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Thread: My First Workbench Build - A Journal

  1. #61
    Join Date
    Apr 2014
    Location
    Davis, CA
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    249
    Quote Originally Posted by Eric Schubert View Post
    Thanks, David! Jim does, in fact, have a couple of these braces. They're a little pricey, but I'm assuming Jim is a reputable seller and only sells tools of good quality. If I grab one on eBay, it'll be a crap shoot whether I get a good item or not, at best.

    Eric, if you want to get a brace and bits anyway, this won't matter. But I employed barrel nuts for my stretchers, and I was able to find a long drill bit to drill the holes. I'll add an edit here when I find the invoice for the place I got them.

    Edit: found them here: http://www.mscdirect.com/browse/tn/H...navid=12106289
    Last edited by Phil Stone; 07-22-2016 at 11:38 AM.

  2. #62
    Join Date
    Mar 2006
    Location
    Austin Texas
    Posts
    1,957
    Which one did you get?
    David

  3. #63
    Join Date
    Jan 2014
    Location
    Loveland, CO
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    418
    Sorry, David! I totally forgot to reply to your question.



    I ended up with a Millers Falls 4508 brace and a nice set of bits, thanks to one of SMC's great members. It looks to be in really nice shape. No rust. Everything moves smoothly. And the wooden handles look great. I'll definitely be good to go when I need to bore some holes. I'm thinking of using barrel nuts on this bench, but we'll see. I want to take this bench with me if we ever move, and that would definitely help break down the base of the bench.

    I put some more time in on the bench today. I worked some more on flattening out one of the top slabs. Man, you better have some serious elbow grease to do this. I was sweating pretty good by the time I stopped. I managed to work across, and then diagonally to, the grain of the wood to get things mostly flattened in that direction. Now, I need to start working along the length of the grain to finish things up a bit more. There are some low spots along the glue line, but I may just leave those alone, since this side is the bottom anyway. In fact, they may disappear as I continue flattening everything out.

    I need to figure out what's wrong with my two smaller hand planes. Both #4's, neither does a very good job. In fact, one of them just loves to dig in hard and chatter like crazy. Even on very thin shavings. I ended up using my #7 for the flattening, which is tiring, trying to throw that much mass around. (Although, it does make powering through the wood grain easier due to momentum.) Some fettling is definitely in order on those two...
    Last edited by Eric Schubert; 09-14-2016 at 10:45 AM.

  4. #64
    Join Date
    Apr 2013
    Location
    Stone Mountain, GA
    Posts
    751
    The bottom surface of the benchtop can have low spots and be fine. The only really important thing is to have the surfaces where the legs connect in the same plane and without twist.

    Not sure why you'd be using #4s for flattening a benchtop slab when you've got a #7 hanging around! But seriously, this is what the 7 is made for. When I first started with planes I also found the larger planes a bit easier to use.

    There was a thread here a few weeks ago you should take a look at, regarding planing technique and body mechanics. Several people posted videos of themselves dimensioning boards- might be useful to you. One of my takeaways from that thread was to generally avoid planing across and diagonally when flattening, unless the workpiece is about as wide as it is long. I had began coming to this conclusion on my own, as it seemed to take a lot more effort (due to tons of short strokes) than simply planing along the grain.

    As for the chatter issue with your #4s, double check that there isn't anything (shavings, dust, debris, etc.) stuck somewhere that is keeping the frog or blade from bedding correctly. Also check for a concave sole.

    Good luck, and try to post some pictures of your progress!

  5. #65
    Join Date
    Jan 2014
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    Loveland, CO
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    I'll take a look around for that thread, it would be interesting to see how others flatten larger slabs. I'm sure there are multiple ways to accomplish this task.

    It's been my understanding that the "proper" method is to go across and then diagonal to the grain first to even out high and low spots and remove twist before going along the grain to finish. And this technique definitely helped me make progress, as some of these high and low spots on the slab were pretty noticeable. Going across the grain took those areas down more quickly than going along the grain, since the wood holds less strength in that direction. The downside is you risk tear-out along the edges. But I'm not concerned about that, as I still have to plane the other sides anyway. I avoided this technique with the 6x8's, and did planing only along the grain, like you suggested. And while that worked for those pieces, it seemed to take longer on this glued slab. And the plane had trouble taking shavings because of the low spots along the glue line. Once I tried going across the grain, things progressed again. So maybe it depends on the situation?

    As for a #4, I intended for it to be a bit of a scrub plane, taking thicker shavings across the grain to progress more quickly. This was going off of what I saw from Paul Sellers, but he was working on a smaller piece. So maybe the #7 is the proper tool here. It's just heavy to wield. But it's been taking really nice shavings, so I'll roll with it. I really like my #7.

    I'll still look around for the thread you mentioned. If there a better way to do this, I'm definitely interested in learning it! Thanks for letting me know it's out there somewhere.

  6. #66
    Join Date
    Dec 2012
    Location
    Ste-Julienne, Qc, Canada
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    194
    It think that your flattening method is just fine and is the one I use all the time. All I would modify is the use of your no.4 which is too short (an opinion here). You would most likely be better off with a no.5 (I use a 5-1/4).

    Good luck
    Normand

  7. #67
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    Jan 2014
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    Loveland, CO
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    418
    Thanks for the advice, Normand. Unfortunately, I don't have any planes between the #4 and #7, so I guess I'll just stick with the #7. It's been working pretty well, so far.

  8. #68
    Join Date
    Feb 2016
    Location
    Odessa, Tx
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    163
    I have two #5s one has a scrub plane style iron it that really helped me one flattening my laminated 2x4 bench. The 2x4s have those radiuses on the edges and I had to take off quite a bit to bet rid of all the little valleys. Scrub blade left behind a U like valley of its own if you try to hog out to much. When I switched to the other #5 I started with thicker cuts, and after I would go across the whole surface I would make cuts thinner and thinner until I got those almost see through shavings the whole length. Went diagonal across bench but kept plane somewhat straight, skewed across if that makes sense. Two, 16 inch by 5 foot laminated beams took about 45 minutes to get nice and smooth. I bet some of the more experienced people here could do that a lot faster, but it wasn't too bad.

  9. #69
    Join Date
    Jan 2014
    Location
    Loveland, CO
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    418
    It's funny how you forget about things in a box... I just dug through a wooden crate that I had my planes in during our last move, and I ran across an older USA-made Craftsman #409 jack plane. Looks like I have the right tool for the job, but I just wasn't using it! Now, to add camber to the blade and have at it!

  10. #70
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    Aug 2013
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    Princeton, NJ
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    Eric, I have a video on my YouTube channel, flattening a panel. The same technique applies to slabs.
    Bumbling forward into the unknown.

  11. #71
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    Mar 2012
    Location
    Virginia and Kentucky
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    3,364
    Eric,

    You have a beautiful brace and bit set.

  12. #72
    Join Date
    Jan 2014
    Location
    Loveland, CO
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    418
    Thanks, Rich! It's in excellent shape. I really like the wood handles.

    I made a little more progress on the bench today. I worked on taking the twist out of my first slab. There was quite a bit, so it took a bunch of work. But, I did manage to remove the twist. Now, I just need to work on flattening this side and I'll finally have a reference from which to work.

    You'll notice some faint lines across the width of the slab. I start at one end and make my way down the length, removing the twist relative to the first end as I go. As each small section gets straightened out, I make sure to mark a line where I've been. So, each one of those lines represents another spot where I've measured for twist and it's been good to go.



    Made a good pile of shavings! I also picked up a monster 24" dust pan to help me clean up.


  13. #73
    Join Date
    Jan 2014
    Location
    Loveland, CO
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    418
    Got a little more done today. I sharpened up my #7 again and started flattening the side that I straightened yesterday.

    I took my plane diagonally across the slab, then went across again along the opposite diagonal.

    Lastly, I started going along the length of the slab. This is where I noticed a hiccup. The center of the slab is thinner than the ends by nearly 1/8", making the length of the board concave.

    Fortunately, this will be the bottom of the slab, so I'm not too worried. At least the twist has been removed. And I plan to put both slabs against each other to flatten the tops at the same time for a continuous surface across my center gap. But, I'm wondering how to avoid this issue when I start flattening the tops of the slabs... This seems to be a pretty common occurrence in my brief experience. I can remove twist and smooth out the edge of a board, but the center always seems to dip lower.

    Anyone have recommendations on how to avoid this in the future?

  14. #74
    Join Date
    May 2004
    Location
    N Illinois
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    4,602
    Thanks for updates..Good work..Nicely done.
    Jerry

  15. #75
    Join Date
    Jan 2014
    Location
    Loveland, CO
    Posts
    418
    Thanks, Jerry.

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