Extremely Average

The last day of March was the first day I could open up the house.  It is hard to describe how beautiful it was outside.  I think the most apt comparison would be to say that it was ‘router table’ beautiful.  I celebrated the outside loveliness by taking a trip to my two favorite places, ACME Tools and The Home Depot.

The drive was lovely and at my first stop, ACME Tools, I picked up a Lignomat moisture meter.  It will be exciting to find out the moisture content of the piles of walnut and cherry that have been patiently waiting for me to turn them from planks into something pretty.  I would have run right down stairs and started checking, but I decided to blog first.  I can play with it later.

The moisture meter was the only item I really wanted to buy today, but I also picked up a couple of Rockler 2 ¼ in multi tracks.  I so enjoyed using the Rockler stuff on the router table top, that the little voice in my head said, “Rockler makes great products, but you don’t really have any need for them at the moment, so it is probably best just to pass on them for now.”  But since the little voice in my head was speaking Mandarin Chinese, and I had no idea what it was saying, so I bought them.

I didn’t need anything else today, so I quickly drove to Home Depot, just to be sure I wasn’t wrong.  While there I chatted with Brandon and Scott.  Scott is the store manager of the Cedar Rapids Home Depot, and they had just won the Gold Cup award for the best garden center of all the HD in Iowa.  I don’t know anything about plants, but I can tell you, it was an impressive set up.  I really wanted to buy something, so Brandon made a wonderful suggestive sell and I chose The Complete Book of Woodworking.  A delightful young woman, named Kate, sold me the stuff with a smile.  I do like friendly people.

I drove home and started my blog.  The preceding three paragraphs were all written immediately after I got home.  It was at this moment I realized I had just finished my last can of Diet Dew.  We were at Defcon 1 folks, and I rushed out of the house, got in my car to drive to the business district of Martelle, where I purchased a 12-pack and rented Planet 51.  Upon returning home, Jackie and Don, my neighbors were sitting outside enjoying the beautiful evening.  I decided to go mingle with them a bit, and it turned out to be a really tasty decision.  Jackie had made some chocolate pie and I got to mingle and eat.  Jackie is the first Martelle reader of my blog, and she has yummy pie.  I think she should be Mayor.   Yes it is true; my vote can be bought with dessert items.  I don’t think she would consider running though.  I will have to ask her.

After my snack and talk I came home and got a call from my sister in Georgia.  Julie doesn’t read my blog.  She has 2 kids, Lucas and Rachael, who keep her pretty busy, and much like my little league baseball games, it just doesn’t hold her interest.  That is ok though, she isn’t really a woodworker anyway.  Julie and I talked about Twitter for an hour.  I told her how to sign up and followed her with my twitter account ExtremelyAvg.  She picked a really cool name too, PurelyJulie.  So we tweeted and talked and then I realized that it was 10:00.  I hadn’t finished my blog.

Tonight’s blog was going to be a detailed description of how I created the dust collection system on my router table, as several people had requested this for a post.  Alas, the blog was all about shopping, chatting, and pie.  Sometimes that happens.  Tomorrow I will tell you all about how I made my router table really suck.

The sound of the router running made me smile.  Tonight I attached the table, using a piano hinge, and installed the safety switch.  The table is now in working order.  Is it done?  Not yet.  I still need to design a device to hold up the top when I am changing or adjusting the router.  I have a few other small details which I may add.  I haven’t decided.  The important thing is that if I need have a router table, I now have one.

If one thinks they I am unbiased in my appraisal of the router table, they would be sorely misinformed.  I think it is the most beautiful router table ever.  I remember the week after I decided to take up woodworking.  I was visiting my parents and mom saw an ad for the Woodsmith store.  After a breakfast, which included eggs, an English muffin, and some turkey bacon, expertly combined to create a sandwich.  I programmed the address into my iphone.  The maps app got me to the store.

Walking into a place like the Woodsmith store, for a neophyte, was like a kid in a goat food store.  There were table saws, band saws, Japanese hand saws, and other things that were not saw at all.  All of them were shinny and called to me.  They said, “You have found your destiny.  Here in this place, you may trade legal tender for tools, and when you do, you will feel joy.”  It was a delight.

After wondering around for a bit I started to chat with one of the helpful people working.  I was told that investing in a router would be helpful in beginning to learn about woodworking.  He also showed me a very sexy Kreg router table.  For many months I lusted after this table, but there was still a part of me that thought I might like to build my own.  The Kreg table with the goodies I wanted is around $500.00. I spent around $100.00 on wood, $40.00 on the Rousseau 3509 Deluxe Router Base Plate,  $30.00 on the Shop Fox template, around $80.00 on various Rockler products, $40.00 on the safety switch and probably $20.00 on sand paper and other miscellaneous stuff.  So in the end, I have spent close to $300.00 building my table.

If I were to assign a value to my table, I think a reasonable number would be $11,237.15.  I love my router table.  I love it so much I can barely stand it.  I am going to enjoy building jigs to use on it.  I am going to enjoy using it.  The best part about the whole project is that I learned valuable lessons each step along the way.

Today I realized that using an awl to mark the spot where I would drill a pilot hole for the screws, makes it easier and saves time.  Before this project, I would have just tried to screw in the screws without the pilot holes.  Adding the awl step makes starting the pilot holes more accurate.  After I had connected the hinge to the underside of the table, flipped it over, and fastened it to the legs, I looked at the top.  There were several dents in the wood, which I had caused when I flipped it over.  Little imperfections can be found on this table, and I have grown to accept them, but these final blemishes were quite simply frustrating.

I considered sanding them out, but that would leave the table less flat.  I worked really hard to get it flat, and I wasn’t willing to tear everything apart to sand the entire top down.  Then, a tiny voice, perhaps the one who told me about the joy I would receive buying tools, said, “Try putting a few drops on the dents and maybe they will soak up the water and look a bit better.”  I read that this works somewhere, but until one tries it, it doesn’t really seem possible.  I moistened the dents and when I checked a little while later, the dents were completely gone.  Of course, I had raised the grain, so I grabbed some 220 grit and gave the area a quick touch up, and the blunder was gone.  Up until the very end my little router table kept teaching me.  I would write some more, but I think I want to go downstairs and hug my router table.

The traffic was bad enough that he was stopped on the Brooklyn Bridge.  He had the window down, despite it being winter and 15 degrees out.  He was burning.  Burning with rage, mad at himself, disgusted that he hadn’t considered the ramification of disappearing.  Since the office was burned up and his ribs were bruised by Tommy’s boys, he had been available to no one.   Luna was safely tucked away in his secret house and he had made sure not to contact any of his pals, except Mike.

He thought about Mike, though he didn’t want to.  He wanted to think about something else.   “The sky is an inky blue.”  Henry thought to himself.  “No, no it isn’t.  It isn’t inky blue at all.  It is bruised and battered blue and purple and black.”  Everything he looked at reminded him of Mike.  Henry had been calling into the precinct daily and updating Mike about the case.  They had decided not to get the journal until the mystery about the code had been worked out.

The newspapers were now writing and speculating, about where Mr. Alexander was, how he was connected to Tommy ‘The Knife’, and if Tommy was losing a grip on his organization.  A rival family was smelling blood and decided to try spill a bit of Tommy’s.  An attempt had been made on Tommy’s life, but he had escaped unharmed, though 5 of his boys had not been so lucky.  Tommy had immediately retaliated, and a pizza parlor, 12 guests, three of whom were rival thugs, had paid the price.  The Mayor wanted answers, the Police Chief worried that there was more to come, and the criminal element in the Big Apple was working overtime to find Henry, Mr. Alexander and the now infamous journal.

Henry knew that hiding Luna was a good idea.  He thought that hiding himself seemed reasonable too.  What he hadn’t counted on was the brutal message that Tommy would deliver through Mike.  Sometime late last night, a handful of guys grabbed Mike as he was getting home from working the night shift.  They beat him with bats and left him on the front step of his place, 2 hours later.  He was barely alive.  He couldn’t even make it up the stairs, this giant of a man; just lay there bleeding and broken.

Sally Mae is 11 years old.  She is the small for her age.  She lives next door to Big Mike and adopted him the day he stopped the neighborhood kids from teasing her.  From that moment on, if Mike was out on a Saturday, walking to the market, or talking with the neighbors, Sally Mae would be close by, asking him questions and generally worshiping him.  Sally Mae didn’t know her father, like so many fathers, he had perished on Omaha beach.

When Sally Mae saw Mike she let out a cry that stopped the neighborhood.  Though the ambulance drivers wouldn’t let her ride to the hospital with him, nobody had the heart to say she couldn’t go with the police officers who were following behind.  She sat in the back of the car and sobbed the entire way.  It was the most heart breaking thing either of the officers had ever heard.  They could tell she was trying not to, but just couldn’t stop herself.  When they arrived at the hospital she sat in the waiting room, head down, weeping into her hands, she didn’t stop until they wheeled Mike out of surgery and into his room.  Her mother, the nurses, and even the Police Chief had all tried to make her feel better, but she just sobbed.

Henry had arrived just as Mike was being wheeled into the room guarded by two officers.  He saw Sally Mae run to the door, stop take a deep breath, wipe the tears out of her eyes and put a smile on her face.  She was being brave for Mike.  Neither officer made a move to stop her; they just watched as she went in and gently placed her hand on Mikes.  In a tiny voice, without so much as a tremble, she said, “I will take care of you.  It is going to be all right.”  Mike did not hear her, he wasn’t conscious yet.  Henry thought it was a small blessing, as he was sure that Mike would have felt more pain at seeing Sally’s little face, than he ever felt from the beating.

The traffic picked up slightly and Henry eased the car forward.  He thought about Mike, though he didn’t want to.  He thought about little Sally Mae, and her brave face.  He thought about the words that Mike had struggled so mightily to get out.  “You were right.  Important…don’t stop now.”  Henry assumed he was referring to there being someone in the department who was on the take.  He didn’t know who, and Mike had succumbed to the pain killers before Henry could ask.  He didn’t think that Mike was in any further danger, as Tommy had been trying to send a message, which he had done.

Night was in full swing, the traffic was moving along nicely, and the lights of the city cast a dim orange glow across the sky.  Henry was relieved to find Luna was safe and sound.  He filled her in on the day and they sat and talked, and didn’t talk, and then mostly they just sat.  Just before bed Henry went downstairs and checked the closet.  It was filled with goodies.  He laid them out on his bench and looked at them.  It must be a clue.  He was too tired to figure it out though, so he flipped off the light switch and went upstairs to bed.

“A man’s errors are his portals of discovery.”

     James Joyce

I spent many hours traveling through my own portals of discovery today.  The quest is to create a device that will hold the hose for my shop vac.  Yesterday I spent considerable time working on cutting some dovetails, which would be part of a box which would hold the hose.  That was the plan until I set the first three sides on top of the connector piece and realized that it wasn’t at all pretty to look at.

I am definitely a form over function sort of guy, and I really couldn’t stand to have an ugly shop vac hose connector.  I mean really, what would the neighbors think?  It was obvious that a more pleasing shape would be needed.  With a piece of hard maple, my compass, and a French curve I laid out the shape that would be my next design.

The smooth curve appealed to me and I took my board down to have a chat with Mary the jigsaw.  Mary looked at my board and quickly chewed the shape out of it.  With one down and three more to go, I let Mary hang out in the shop as I went back upstairs and laid out the remaining three.  Using the first one as a template I made quick work of the task.  Next I ate a bag of popcorn.

When I let Mary cut the second piece I realized that skills at making Mary follow the lines, left a bit to be desired.  Mary is quite fetching and I haven’t quite figured out where to train my eyes to get the best out of her.  I have tried looking at the outside edge of the guide and the inside edge, but I suspect that I need to try to keep the line in the center.  Like everything, the more time I spend with Mary, the better I will become.

So now I had two pieces.  If they were large boards I would route out the excess with my bit that has a guide bushing.  I have gotten pretty good at it.  It took only a few minutes to realize that the pieces were too small to clamp, and that I would have to create some sort of jig.  I recalled seeing an article on using the shop fox templates, and it seemed like they might do the trick.

I have lots of magazines now, and I spent a couple of hours flipping through them, without any luck.  I went to bed.  When I got up today I had a couple of more ideas.  But careful consideration found a flaw in each one.  When I was about to give up, I decided that I would try clamping them all together in the vice and with the 3” belt sander, try grinding away the excess.  Twenty minutes later they were all smooth and identical in size.  It took me 4 hours of fussing about, trying to find out a way to avoid grinding them down, when in the end, it turned out to be really easy.So now I needed to drill holes in them, for the hose.  I quickly made work of the first two, drilling a 1 1/4 inch hole.  My batteries were dead, so I did the logical thing; I put one in the charger and went to Milo’s Sub shop.  It was beautiful here in Iowa today.  The drive was a joy and the Italian club sandwiches were extremely tasty.

When I got home I swapped out the batteries and ate dinner.  Next I drilled out the third piece and then took a chisel to the 4^th, as I wanted a half blind light bulb mortise.  I am not sure that there is technically a thing called the half blind light bulb mortise, but I am fine with that.  You get the idea.  Using a 3/8^th inch chisel I quickly dug out a light bulb shape and the more I played with the chisel the better the shape.I don’t have a band saw, table saw, drill press, lathe, jointer, planer, nuclear powered saw mill, or any of a dozen other really fun looking tools that I see in the shops of the big kids in the magazines.  I realized today that they are mostly offer efficiency.  I have spent a dozen hours flattening my router table top, where a planer could have banged it out in a few minutes.  I spent 20 minutes grinding down my curvy pieces, where a band saw and some sand paper could have achieved the same result in 19 minutes and 47 seconds.  My belief is that many projects can be completed with a basic set of tools, a bit of patience, and the desire to solve problems.

I love the challenge.  When I was building my workbench, I recall thinking this would be a good deal easier if I had a workbench.  I have used my router half a dozen times while building my router table, each of them would have been easier on a router table.  That being said, having the workbench to build the router table has been wonderful.  I expect that the next project will benefit greatly from the router table.  Though each mile on the journey of woodworking takes me across foreign terrain, full of mysteries and dangers, the lessons learned make the continuance possible.

I cut mortise and tenons and this helped cut the dovetails, which gave me the skills to cut the half blind light bulb, and now I feel confident that I could cut almost any shape.  There are teachers who make their students learn hand tools first.  Though I don’t have a teacher, following this principal seems to be leading to great discoveries, and the progress fills me with happiness.

Being an early riser I got up at the crack of noon today.  I was excited to try out my new whetstone flattening tool, though not before a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich.  It was super tasty.  Before I could get started with my whetstone chore, I got distracted by the practice dovetails I was working on.  As I mentioned yesterday, I broke the really good pins I had created yesterday, but before I went to bed I had cut some more.

Let me take this moment to say how much I love my try square.  It is so very user friendly.  The marks that I laid out for the pins and tails were a delight.  I like the way it feels to use, I like how confident I feel about the accuracy, and I like the brass bits on it.  If you don’t have a try square, and I am sure most of you do, run out and get one, except for my mom and dad, as they don’t really have any need to mark an accurate line or know if something is 90 degrees.  Everyone else though should get one as soon as possible.  My little brass marking gauge is very handy too.  I like the way the mark makes the placement of the chisel much easier than just a pencil line.  This is one of the most exciting parts of my recent dovetail practicing, the improvement in the line across the bottom.

I am still not quite perfect at the fit yet.  There are little gaps, but the most recent set is better than the one before it.  The learning curve seems to be similar to what I experienced with the mortise and tenons.  With each attempt comes an educational blunder.  It takes me hours to cut one set.  If one compares this to the online videos of people doing it in 3 minutes, well, it is longer.  Have I mentioned that I am the son of a mathematician?  I digress.

The point is that it is hours and hours of enjoyment.  The last set, when the pens finally were paired down enough to fit, was a tremendous job.  The hours of joy were not consecutive today however.  I had marked some pins before bed, and I cut them quite quickly.  Next I needed to do some chisel work and I checked my chisel, and lo and behold, it needed some sharpening.  This brought me back to the whetstone flattening.

I bound up the stairs, grabbed the whetstone and took it downstairs to the precision flattening cinder block.  I rubbed the whetstone across it and a satisfying red color started to cover the block.  I flipped it over, excited to see how it looked.  The sight was very cool.  The edges were wearing down.  I thought to myself, “This won’t take long”.  This turned out to be true, if one is comparing the time it took to the length of time since the big bang occurred.  In actual time it took a 30 minute session, followed by some lunch, another 15 minute session, and then a break to watch golf.  After Ernie Els finished the 18^th hole, I brought the cinder block upstairs and put it on my lap, and started the final session.  This last session took exactly 5 episodes of the Mentalist.  I watched and rubbed.

After it was flat, I spent about 30 minutes sharpening, and went back to my dovetail cutting practice.  The newly sharpened chisel did a lovely job, and before I knew it, it was nine in the evening and time to share my woodworking day with the world, which I have done.  Now back to the Mentalist, this isn’t as good as Psyche, but is still entertaining.

One must take the approach that today’s task is practice for tomorrow’s triumph.

-Sharpening Monk Proverb

It has been quite a while since I devoted an evening to practice.  Tonight I felt I would do some and get myself ready for a weekend of router table work.  I am close enough to getting it finished that I can almost smell it, and it smells, well like sawdust.  I think that is probably pretty typical with woodworking.  The smell of success would seem out of place if it was the odor of cinnamon buns or a bacon cheeseburger.  But I digress.

I set my sights on some hand cut dovetail practice.  After I marked the practice piece for pins and made the cuts I grabbed my 3/8 Irwin chisel.  A close inspection revealed that it was dull and a little bit dinged up.  The dings looked rather severe and I didn’t relish trying to grind them down on the 1000 grit stone.  While it is true that I have a bevy of grinders in the garage, they are old and scary, and would most likely do more damage than good.

I learned several things today, while I was sharpening.  The first pearl of wisdom which made itself known to me, was that sharpening is not terribly complex.  Step one, flatten the back, not too hard, just move the back of the chisel across the wet tone to and fro, fro and to.  I did this for a few minutes.  Step 2, put the chisel into a sharpening guide, and then run it back and forth across the whetstone.  The second step is the one I dreaded, as I knew that a normal person would have ground out the dings before starting, thus saving them considerable time.

I was reminded of the old saying, “A watched chisel, never sharpens.”  It seemed that every time I flipped the chisel over, wiped off the edge and looked at it, there was a disheartening amount of progress.  So I stopped looking and got into a bit of a rhythm.  Occasionally I would change hands and go the other direction.  I remember reading that it is important to try to use the whole whetstone, to keep it even.  Back and forth I went and before long I had my second wonderful sharpening wisdom pop into my head, “It is something that can be done while one thinks about other stuff and this helps the time pass.”  I started to wonder if the reason that many people find sharpening to be a challenge is that they don’t reach this state of Zen sharpening.  I thought about how I hadn’t especially enjoyed the first five minutes, but now that my mind was wondering I didn’t find it too bad at all.  This went on for quite a while, when the thought of those two dings popped back into my head.

“Ugh I thought to myself.  I wish I had a nice grinder.  Maybe that purchase should be moved up on my list of priorities?  I wonder if I should just break down and buy another Irwin chisel and start over, they aren’t that expensive.  I don’t know.  I am a little hungry.  I need a snack.  I don’t want to stop though.  When will you check the blade again?  Oh it doesn’t matter, I am sure I will still have a long way to go.  I wonder if my girlfriend from my freshman year will read today’s post?  She does sometimes.  There is one cookie in the cookie jar, I could probably eat it with one hand and carefully continue sharpening with the other.”

This went on in my head for a while.  Finally I needed the cookie, so I took a break, washed my hands, and ate it.  It was delightful.  I was ready to get back to the chisel and decided to see how much further I had to go.  I flipped it over and was shocked, the dings were gone.  They were gone!  Had they snuck out while I was getting the cookie?  I couldn’t be sure.  Everything I had read made me believe that I would have to spend approximately 3 weeks, 9 hours, 27 minutes on the whetstone to get out the dings from the chisel.  This is why everyone grinds it down first.  It seems that one can indeed grind down a chisel manually; the trick is to think about other things and let time eat away the minutes and the steel.

I had been at it for about 30 minutes, and now was extremely enthused for sharpening.  I grabbed my 1 inch chisel and honed its edge.  Next I got one of my practice chisels and went at it.  I have a couple of really old chisels that are in need of serious work to get them into shape.  I grabbed one and flipped it over and looked at the back.  It was ugly and brown.  The steel was likely under all the age and gunk, I just had to find it.  So I put my brain into random thoughts mode and 30 minutes later it was looking much improved, though still not perfect.  I picked up another old practice chisel and spend another 30 minutes on it.  Ninety minutes of practice chiseling and I feel I am getting better at it.

When I was done with the sharpening I looked at my whetstone, I held it up and realized that I had failed in my attempt to keep it flat.  The stone was visibly shallower in the center.  It was a nice day so I hopped into the car and went to Ace Hardware for a cinder block.  It seems that one can use them to flatten a whetstone.  I am not sure if buying a cinder block counts as a tool purchase, so I picked up a file, just to be safe.   Tomorrow I will try out my brand new whetstone flattening device.

I went back to the dovetails and my newly sharpened 3/8^th inch Irwin made quick work of the waste.  Ok, it wasn’t quick work, as I still lack confidence with dovetails, but it was much quicker than if I hadn’t sharpened it.

I then set about making some tails, when looked awful.  The pins were brilliant, but the tails looked like the dove had been suffering from some terrible disease.  Naturally after I got them together, I broke one of the beautiful pins off, as I tried to pull it apart.  Oh well, it was just practice, and if one is to believe the wise sharpening monks, this will lead to a triumph tomorrow.

In every journey there is a point where one needs to find their way.  One can use a map to find their destination, unless; well unless they are a man.  We men prefer to use the force.  In my woodworking journey I decided to find my way by using a compass.  I had forgotten how much I enjoy using one.  Now that I have a try square, it is the perfect time to revisit this powerful tool.

I needed to make some square pieces of wood.  I could have used a ruler and measured the width of the board and then marked out the same distance along the length.  But I choose to find my way by drawing an arch and then using the try square to draw my cut line.  This was a simple and enjoyable exercise.  I marked out six squares.

I hadn’t thought about it since I started doing woodworking, but the compass is the perfect tool for dividing a board in half.  Imagine that you have a board that is trapezoidal in shape.  One could measure each end and do the math to figure out where the middle point is and mark it.  Or simply use the compass to find the center of each end and connect the points.

If it has been a while since you have found the center of two points with a compass, I will give a quick refresher.  Place the pointy end of the compass in a corner, stretch the compass until it reaches past the half way mark, then draw an arc.  Move the compass to the next corner and repeat.  The point where the arcs cross is the center.  If one then opens the compass a bit more and repeats, followed by connecting the two points, one now has a line that is centered.  Creating a perfectly centered line without a ruler is almost like magic.  I won’t go into deriving an octagon or solving the proof for Euler’s circle, but I will say that geometry is cool.  You may not think so, but once you start to use a compass and straight edge to solve measuring problems, it may become magical to you too.

Now back to our regularly scheduled blog piece on my router table fence.  The fence needs to be able to have an attachment for my shop vac.  After considering several options I decided upon a design.  The first step was to chisel a mortise that matches the opening in the top of the fence.  Before I started the mortise I gave the chisel a good sharpening.  With my sharp chisel in hand I created a shallow mortise fairly quickly.  Actually I don’t really know how long it took.  It was such a joy that I didn’t really pay attention to the time.  It might have taken quite a long time; I guess we will never know.  Into the mortise I glued two triangular blocks of 6/4 hard maple, which were cut off of the feet of the saw horses Teri and Tracy, and had been waiting to be included in a project.  Before I glued the blocks into the mortise I drilled a one inch hole.

After the glue had dried sufficiently I tried the connection and it was really wonderful.  A nice tight fit, which I will be able to remove, should I get another different shop vac, and replace with a connector designed for it.  This was an important consideration in the design.  I know that this isn’t my last shop vac and I wanted the option to be able to switch connectors.

The next step is to create a top to the connector that will take the hose.  This is where the six square blocks previously mentioned will come in.  I have an evil plan which I will work on tonight, after this post, and show it to you tomorrow.  Unless it fails miserably, then I will try something else.

I am finding my way, with the help of my trusty compass, and enjoying all the sights along the way.  Now back to the shop, at least until the Cornell game tips. 

Can you have a post script in an email?  I am not sure.  Let’s give it a try.

p.s. Yes, it seems to work.  The proof is created with only a pencil, paper, straight edge, and compass.  Euler’s Circle is a 9 point circle that can be constructed given any triangle.  Originally he theorized that this proof would be a hit at parties and would wow the ladies.  Sadly this turned out not be true, though there are still a few of us who dare to dream.  I constructed the pictured version a few years back, it took me 45 minutes, and as of the writing of this post, has yet to cause a single woman to swoon.

“A deadline is negative inspiration.  Still, it’s better than no inspiration at all.” 

~Rita Mae Brown

There isn’t a deadline for finishing my router table top.  I love working on my project and that joy is all the inspiration required.  So this quote doesn’t really apply at all, but I still like it.  Not because I agree with it, or because I know what it is like to be an author with a manuscript due, but because Rita Mae Brown has a co-writer.

She writes, among other things, the cozy mystery series, which she has co-written with her cat Sneaky Pie Brown.  I find her books delightful.  So when I saw this quote, I simply had to use it, if for no other reason, because I couldn’t find a quote from Sneaky Pie.

Though I don’t have deadlines per se, for my projects, I do have my own daily blog deadline.  It is not carved in stone, but I like to try to get the blog up by 10 pm central time.  If I can get it up earlier I do.  If I am distracted by snacks or something shinny on the internet, it can be a bit later.  The important part is that I do it every day.  I wouldn’t call my daily deadline a negative inspiration either.  I would call it fun.

I do create mini goals each day.  As I get better at understanding what is involved in projects I am able to set my sights on what is possible, given my time constraints.  A couple of months ago I would routinely underestimate how much time would be involved for something simple like sanding.  Today I wanted to get the router fence sanded and the hole cut.  I spent about an hour sanding and around 40 minutes on cutting, using the micro-plane, and chiseling the opening.

Of course I cut the opening with Marey the jigsaw.  She did a really nice job.  This was the first time I had cut a serious arc, and there was a bit of burning, as I wasn’t moving quickly enough.  Marey can get really hot if she sets her mind to it.  I have no doubt that I will get better at making Marey do my bidding in the future.  [Editor’s note:  In the interest of full disclosure, the name sake for which my Festool Jigsaw is named would not do anyone’s bidding.  It is important that we make this clear, so as to avoid any repercussions at the next Sauerkraut Days in Lisbon.]

After cutting out the opening, I tried to use my micro-plane, with the curvy blade.  I had purchased it some time ago, when I was overcome by the need for an impulse purchase.  This was my first chance to use it, and I was foiled by the handle.  It has a bit on the end, which rendered it useless in this instance.  I would not be tin foiled or saran wrapped and took the micro-plane blade out of the handle and used a piece of 1 x 2.  This worked tremendously and filled me with a great sense of accomplishment.  It is the little things you know.I was able to plane away the bits that hadn’t quite made it up to my carefully marked line.  After that step I used a file to clean it up a bit more.  I stopped and took a picture, then cleaned up the saw dust and took another one with the fence in place.  It is not connected yet.  I still have to think a bit about how I am going to approach the track I intend on installing on the face of the fence, and the shop vac connection piece, but that is for another day.

I really enjoy nights like tonight.  I felt I was efficient in my woodworking.  I didn’t have any terrible mistakes.  And I got to do lots of sanding.  I do love the feeling of a finely sanded router fence.  Now I need to sit back, possibly with a cookie, and form my game plan for tomorrow.

It was 3 am and I was trying to fall asleep, but I kept thinking about the tracks for the router table fence.  I had installed them, by screwing the first track down, and then I made marks in a piece of oak.  I drilled holes for the little track peg thingies.  I reasoned that if I built a test piece, I could make sure that the other track was parallel, when I screwed in the final two screws.  It worked really well, but I also realized that there was enough play in the track that it wasn’t really necessary.  Next I started to think about the tracks I had installed.

 I realized that I had made a design decision that I realized had a dreadful flaw in it.  Each track was intentionally set about 1/32 of an inch above the surface of the table.  In my mind, this seemed like a brilliant idea, as my pretty blue Rockler bracket, which would be the foundation of my fence, would slide smoothly on the raised tracks.  It is true that the fence bracket does slide effortlessly on the tracks.

The problem, as I am sure most seasoned woodworkers have already surmised, is that though I can route the edges of boards quite nicely, the tracks will prevent me from sliding the track back and cutting dados.  No dados!  Oh my, this is certainly a fly in the proverbial ointment.  I love a dado, and really want to use my sexy router table to its fullest potential.

The first idea that popped into my sleepy brain was that I would just have to lower the tracks back to table level.  I didn’t like this idea, because it meant that I would be giving up the silky smooth sliding.  Silky smooth sliding is one of my top 29 favorite things, just between a perfectly executed double play, and Catherine Zeta Jones.  You can see my dilemma.

I was almost asleep, secure that my plan to lower the tracks was the best option.  Suddenly, as I was almost off to the land of nod, I remembered that I had broken off a screw in the track, and had been forced to flip it around and drill new holes.  In an instance, the thought of that screw in the wood, became a hazard for my router.  Of course, I could take care of it before I route out the extra depth, but my brain was now imagining me forgetting to remove that little bit of metal, and dying in a horrible accident.  So I got up and wrote myself a note and took it downstairs to the table and affixed it to the track.

I turned the light off and almost went back up the stairs.  Instead, I turned around and decided it would be better if I took the track out and gave it a look, which I did.  It wouldn’t hurt just to chisel a bit out.  Now wide awake, with chisel in hand I went to it.  It was such fun.  I am so glad that I bothered to learn how to use the chisel, because I succeeded in removing the screw.  While I was working on this, I had another idea, I could create an add on for my fence which would ride over the tracks and allow for dado cutting.  This idea was worth considering, but I really needed to get some sleep, and since I had averted my future power tool disaster, I packed it in for the night.

When today arrived I was well rested, but not at all convinced which solution was the best route.  I still don’t know, but I have, for the time being, decided to go with the add on.  If the extra bit on the fence doesn’t work out well, I can always lower the tracks later.This evening was all about building the regular fence.  I have an idea about how it will work and have included a gap for duct collection.  I have an exceptionally mediocre shop vac, but I think that with some brilliant engineering and a considerable luck, it just might work.  Though I have considered the possibility that it may suck, and by that I mean, that it won’t suck.  The first step is to glue a couple of 6/4 hard maple pieces, separated by 5 3/16^th of an inch, to a 36 inch piece.  You might wonder how I arrived at 5 3/16^th, well I took the sucking power of the shop vac, divided  by the coefficient of guessing, and then cut a piece of scrap hard maple in half.  After it is dry I will add another piece of wood, likely oak, to stick with the two wood theme, to the other side.  Once I have the fence together, I will figure out how I am going to work the connector for Cheapy McShopva.  Until the next time, take care and be good.

After a lovely weekend with mom and dad, I was eager to get back to working on the router table.  So when I was done with work today I went down stairs to install the tracks for the fence.  The troubles I had with my miter track, were still fresh on my mind, and I was determined to be doubly extra super duperly careful.

I measured, clamped, measured again and ran a shallow pass with my router.  Next I checked the fit and it was slightly too thin a dado.  Another quick pass and it was a lovely dado.  I unplugged the router, adjusted the depth of the cut, plugged the router back in and took another pass.  The other side was easier because the jig was already set.  Once both dados were cut I measured again.  They were very close to where I wanted them, but a little bit of work with a chisel and file improved the accuracy.

If I have learned anything about woodworking, it is that any moment can be one where things go awry.  I carefully measured my track, and cut the two pieces which I would install.  The edges of the tracks were not exactly a right angle, so I decided to throw caution to the wind and try out one of the bench grinders in the garage.  They are frightening looking old beasts, but I needed to grind just a little bit, so I decided it couldn’t hurt to look.

The first one had major scary issues with the cord.  The second gave me the impression that it wouldn’t try to kill me, so I plugged it in and it gave it a go.  I was surprised how well it worked, so much so that I may actually have a pretty good grinder for my shop.

I used my awl to mark the holes for the screws, and then drilled a pilot hole.  The first screw went in fine, but the head was just a little bit too big.  It must be perfect, or the track won’t work.  The time was 8:27 pm and Home Depot is open until 9 pm.  Could I make it?  I grabbed my keys, ran out of the house, making sure to bring the track with me.  I generally don’t like to speed, and I certainly didn’t want to get a ticket, but again caution was being chucked to the wind, but I felt an additional 4 miles per hour was justified in this instance.  I know what you are thinking only 4?!  Yeah, I know, but I really don’t like to speed.  I am really not very daring.

I arrived with a mere 4 minutes to spare.  The Home Depot folks were very nice and didn’t rush me at all.  There was another gentleman looking for screws too, and he indicated that he also had an emergency project that he really wanted to finish tonight.  I found my screws, went to Jimmy John’s sub shop, bought a yummy sandwich, and returned home.

I really wanted to get the tracks in, so I could take a photo and write my blog.  But on the way home I had an idea how I might make sure they are installed accurately.  The idea involves one of the boards I am going to use for the fence, a bolt, a couple of drilled holes, and a mongoose.

I realized that my idea for added precision would take a little while and didn’t want to break my consecutive blog streak, so I thought I would get it done and then go down and finish.  Also I really wanted to eat my sandwich.  So I guess you will just have to come back tomorrow and find out if my idea worked.