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Sorry for the long gap between articles. I could say I’ve been busy, but the truth is I’ve been vegetating. With that out of the way, let’s get into it.

This time I’m tackling the front frame. Normally you’d add one to hide the exposed edges of the plywood. My reason is different. I want to carve some leaves into it, so here it’s purely decoration.

I skip the tape measure. I hold each piece against the bookcase and mark it with a knife where it needs cutting. On the first side that’s directly below the top moulding. After cutting, it’s a perfect fit. I repeat the same thing on the opposite side.

Then I lay both pieces on the bench and carve the leaves. I don’t lay them out first, I just cut them by eye. I carve them fairly deep because I apply stain with a rag, and a rag skips over the carved out areas. They stay the natural colour of the wood while the surface takes the stain, and that contrast of dark and light is what gives the frame its Spanish, Andalusian look.

I now finish the top and bottom by repeating the same method as I did on the sides. Once all four are carved, I glue and clamp them to the bookcase. The frame is wider than the thickness of the bookcase sides, so it leaves a lip. That lip is where the arched panel will attach, which you’ll see later in the project.

Because it’s softwood, 30 minutes or so is enough for the glue to grab. After that I nail the frame and putty the nail holes. I could have left the glue to cure overnight, but I wanted to get it done.

Next up, I’ll make a small moulding that sits directly below the top moulding.

from yesterday

This was the last thing I did in the shop before I killed the lights yesterday. 1/8" plywood I have learned is more than sufficient for a box of this size.

hmm......

Put the Soss hinges in and checked the swing and how much clearance there was. It is basically 2 frog hairs and beveling either the lid or the box wouldn't help. The hinges are too close the edge - the bevel would eat into the hinge holes.

I was going to make a new lid with the hinge mortises inset further in away from the edge. That plan went south on the express in a hurry so I stuck with what I got.

flushing the bottom

Sawed off most of the bottom overhang before planing and sanding it flush. I paid attention this time to make sure I wasn't throwing it out of square again. The front edge was bit on the wonky side. There was a hump in the middle with the left side corner square but the right one was out to lunch. Some things you just let go because it still looks good.

signature look

I went back and forth about beveling the back and in the end I didn't. With the hinge mortises so close to the edge the bevel of the top might have exposed them. I didn't want to chance being wrong or right about that.

can you see it

Made a small finger grabbie thing on the underside of the lid. Opening and closing the lid as is without would have worked but this only took a minute a whack out. 

a real big sigh

I didn't go postal on this and just excepted it. I put the grabbie thing on the wrong edge. I did it there because that is where I had the center of the back edge marked. After looking at it I decided it was for the best because the grabbie thing looked like crap against the bevel. It looked too thin and looked like a big me-steak.

new lid upcoming

I had three pieces of pine to choose from and picked the one that had most straightest grain. All of them had swirls and cathedrals that looked too busy.

ran out of gas

I'll finish the new lid in the AM or PM. The other box is still waiting for its turn at the workbench.

Had a terrible night last night trying to sleep. I had been coughing continually all day long and it didn't slow down when I hit the rack. I would cough, it would stop, I would fall asleep, and then I would wake up coughing. Wash, rinse, and repeat all night long. This was something new as before this I would wake up and then I would cough a minute or so after. Now I was waking up coughing.

I finally said No Mas and went vertical and instantly felt like crap. All morning long I felt like a carpet that had the snot beaten out of it. Didn't even entertain any thoughts of wandering down to the shop. Feeling like this sucked pond scum where I just wanted to take nap. The nap wasn't happening because the coughing just would not stop. Hoping that this is just a another bad day that it will be better in the AM.

accidental woodworker 

Joshua Farnsworth Teaches the "10 Steps to Hand Planing for Beginners" Basic Crash Course to get you Hand Planing ASAP! Summary: How to Beginners use a Hand Plane? Hand planing is the process of using a sharp woodworking hand plane to remove controlled amounts of wood.

It takes time to develop your workspace . . . to establish the version you've created in one or more places and reestablish it in a new one if that's what you have to do. What I have learned through the decades is that being different to be yourself is mostly all that matters. I haven't had a series of machines adjacent to my workbench since I lived in the USA. That's almost 20 years. I mainly had the half a dozen machines to mill wood for my classes of 16 students who need upwards of fifty sticks of wood to make their projects from. I rely solely on a single 14" bandsaw now. It takes a two-foot by two-foot footprint with a dust extractor next to it. We all make choices good or bad and need to live with them either way. I'm looking for something more in my life than machine cutting every stick and stem. I'm still evolving as a woodworker and each day seems to be a decision day. What excess do I need or want to get rid of next?

Being aged 77 on January and having yet still my steady hands, good eyesight and no aches or pains anywhere in my body is mostly down to lifestyle and healthy choices in food, exercising and especially my work. Every healthcare professional I meet with now that I am old ask me the same questions. "How long have you been retired?" and then, secondly, "How many units of alcohol do you take in a week?" I usually say something smart like I retired in 1965 when I started woodworking for a living or let's try how many units of alcohol I consume in a year. I have never really cared for alcohol and certainly never needed it for anything, and my work is physical activity because, well, I'm a manual worker.

The electrician told me how many metres of wires it has taken to wire the workshop I will soon work in and then the office area for video processing our work, but we did the job top-notch for longevity and each of the guys exemplifies excellence in every area of workmanship with the most excellent work ethic.

Woodworking is a lifestyle for me. I've integrated into all of my daily activity by visiting woodlands, harvesting trees, creating pieces large and small and making my living from selling what I made. More latterly I have taught others to work with wood using hand tools and converted one or two from machining wood to become more hand tool oriented. These life choices have made me contented and fairly healthy too. But don't get me wrong. There's nothing wrong with machining wood and owning machines. Let's just not confuse the two very different entities as one and the same. No, no, no.

It looks less than it is currently with the plasterwork dried out now and a lot more work done. Just hate waltzing around their workspace with my phone out.

Joseph and I were able to hang the two lighting tracks that hold our fuller lighting rigs. We are aiming for a free floor space with flexibility. Because we have insulated for noise and temperature control, we have air control and filtering for fresh air. This is not just a woodworking workshop but a space for half a dozen other creatives to deliver.

Moving workshops these last few months and having been settled for the last seven years has been difficult for me. Even though we replicated my temporary space as closely as possible to the one I have been in since 2019, there has been a kind of creeping occupation I could very much live without. What I had prior to this was a wholly evolved workspace I finally felt matched my best shot at a domestic home workshop with the practicality of making anything I want from wood using hand tools. So, by 'domestic' I mean a workshop space that I could make just about anything needed for a home or office in in reasonable comfort. And remember, please, I just made the last hundred and more furniture pieces in a space the size of a single car UK (not USA) garage, so that is roughly 5 metres by 3.3 metres, so 16 feet by 11. Of course, we have other things that take up space; a pair of stepladders, saw horses, work support, wood, the list is endless.

The curved path took longer than a straight one, but it definitely enhanced the final appearance. Raised beds are now in since this pic was taken and soon the turf will cover the earth again. Can't wait!

Though missing my work zone proper, I have been enjoying getting on with other things. Being on-site, the builders have shown extraordinary diligence working through the extreme high-heat summer days with no respite and not stopping in recent days on the outdoor work when it rained. I have enjoyed seeing their accuracy and work ethic along with their consistent high standards of workmanship. We are but a few days away from handover. The electrician wired the office plugs and has the conduit in my space for lighting and plugs. He's thinking Friday to be done on what's left. Mario is but six square metres away from finishing up 150 square metres of paving parking spaces, walkways, two patio areas and about to be garden plot. The larges block pavers are 8" by 5" with others 5" by 5". He's spent four weeks on his knees to do that.

Mario is the most patient man I know. He started with two scaffold poles, a truck load of sand and 150 square metres of paving blocks

My sedum roof is on and successful and as green as can be. This, together with the open or porous paving, reduces my carbon footprint on the whole development to as near zero as possible.

Sedum in crates of soil covers our waterproof roof both sides for a green way forward.

 Been sleeping late and today I woke up just before 0800. Last night was peaceful too. I barely coughed at all and I was only entered in one toilet trot race. I coughed off an on all day but nowhere near the volume and intensity yesterday. I hope this trend continues because it was nice for a change.

ready for clean up

The box looked good when I eyeballed it. All the tails/pins appeared to be gap free.

flushing the corners

The bottom of a box (or a drawer) is the reference surface. I flushed the corners first and then ran the #3 around it a few times.

happy face on

The bottom is twist free. If I wanted to be totally anal I would run a knife line all around the top and then plane down to it. That would make the bottom and top parallel. But that isn't necessary for this box.

Soss hinges

These are the smallest Soss hinges I have with a 8mm diameter. The minimum stock thickness for them is 7/16" and the box is between 3/8 and 7/16. I am going to use them regardless.

flushing the top

The top is now twist free too.

cleaning the box

Instead of planing the box I sanded it. The tails/pins were no more than a frog hair off flush. First one out of the starting blocks was 80 grit followed by 120.

hmm......

I want the lid to overhang the box at the front. The tablesaw wasn't able to make the complete resaw cut. Finished it with my japanese saw.

it is gone

Flushed the web first and then planed it until it was a 1/2" thick. I made it that thick to accommodate the 3/8" depth needed for the Soss hinge.

minimum

I went with a frog hair more then a 1/2" to allow for the spur on the 8mm brad point drill bit.

close, oh so close

The front and back walls on the hinges in the box look ok. The ones in the lid aren't the same. They ended up painfully close to the outside edge. Thinking now that maybe I should have pushed the back of the lid past the back of the box a wee bit.

 The instructions say to drill a 8.2mm hole for the hinges. I drilled 8mm holes and the hinges fit in them snug. The lid opened and closed without any hiccups. 8.2mm seems to be oversized and the hinges wouldn't fit even with the screws installed.

#2 FH screws

There is a groove on both sides of the hinge, top and bottom. They are for a #2 screw to secure and keep them from twisting and uplifting when the lid is opened/closed.

hmm......

The outside of the box ain't square. The inside is dead nuts square. There is also a slight bow in the back long side. I didn't expect the sanding to go nutso and throw the box out of square. Used the #3 to square the back corners. I left the front one alone. I did this to help with evening the overhang on the ends.

slight curve

The overhang on the ends is about 3/16" and the apex of the curve at the front is about 3/8".

Didn't get to the smaller box but there is always tomorrow. I got the planer to the tool guy and he said that the way he does the belt change is to loosen the big pulley. When I had first looked at changing the belt I had thought that was the way to replace it. Don't know when he'll get around to it and I'll get it back. 

accidental woodworker

When spindle turning between centers you are always peeling perpendicular to the grain
Do you learn the way I do?

If we're talking about a hands-on skill like turning, I need to understand why a process works. I have a terrible memory for procedure, so unless I understand the procedure steps in context, I won't be able to remember the procedure.

When I begin to learn turning I read a lot and saw a lot of videos. But very little of that information was about the "why." It was mostly about the "how."

This series is about the "why." It won't of itself teach you how to turn, but it may help give some context that can complement other turning instruction.

Before we look at the tools, let's look at what we're trying to accomplish. There are two types of turning: the first is spindle turning (above) - think chair legs, candlesticks and banisters. The wood is mounted end-to-end between centers, with the grain running parallel to the spindle of the lathe. When you turn a spindle, you're always cutting across the grain.
With bowl turning, the grain is always shifting direction
The second type of turning is bowl turning. In this type of turning, the wood is mounted perpendicular to the spindle. As the wood rotates in the lathe, you may be cutting along the grain, with the grain, or half the time directly into the grain, albeit the wrong way. This presents a lots of problems cutting against the grain.

We'll look at bowl turning another time, but for now, let's look at spindle turning in more detail. As I just mentioned, you're cutting across or perpendicular to the grain. Typically when you cut across grain, the wood simply peels away. Different species offer different experiences. If you have a very stringy wood, it will peel away leaving a rough surface. On a fine and dense wood, you'll get a fine surface. There's no real danger of tear-out, except on corners of the cut (where the wood will splinter out if the corners of the cutting tool are buried in the wood).

With a straight chisel, the wood just splinters out at the corners of the chisel
The very simple solution to splintering out at the corners of a straight tool is instead of a straight tool is to use a gouge that cuts and peels the wood away in the middle - and then gracefully exits and shears the fibers at the corners of the tool without splintering. This is essentially how all spindle turning tools work. The center of the gouge peels away material, and the curved sides exit cleanly.

A continental gouge, which has a gentle curve to it, can cut cleanly, provided you don't have too heavy a cut, which can engage the corners of the tool. A roughing gouge, with its high sides and U-shaped profile, can take very deep cuts and still cut cleanly. A thumbnail spindle gouge, has a nose (finger) sticking out in the center of the tool so it can cut deeper, but the tool still has the raised sides of a gouge so it can do some shearing at the sides and leave with a clean transition at the edges of the cut.

Skew chisels, and scraping tools, both of which are flat and don't have a curved gouge geometry for a clean cutting on the sides are used differently than gouges and I will look at them analytically another time.

Nice clean shavings

The next issue is how to hold the tool against the material. The turning tool is always braced on the tool rest and kept steady by one hand holding on at the end of the handle. But that's not enough to rigidity to keep the tool moving even a fraction of an inch up and down as it can pivot on the rest. So the tool won't cut evenly or consistently.

Holding the tool with no support leads to chatter and uneven cutting

The tool is unsupported as in the photo above, it will cut, but even holding the tool as steady as you can, there will be enough movement at the cutting edge so that you will not get a steady, even cut. The cutting edge will bounce up and down, going in the work too deeply, or bounding out entirely. The tool is essentially a see saw.

Riding the bevel on the work - a nice clean, smooth surface

The key to smooth, even, shiny surfaces is riding the bevel of the turning tool on the spinning work. In the image above we have two places for support: the tool rest; and the work itself. You can easily hold a steady position because the tool cannot lift out of the cut and you are holding the tool hand up against resistance and the tool cannot dig deeper into the cut because the bevel is rubbing against the work as it turns. You get continuous, long shavings, a smooth surface, and controlled cutting - because the tool is prevented from bouncing in and out of the cut. The position of the tool rest, how far above or below the work centerline it is and how far away the tool rest is from the work is determined to make it is easy for you to position the tool so it naturally allows the tool bevel to rub against the work as the work is turned smaller. Riding the bevel is generally how all turning is done. There are exceptions. The most notable being when you are taking a new piece of stock and turning it from square to round. No matter how much you might want to ride the bevel, between cutting the corners of the stock round, there is no support so steady hand holding may be the best you can do.
When roughing from square, the tool is unsupported as it rounds the stock

Once I understood these basic principles I could easily focus on easy turning. I don't think for example of my tool rest is high or low, but how well the tool is cutting. If I am getting a ragged cut, or have trouble with control I know to look to see if the tool bevel is supported by the work, or am bouncing free. And the fix becomes obvious.

For the past few weeks we’ve been afflicted by the nuisance of being bombarded by thousands of two-inch ball bearings cascading down into the yard.  You might call these ball bearings “black walnuts” but we just view them as hazards of the yard and hillside to be navigated around.

Neither of us like eating black walnuts so we see nothing beneficial in their presence.  In addition, many of Mrs. Barn’s plants, especially in the vegetable garden, are harmed by the toxic juglone in walnuts, walnut leaves, and walnut sap.  She’s had to reconfigure the garden continuously to accommodate the magnificent trees growing just outside the west end of the fenced area.

Bombing season is drawing to a close so I will rake up the trash-can-full of these dangerous nuisances in the coming days.  If only we had a better breed of squirrels to haul them all away.  We’ve got gigantic squirrels here (seriously, almost as big as the cat) but the bums are too lazy to bother with our needs and clean up the yard.

hmm.......

Made it to the shop late and I was determined to make something. Even if it was something I didn't need. On the flip side I just had the desire to work with my hands and have something to show for the effort. So a box it is but with a twist. The long sides will be thicker than the ends. I can't remember if I have made a box with different thicknesses of the sides. Not only different thicknesses, the dovetails will be on the teeny side.

made a detour

While I was figuring out the dimensions of the box I saw a scrap of pine by the tablesaw and resawed it to 3/8" thick. I'll make a box out of it first. Then plan was to get both boxes glued and cooking by the end of the PM session.

my shavings

I was able to plane the sawn face smooth and flat without expiring. I didn't have a coughing fit but I had to take 10 to catch my breath.

not my usual box

I sized the box so the long sides are twice the size of the ends. I also sawed the sides so that the grain flowed around continuously.

tails sawn

I have gotten in the habit of using the dozuki saw for stock thinner then a 1/2". No headaches sawing the tails which was welcomed. No fits or shortness of breath issues. 

no Moxon

I had thought of using the Moxon to do this but nixed it. If I was making a lot of boxes I would have done that. Instead I used this handy jig for setting the height of the pin board. 

off the saw

I didn't lose anything with my dovetail skill set. It appears that this type of work is something I can still do. It is relatively stationary and doesn't involve a lot of exertion. Both diagonals agreed on 8 3/4".

happy accident?

I thought I had centered the middle tail. The left pin socket is noticeably larger than the right one. I must have read my centering rule wrong. I didn't have my glasses and I didn't want to go topside to get them. Looks like I should have.

happy face

The inside corners are gap free. This is something that I don't always get.

opposite end

I usually end up with one or two gaps on the inside but not today.

it is square on the inside

No need for clamps as the tails/pins are on the snug side. I had to fuss with it a bit to get here. I had used a clamp to close one tail/pin and that threw the diagonals off.

kind of like the asymmetrical look

The plan is to glue a piece of 1/8"  plywood for the bottom of the box. IMO that would mean making sure the larger pin/tail is at the bottom and the thinner one is under the lid.

Didn't get to the thickness box but it will give me something to look forward to in the AM. I had to go topside during the AM session and that wore me out. I sat down at my desk to catch my breath and once I did, I didn't feel like getting back up. Spoiler alert - stayed there for over an hour.

Called the repair shop this AM and he said that he was out of the shop today. He also said that he has replaced the drive belt several times. I'll drop the lunchbox off to him tomorrow. 

accidental woodworker 

Find me at Ultimate Tools this Thursday to learn all about Suction Controller, plus lots of other amazing top-tier tools at their annual Oktober Tool Fest event which is one of the biggest woodworking events in the Lower Mainland.

Other reps will be there to demonstrate and educate you on tools from Mafell, Lamello, Mirka, Sia and Robbox. There will also be lots in-store deals you won’t find anywhere else.

Where: Ultimate Tools, 3847 1st Avenue, Burnaby, BC
When: Thursday October 22, 10 AM to 3 PM

Is creative woodworking art – true art? Though there are some exceptions, no, building woodwork is not true art. It is about much more than art.  Does it involve or use art? That is a different question. The answer is yes, virtually always! That is what’s important. Thus, woodworking is virtually always, at least partly, […]

 Yesterday was the first day of the heating season for me. The temp dropped down to freezing (0C) overnight and I set the thermostat at 70F. I don't play with it and I'll leave it set at that until I shut off the heat in may/april next year. I struggled taking the radiator covers off and stowing for the season. Coughed a lot and got short of breath quick too. Got it done albeit at an ninety year old man's pace.

need a good cleaning

I've been thinking a lot lately about a post by CS at Lost Art Press he posted a few years ago. It was about him going to shop and just looking around. No work just him contemplating the space he occupied. In that post he also wrote about a wood carver who couldn't work anymore but still went to the shop just to be in a familiar space. Enjoying his time there even though he couldn't carve anymore. 

I'm feeling a lot like the wood carver now. Two weeks ago I was aligned with CS. Today I went to the shop to do some woodworking and I did nothing. I looked around the shop noting the things I've made and the thought of that not happening again popped up and said hello. 

I don't have a warm and fuzzy about getting the console/entry table done now. Or it just might be the last project to leave Ralphie's Workshop. I am going to try and make it even though I will have to work slowly, I find that thought more comforting than sitting on my arse at my desk.

cherry Welsh stick chair

I think I waited too long to take my head out of my arse before starting this chair. I have been thinking more and more of selling it because I can't see myself being able to make it anymore. If I do part with it I'll include the templates for it too. I got to sit in a Welsh sitck chair at the Lost Art Press when I took a class there. It was the most comfortable chair I have ever sat in. That is when making one went on the future to do list.

On a brighter note, last night was the best nights sleep I've had in days. Maybe it was my wife coming home from North Carolina that did the trick. Coughed a little after the 3rd toilet trot race but I dropped off right away and didn't wake up again until after 0800. 

Wish me luck with the lunchbox planer saga tomorrow.

accidental woodworker 

This video is all about making the neck blank from some very special Cuban mahogany. Also, I set myself the challenge of making a head inlay to match the mandolin’s rosette as seen here-

Cheers Gary

clean up time

Put all the tools away except for the allen wrenches. Buttoning up the lunchbox was next on the menu. I had planned to go to the tool repair on Jefferson but it didn't happen today. I was getting the directions when I noticed that it isn't open on saturday. Saved me some time and gas on that one. It opens on monday at 0830 and I'll head that way after breakfast at Johnny's Chalet.

neat and tidy

This is all I got done today and this took a bazillion hours to get done. I woke up feeling ok but by mid morning I had a headache that felt like it was going to split my skull in two. It was manageable if I sat and did nothing but that sucked pond scum. I had wanted to go to the shop and make a box. After suffering with it I finally took a couple aspirin. I have to be careful with that because I take blood thinners for my A fib.

For the 3rd night in a row I have repeated the coughing fit dance steps. Again last night it was the 3rd time I woke up that was the worse. It looking like the early blog posting is going to be a thing of the past.

Fingers crossed that the tool repair shop will be able to get the belt on the DeWalt. Glad that I got two when I ordered it.

accidental woodworker 

 Having removed the rotten timber, it's time to use it as a template to make the new pieces.

Time is of the essence. This building houses a school, and it's easier to do the work when the children are not here i.e. at the weekend. 

Transfer the shape of the cruck plate to the new section.

Inserting the new cruck foot.

Inserting the new plate.

A nice tight fit. Bolting through.

A historic chamfer repair had to be removed, before making the cuts to remove the rotten parts. This unfortunately fell into pieces.

So, carefully glued it back together.

Offering it up, so trimming can happen, to fit the new shorter cruck foot.

The boltholes plugged with aged oak, the historic chamfer repair re-fixed over the cruck foot repair, the new architrave and the new oak darkened with it's own juices etc. The first visit from Prides Plastering, to apply a dubbing out coat of lime to the adjacent masonry.

FINALLY

I tried to get the belt on with the rod but got nowhere. I got a teeny bit of the belt on the big pulley and that was it. The belt would not cooperate at all and after 30 frustrating minutes I removed the rod. I felt like I had given birth when I got the belt partially on both pulleys then.

blurry pic matches my mood

I couldn't get the belt to fully engage on either pulley. I did manage to get about 3/4 of the belt onto to the bottom pulley and then I stalled. Even though I got 3/4 of the big pulley, the smaller one was gong in the opposite direction. I started with 1/2 of it on but by the time I got 3/4 on the big one, the smaller one had moved outward and barely had a 1/4 on the smaller pulley.

I cursed and threatened it with going postal on it and still nada. I tried to hit the belt with a hammer as I turned it and that did absolutely nothing. It wouldn't move even one more groove onto either pulley.

it got worse

I got most of the bottom pulley on but the smaller one was in danger. The belt was only on two grooves there. What idiotic engineer came up with this design? It shouldn't be this difficult to change a high wear part like this.

hmm...........

This was the last thing I tried trying to get the belt onto the pulleys. I turned the switch on and pushed the plug in briefly. I was hoping that the motor turning would cause the belt to ride over onto the pulley. No such luck boys and girls as nothing happened. As the belt didn't change its position on either pulley one iota. The belt didn't shred or break so at least that is a point in my favor. 

I tried doing it a couple of more times without any success. Maybe if I had another set of hands I could have used a screwdriver as lever to push the belt as the motor turned it. But I am done trying to do this. Tomorrow I will go to tool center on Jefferson and talk to the service tech about it.

came today

I'm glad I didn't wait for this to come in as it took a while for a in stock purchase. To further increase my fun, this kicked my arse all over the house trying to get it open. I could see that the bottom was screwed on but the label was adhered with a glue that wouldn't let go.

nice looking bit

This is the first purple colored router bit I have seen. The six cutters and the mass of the head should make for a clean and smooth cut. I'll road test on the twisted sapele board tomorrow or the next day.

Had another rough night sleeping. Woke up 3 times, 2 of them I coughed a little and drifted back off to sleep. On the third wake up I thought I was going to cough up a lung. I watched YouTube for over an hour and tried to sleep again sitting up against the head board. I had stopped coughing and I didn't want to risk another fit going horizontal on my side. "Wandered in/out of sleeping and I finally laid down on my side and after coughing for a while I finally was able to fall asleep. 

I don't know what time that was but I didn't roll out of the rack until 0815. Maybe it is time for me to change my blog posting to around lunch time. I felt better today than yesterday when I went vertical. No blah feeling and no feeling tired and washed out. After my first pot of coffee and finishing my two puzzles it was 1030. 

Since today was fish 'n chips day I waited until after lunch to do battle with planer. Thinking now that maybe I should have taken the entire day off from it and gone to shop and made a box. At least then I would have something to show for the day.

accidental woodworker 

I’ve never liked the idea of giving my instruments a name other than one that describes it, i.e. parlour guitar, twin-point mandolin etc.  Clearly, the different instruments must have some means of reference, especially as all enquiries for my instruments come via email and a prospective client needs to communicate their needs.

You would probably have seen my previous “New Model Mandolin” build series: I called that instrument “New Model” as, at the time I was undecided on a suitable name.

Around 2007/08 I was designing a couple of instruments to my own shapes. One was a steel-string acoustic guitar which I designated Model 1. Another shape was designed for multi-course instruments and this was designated Model 2.  Over the years that shape was scaled down and tweaked to become my electric mandolin and now, the shape of the new acoustic mandolin (temporarily dubbed New Model). So, after much deliberation it seems fitting, henceforth to refer to this new shape mandolin as Model 2 Mandolin. Simple!

If someone tries to steal your watch, by all means fight them off. If someone sues you for your watch, hand it over and be glad you got away so lightly. ― John Mortimer

A watch is an essential tool to anyone who must perform a job within contractual time constraints, or when She Who Must Be Obeyed demands punctuality using the cat-o’-nine-tails that is her tongue (ツ). Not critical for fishing, cleaning rifles, or watching TV perhaps, but indispensable when engaged in work-related activities such as installing cabinets, pouring concrete foundations, or erecting structural steel frames.

In this series of articles your most humble and obedient would like to relate a few ways I’ve used my watches at work, and the sticky ends some of them met.

In this first article I will relate a true story of an effective, time-proven way to use an honest wristwatch to stave-off venal, criminal bureaucrats for good purposes. I don’t know the watch’s ultimate fate but, for a time at least, it ended up in the hands of an undesirable person.

As background information, I should first share my sartorial philosophy about timepieces, because after all, fashion is my life (ツ).

In our time, the wristwatch is the only jewelry, besides a wedding ring, a manly man can wear during manly pursuits. That said, my exquisite sartorial standards do not mandate fancy watches, for while a finely crafted diamond watch can make a serious fashion statement, IMO an expensive luxury watch clasped on the wrist says nothing positive about the man, manly or no. That said, at one time in my career in international construction I was compelled to buy, wear, and even drop a luxury clepsydra (wristwatch) in public. No diamonds…

Allow me to explain this contradiction.

At the time of this story I lived in Tokyo and was employed by a major Japanese general contractor, indeed the largest general contractor in the world at the time.

As you are aware, commercial construction requires many sheets of drawings. Nowadays, we think nothing of transmitting vast quantities of digital data instantly and very cheaply, via the internet, data devoid of weight and volume. But at the time of this incident, internet access was available only to a few major research Universities and government agencies, so architectural and technical drawings, which were all drawn by hand at the time and printed out as heavy, bulky, paper blueprints reeking of ammonia copy fluid, were delivered to government agencies, bidders, suppliers, subcontractors, and jobsites either by slow boat, airmail, courier or hand delivery. Accordingly, the cost of reproducing and distributing such bulky documents internationally was a major project cost that made UPS, DHL and Fedex highly profitable back in the day.

Time and traffic aside, the taxes and extortion these drawings and specifications faced when the customs agencies of some countries (actually, many countries taxes and tariffs) got their mitts on them were monumental.

In this case, my employer had been awarded a turn-key hospital construction project inside the Philippines through an agency called JICA. JICA selected the designers, and contractors (always Japanese companies) and funded 100% of the design and construction costs with all payments made following JICA procedures inside Japan. This means there were no transfer of funds within the country where the public hospital was erected.

As you can imagine, while the local residents no doubt appreciated the improved, indeed unprecedented access to health care this facility provided to the poor, the JICA system prevented the local government kleptocrats from embezzling or stealing the project funds, so they hated JICA projects with a dragons’ bitter hate. Gentle Readers familiar with both large bureaucracies and international construction will gasp immediately grasp the ramifications.

Chief among these ramifications, IMHO, is the evidence it provides that corrupt governments would rather their citizens suffered and died if their survival meant local politicians and/or government employees might be denied an opportunity for graft and extortion. This is not even a tiny exaggeration.

I don’t know about now, but at the time Japanese taxpayers and general contractors smiled on JICA projects because it provided a an actual, physical, world-class hospital to people in third-world countries desperately in need of health care quickly, reliably and at a reasonable cost, thereby showing Japan’s benevolence to countries the Japanese military ravaged during past foreign adventures, all while maximizing retention of taxpayer funds within Japan. The Philippines is one such country.

But graft, corruption and outright theft are always a problem with construction in the Philippines, and the local politicians, at least those I knew at the time, also loathed JICA projects because funds for the construction work were paid directly to the Japanese construction companies, like my employer, in Japan, giving the famously corrupt government in Manila no opportunity to embezzle them. Likewise, Japanese politicians, also extravagantly corrupt, loathed JICA projects because the opportunities for graft and embezzlement were much much fewer than a standard construction project.

Here’s a word to the wise: Be extremely distrustful of any politician in your nation that goes to a foreign country to discuss, negotiate, or visit a government-funded construction project because it’s almost guaranteed that they will use the opportunity open an account in the Bank of China and arranage to receive bribes from foreign governments, contractors and suppliers free from the risk of detection of wrongdoing by their own government. I say this based on direct experience.

But I digress. Meanwhile, back in Manila, at that time customs demanded a payment of 25% of the full value of the actual physical construction work reflected in the drawings. Not just the cost of producing and/or printing the documents, but the cash cost of placing physical concrete and erecting actual steel. That’s a lot of money, millions of US dollars in fact, and involved a big time delay while the amount is evaluated and negotiated.

But as with most problems, there was a way to sidestep the problem. To whit, my superiors in Tokyo asked me to courier the drawings to Manila on several occasions. The reasons for this, as it was explained to me, is that Japanese companies have a history of being generally more agreeable to demands for bribes, so they are pressed harder than American citizens, such as your humble, befuddled servant, who have a reputation for refusing demands for bribes entirely, and then angrily calling on embassies to support them against undue pressure from foreign governments. It’s illegal under American law to pay bribes, donchano.

But because vague assurances from Philippine government officials of speedy, honest treatment could not be relied upon, in preparation for my visit at Manila Customs, my superiors required me to buy a Rolex watch, with my own funds, with the promise they would reimburse me in due time. So I bought a GMT-Master II.

At the airport I retrieved my bags and three big packages of specs and drawings and toddled off to customs inspection. As soon as the agents at Manila customs saw the heavy pile of drawings their eyes lit up, but before they actually demanded a percentage of the total construction cost, I followed my superior’s instructions, extended my left arm over the stainless steel inspection table, displayed the watch, deliberately released the catch on the watch band, and allowed the watch to fall clattering onto the table.

The inspector quickly picked up and examined the watch, and glanced at me questioningly. I just nodded to him respectfully, loaded up my documents, grabbed my travel bag, and left without saying a word. As I was passing through the doors isolating the inspection area, I glanced back and saw the custom inspector smile like a maniac, stuff my watch into his pocket, and wave his next victim to his station. And so the ancient game of taxes, tariffs, bribes and extortion continued.

Of course, my associates were waiting outside the airport in an automobile by the curb to receive the drawings. We drove to the office to drop them off, and then went out to one of the many clubs in Manila to relax until my return flight to Tokyo was ready to depart.

Why a Rolex GMT.Master II watch, you say and not the Breitling Navitimer James Bond wore in Thunderball or Scaramanga’s Rolex Cellini King Midas seen in The Man with the Golden Gun, or even the economical Swatch GE218 that Blowfeld wore with such panache? This was before the fake “Swiss Made” watches deceptively sold by Rolex recently destroyed their reputation were available, but until recently Rolex watches were immediately recognizable and were considered as good or better than cash in many countries, including the Philippines. Indeed, it was standard operating procedure back in the day for businessmen of all nations to wear a Rolex watch as a last-ditch source of emergency funds, especially since the prestige and value of this brand of watch was instantly recognizable, unlike a cheaper Omega or a more-valuable but little-known Patek Phillipe.

BTW, this is exactly why the solid gold Rolex Presidential watch sold so well for a time in many backwards countries.

And why was I instructed to ostentatiously and noisily drop the watch onto the metal table and then walk away without a word? Three reasons. First, because if one offers government employees cash, it’s obviously a bribe, a crime even if the customs officer demanded the bribe at gunpoint. And as in the United States, superior officers are always eager to use the color of authority to steal cash from subordinates. Just ask Congress, US military, or the IRS where they misplace billions of US dollars every year. But a watch is just a timepiece without a receipt.

Second, human avarice being what it is, an argument about the amount or method of a cash payment is likely to arise, especially if the prospective recipient has the power to demand a look into one’s wallet, as the man with the gun does. The Rolex simplifies all that.

Third, if one pays cash, unlike a single timepiece that cannot be easily divvied-up among other customs officials, arguments and long delays in backrooms will always arise. But if the bakshish is just a single watch of obvious value that cannot be divvied-up like cash, dealing with the custom agent’s coworkers and relatives becomes his problem to resolve after his shift is over and you and the drawings are long gone. Indeed, if he’s clever and discrete, they may never know the transaction occurred.

And lastly, if the customs agent suddenly decides a watch is not enough compensation, and in mighty, puffed-up, hypocritical umbrage tries to turn the tables by claiming a crime has been perpetrated, you can play dumb and insist you innocently, clumsily, or accidentally dropped the watch, and you thought the agent kindly picked it up to return it to you. Cash would not work for this approach.

Clever no? I didn’t think this technique up, but I saw it work well 5 times. Welcome to the wonderful world of international construction.

While it was good to provide a hospital to poor people, I’m not proud of my role in this tale. Gentle Reader will draw your own conclusions from this account, but I will be so bold as to state that it’s a stretch to criticize the person being extorted when the person doing the extortion is one government official among many making the same demand, and he has a gun.

Corruption always lead to destruction of civilizations and the suffering and death of innocents.

In future articles in this series well consider the attributes of a useful watch for the woodworker, and examples of how to use one to improve one’s efficiency at work.

YMHOS

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Ursula Andress, at one time considered by many in the West to be the most beautiful woman in the work, decked out as a blonde Ayesha

With days getting shorter and nights getting cooler, the forecast for a few days of below-freezing nights had us diligently wrapping up the squash harvest.  This is about 2/3 of the haul, I just forgot to take the last “all done” picture.  Winter is a time of heavy soup and stew lunches, and one of my absolute favorites is her squash soup made with fresh raw milk and heavy cream.  No need for dessert with that on the table.

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Combined with Mrs. Barn’s relentless earlier harvesting and canning, we are just about wrapped up for the season.  There are a few more tomatoes in the greenhouse but we do not know their ultimate disposition.

I rode my bike along the cycle path that parallels the Thames. I can't see it, but it's there as I ride through the mist hogging the river. The geese signal my passing in the morning and I can hear the river in various places sometimes as I ride. The river is still lower than it should be, but that's bad river authority management. Heaven help us if the state takes it over. I'm in no hurry, and stop in the early mist to listen and see; the atmosphere changes in pockets of density where the cloud cover moves, thins, thickens and then leaf density and colours shift in range. The berries hang in clusters of red, of crimsoned jewels I knew a few weeks back to be green buds yet to form bright white flowers. Leaf fall has been more a shedding of excess for survival this year; our unusual heat of a long summer cyclically passes through every half century or so, reminiscent of my Texas summers long ago. Was it really 2008 when I endured forty straight days when the heat never dropped below 38C (100F in real money) even in the night. Leaves tell stories, transmit into the grain in ways we never see, a swelling growth ring followed by shrunken ones . . . still never seen. Surviving by shed leaves and deeper root passage reduces the intensity of deprivation. The grasses lose all colour to a sere yellow blandness we seldom see in the UK summers. Stopping takes determined effort to get off the conveyor belt that gets us through distance faster, yet pacing through we dismiss the journey as being of little value. Transitional spheres do that, undermine the value of being there, the allowance of time stops to shift reasonably from a zone that spans and then extends the breadth of our existence to process, compress and then decompress. It's something we should enter with listening awareness of both life and silence.

Cyclists of a serious ilk barrel through towns and countryside knowing nothing of what I speak and seek, things special we dwell in. Such groups centred on self and self-centred then on the roads of any kind and for the main part dismissing more self-disciplined users dominate all where they can by scaring speed. Cluster groups like these uniformed cycle junkies (unfortunate men) rarely stop except to adjust a Lycra skin and to glug water or crunch through another protein bar. But the paths I'm on aren't meant for the thin wheeled road bikes with dropped handle bars and ultra-thin bike seats. The deeper mud and rougher terrain is quite high demand in cycling skills but relatively slow speed compared to their workout. Heavier bikes take a little muscling through. I want the stops to listen in and look beyond what speed stops. The subtle colour changes of a single berry type like hawthorn brings me back to reality with another cycle called life. It's in this cycle that life prepares for the new winter migrants with berries in full ripeness and bright red leaning to crimson. In the US, I loved seeing the Cedar Waxwings drop by to crop the junipers, so much bird life in my former Texas life there is gone for me. And then there's the anticipated long-haul flights across Texan skies in continuous passing when the Sandhill Cranes cried across the skies en masse. Never heard them? You missed a treat of sky gazing, I can tell you. I have yet to see my first Redwings and Fieldfares arrive to feast over winter from Scandinavia and Europe. We might seem Bohemian Waxwings as an irruption now and then. In my North Wales backdrop of Penrhyn Castle where my last real workshop was housed for my workshop classes, I remember these Waxwings descending in a massive takeover of various berried trees. Their chatter came differently to other birds without the melodic song and more softly, with overlapping variations of pitch in thin whistles, the buzz and twitter of action through stiffened wing movement and constant position shifts for highly competitive berry grabbing.

My field trips embrace the impression wild life has on me still, it's governed my movements throughout my life since very young. Texas gave me some of the best years of wildlife because of the still wilder and big places I found where even in the late 1980s and early 1990s I frequented land that only a handful of human souls ever found over that and previous decades. It's saddening to see how people now more relate to nature only through the minute lens of a smartphone rather than the wide-eyed amazing human eye. As I pass along my path I see many people looking only at their phone screens with little regard for what surrounds them in the now of it. Worse still is the baby in the pushchair whose parent pusher rarely seems to see the baby and then even looks at the baby through their phone. It's as if the bigness of real life in nature has to be confined to a rectangular 12.5 by 5.5 glass-faced rectangle.

In some ways, I liken this to my woodworking where the majority never touch a sharp gents saw to cut a dovetail nor plane a surface with a hand plane, and yet they think what they have is the same as mine. A machine cut can never be the same as a hand cut anything even if it delivers a pristinely smooth and dead square cut end. I can't even begin to describe being surrounded by a hundred-strong heard of totally wild longhorn cows amidst mesquite trees in semidesert with the cactus in bloom and the sweet and even sickly fragrance of mountain laurel in a Texas bloom time. Javelina striking out of the undergrowth in front of you with screams so wild they chill you to the bone yet still represent the experience of being immersed in nature, no question about it. Life is tame here in the UK. The biggest challenge to our humanity is our humanity. Cluster groups on bikes travelling through towns is always intimidatingly done by the privileged as is those barrelling through individually these days on electric cargo bikes regardless of age, disability, space occupancy and so on. Their dominance in cities, noise and light pollution, air travel, changing patterns of life when we know the answer but don't do what we should or could.

My walks and cycle route excursions lack the wildnesses of past life for me and I surely miss the explosion of nature in Texas in my opening years there. Being alone in the middle of a hundred thousand acres of ranchland owned by a neighbour way down the canyon in Reagan Wells never caused me concern. His land surrounded my home and I never suffered any fear or doubt. I am more threatened here in the UK than I ever was in the wilds and alone in Texas wilderness life. There is an unfortunate element of people who are more belligerent living in a comfort they don't like disturbing. They rarely distance themselves too far from a luxury car, a road and familiarity. But I still enjoy taking time out for the wilder things, the stops and starts of the flash and snazzy blue of a darting kingfisher when and where I least expect one. I have mixed feelings about COVID. Pre covid days meant freer spaces from people, and now it's hard to escape them and their extreme habits of pure badness. It's been nearly three years since the cowardly attack on me from behind. The man broke three ribs and left me unable to breathe on the cycle path not far from my home but far enough in my inability to take a breath. Being surrounded tight by a hundred longhorns never spooked me one bit and neither did the wild-eyed bobcat that stared me down unflinchingly and would not move as I approached. It was me that stepped aside for a much wider birth in his country, but it was him that stalked me until I was a safe distance away.

I'm vlogging again in my different spaces and places, thinking about the coming week. I hope my pace of life matches yours. I have missed my workspace since we started building the new one, we are so close, just a week or so should do it.

This will be the most climate controlled workshop I have ever belonged in. It's more compact and I look forward to sharing it with you. I doubt that you will see any difference from your side of the camera but for me, it is a space I have evolved with and in to.

 Had an absolute horrible night. I woke up 3 times, and 3 three times I had coughing fit that lasted for a bazillion hours. The upside of that was I was able to fall back asleep once things calmed down. Not the best night I have had and it was awfully close to being the worse one.

I rolled out of the rack late and felt blah all day long. Not sick blah or tired blah but something entirely new for me. I played with the DeWalt a few times but most of the day I spent molding my butt cheeks to my desk chair. The crappy blah feeling didn't go away but I did get bone weary tired in the late afternoon. 

My patience with getting the belt changed is wearing super thin. If I can't get it changed in the AM (if I'm up to it) I'll bring it to a tool repair center. I found one on Jefferson Blvd which is only 5 minutes from my house.

hmm.......

I tried to get the belt on with the rod off. Don't know if not feeling 100% had anything to do with it but nada. I couldn't even get a smiles worth of the belt engaged on the big pulley.

I watched the YouTube vid again but it was muted. I learn better visually over reading or an oral rending. I was listening to a podcast at the same time. I watched it twice to make sure I understood how he maneuvered the belt unto the big pulley. 

ouch

I spent more then 5 minutes trying to screw the rod back on and nada. Initially I thought that it wasn't engaging the first threads but that wasn't the problem. The rod is threaded left handed. I was putting the rod back in because that is the way the vid has it.

nope, nope, and nope

I couldn't get the belt to partially engage on the bottom pulley. I could get it to pass by the rod after the 3rd attempt but couldn't get it started. The vid made a point of not levering against the rod and damaging the threads. I was able to get the screwdriver under the belt and the tip on the nut. Tired to pull the belt and turn it at the same time and got nowhere.

I left this here as is and watched the YouTube vid again with the audio this time. Discovered a tidbit that I missed from watching it muted. I had been putting the belt first fully on the top black pulley but I should have been putting only 1/2 of it on that pulley. I revised the battle plan for the AM. 

accidental woodworker