A Hand Built Roubo, and the Education of a Woodworker

[David Wadstrup]

Hi David,

Thanks so much for your feedback. This kind of helpful mentoring is exactly the reason why I decided to post this build here!

You know, I was thinking that my ripping was taking too long, too. I guess one of the problems is that I have been sawing at a too low angle... somewhere in the 55 degree range. I'll try upping it and see if that helps. I do use saw benches that are about 20" tall. Regarding the saw... it's a brand new Harvey Peace panel saw made by Mike Wenzloff. I don't know too much about the intricacies of saw making and such, so I described to him the kind of work I was planning on doing, the kinds of wood I'd likely use, and what I was able to afford, and he suggested a 24" 8 tpi rip saw. It's true that it's a little slower than a 5 or 6 tpi, but the goal was versatility -- I could only afford 1 rip and 1 cross cut saw. Also, keep in mind that I'm talking about 8/4. I'm able to get through 4/4 considerably faster. Anyways, Like I said, I'll try upping the angle. Thanks for the pointer. Hopefully it'll make a big difference. Please feel free to let me know of any other advice or suggestions you might have. I really appreciate them!

Thanks,

David

[Andrew Nielsen]

Yes it is Steve. The 7 1/4 inch rods on a Record 044 probably give you 5 inches of capacity, in theory this means you can 'rip' a 10 inch wide piece of wood in half.
Once the timber gets too thick for the plough plane you just flip the piece over (maintaining the same reference edge). All tools have limitations.......

[Steve Branam]

My ripsaw is 6 ppi. When I'm cutting heavy stock and it seems to be going slow, I resharpen it (10-15 minutes of work), and it usually cuts at three times the rate. After a little experience, you'll start to have a better feel of when it needs sharpening.

[Steve Branam]

Heh, one man's work is another man's fun! Using a plow is a lot of fun! And even if you eventually can't plow any deeper from either surface, you've reduced the remaining thickness that can then be completed with a ripsaw. Reduce a 2" thick rip to 1" or less. So the final rip will be much easier. Just a different way to break up the labor.

[David Keller NC]

Isn't the cut limited by the depth of the fence (distance from fence to blade)?

Steve - Yes, there are 2 limitations - the maximum distance between the skate and the fence (dependent on the fence rods in a metal plane, the length of the wooden threaded rods in a wooden plow), and the depth of the skate.

This is one of the reasons that I much prefer wooden plow planes to metal ones - they typically have a much deeper skate, though I also have metal ones that have advantages in certain situations.

I mentioned this method specifically because of what I perceived to be David's situation - ripping relatively narrow boards to a specific width to glue face-to-face to make a bench. Under these circumstances, one typically has a 5" to perhaps 8" wide board, and you wish to make it 3-1/2" to 4-1/2" wide. The technique, of course, is dependent on having a straight reference edge to run the plow fence on. Since you will have to joint at least one edge and both faces anyway, you can just do the jointing first and use the plow instead of the rip saw.

Personally, I'd rather rip softwood boards like cypress, EWP, cedar or southern yellow pine because the work goes exceptionally quickly. When faced with hard maple, soft maple, hickory, pecan or other really hard woods, I prefer the plow method.

This, btw, is one really good reason to use softwoods as a bench top if one wants to build one entirely by hand. An even better solution is going on a micromill lumber hunt and picking up a big slab - then there's only flattening and edge jointing involved, which saves perhaps 40 hours of hand work.

[David Keller NC]

You know, I was thinking that my ripping was taking too long, too. I guess one of the problems is that I have been sawing at a too low angle... somewhere in the 55 degree range. I'll try upping it and see if that helps. I do use saw benches that are about 20" tall. Regarding the saw... it's a brand new Harvey Peace panel saw made by Mike Wenzloff. I don't know too much about the intricacies of saw making and such, so I described to him the kind of work I was planning on doing, the kinds of wood I'd likely use, and what I was able to afford, and he suggested a 24" 8 tpi rip saw. It's true that it's a little slower than a 5 or 6 tpi, but the goal was versatility -- I could only afford 1 rip and 1 cross cut saw. Also, keep in mind that I'm talking about 8/4. I'm able to get through 4/4 considerably faster. Anyways, Like I said, I'll try upping the angle.

Ahh - that makes much more sense. 8/4 is actually more than twice as hard to rip through than the same species that's 4/4, particularly with a finer saw, because the gullets of the teeth tend to clog with sawdust before they can exit the board. Not only does that interfere with the cutting action, but it also heats the sawplate. When that happens, a lightly-set saw may expand enough to where it is partially binding in the kerf, which adds considerable effort to the saw stroke.

My guess is that you've about 20-25 teeth in the cut by using an 8 tpi saw on a 2" thick board and leaning the saw back at about 50-60 degrees. Ideally, you want no more than 10 teeth in the cut, so sawing more vertically may help. Mike Wenzlof knows what he's doing, no question, but it's highly probable that he set your saw up for a different situation - ripping 1/2-7/8" thick diffuse-porous hardwood. It's also quite possible he made the saw with minimal set and more rake than usual - this is much easier for a beginner to start the saw and keep on the line because the saw doesn't have much room in the kerf to flop back and forth. But it also makes sawing slower.

However, given your situation I wouldn't change the saw except that I would buy some saw files. My guess is that you have more than 100 lineal feet of sawing in very hard lumber to do, and the saw (and possibly your arm!) will benefit from a light touch-up several times during the process.

I would also recommend using a candle on the sawplate - just about any old candle will do; just scribble it on both sides of the plate. If that makes a huge difference, than I do suspect that the saw has little set and is getting quite hot as you work your way down the board.

Hmm - I just had a thought. Us neanders should come up with something like The Spartan Death Race, except themed as handwoodworking. Your task of making 10-15' eight foot long cuts in hard, kiln-dried 8/4 ash could be the first event.

http://www.youmaydie.com/

[David Wadstrup]

I've got all of the leg pieces cut and planed and glued up. It was my first hand planing experience and I really feel like I learned a lot -- each of the 8 boards seemed to go quicker than the one before it(there are 2 laminations per leg). Gluing up was very satisfying. I planed a VERY slight cup in one side of each of the laminations. It was a good technique for ending up with near invisible glue lines -- kind of like a spring joint.

Each leg is pretty close to perfect, but not TOTALLY perfect. What kind of tolerances do you think are acceptable? I'd say that 1/16" is the maximum difference between any of the measurements of any of the 4 legs(width and thickness). Most are within less than a 32nd. Does this sound acceptable? Also, while I did get each of the 6 sides of each of the legs pretty close to perfectly square to one another, they are not PERFECTLY square. For instance, the width of one of the legs is 1/32" thicker at the top of the leg than at the bottom. Do you think this is acceptable? I cut the bottoms in my old Stanley miter box, so they, at least, are perfect. They stand stable and secure. What do you think? I've been fiddling with these things for a few days, getting them closer and closer to perfect, and I'm wondering when I should just say "good enough." Any words of wisdom regarding the quest for perfection and the tolerances acceptable on a workbench?

Here are a few photos of the progress.

IMG_0802.jpg IMG_0788.jpg IMG_0819.jpg IMG_0832.jpg

Thanks for reading,

David

[Chris Fournier]

Throw all of those pretty loose tolerances into the project and the 1/8"s will start to show up and square will be nowhere to be found. Cutting joinery will become a real mess and joints won't draw tight or square. Throw some glue and clamps at it all and things will turn south faster than you can imagine. Huge trouble and a witness to your sins. Ha, I've been there.

Set your marking, measuring tools once and run through all of the similar pieces to get uniformity. You have done well for where you are coming from but I think that you should strive for better if you want a bench that goes together well and you can be proud of. If the fundamental pieces are out this much the project will magnify these errors as you carry on and you will be upset with the outcome. Well perhaps I should say, "I'd be upset with the outcome". Get things right now and you will save yourself HUGE amounts of time as the project progresses.

Good luck and don't give up!

[john brenton]

Truer words have never been spoken, Chris. I've just had to accept the fact that although I'm "capable" of fine work, if I'm too impatient to make it happen then that "capability" means nothing. I'm on the homestretch for finishing my bench, and I "let it all hang out" last Saturday and am paying the price now.

My biggest mistake was not planing the bottom as flat as the top. Sure, I got it "relatively" flat, but when you're talking about tenon shoulders fitting tight, "relatively" ain't gonna work. I knew it would cause a problem, but I thought I could just fudge it and make it work, which I did. I did fudge it, and it does work...but why didn't I just do it right? Why the laziness? That's what makes this hobby such an awesome journey.

The tenons themselves fit tight and are robust, so it's not going to affect the strength...its just the principle that if you spend time doing something, you may as well do it right. It's easy to forget that in a 100* garage with 80% humidity.

It's solid as a rock, but it just downgraded to "paint grade". It's ok, because I had been thinking about painting it anyways. I picked up some "colonial red" enamel...it's going to be awesomely horrible. I'm going to call it the "red baron." In fact, I'm thinking about painting everything...there's too much brown and tan in my shop.

But anyways...to the OP...don't accept anything less than your idea of perfection. You're using good wood, and you've already done a lot of work on it. If you see something is wrong but feel the desire to push through anyways just walk away and come back to it when you have a cooler head.

Throw all of those pretty loose tolerances into the project and the 1/8"s will start to show up and square will be nowhere to be found. Cutting joinery will become a real mess and joints won't draw tight or square. Throw some glue and clamps at it all and things will turn south faster than you can imagine. Huge trouble and a witness to your sins. Ha, I've been there.

Set your marking, measuring tools once and run through all of the similar pieces to get uniformity. You have done well for where you are coming from but I think that you should strive for better if you want a bench that goes together well and you can be proud of. If the fundamental pieces are out this much the project will magnify these errors as you carry on and you will be upset with the outcome. Well perhaps I should say, "I'd be upset with the outcome". Get things right now and you will save yourself HUGE amounts of time as the project progresses.

Good luck and don't give up!

[Jessica Pierce-LaRose]

Going the extra mile is most frequently worth it, and as Chris said, small intolerances add up over distance. Remember if you plan to do any serious woodwork, you're going to be looking at this bench quite a lot! I know for myself, if I have to see the little imperfections over and over, it'll bug me. That said, on some shop gear, I've let somethings slide that wouldn't in a home piece, but that's mostly minor tearout or finishing woes.

One thing with getting stock squared and straight and level, think about how everything's going to fit together, what your process is going to be. Everything will be easier if everything is perfect, but there are places where if you can let perfectly square slide, if it looks good enough. There's other places where you can't, because it's going to affect the fit of joinery as you assemble parts - it might still be doable, but it's going to mean some fiddling getting everything to go together seamlessly. I sort of think of it as the inside and outside of a piece - often the inside has to be more square for everything to fit properly, while the outside really needs to look it's best.

A workbench seems like a decent place to let some things slide, until you think about the scale of the things you're putting together, it's gets awkward when you realize something is canted or out of square as you're trying to assemble things. And once it's done, you're going to want to use surfaces on there you haven't even thought of yet for some sort of workholding, and if they aren't square and true, that can be a hassle. I wouldn't worry about getting the top perfectly flat until it's joined to the base, but the bottom has to be flat enough to make joining it to the legs easy. You don't want to be test fitting that joint anymore than you have to.

That said (in a rambling manner), if the discrepancies you're talking about are the differences between the size of one leg to the next, I wouldn't worry quite as much; rather than trying to make everything perfectly sized so it goes together like a puzzle, you'll begin marking your parts off of each other as you join assemblies together. Having one leg slightly larger than another isn't going to kill things; when all is said and done, you'll most likely be planing the assembled bench a hair to make things like the legs and the top flush and square to each other. If each leg is square to itself and the top, and flush to the top, and the joinery is square and flush and tight, having one leg be a hair larger than the others isn't the end of the world. Inside and outside again - the inside surfaces of the legs need to be true and square, so you build up "boxes" which are square and true, to make adding the top easier.

But if the discrepancies you're talking about are in one leg itself; if the measurements being that far off are the width at one end compared to the other, it can become an issue.

[David Keller NC]

David - It is possible to work with the imperfections that you list, but my fear is that you will find the way that you will have to work to accomodate those imperfections to be a bit too foreign to deal with. Specifically, if your legs aren't square within about 1/32nds of an inch, you will need to cut your tenon shoulders for the stretchers by clamping the stretcher to the assembled bench and knife a line, then cut to that line. That's quite a bit different than marking a tenon shoulder with a square and cutting to that line, and there's a pretty big learning curve w/ respect to throwing one's preconcieved 21st century notions about work practices out the window and adopting an 18th century mentality, which is "fit the piece to the sapce that's present" on a partially completed project.

It can certainly be done, and many of us are close to "getting there", but it is a radically different procedure to making identical parts (say, 4 legs) that are interchangeable.

[george wilson]

You aren't far from Maurice Condon Boat Lumber Co.. It is a great place in White Plains. They have a huge variety of woods. I went there years ago,and picked out a lit of quartered Sitka spruce 2"X8" 's. They cut the wood into 5' lengths so I could get it into my station wagon. Nice people to deal with.

Out in the street,in this relatively unpopulated little area,I found .25 cal. empty cartridge cases,but that's the big city for you! So,go there in the DAYTIME!!

[john brenton]

Test fitting the joint is what killed me. A heavy 3' x 3" x 5" leg with a tight fitted 2" long by 4" wide tenon is a pain in the butt to be pulling in and out, and I just couldn't figure out where the problem was. I was sweating like a pig and had somewhere to go in a few hours, but I was determined to join the legs that day. The tenon looked fine and square, and no matter where I adjusted the shoulders weren't fitting perfectly. I even undercut the shoulder very slightly and it just wouldn't sit perfectly flush.

Funny that I haven't had a problem like that in a long time. I thought the joining the legs would be a breeze, and that the top was going to be the PITA, but it was the opposite. You said it right Josh, with the size and strength of the members, there is just no wiggle room.

[David Wadstrup]

Thanks so much for your input, everyone. It's unanimous... I need to get closer to perfect. Chris, I'm so happy you spoke up! You said exactly what I needed to hear. Everything you said made perfect sense to me, and I feel like you taught me something important. I knew in the back of my head that I needed to do better, but since I'd gotten a bit tired of working these damn legs, I thought that maybe someone would tell me that what I'd done so far was good enough. Thanks for not doing so!!! I'll give myself a break over the next day or two, and approach them fresh.

Thanks again.

David

[Jim Foster]

Another Opinion... Good enough when you consider that fact that this is a cut-to-fit piece of work that is a bench and the annual changes in dimensions due to climate will cause variations more than you mention. As an example, when you get the four legs assemble to the stretchers, you transfer locations to the top from the leg tenons, not via a shop drawing.