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+-- Thread: Rocking Chair Build-A-Long Thread using Hal Taylor Plans (Pic Heavy) (/showthread.php?tid=5312423)
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Re: Rocking Chair Build-A-Long Thread using Hal Taylor Plans (Pic Heavy) - tocws2002 - 03-05-2011
Saturday, March 5, 2011 (~8 hours)
Had a really good day in the shop today and made some progress on the rocking chair. Started the day by working on the seat, first up was to work on the front and rear leg joint to create something similar to what is shown below (which was made by Marc Adams at a seminar I attended at Woodcraft several years ago and I got to take it home):
To start, I set up my router with the 1 ½” diameter rabbeting bit to take slightly more than a 7/16” deep cut. This will leave me with a tongue approximately 1” in thickness. Hal prefers to perform this operation with the seat vertical, but I didn’t feel comfortable with this, so I chose to rout the notches with the seat flat on the workbench. I clamped the seat down and routed the top side, then flipped it over and routed the bottom. Below are the pictures of the router bit and the seat with the front and rear leg notches rabbeted:
Whiteside Rabbeting Bit
Top of the seat with just the top side of the notches routed
Bottom of the seat with both sides of the notch routed…here you can see the tongue that was created
Next up was to rout the back brace holes using the BBHT (back brace hole template) that was purchased from Hal. This template has holes for the small, medium, and large rocking chairs. The holes are routed using a ¼” bit with a ½” collar. To keep from routing the wrong hole, I drew a line between the holes I needed to rout, as seen in the pictures.
Here is the BBHT aligned and clamped to the seat blank.
And with the holes routed and the template still attached…
And now without the template:
The next couple of pictures show the front of the seat cut on the band saw and the depth holes drilled in the “field of the seat”. These holes will be used to help guide me when I start the grinding process.
I set the seat aside after getting to this point and continued my work on the back brace and rocker forms. I added the aluminum angle and drilled the holes to complete both of the forms, as shown below:
Rocker Form
Back brace form with rocker form in background
Once the forms were finished, I moved onto the front legs. Shown below are the front leg blanks and the “adder” piece and a couple of close-up shots.
Following this I moved onto the back brace billets (spalted maple and ash). I had to cut to rough size, joint, and rip to width and I had to dig the ash out from under a stack of red oak, so this took a little bit of time.
Spalted maple back brace billets…
Ash back brace billets with some ripped to just over 0.100”, they will get drum sanded to 0.090” thick…
I cut more ash back brace billets than I need so I would have plenty for the rocking chair and so I could glue up one to use as a clamping block/pad on top of the real rocker back braces to distribute the clamping pressure and to keep the clamps from damaging the ones to be used in the rocker.
Below are a few pictures of four strips of ash being glued up in the form, this one will be used when gluing up and clamping the real back braces.
This is where I left off for the day; I am hoping to get a little bit of time in the morning to take the brace out of the clamp, but probably won’t have time to do much more than that. If you’ve made it through all of this, thank you for reading and following along, if you have any questions or comments, feel free to post them here!
Thanks,
-jason
Re: Rocking Chair Build-A-Long Thread using Hal Taylor Plans (Pic Heavy) - jestrada - 03-06-2011
Looks like you're make good progress on the rocker, Jason. Those spalted maple pieces are killer.
I have one question: What was the purpose for adding the aluminum angles to the back brand and rocker form? Was it used to align the strips during glue up?
Re: Rocking Chair Build-A-Long Thread using Hal Taylor Plans (Pic Heavy) - tocws2002 - 03-06-2011
Yeah, I love that spalted maple, I almost hated to cut it in fear that I would screw it up and ruin it.
As for the aluminum, you're exactly right, they are used to align the strips when gluing them up. The process is as follows:
1. Put glue on all the laminations
2. Stack them in the form
3. Use one clamp in the center to hold them to the form
4. Use clamps on the aluminum angle to align the edges of the laminations
5. Apply remaining clamps and let sit overnight.
Thanks,
-jason
Re: Rocking Chair Build-A-Long Thread using Hal Taylor Plans (Pic Heavy) - Superglide - 03-06-2011
Great progress!! I really hope the spalted maple works for the legs and back braces. That is some crazy wild looking wood.
Seat nothces look nice and clean. For me, the leg and seat joint is the most critical part of the build. Every chairbuilder will look at that first, and it looks like you nailed it.
Keep em coming!
Re: Rocking Chair Build-A-Long Thread using Hal Taylor Plans (Pic Heavy) - esanford - 03-06-2011
Jason, I appreciate you going to the trouble of documenting your build. One of these rockers is on my future project so getting th watch the process unfold is awesome. And great looking maple! Those slats are going to look phenomenal.
Re: Rocking Chair Build-A-Long Thread using Hal Taylor Plans (Pic Heavy) - tocws2002 - 03-06-2011
Superglide,
I'm hoping the spalted maple will work for the back braces, I'm reasonably confident that it will be fine since I'm using the ash in the middle, guess time will tell. I opted not to use the heavily spalted maple for the legs due to the comments expressed early. However, the pieces I am using for the front legs (I have yet to cut the rear legs) are from the same board as the back slats, just not in the spalted area. The front leg pieces have some nice coloration and some slight curl, which should match up with the headrest pretty well.
If all goes well (and as planned) the back slats should be one of the focal points of rocker. I'm hoping to have some time this coming week to rip a piece or two of the spalted maple, sand them to thickness, and glue up a back brace or two and test the strength of it.
Thanks,
-jason
Re: Rocking Chair Build-A-Long Thread using Hal Taylor Plans (Pic Heavy) - Bozz - 03-06-2011
Awesome work, Jason!
Re: Rocking Chair Build-A-Long Thread using Hal Taylor Plans (Pic Heavy) - R Clark - 03-06-2011
Jason, thanks for posting the latest set of pics. Maybe you could use spalted maple for the top lam that would be most visible on the rocker, and more durable stock beneath that? Just a thought...and perhaps would every penny you paid for it!
I do have one question...what is the capacity of your bandsaw? I have a Delta 14" closed stand with the standard 6" vertical capacity. I see in Hal's plans that he says more capacity is needed for easily shaping the headrest. Thoughts?
Thanks for posting the pics...I'm still in the hunt for stock for mine. Also have to get a couple other projects to get out of the way first. And then there's the spring fly-fishing trip coming up. And maybe a trip to Arkansas to the in-laws and a little fly-fishing there, too. And maybe a trip to my daughter's new place in San Antonio.
And somehow I have to find enough time to do the job that pays dollars to enable all the rest. You know, employers are funny like that...
Beginning to sound like I'm living vicariously through your rocker build!
Re: Rocking Chair Build-A-Long Thread using Hal Taylor Plans (Pic Heavy) - MWS - 03-06-2011
Jason,
I am really enjoying this build thread. This will definitely go onto my to do list. I have never done a bent lamination, only read articles and watched David Marks demonstrate. I've usually seen a mating form used to sandwich the laminations insted of clamps placed directly onto the laminations. Is there an advantage? Just a different way of skinning the cat? Easier? Thanks.
Mark
Re: Rocking Chair Build-A-Long Thread using Hal Taylor Plans (Pic Heavy) - Richard D. - 03-06-2011
Looks like it is coming along nicely.