hivisvest72
Established Member
Well here's my first post in the "workshop tours and projects" forum – I've read with interest a load of other people's posts and thought I'd submit one of my own.
Firstly a quick tour around my workshop.
I'm hoping that a few pics and a description of my modest setup will serve as encouragement to those of us (me included) who look in envy at some of the setups of other members with Norm Abram-like space and equipment.
In terms of equipment, I've bought a couple of 'Perform' branded items, a couple of Axminster white branded stuff, plus the odd purchase from Aldi (for which I probably ought to burn in h3ll).
In relation to the Aldi stuff – there's no doubt you get what you pay for, but if it's all you can afford then it's better than nothing – you just need to learn to work with it and perhaps not expect 100% accuracy etc.
Since my space is limited (little larger than a single garage) I have no option but to take the bigger machines out and set them up (stabilise on floor, connect dust extraction, fences, outfeed etc) as and when I need them. It can be really frustrating if you only want to make 1 cut or pass – but it does lead to me working out all my cuts, doing as much as I can in one go, then doing assembly as a separate operation. It also leads me to sometimes take shortcuts and use hand tools when I can't be bothered digging all the machinery out for one cut – has it's pros and cons too of course.
The white PVC pipe you can see running along one of the walls in the garage is my multi-point dust extraction system - one end plugged into my perform extractor, and two or three ports along the pipe where I can fit in a variety of hoses to attach to various power tools. To prevent loss of suction, I used end caps on the unused ports - all easily swappable and flexible to cover all my tools (and very cheap to install).
In the workshop I have a thicknesser, a Perform jointer/planer, fretsaw, Aldi bandsaw (small but I've found it adequate so far), basic table saw, morticer, pillar drill, router table (Dakota, I think from Rutlands) with a B&Q router installed (because it was cheap, easy to change bits, and has a twisty knob underneath that I can use to find tune depth easily).
I also have a variety of power tools (biscuit jointer, 3 or 4 types of sanders, couple of cordless drills, jigsaw – plus a wide range of the usual hand tools.
Onto my project then…
My project is a birthday present for my mother – both she and I are from the Shetland Isles originally and I've made her a "Shetland chair" – a particular style of design that dates back to the practice in the old days of using any old crates or driftwood that washed up to build furniture.
I did my initial design in Sketchup (which I was just learning to use – I find compound angles etc really difficult to get across into the 3-d). This was enough to give me the basic seat and legs structure and was a handy tool to ensure that the proportions looked right before I started ordering timber and cutting away.
Importantly it does not have the boxed sides and top that are a key feature of a Shetland chair, but I was confident that it would be easier to add these when I could measure directly off the part-finished chair during the build so I didn't waste time doing them in Sketchup.
I deliberately used cheap pine (planed, from local timber yard) and again deliberately based my design on standard sizes available (so I didn't waste wood planing it down to width). This saved me so much prep time. I was also determined not to use any mechanical fixings – just glue and wooden joints – which I accomplished as you'll see later.
First few steps:
Prepare the legs/back lengths – using a kind of long finger joint, and glued up
Then cut mortice and tenons in all the lower pieces
Dry-fitted legs and supports together, held with band clamp.
This allowed me to cut seat to correct size – why trust sketchup when I can measure the actual wood itself!
You may notice that I originally had through tenons coming up from the front leg into each arm - I had intended to then put a contrasting wedge in from the top, but couldn't get the angles and sizes of the arms and mortice hole worked out, so ended up just chopping the tenon off and attaching the arms with dowels and angling them in towards the back, which I think turned out much nicer.
With the seat attached I then glued the whole assembly together (although have left the seat floating to avoid any issues with wood movement).
Before I glued it, I routed channels in all the necessary stock to accept the tongue and groove.
From here started attaching the sides and back, using 22mm stock and T&G strips.
The top was the last piece to go on, which holds all the vertical stock and T&G in place.
The back supports add a bit of strength to the T&G
I finished it with several coats of inexpensive clear varnish (I must investigate oils and waxes some day).
The recipient was very happy with her gift.
I've made a fair number of furniture pieces now and smaller items (you can see them on my own website: http://www.alanhill.co.uk) but I'm proud of this one, sure there are bits that I'd improve upon but overall I'm very happy.
I'd welcome any comments good or bad, ideas or tips for future projects (but go easy on me, my first project posting on here!).
Anyway, hope you find something in here of interest.
Alan
Firstly a quick tour around my workshop.
I'm hoping that a few pics and a description of my modest setup will serve as encouragement to those of us (me included) who look in envy at some of the setups of other members with Norm Abram-like space and equipment.
In terms of equipment, I've bought a couple of 'Perform' branded items, a couple of Axminster white branded stuff, plus the odd purchase from Aldi (for which I probably ought to burn in h3ll).
In relation to the Aldi stuff – there's no doubt you get what you pay for, but if it's all you can afford then it's better than nothing – you just need to learn to work with it and perhaps not expect 100% accuracy etc.
Since my space is limited (little larger than a single garage) I have no option but to take the bigger machines out and set them up (stabilise on floor, connect dust extraction, fences, outfeed etc) as and when I need them. It can be really frustrating if you only want to make 1 cut or pass – but it does lead to me working out all my cuts, doing as much as I can in one go, then doing assembly as a separate operation. It also leads me to sometimes take shortcuts and use hand tools when I can't be bothered digging all the machinery out for one cut – has it's pros and cons too of course.
The white PVC pipe you can see running along one of the walls in the garage is my multi-point dust extraction system - one end plugged into my perform extractor, and two or three ports along the pipe where I can fit in a variety of hoses to attach to various power tools. To prevent loss of suction, I used end caps on the unused ports - all easily swappable and flexible to cover all my tools (and very cheap to install).
In the workshop I have a thicknesser, a Perform jointer/planer, fretsaw, Aldi bandsaw (small but I've found it adequate so far), basic table saw, morticer, pillar drill, router table (Dakota, I think from Rutlands) with a B&Q router installed (because it was cheap, easy to change bits, and has a twisty knob underneath that I can use to find tune depth easily).
I also have a variety of power tools (biscuit jointer, 3 or 4 types of sanders, couple of cordless drills, jigsaw – plus a wide range of the usual hand tools.
Onto my project then…
My project is a birthday present for my mother – both she and I are from the Shetland Isles originally and I've made her a "Shetland chair" – a particular style of design that dates back to the practice in the old days of using any old crates or driftwood that washed up to build furniture.
I did my initial design in Sketchup (which I was just learning to use – I find compound angles etc really difficult to get across into the 3-d). This was enough to give me the basic seat and legs structure and was a handy tool to ensure that the proportions looked right before I started ordering timber and cutting away.
Importantly it does not have the boxed sides and top that are a key feature of a Shetland chair, but I was confident that it would be easier to add these when I could measure directly off the part-finished chair during the build so I didn't waste time doing them in Sketchup.
I deliberately used cheap pine (planed, from local timber yard) and again deliberately based my design on standard sizes available (so I didn't waste wood planing it down to width). This saved me so much prep time. I was also determined not to use any mechanical fixings – just glue and wooden joints – which I accomplished as you'll see later.
First few steps:
Prepare the legs/back lengths – using a kind of long finger joint, and glued up
Then cut mortice and tenons in all the lower pieces
Dry-fitted legs and supports together, held with band clamp.
This allowed me to cut seat to correct size – why trust sketchup when I can measure the actual wood itself!
You may notice that I originally had through tenons coming up from the front leg into each arm - I had intended to then put a contrasting wedge in from the top, but couldn't get the angles and sizes of the arms and mortice hole worked out, so ended up just chopping the tenon off and attaching the arms with dowels and angling them in towards the back, which I think turned out much nicer.
With the seat attached I then glued the whole assembly together (although have left the seat floating to avoid any issues with wood movement).
Before I glued it, I routed channels in all the necessary stock to accept the tongue and groove.
From here started attaching the sides and back, using 22mm stock and T&G strips.
The top was the last piece to go on, which holds all the vertical stock and T&G in place.
The back supports add a bit of strength to the T&G
I finished it with several coats of inexpensive clear varnish (I must investigate oils and waxes some day).
The recipient was very happy with her gift.
I've made a fair number of furniture pieces now and smaller items (you can see them on my own website: http://www.alanhill.co.uk) but I'm proud of this one, sure there are bits that I'd improve upon but overall I'm very happy.
I'd welcome any comments good or bad, ideas or tips for future projects (but go easy on me, my first project posting on here!).
Anyway, hope you find something in here of interest.
Alan
