Innehållsförteckning för February 2021 från Woodworker's Journal

With each new issue of Woodworker’s Journal we provide four new woodworking plans. We put a lot of thought and work into these efforts, and I hope it shows. With that said, we have been doing this for a good while now, and for that reason there are many projects in our archive that are practical, fun to build and just might spark your interest. As editors, we have our favorites that we would like to share with you. For that reason, look to this spot in the magazine each issue for our picks. Or you simply can find them at www.woodworkersjournal.com/wjfeaturedplans —Rob Johnstone Shaker Plan Collection These practical and functional projects are designed in the Shaker style. They’re beautiful and simple. Item #WJ172 Three Classic Workbenches Workbenches from three…

It dawned on me one summer while teaching at an arts camp for children, that my students could spice up their illustration projects by using heated tools to burn their drawings into wood. The tools were rudimentary soldering irons I’d found in a bin of loose supplies, and although I had no previous experience using them, the students and I took right to it. We practiced on leftover scraps of wood, ultimately creating some beautiful work we were proud of. Though simply a fleeting project idea at the time — a small, nearly unnoticeable moment in the bustle of long, creative days — that brief introduction to a brand new way to “draw” sparked my now decade-long fascination with an art form known as pyrography. As a lifelong lover of…

A material list, which can also be known as a cutting list, bill of materials or schedule of materials, is simply a listing of all the parts that will be required to construct a project. In today’s terms, it is a spreadsheet that allows a woodworker to harvest the parts in the quantity and sizes they need. This information can be derived from multiple sources: a measured or scaled drawing, a mocked-up project or an existing piece of furniture. Most material lists follow the convention of listing the thickness of workpieces first (T), their widths second (W) and their lengths (L) third. Another convention to be observed is that the length of a solid wood parts will represent the direction that the grain is running, which is how you can…

Corded routers are certainly work horses in a woodworking shop. Plowing grooves and dadoes, shaping decorative edges, cutting dovetail joints, excavating mortises and shaping intricate parts with a template are all in a day’s work for these handheld dynamos. And when they are mounted in a router table, their versatility is enhanced even more. This feature-rich RT1322-00 SKIL router is a promising new option. With its 2.5hp motor, the SKIL offering fits nicely into the mid-sized router niche. The 1322 comes with two bases — fixed and plunge. The motor swaps between the two without tools. Both bases have a dust extraction adapter specifically made for each version, and each is equipped with ergonomically overmolded handles. Cutting depth is controlled by the typical three coarse setting dial and additional micro-depth…

Building that first piece of Arts & Crafts furniture is a woodworking rite of passage for many of us. I recall how excited I was at the prospect of cutting lots of mortise-and-tenon joints, which were an achievement for me at the time. But I also eagerly anticipated the chance to shop for and use quartersawn white oak. Its distinctive patterns of ray flecks are a hallmark of the style, and it was a thrill to see them reveal their swirly glory as those roughsawn boards exited the planer. Heck, that “reveal” still makes my heart flutter 20-plus years later! Medullary ray flecks only show themselves when Quercus alba is sawn so that its growth rings are presented roughly square to the board faces. When those growth rings are oriented…

A NEW YEAR, FULL OF OPPORTUNITIES Some folks wake up every morning and view the day as new, fresh and full of opportunities and excitement. There are others who start the day with a list of things concerning them and consternation regarding what to do about them. People face the new year with attitudes similarly divergent. Some are more positive about it, and others are not so much. Well, if ever there was a year that I would want to be an improvement on the previous one, it would be 2021. While the future is always unknown, I am truly hoping that this new year brings with it a degree of peace and some relief from the challenges that 2020 showed us in spades. (Not to beat a dead horse,…

Technically speaking, a router table isn’t a “tool” in its own right. In fact, by itself it can’t do much of anything. However, once combined with a router, it turns that shop staple into a wholly different and more versatile kind of tool. Not only does your router still deliver the goods, but when mounted and properly accessorized, the combination of tool and table delivers a one-two punch that makes your wood-shaping tasks both easier and more productive, offering better results with more repeatability. You can even perform a lot of functions that simply aren’t practical or even possible for a handheld router, like edge-jointing or creating narrow moldings. Add the stability afforded by routing while the work-piece rests on a solid surface and being able to guide the workpiece…

With Rockler’s Indexing Dado Jig, you can rout evenly spaced dadoes or grooves for shelves, cubbies, box dividers and more from as little as 1/8" to 69⁄16" apart and with complete control. A two-part aluminum fence beneath the jig’s 1/2"-thick, melamine covered MDF base adjusts to fit 1/8" and 1/4" to 3/4" dado widths. Two easy-to-grip knobs open or close the fence as needed to match an existing dado or groove width. A reinforced plastic baseplate on top of the jig is drilled with hole patterns to suit many popular routers, and screws are provided to mount your router to it. Loosing two more easy-to-grip knobs enables the baseplate to slide along slots in the jig base so you can align a pair of hairline cursors to match the dado or…

James Krenov’s distinctive cabinets, elevated on long-legged bases, have inspired scores of woodworkers to imitate similar forms. I’m one of them! So when the opportunity finally came to build a cherry cabinet on legs, I jumped at the chance. Our art director Jeff Jacobson drafted the overall concept, including the unusual frame-within-a-frame apron design of the leg base. If you look closely, four inner walnut frames set behind a “belt” of dovetailed cherry outer aprons. It’s a light and dark peek-a-boo effect that definitely catches the eye! These walnut frames and the tops of the leg tenons also protrude above the aprons, to suggest a sense of lightness, as though the cabinet is lifting off its base. Our project’s upper cabinet features through dovetails that connect the corners, and its…

Once you have a material list developed for a project (see page 50), next comes determining how much lumber you’ll need to build it. Lumber is sold in a variety of forms. Dimension lumber (2 x 4s, 4 x 4s, etc.) is generally softwood lumber. Hardwood lumber is sometimes milled to dimensional sizes but is more commonly found in random widths and lengths. It is sold as rough-sawn lumber and in variable surfacing options with letter and number codes: •S2S: surfaced two sides; •S3S: surfaced two sides with one straight-line ripped; •S4S: surfaced four sides, which means that the two wide faces have been planed and the two edges have been straight-line ripped. Rough lumber is sold in multiples of 1/4" thicknesses. So 4/4 lumber (read as four-quarter lumber) is…

Q If a board I buy at a home center or lumberyard is already planed down and smooth, why is it necessary to sand it again before applying a finish to it? A When boards are planed conventionally with spinning cutter knives — and that’s almost always the case with mass-produced lumber — there will be little corduroy ripples left behind from the planer. The same is also true when you surface lumber with a home-shop jointer and planer. You may not see them easily now but you can often feel them, and they’ll show up once you apply stain and finish. Sanding removes those machine marks. Start with 100-grit and sand up through the grits to 180 or 220. If the wood was “planed” using a drum sander instead,…