It’s probably going to be a bit of a struggle at first. you know, what with techno fear and all the associated troubles. But life is a bit of a struggle isn’t it? and, apparently like riding a bike or falling off it, or something. Anyway, jolly profound, I would have thought. Mostly, it’s about a sustainably managed woodland and a green wood working school and the volunteers that volunteer on Thursday. (Not life, this blog). But it may well drift. A bit. Firstly, I shall be blogging the bench wot I made.
And what a lovely bench it is too. With legs and back of Ash and seat of smashing oak. All of it built in the wood, in the rain and from the wood in the wood as it were. It took a mere six days which was spent in marvelous company, enjoying the delights of forest life.
Much of the first morning was spent trying to cleave the bastard log that The General gave us. Oh yes, it may have lovely curves but, that will be to hide the effing great knot that lurks beneath and, will keep us puffing till lunch time. With much thwacking with a froe, it eventually gave up its sinewy mass and left us with eight lovely potential legs; four for me, four for him.
It may look good now but it gave me blisters. Anyway, each of those legs was shaped first with a side axe, then with a draw knife, whilst holding said leg in a shave horse. Quite honestly, these tools would be better described with a picture. So I’ll post that later. The Y shaped back was a piece of Ash that was sawn in half with a Japanese saw. The two pieces were then shaped, again with the draw knife and shave horse and eventually steam bent.
The comb back was cleaved from a piece of curved Ash and further shaped with a draw knife and spoke shave. The lovely seat was cut from a big plank of oak. It was shaped at the front, mainly to get rid of some sap wood that was there, but the result was a jolly attractive seat, with the travisher really bringing out the beautiful grain int the Oak.
The mortise and tenon joints were made by drilling holes with a brace and bit, then cleaning up with a chisel and a gerbil. The tops of the legs were rounded with a rounding plane, cut to accommodate an oak wedge and fitted/wedged into the drilled holes in the seat. Finally, there were some small oak pins to make to hold it all in place. Et voila! Which is french for there you go.
Next week; how to build a garage and carving small figurines of annoyed smokers who have been force outside because of Britain’s new nanny state laws. It all links.
