/8 inch wide.

Take a large piece of corrugated cardboard (no more than 1/4 inch thick) and cut it into 1 inch wide strips. Now place five of these strips side to side and begin applying pressure to squeeze them together. They'll buckle upward in no time at all.

What I need is something of a two-way glue assembly jig. One that will keep everything nice and flat while I put pressure on the strips from the outer edge to get them to stick together. At the same time, I do not want to use an excess amount of glue because it will seep into the nice decorative groove created by the 1/8 inch round over bit.

I know exactly what the jig should look like--a little like a plant press only very narrow, but I do not recall ever having seen one before in the magazines or catalogs. I'll need four carriage bolts, washers, nuts (wing buts would be best) and four pieces of very straight and smooth hardwood....mmmm.

Be back later.

W

No comments: