Stickley Morris Chair - finished

[Ironballs]

Okay a few jobs here, a few recent ones and one I did a while back but didn't get a photo. First is the underside of the arms, they need a channel routing to so that they can sit on the upper rails for strength and stability, fairly simple job with a router and fence - and I'm now a proper convert to bench cookies

I did the corbels a while back, made a template in mdf and used this to draw on the cut to size rectangular blanks before bandsawing and spindle sanding. Template was used as a reference again when sanding. These just need part of the tenon trimming off once I trial fit the arms

You may recall that I had difficulty getting the legs 100% square when glueing up, well this transferred to the tenons when marking up from the outside face. The result was this set of measurements

I needed to get to 38mm square so out with shoulder plane to trim to size

And a veneer added to one face to add some thickness

As I now know that the mortices in the chair arms are going to be 38mm I could make the mortice caps - a decorative cheat. Made them 0.5mm oversize just in case, so prepared this blank

Fronts were simple and just required angling the tablesaw blade to 9.5 deg and cutting each side against a stop block

And then cut off to the required depth

Rears were a little more complex involving more saw angle (and less) and mitring the cuts to the blade. Pretty dull to follow and even more so to write here, so I'll skip that

Next was the little jig I needed to make to rout the slots in the filler strips for the spindles to go into. There are 4 for the chair and 4 for the stool, each spindle needs to be the exact same distance from the other; the eye will easily spot a difference here. I was all set to try and clamp the pieces together with some mdf cheeks and devise some way to rout equal distances, until I asked Derek the tutor what he would do. He sketched out this jig for me, simple and clever.

MDF base, fixed piece screwed square on one side and a floating piece on the other side that will clamp the strips and act as a base for the router. I then had to rout a first channel and then a second using a thickness block to get the right distance between the channels

Oh and you definitely can't see a third channel, that's just an optical illusion. Certainly not a cock up. Oh no. Leaves me with these channels

One of which I can slot a form of fence into

Strips inserted and first cut has to be lined up by eye from my pencil marks

Then the jig comes into its own and the slot fence fits into the cut I've just made

I then just feed the strips up each time and ensure they're properly aligned

Little instruction to make sure I don't get carried away

And jobs a good un. Last thing for this update, I did say elsewhere that I had something in this project that Rob would really hate.... and here it is

Yep, woodworm holes. A few of the pieces have some old worm holes. In the spirit of economy, character and the way Hank Gilpin uses his timber, I decided that rather than chuck out great figured pieces I'd carry on and retain them and their holes in the piece. Adds a little character I think

Feel free to criticise Rob, I can take it. Go on, punch me in the stomach, hard as you like

:wink:

 

[clogger]

Great work in progress.
Has anybody seen this work in progress of the same chair?
www.finewoodworking.com/morris-chair-video-preview/

 

[Benchwayze]

Great work in progress.
Has anybody seen this work in progress of the same chair?
www.finewoodworking.com/morris-chair-video-preview/

Clogger;

I think your picture-link has been caught by the automatic spam filter, as you are a newbie. After a few posts this 'trap' is sprung and goes away, but if you pm me, I will check the link and post it for you.

Welcome to the forum by the way, and I hope you enjoy this place as much as we do.
regards
John

PS

Seems the link in my 'quote' works. It's fine. Just woodwork-po*n!' Nothing nasty at all! I have seen it myself, but anyone who hasn't will find it interesting.

John

 

[ByronBlack]

Looks like your making good progress IB - on the worm-hole front, I'm with you; keep them in, they add to the piece IMO, and are so small that most people wouldn't see them anyway.

 

[OPJ]

Good to see another Bench Cookie convert (there have been several others, lately! ). Your first image demonstrates another reason why they are excellent - you probably would have had to clear most of your bench first if you were using an ordinary rubber mat! Also, they'll support "any" length, where you may otherwise need to lay a second mat or more. :wink:

 

[woodbloke]

Damian - my compassion on this occasion is unbounded 'cos...

there's woodworm holes in the back panel of this.

However, had there been sap... :lol: - Rob

 

[Benchwayze]

Good to see another Bench Cookie convert (there have been several others, lately! ). Your first image demonstrates another reason why they are excellent - you probably would have had to clear most of your bench first if you were using an ordinary rubber mat! Also, they'll support "any" length, where you may otherwise need to lay a second mat or more. :wink:

I had to Google 'Bench Cookie' Olly! Never heard the phrase before.

I missed out there. Somewhere, I have some 10mm thick MDF circles; the waste from a hole-saw project I did some years ago. I used them as 'cookies' and also as coasters! They are probably down the back of my bench, where I can't reach anymore. (Number One Son will move the bench for me one day!) :lol:

But I have often cut up scrap into small squares when I want to lift a job clear of the bench. I guess it's because 'Hard-tack' biscuits in the Navy were always square! :wink:

John

 

[OPJ]

John, you can make pretty good 'imitation' cookies from discs of MDF and bits of rubber matting (Andy King did this in Good Woodworking a few months ago). But, the mesh on the cookies is much finer and doesn't appear to mark the work in the same way that an 'oily' mat can when you're sanding. £10.95 for a pack of four isn't bad, really (even if the Yanks get a free mug or T-shirt...! :roll: ).

 

[Benchwayze]

Thanks Olly...

Sadly there wouldn't be a 'T' shirt to fit me! :lol:

I use one of those mesh mats sometimes. But my routing I usually do in overhead mode on the router-rack.

So I think the BCs would lie idle a lot. But it's worth thinking about!
regards
John

 

[wizer]

Nothing wrong with woodworm. I recently saw woodworm holes being dremmeled into white painted MDF panels. :shock: I'm not kidding either! :wink:

 

[Ironballs]

Okay, a few weeks since the last update but I have been busy getting some fiddly jobs done, I'm getting to the stage where we're close to dry fits and final fettling. In other words, slow progress

A bit of fettling arrived at this little pile for the stool

And a couple of dry fit ups to check

All pretty much cock on

Also got to the same point with the chair back

Had to trim and fit the mortice inserts for the spindles, still a weak point in the design with these plans IMO and I think I'd do it differently next time. It wasn't the time saving trick they claimed it would be. Anyroad, glued 'em in

As mentioned before I'd decided to fume the oak to give the darker colour before finishing, all new territory for me but I had some fun browsing reagent.co.uk and looking at all the evil chemicals available just a click away. Eventually settled on this stuff

Thought it best to break out these as well

The mask deals with most of the fumes but it doesn't stop vapour hitting your eyes and it really does make them water if you get a faceful. Must be said though, not unlike old cat litter if you've let your cleaning regime slip...

Next job was to build a fuming cabinet, simple pine frame resting on a MDF base (not attached)

A trip to B&Q to get some clear, thick polythene proved fruitless at first. They only had the thin decorators stuff and asking the assistant was no good, ascertained I wanted polythene, I re-iterated it had to be clear, he then took me to a shelf and pointed at some black DPC and asked if that would do. So I stabbed him through the neck with a small Philips and left him gurgling in a pool of his own blood and carried on. Luckily I found a big ball of clear poly in a bin that had been used to wrap some stock, so swiped that and in the best tradition of Bodgit & Fixit arrived at this

Got out a couple of tupperware sarnie boxes and put in enough ammonia to just cover the base and placed these pieces in the fuming cabinet with them to see what happened

Two and a half hours later and this was the result. I deliberately used a piece with some sap on to see what the effect would be, quite striking really and shows that the sap has almost no tannic acid. For comparison there is an unfumed spindle shown as well

And in direct sunlight

I then spent a vast amount of time doing the remaining cleaning up jobs and then onto planing, scraping and sanding. Now have a right arm like Glenn Quagmire from Family Guy after he discovered internet porn. Also found out how long it takes the thermal cut out to kick in on the old Dyson when using it with the Abranet - about 15 mins non-stop.

Bit behind with my pictures but do have this of one end of the stool glued up. Stool is now fully glued up so will have to get a picture of that

Had to glue and screw the cleats for the base of the stool and for some reason I decided I needed to polish the screw heads. Don't know why as they won't be seen

Need to make a lot of dowel for the joints so this will be getting some hammer - literally

Will be spending some time with the tutor as well as some pegs need turning; so tomorrow I'll be doing a bit of turning at class and then going home to shower and scrub myself clean and pretend it never happened.

 

[Oryxdesign]

Nothing wrong with woodworm. I recently saw woodworm holes being dremmeled into white painted MDF panels. :shock: I'm not kidding either! :wink:

There real they are, blinking hard to get them to eat mdf :lol: especially in such a selective manner.

 

[OPJ]

So I stabbed him through the neck with a small Philips and left him gurgling in a pool of his own blood and carried on.

Is your real name Jack Bauer?!?

Looking good though. Th fuming appears to have worked quite well. Is that dark enough for what you want or are you going to try and darken it some more?

I also see your doing your mortises the true Arts & Crafts way, with the use of spacers... Is any easier than cutting a series of mortises? I can't see any real benefit to it.

 

[TrimTheKing]

Liking this, more pics

 

[Ironballs]

Okay, a bit more progress. I did say that I had glued up the stool and so here it is

Most of the jobs from here on in are little finishing items, fettling and trimming etc. Such as fitting up the fake through tenon covers, straight at the front and angled at the rear

Jobs a good un

Then I glued in the corbels, the rears required an angle putting in. Disk sander job

You'll recall that last weekend was the hottest of the year so far, on the list of things not to do in a warm garage when it's boiling are making oak dowel with a dowelling plate. Sweat tacular

This meant that there was now no putting off a glue up and it has to be said that this was one of the most awkward/difficult glue ups I've done. All those spindles were a nightmare, though luckily I had an assistant. However, near the end of the job my assistant said I was one spindle short, assumed we had just glued one too few but in actuality I had 16 spindles and 17 holes. Balls. Swiped a spindle from the other side, but of course this would leave me 2 short on the other side. Don't know how I managed to make an extra hole but maybe it was subconscious as it looks much better and more balanced with 17. Just the other side to do

I did mention I had to do some turning, I'd just like to make this clear it's a means to an end Fairly simple, make the pivot and adjustment pins which are a shaft and a larger head with rounded end. Even I could cope with this. The only bit I really enjoyed was using the big gouge thing that shifts waste at speed and up in the air. These were the result

Which after some cleaning up looked like this

I had glued the back up previously so now had to mark up and then drill the holes for the pins. I tried various drill bits in some scrap, I didn't have a forstner of the right size as my dowel so thought a lip and spur would do. Results were average, some holes good, others a bit oval. Played around with a few other bits and some other forstners but then realised that what I needed was a forstner of the right size as getting this finishing touch wrong could trash the piece. So added a 10mm Clico forstner to my Axminster basket and off I went, more expensive but worth the expense.

Trimmed my dowel down to slightly too long and then fitted into my lovely round holes, bit of glue round the edges of the hole but none on the dowel to try and avoid glue squeeze out. Little tap in and away we go

Did all the pins on the stool, so will be trimming and then finishing tomorrow. Plus glue up of the other side of the chair...............

 

[slemishwoodcrafts]

Very impressed with how this is coming along, its something i've aways wanted to build. Looking forward to see how it turns out.


Off topic, i can't help noticing the exhausts in the above picture. Can ask what sort of car it is?

Michael

 

[OPJ]

It must be nice to have it all glued up, at last. I did my chair this week and, despite using Titebond Extend (which is supposed to give you 15-20 minutes... ), at college, it was starting to go off in less than ten minutes! :shock:

Only thing I might have done would've been to pre-finish/ebonise the spindles before gluing them in. Hope it doesn't give you too much bother when you come to finishing those edges, later.

For that amount of dowelling I probably would've bought in a longer length or made them on the router table! :wink:

Looking very good, though. You really have got some nice oak, there.

 

[Ironballs]

The exhaust is the side pipe from my Cobra V8 kit car, lovely car but really gets in the way when you're trying to do big glue ups. Also currently for sale as I have a TVR itch to scratch

If you have the time and inclination then I'd give this project a go, most of it is straightforward mortice and tenon, you just need to be accurate with your marking and cutting - and don't under estimate just how much oak it consumes :shock:

Olly you're right about glue up times in this weather, it's a nightmare. Thankfully I got the other side glued up tonight so tomorrow I can glue the two halves together. Have started to throw some finish on the stool, pegs and chair back, looking really good but oiling the spindles is a faff

 

[slemishwoodcrafts]

I thought perhaps it was a kit car. Would love to drive a V8 cobra, will need to stick to my golf however until the student loan is paid off!!

I made a mission style coffee table, similar sort of design with the spindles. I found the spindles the most challenging part, however after taking time and care it was a considerable reward to see it finished.

Michael

 

[Ironballs]

Tis a good car the Cobra, even though it's only the Rover 3.5 V8, with those side pipes I've still managed to set off a couple of car alarms when going past parked cars. I'm just a ten year old at heart