Beams to Dreams

It’s time to get started. No more planning, no more thinking and hopefully no more tooling up. First order of business is to start cutting my beams down to size. Though it’s not as straightforward as it might appear. I’ve learned a few things about buying wood, some which I already knew but didn’t quite register with me. I guess i’m an experiential learner… 1st off, country folk are savvy and you should drive a hard bargain. I still can’t decide whether I got a good deal… On one hand, walnut beams are exceedingly rare and should cost a small fortune. On the other hand these beams have checks, pith, debris and the tree ate a small fence and a few lag bolts back in 1982. All in, I probably did very well, especially considering I wouldn’t have been able to buy the same amount of wood in ash or oak from the local hardwood supplier for any cheaper. Actually it would have been close to double. The trade off is that I had to dig metal out of a few beams, I’ll have take care to mill the pith out where ever possible and I’ll probably end up having more dutchmen than than the Netherlands.

It took a bit of rotisserie but the bosch glide got it done.

Used a mdf sled to get straight and true edge.

Hot damn, it actually worked!

Legs were looking a little hairy and needed a shave.

I wasn’t kidding about the pith & checks. I might need to drown those dutchmen in epoxy.

proto-roubo | walnut-henge

First Steps

I managed to drag two of the six walnut beams into my shop yesterday. A few passes with a hand plane gave me my first look at what was waiting for me. A few checks and cracks but nothing that can’t be stabilized. Moisture is a little on the high side but it’ll come down over the next few weeks. Building this Roubo will be an exercise in timberframing before cabinetry. I still have a lot of decisions to mull over… face or edge grain for the top, cabinets below or open space… who can I trick or bribe into helping me rip them down on the bandsaw.

Walnut + Ipe

Had a few minutes today to get started on the razee style jack plane.  One of these blocks will form the body, the other will be ripped in two and used as the sides. I've given some thought to the grain orientation as one of the blocks is half sap wood and the other is darker walnut. I feel the sap wood is visually interesting, i think I'll use it for the sides. 

Laminating on the ipe sole. 

Selection

In hard places; now is the time to be sensitive. Knots aren't always defects, sometimes straight grain is dishonest, figure lies beneath the surface. 

Flat packed for a small car.