Help with fanlight window

[Russ]

I need to take out an old sliding garden door and make a double door with frame/fanlight. Just scratching my head on the best way to make the arched top (250 x 60 cm) I plan on marking the profile onto some old ply but need some insight on how to make the arch

The door will be painted and I plan on using iroko, or should I consider an alternative. Sorry, but exterior work is something that I have no experience
with and the customer knows this but still insists that I go ahead and make it.

Cheers

Russ

 

[laird]

Can you not use (i.e.) oak and just steam it? Similar shape to a boat rib that I've made this way. (I can't comment on how iroko steams as I've never used it. Larch, beech, oak, pine yes. Iroko, no.)

 

[Night Train]

You can make it in jointed sections. Maybe build up the shape with overlapping thinner sections in a brick work pattern. You could also laminate it out of thin strips.

 

[joiner_sim]

I would have said over-lap the sections as well, to make up the arch. I'm sending you a PM with some photos of the fanlights/ arches I have done in the past.

 

[JonnyD]

I would build up the top section arch in 4 pieces. 2 uprights either side and 2 pieces which meet in the middle. To join these it would be best to use a large loose tenon which is pegged together. The groove for the loose tenon could be cut on either the spindle if you have big enough tooling or mortised out on the mortiser or overhead on the saw with a suitable jig.

It would be easier to keep things square for cutting the joints and shape after it has been glued together.

I have never painted iroko but i imagine it would be best to degrease the surface and use a zinc primer.

Jon

 

[Russ]

Thanks guys!!

Each day you learn something new

Just watched this on youtube ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dg7mWlRHJw ) think I'll give it a try next sunday, just to keep my son entertained..

Russ

 

[laird]

I've used a tube of polythene, wood inside, wall paper steamer sealed onto the tube at one end, other end open. Put timber on two (or more) bits of anything to keep it out of the condensate (if any, a good steamer just fills the tube with steam.)
Or an old length of cast iron down pipe, complete with bend on one end. Mount pipe at an angle, fill bend with water, wood in top (wedged clear of the water) Portable gas heater under the bend to boil the water.
Either way about one hour per inch thickness.
Enjoy

 

[Night Train]

Steam bending is fairly easy.

This is an old video of me at college as a student steam bending a pair of cherry legs for my chair project. The mad bashing with the mallet is because I didn't allow for the timber expanding too much to fit in the socket I made at the end of the jig. It was my first time and I had to help make the new steamer to do the job.
I had my tutor and a fellow student helping get the cramps on before it cooled too much.

The steamer was made from a wall paper stripper and a length of 200mm bore yellow gas pipe we 'procured' from the gas contractors working outside the college.

I have the other end of the gas pipe for my own steamer though it isn't set up at the moment.

The finished chair is this one.