Goldielocks' Chair

[Kenn Osborne]

I made my daughter a rustic chair for her 1st birthday and since then I have had alot of people ask me to make more. A few trees came down on our property so it was the perfect time to make some. Here is the first one, the others are waiting for glue to set.

[Gary Sutherland]

Love it!

gary

[Jason Tuinstra]

Kenn, I don't mean to be a discouragement, but I think the lower rung is slightly out of square Seriously, nice idea you have going there. I'm sure your daughter loves it. Did you use the tenon cutters from Lee Valley for this? Thanks for sharing.

[Gary Whitt]

Nice rustic frame. I love that type of furniture.
The seat does not look too rustic; it's appears to be some of the newer genetically-engineered foilage.
I guess you couldn't use real leaves, eh? Might not be too sturdy!

[Pete Lamberty]

Hi Kenn, Really nice chair. I noticed that you said you had to wait for the glue to set on the other chairs. You could assemble the chairs with out any glue if you want. It makes for a really strong lasting joint. This is how to do it. Drill the mortice hole to whatever size is needed. Say 3/4 of an inch. Then make the tenon a few thousands more than 3/4 of an inch. Now put the tenon pieces into a drying oven (plywood box heated with light bulbs). Wait a few days and the tenon pieces will have very little moisture content. These pieces will have shrunk. So the tenons maybe 3/4 of an inch or maybe less. Now assemble the chair with no glue. You will have to bang the pieces together with a mallet. But as the tenons absorb moisture they will expand and as the mortice holes dry they will shrink. This all makes for a very tight joint. You can also cut a notch around the tenon so the mortice hole shrinks into the notch. Just a thought if you are going to make more of them.

[Kenn Osborne]

Kenn, I don't mean to be a discouragement, but I think the lower rung is slightly out of square Seriously, nice idea you have going there. I'm sure your daughter loves it. Did you use the tenon cutters from Lee Valley for this? Thanks for sharing.

What is square? Never heard of it Yeah I used a tenon cutter. On my daughter's I turned the tenons on a lathe but then I got the tenon cutter after a demo at Woodcraft. I am having some trouble with it though. It cuts fresh wood like butter but if it drys, even over night, it doesn't want to cut.

Gary W, yeah the seat is different than my daughter's. Hers has a solid oak seat made from a stair tread. I will post a picture of them side by side later. The new ones I just put some batting and fabric over some MDF. It much softer but doesn't look as nice IMHO.

Pete, I will have to try that. Do the bulbs have to be heat lamps or normal light bulbs? How do you cut your tenons?

Thanks all for the comments and suggestions

[Pete Lamberty]

Hi Kenn, I took a chair making class several years ago. The drying oven was made out of plywood, it had formica on all of the inside surfaces. It was about two feet in all three dimensions. So it was a big cube. The lights were shop lights. The type with the round metal dish reflector around the light. There were two big holes cut into the floor of the box, the holes were just smaller than the metal dish. So when the light was put into the holes from inside the box the edges of the metal dish would hold the light in place. The lights themselves were just regular light bulbs. Probably just 100 watts or maybe 150s. It only needed two light bulbs. We were using green wood. After a few days in the box, the inside walls of the box were all wet. And the wood was dry. The teacher had used a dial caliper when we put the rungs in and when we took them out and they definitely shrunk. We cut the tenons with a tenon cutter. If you have any more questions don't hesitate to ask. I hope this helps a little. Also if you aren't going to use your wood that day. Spray some water on the green wood and wrap it up in plastic. This should help so that it doesn't dry to fast on you.

[Jason Tuinstra]

Kenn, I hope I'm not breaking any copywrite laws here, but I remembered a picture from FWW from their August 2001 issue (No.150). It shows how Brian Boggs "super" dries his tenons. I took a picture of it. If this is untoward, let me know Ken (Adm.) and you can yank the picture. If not, I hope this helps, Kenn. Looks pretty easy to set up. Have fun filling all the orders

[Pete Lamberty]

Jasons post helped me remember something. There were a couple rows of wood dowels inside the drying kiln. The first two were a few inches above the bottom. And the next two were a few inches above the lower two. The dowels were placed about 12 inches apart in the oven so that they formed a kind of shelf. You could lay your rung with the tenons on it across the two dowels so that they would be evenly heated. I don't remember if there was insulation inside the box or not. Also, the teacher of my class was Brian Boggs. Check out some of this mans work for inspiration. http://www.furnituremasters.org/artists.cfm?ID=20

[Mark Rios]

not too big....not too small....juuuusssttt right!

Nice job. Very cute.

[Jim Becker]

I think that the contrast between the rustic construction and the "formal" fabric seat is awesome. It makes an interesting statement. Bravo!

[Kenn Osborne]

Thank you all for the comments and tips. Here is the pic I promised of the first ones and the new ones. The first one is the one in the middle. Please excuse the "Toy Bomb" that went of in the background.

[Mark Singer]

Really great character....someting to keep for ever!