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Sometimes I end up making things that I don't consider to be overly exciting but needs to be done...
coatrack.jpg


Coatrack for the utility room ;)

Then I needed to move the clamps from the wall as I needed the wall space for something else, plus there wasn't room for the other clamps I want to get so I decided to make a mobile clamp stand, it's not the best looking bit of woodworking in the world but it works and it only sits in the workshop...
clampstand1.jpg

clampstand2.jpg
 
Not in the league of the fine achievements I see every time I visit this thread but nevertheless I finally got around to making the 1st of 2 or 3 cd storage units. All because I have them on a shelf in my small workshop along with 100,s of vinyl albums and singles taking up valuable space .It was a case of using what I had so not perfect . I did however enjoy the whole process from design to construction so here it is …
I made a few mistakes I’m sure you will spot but overall I’m pleased with it. 🤗🤗
Ah found it - I think that's bloody great!! Very nice! You absolutely should be proud of it too!
 
Sometimes I end up making things that I don't consider to be overly exciting but needs to be done...
View attachment 197079

Coatrack for the utility room ;)

Then I needed to move the clamps from the wall as I needed the wall space for something else, plus there wasn't room for the other clamps I want to get so I decided to make a mobile clamp stand, it's not the best looking bit of woodworking in the world but it works and it only sits in the workshop...
View attachment 197080
View attachment 197081
A tip for coat racks is to hide the fixing screws under the hooks.
 
Ah found it - I think that's bloody great!! Very nice! You absolutely should be proud of it too!
Thanks - i, m planning a 2nd but unfortunately a recent worn out clutch has left me £700 lighter so it will likely be a little later this year . 🤗 lots of examples of the members work here and like I said it’s from an across the board of skills and abilities.
 
New desktop made from Iroko. It's had a single coat of Osmo door oil.

I am very happy with it considering it's my first time working g with Iroko.

Designed to go into a corner on wall mounted buttons and a single leg in the right hand front corner.

I'll post an update once it's installed.

IMG-20250201-WA0000.jpeg
 
I’m in the process of swapping vans & as it’s a completely different make I need to make new racking, I’d seen a thread about cheap medical systainers & found someone local selling them for £10 each which I figured was a bargain & ideal to base the new racking around.

The systainers are quite tall so I decided to make ply boxes to fit inside so I could easier access the gear at the bottom of the box, a mate cnc’d me the base of the boxes from a program someone posted on hear, after that it was just a case of cutting the sides to size & running some grooves in the bases.

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I made 12 two for each systainer simply glued & pinned together

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They fit nice & snuggly, I’ve added a simple dowel handle to lift the top box out.

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The systainers are going to sit above the rear wheel arches so I made a start on a unit to hold them.

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I’m trying to keep the weight down as much as possible so it’s made from 60x24mm redwood & ply, this is as far as I’ve got up to present

View attachment 197062

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There’s more to do to get it finished but I think this will work well & eventually hold 4 systainers
Nice work, I bought a bunch of those covid systainers as well, some of my original ones are getting knackered and I need to get organized. I like your rack design, its nicer than the normal plywood slabs.
That might be my drawing, if so glad to see it put to such good use.

Ollie
 
Not quite a Grinling Gibbons but my first attempt at carving …

View attachment 197247
Now I be hoping I can do as well with me own first reliefer.

Will you go further with yours, perhaps with the scrapers and sanders? I like the idea of finished-from-the-gouge-or-knife but, in the spoon & bowl making, I've yet to find such a finish good enough as my techniques with gouge and knife are still in need of improvement. But its also a matter of taste. In fact, some of the bowl carvers seem to make a very smooth from-the-gouge finish then have-at it with a gouge to put 150 gouge scallops in it as decoration.

I'd be interested in your thoughts on what degree of finishing is .... appropriate; best for certain purposes; etc.?
 
Now I be hoping I can do as well with me own first reliefer.

Will you go further with yours, perhaps with the scrapers and sanders? I like the idea of finished-from-the-gouge-or-knife but, in the spoon & bowl making, I've yet to find such a finish good enough as my techniques with gouge and knife are still in need of improvement. But its also a matter of taste. In fact, some of the bowl carvers seem to make a very smooth from-the-gouge finish then have-at it with a gouge to put 150 gouge scallops in it as decoration.

I'd be interested in your thoughts on what degree of finishing is .... appropriate; best for certain purposes; etc.?
It sounds like you are some way ahead of me - other than a bit of chip carving this is my first go. I’m hoping that as my experience builds getting a smooth(er) finish straight off the tool will happen!
 
Robert mouseman thompson embraced the textures created by the tools, tool marks are part of hand made and make pieces individual
 
There's some Mouseman copies in our house, made by one of his apprentices in the same way as the Mouseman made them. All the surfaces are thicknessed and finished with a long handled adze swung between the legs as the worker stands over or on the part being adzed. The adze blade has a very shallow sweep so the surfaces look flat until you see them in a raking light or have a feel at them. A skilled adzer can make very regular scallops that overlap but in a very uniform fashion.

These surfaces look and feel very "real" in a way that flat surfaces don't. Flat is rather unusual in nature; the adzed surfaces are like the surface of a lake that's rippled by the wind.

I'd like to make bowls with a similar but scaled-down surface, given a final wall thickness by using regular in-outs of a shallow-sweep gouge. Here's a rather good vid from Strongway tools in Ukraine that ends up with such a finish.

 
Have you ever heard of a captain's table? No, neither had I.

1738919033320.jpeg


This is the underside, but it is an oval coffee table sized table where all 4 sides fold up into a tray so it can be quickly carried away. Note on the right hand side, I believe at some point the side was turned over, as there are those two small brass hinge supports (which became a small issue later). The only examples of this sort of table I could see online were for sale for around £2,000.

So a client wanted a base made for it, but crucially it could not be fixed to the table as the whole point is that it can be lifted away, so with nothing to refer to and no previous examples to look at, away we go!

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I had recently bought some lengths of recycled oak skirting board/architrave, which I felt would be perfect for the rail, so I cut to length, sanded and (after this photo, obviously) mitred. Because of the tables framing, I had to cut dados at each end and in the middle of the side pieces, and very small dados in one of the end pieces to accommodate the brass hinge supports as well.

Once this was all done it was almost possible to pick up the table top by the rail alone, as the fit was nice and tight.

1738919593308.jpeg


The legs were from another piece of oak I had to hand, this is at dry fit stage. The two legs that were at the hinge support end had to have a small piece taken away to allow for the hinge support to go fractionally beneath them.
I decided that I didn't want any screws etc, so used 4 dowels per leg to fix them to the frame.

1738919724565.jpeg


Staining came next, and i got really close to the original colour with a blend of these two stains, as individually none of my stains (I have quite a few) were close enough. It was important to the client, and to me, that the frame looked the same age as the table top so once applied, I wiped off as much stain as possible to give a aged patina look to it all. I'm very happy with the final result of the staining.

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So here it is, almost finished. Feet to be added, a bit of buffing of the legs (and dusting of the table top) and finally, 50 years after my client's mum bought the table top at auction, it becomes a very interesting and useable coffee table.
 
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Some more use of offcuts from the box project,

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a little shelf for the block plane, the front edge is there to reduce risk of fall during earthquakes.

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This shelf has an orange stripe as I forgot to stop going with the router. This is despite the markings with pencil and tape and a couple of practice runs without being switched on. There was the start of the distraction and I forgot to make the front lip. I will add something later.

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A shelf for the Japanese kanna. I do not know why but I some how managed to mismeasure or cut wrongly nearly every element. The back board came from a kimono cabinet carcass.

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Some under bench holders for some clamps, installed upside down (after making them I decided they were easier to use this way up).

Those little pieces freed up about a metre of shelving space, gives more convenient access to the tools and all were good exercises, even though I graded myself a *D minus*. 😆

The clamp pictured is one of two; I found on the A site for equivalent GBP14. I think they are well designed, good engineering and build and very good value for money. It is a very useful tool, though now I have a whole lot more holes in my workbench.
 
Such trays/tables I have known as Butler's Trays. Jeeves would appear with a footman carrying two elegant trestles upon which he would place in front of the fire or in a corner of the orangery or the terrace and the Butler would place the tray thereon.

'Butler', an Anglicised version of 'Bouttelier', the servant entrusted with drawing, clearing and bottling wine from the barrels in which it was delivered.
 
That's a very nice table. It seems to be a scaled up version of a butler's tray, a thing I've planned to make for, oh, about 25 years but never made. I looked up "Captain's table" and found but one example, which really does look like a scaled up butler's tray, including the inadequate looking supporting stand.

The supporting frame for the tray/table top has always had me somewhat stalled. If you look at the traditional (generally Georgian) examples they seem to have supports that are too flimsy - inclined to develop racking and wobble - because Georgians liked skinny-curvy stuff. I suppose a flimsy underframe might be OK with a butler's tray with one croissant and a small cup of coffee on it but a Captain's table? Surely this would need to be substantial, not to mention immune to the bash from squalls and heeling overs?

Your solution looks far more practical and sturdy to me. Almost A&C Cotswold, me favourite style. I have a prejudice agin' the gadrooning and folderols and flipperty-flapperty skinny things, though, me. :)
 

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There's some Mouseman copies in our house, made by one of his apprentices in the same way as the Mouseman made them. All the surfaces are thicknessed and finished with a long handled adze swung between the legs as the worker stands over or on the part being adzed. The adze blade has a very shallow sweep so the surfaces look flat until you see them in a raking light or have a feel at them. A skilled adzer can make very regular scallops that overlap but in a very uniform fashion.

These surfaces look and feel very "real" in a way that flat surfaces don't. Flat is rather unusual in nature; the adzed surfaces are like the surface of a lake that's rippled by the wind.

I'd like to make bowls with a similar but scaled-down surface, given a final wall thickness by using regular in-outs of a shallow-sweep gouge. Here's a rather good vid from Strongway tools in Ukraine that ends up with such a finish.


If you have an interest in Robert Thompson you will probably enjoy this.



The workshop is a few villages away from where I live and you can watch them at work from a viewing platform using pretty much the same methods. I've not seen anyone wearing a tie or smoking a pipe though!
 
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