Since I work a lot on tortoiseshell objects d’art, and in due course must make some of my artificial tortoiseshell, I have to deal with the fact that both true sea turtle shell and my vaguely pseudomorphic replica are both polymerized proteins (keratin or its counterfeit) and thus hygroscopic. Moving moisture into and out of the tortoiseshell scutes or the newly fabricated tordonshell is simply part of the equation. To address these concerns is the reason I keep a couple hundred pounds of silica gel in the barn, taking what I need from storage and conditioning it, then using it. For the most part I need desiccated silica gel to pull moisture out of the newly minted replica material.
Over the years I have adopted the following stoopid simple and cheep technique to acquire a sizable quantity of the desiccant needed. Silica gel can be conditioned to almost any specific moisture content by simply placing it in the relative humidity atmosphere desired, then allowing it to acclimate. Since what I want mostly is silica gel with a moisture content as close to zero as it practicable, I rely on simple techniques.
First I fill a clean slow cooking pot with silica gel and turn it on the highest temperature setting to cook off any bound moisture. (Between making tordonshell and processing beeswax I am using slow cookers a lot, and purchase them at yard sales and thrift stores.) I generally cover about 3/4 of the pot opening with a scrap of plywood to conserve heat and to allow the offgassing of the water vapor. It takes about ten hours to get it as dry as it is going to get, which at this altitude during the dead of winter is about 3-5%.
Once the gel is conditioned it goes directly into a Gamma dog food container which with its seal-able huge opening makes a darned near perfect desiccation chamber. When I use it long enough to pull out moisture to the point where the gel is too moist, I just cook it in the pot again. It can be reconditioned repeatedly.
I’ll be using this chamber a fair bit in the immediate future as I need to make some tordonshell within the week.
My friend DrDan is a man consumed with interests as broad and idiosyncratic as my own, which I guess is one reason we have become friends in recent years. He’s also a pretty amazing furniture maker with a passion for preserving the knowledge and materials of the past.
One of the hurdles he recognizes about replicating historically important furniture making is the scarcity of many of the woods consumed in generations and centuries past. To address this matter, and frankly in great part to assuage his own curiosity, he has begun to sprout and nurture seedlings for trees long passed from our marketplace.
Last summer some of these seedlings arrived on my porch. So, I now have a makeshift greenhouse sitting adjacent to the south-facing dining room windows. It contains four seedlings DrDan sprouted, including Santo Doming mahogany, Brazilian rosewood, and Red Sandalwood. We’ll see how long I can keep them alive, as I’m not the gardener in the family. I’m probably closer to Chauncy Gardner than tree gardener, but I will give it a yeoman’s effort.
DrDan is even trying to sprout and nurture some diospyros, so we await those developments anxiously. That’s Gabon ebony to youse.
Today confirmed my opinion of the general veracity of all things Google. I made a round trip to the Maryland panhandle to return some of the tortoiseshell artifacts I’ve been conserving to their owner. Since I had not made this trip before I got directions from Google Maps. They gave me a route and an estimated travel time of 3 hours and 16 minutes. Despite leaving an hour before sunrise and driving at or above the speed limit the whole time, the trip took 3 hours and 48 minutes. Sheesh. Makes me glad I will be eliminating all the travel I can for the next two years.
I returned home from FORP 2015 to find my old friend Jersey Jon (accompanied by the lovely C, Mistress of Toolism) parked in the driveway, having just deposited a 14″ chop saw on the doorstep of The Barn. This mega tool had fallen into disuse at Jon’s place and he was loaning it to me in anticipation of its use for next Spring’s bench build.
Jon indicated that the saw would cleave a 6×6 in a single stroke, so it ought to handle our work load. I’ll touch up the blade and it will be ready for work.
This particular box needed no meaningful repair, but rather a good cleaning and polishing. The tortoiseshell surface had a slightly cloudy appearance due to abrasions typically imparted through the nearly two centuries of use. Given that chemically tortoiseshell is nearly identical to your fingernails as high density keratin fiber plates, it can easily be scratched and polished.
Polishing the surfaces was a straightforward process I have described here previously, and the results were not disappointing.
The larger component of the treatment revolved around the cleaning and polishing of the ivory feet. In short, I became a postmortem elephant dentist.
Diving into my tool kit of dental tools I withdrew my favorite cleaning scraper. If I could ever find another one like this I would snap it up. I recall this tool being a vintage SS White piece from an old military dental kit.
A half hour of dental hygiene cleaned each foot.
The cleaning/scraping was followed by a few minuted of dry polishing, using a cloth I made from chamois rubbed with 1 micron agglomerated microalumina metallography abrasive.
Like the polishing of the tortoiseshell, the treatment of the ivory yielded a satisfactory result.
With most decorative objects I treat, my objective is to conclude with a piece that appears “old, but well-cared for.”
The week of fellowship began immediately with the “get acquainted” barbeque and social hour preceding the orientation lectures Sunday night.
There is no doubt that the highlight of the week was the many levels and contexts for the fellowship of the instructors and participants. FORP 2015 reconvened a core of FORP 2013 fanboys for another run at the prize, and my time spent strengthening friendships and just having plain old fun with Jameel Abraham, Bo Childs, Jeff Miller, Will Myers, Raney Nelson, and Chris Schwarz goes straight into the memory book.
Narayan recorded the events of the week with his camera and his unerring eye.
This posse was augmented by John Hoffman and my Virtuoso collaborator Narayan Nayar, making the company of companionship darned near perfect. At one point in the week Jameel asked us all at dinner whether anyone would be willing to participate if it ever happened again. Every hand at the table was raised.
Jameel was around all the time, especially when help was needed with the design and layout of the criss-cross and Benchcrafted end vises.
Equally delightful was the time spent with the subscribers, coming from all around the continent, with the closest being only a few miles from his Atlanta home, and the farthest from home having driven from the Pacific Northwest. Of course the fellowship for a remarkable endeavor was the drawing card; any one of the participants could have probably built exactly the same bench at home alone or with some buddies to help with moving the mass. But to engage in the same activities with two dozen other fanatics was irresistible.
During the week Chris and John Hoffman were at the south end of the room building a bench and helping any and all who called; I was on the north end of the room ensconced between Steve, Walter, and Joe. The grouping was representative of the gathering; one retired guy with a bum hip, one software developer, one facilities manager, and one anesthesiologist.
Raney, Will, and Jeff were peripatetic throughout the week, doing whatever needed to be done, helping whoever asked for it. Jameel and Bo ran the endeavor from behind the scenes such that it appeared to be smooth running flawless operation, but we all knew how much effort it took to make it seem effortless. Since I was limited in my strength and mobility I was mostly a cheerleader and adviser, providing instruction and demonstration as needed. One thing I could do without hindrance was sharpen, so I set up my sharpening station and invited anyone who needed something sharpened to drop it off. I’m not sure how many plane irons of chisels I sharpened, but it was a bunch.
Rick especially appreciated my timber framing chisel when it came time to get his bench top ready for the Bechcrafted end vise.
I was also able to loan out many of my tools when there was a need. I brought my timber framing tool box, and the scale of the work was more akin to that skilled trade than furniture making.
The bull session at Ron’s plane making shop.
Ron took the opportunity to deliver this new plane to Ted, one of our company.
During the week there were two scheduled social events, the first being a group dinner at Ron Brese’s house, the second being a barbecue in the Wyatt Childs workshop we were occupying for the week. The former allowed us to have a great meal under the faithful hospitality ministrations of the Breses, a bull session in Ron’s pane-making studio, and the opportunity to help out one of the company who inadvertently maneuvered his rental car into the ditch.
Joe’s daughter making music for us while we are all blending and yakking.
At Thursday’s social Chris chats with FORP 2013 alum Krishen, while Marty’s new bride checks her phone in the background.
At the second we were able to visit with a FORP 2013 alumnus and listen to the musical interludes provided by Joe’s lovely daughter, and to make the acquaintance of many family and friends of the group.
I think this was Pete’s rig, heading back to NYC.
Chris and John headed back to Cincy with this new bench hanging out the back end, with the tailgate mostly open. Good thing there was no rain in the forecast.
By Friday lunch the work was winding down, and the vans and trucks started getting in the queue to load up. Once again this was a group effort as the task of loading a 450 pound bench and the accompanying hundreds of pound of tools for each person was not inconsiderable. As the crowd thinned out I departed late Friday afternoon, needing to get home and resume many projects in the barn. A few hearty souls stayed to work on their benches on Saturday, and then the event was concluded.
One of the delightful occurrances of the week was our daily catered lunches, served on the c.1900 Forge Royal Rouboesque bench.
I saw many captivating tool boxes and tools during the week, but my favorite just might be Francis’ hand made boxwood rule. Were it for sale I would buy it in a heartbeat.
Wandering through the Wyatt Childs’ inventory of mostly architectural antiquities yielded some surprising discoveries.
This mighty cypress log was scheduled to be milled the week following FORP 2015. The widest point at the base of the bole was over four feet.
When building a Roubo Plate 11 workbench nothing is more important than getting the complex joinery of the leg top protruding through the slab bench top. I’m not 100% certain, but it might be the only important thing. As such, the layout and execution of the double tenon and mortise joint consumes more time and energy than all the other parts of the bench fabrication combined.
Jeff and Walter consult on the layout and execution of the joints in Walter’s bench.
I’m demonstrating on Joe’s bench one way to finish off the inside corners of the dovetailed mortise.
Not too surprisingly the hours of initiating this process brought about the most intense interactions between the “enthusiasts” and the students. At the beginning, Chris briefed the assembled throng on the assembly of the legs and stretchers, then inverted onto the underside of the bench top slab to provide for precise layout of the joinery for which there is no room for error.
Once again Francis charged in with only hand tools.
Steve’s concentration was entirely typical for the work of the week.
The following hours featured innumerable moments illustrating the intense concentration of the makers imposing the joinery on the slabs.
Karl is using the superb jig and tool combo brought by Devon. I think pretty much everyone in attendance made note of the combination and will try to replicate it.
I cannot recall who fabricated this particular drilling guide that Steve is setting up, but it certainly got a solid workout on our end of the room.
Joe took the effort to the max, working from on top of the bench top slab.
Once the dovetail mortises were done the energies turned to the inner rectangular mortises, where accurate drilling for waste removal was paramount.
Once the holes were drilled and the waste removed, the most serious hand-work of the week was underway.
Being the most experienced maker in the crowd, it came as no surprise that Chris got done first.
The second day began with a room full of roughed glued-up bench tops and the energies first turned toward the preparation of the legs.
Jeff and Ted making little timbers out of bigger timbers.
Leg stock was roughed from the timbers on hand, having been cut from remaining inventory that had been used for the tops.
68 legs needed to be readied, so once again the assembly-line teamwork jumped to the fore.
Jeff then manned the monster sliding table saw to establish the ends of the legs, which were pretty much custom fit for each participant’s preference.
Once the legs were cut the mortises for the stretchers were punched into the legs using Chris’ favorite machine at Wyatt Childs, Inc. This pneumatic power mortiser made quick work of the rectangular holes.
As soon as that was concluded the focus returned to the bench tops themselves.
The gobs of excess epoxy needed to be scraped off, and then the glued up slabs went through the planer one last time to clean them up.
Many of the slabs needed for the edges to be trued up so the leg joinery could be laid out precisely, and several hearty souls formed another Jointing Conga Line dance company.
As we had come to expected, Francis took a different approach. After scraping off the excess epoxy, he once again broke out the #8 and got to work.
The results were impressive.
Once the tops were flat and the edges trued it was time for the lengths to be cut. I had never experienced Festool World before, but it seems as though the tool line was the favorite of the gathered crowd. Joe was one of the fellows who brought their Festool Collection and set to work. I was impressed by the performance of the tool setup, but doubt I will be taking the plunge as I get by with my 7″ and 10″ Milwaukee circular saws and some aluminum angle bars just fine.
Joe cut his top precisely from both faces, but still a sliver remained for his handwork.
A somewhat simpler and scarier option was to use “Barbie,” the monster 16″ Makita timber saw that could almost effortlessly crosscut the slabs in a single stroke.
The end result for the day was the upside-down top with the legs sitting in place.
Joinery started the next day. Cutting and fitting the leg joinery into the top is by far the most difficult and fussy part of the whole project.
The first day of FORP 2015 unfolded pretty much the way the first day of FORP 2013 did, as we continued the “get acquainted” niceties — including ogling each others’ tool chests and their contents — and got down to the bidnez of hossing around tons of vintage oak timbers.
At least one tool chest held a secret surprise.
Jameel and Chris reminded everyone about safety (other than a minor chisel-to-thumb incident the week was wonderfully uneventful) and restated the strategy of the week. Monday and Tuesday were essentially team work in prepping all the stock, and the remaining time was solitary work on individual benches. My goal along with Jeff and Raney and Will, was to simply be as helpful whenever and wherever needed.
As the participants gathered in the Straitoplaner room to accomplish the first step of flattening the two faces of the timbers, the enthusiasm ran high as you might expect. I am sure that in the minds of oh, say, two dozen men in the room, the thought “I gotta get me one of these!” flitted ever so briefly in the cranium. While the machine is magnificent in its capacity for work, and surprisingly quiet at that, finding a place for a machine with the working footprint the size of a cattle trailer and probably the weight of a small dump truck presents insurmountable hurdles for a crowd of whom all work in smallish home-style workshops and studios.
Once the bench top faces were established the pieces were carted into the main workshop. Most of the bench tops were made from two pieces as required by the timbers themselves; only a handful were single slabs. But everyone pitched in, and after some fussing with the 12-inch Northfield jointer and retrofitting it with the grandest fence known to mankind, the edge dressing began.
The choreography was a delight to behold and most of the slabs required a complete team of Rouboistas to handle and feed the 150-200 pound workpieces over the jointer bed.
While this was going on Jeff and I reprised our roles as “jig makers” for the sled on the bandsaw that was used to cut the massive dovetail tenons at the end of the legs. When there are 136 dovetail tenon cuts to be made, such a commitment of time makes sense. For a single bench, it does not. The sled we made for FORP 2013 was nowhere to be found, so another version was called for. This time we made sure to mark the finished sled so it will be around for any future FORPs.
As the work on the Northfield jointer was wrapping up for the day, we got the first notion that Francis, our witty Montrealer, was dancing to a slightly different beat. He was committed to doing the maximum amount of work by hand, and the result of his hands was impressive. As he hand planed the gluing edges with his #8, the pile of full-width full-length gossamer ribbons was noted by everyone in the room.
Once the edges were ready, the gluing began. Since the water content in the wood slabs was variable the adhesive of choice was marine epoxy, a messy but effective material. Once again “teamwork” was the clarion call, as each gluing was attended to by six or eight of the crew.
Happily all the bench tops were glued up by the end of the day.
Thus endeth the first day.
We finally broke down and lit a fire last weekend as the days were still fairly pleasant but the nights getting brisk.
When working with a wood stove the emphasis for the fire is the three basics; ignition, oxygen, fuel. Matches dealt with the first issue and a dozen tons of firewood the third. Regarding the second point, the vintage hand pump bellows that came with the cabin finally ruptured the leather membrane that allows a bellows to blow, rendering the tool useless. And without a bellows to get the fire going properly first thing in the morning from the residual embers, somebody needs to get down on the floor next to the woodstove and blow. Getting down and up for that is not something I am especially adept at.
So today I carried the old bellows up to the shop, and in between working on conservation projects spent an hour stripping the old leather off and installing a new piece of deer hide I had in my stash of eccentricities. It now works perfectly, hanging in the ready next to the stove.
As for the long lasting effects of the tool, I will be able to better judge that come January or February, some morning when it is about zero degrees outside and the fire needs to get back to work. Pronto.
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