Rocking horse plans needed

[TDKPE]

Resurrecting this thread, she's now 19 months old, and will be 2 years old in late November.  Beginning at what age would this rocking horse be appropriate?  Given my summer schedule, and glacial pace in the best of times, I have to start thinking about building this now.  But is 2 years old to young for this rocking horse?

[joe1086]

Go for it, she'll be close one way or the other.

My granddaughter is 2.5 years old now and would love that RH. At two years old, she may not have been quite ready for it, but pretty close....

[fredhargis]

I would plan on building it this year. If it's too early, she will grow into it.

[EP]

I can not believe that we are this far into a rocking horse thread and no one has posted the infamous BobZ Rocking Horse build story.   Am I that old, am I the only one who remembers it????   I don't have it  but it is legend.

[Bill Wilson]

I can not believe that we are this far into a rocking horse thread and no one has posted the infamous BobZ Rocking Horse build story.   Am I that old, am I the only one who remembers it????   I don't have it  but it is legend.

Ask and ye shall receive.  Beware, it's very long.

Heh, heh, heh..... boy, have I got a 'tail' for you. Watch this space.
See? Hopefully this will partially reward some that patience...

Having recently passed the half century mark, a rocking horse for my own grandchild, was at best, several years off, but I should have started it yesterday. 'Can you build Grace a rocking horse'? my sister asked via long distance one late August afternoon. 'She'll be two this February ya know'. Do little girls ride rocking horses I wondered, a vision of Anne Oakley in pampers forming.. uh.. 'OK', I said, figgering she'd forget about it by the end of this conversation. I wanted to finish up my fourth work bench (all I really make is workbenches) before tackling anything new. (Like #5.) It was just easier to say 'yes' than take two hours saying 'no'. The call was after all, my nickel.

The middle of September rolled around and we're chatting on the phone about a welcome winter ahead and she drops a casual one liner, 'so how's Grace's rocking horse coming along?' <insert hugely pregnant pause> 'Uh, I'm still looking over plans' I said matter of factly... 'won't be long now before I pick one', I lied like a hearth rug. Damm, I muttered. My other sister is putting her up to this I thought, trying to recall what childhood prank of mine she was loath to forgive. Hmmm... nah. She's just foolin' with my head, that's it. Yep. We said our good bye's. I hung up and forgot about it.

Later that day I'm on the horn with my Mom and she mentions how tickled she and Dad are that I'm going to make their little grandaughter (the Princess of the Universe) a rocking horse. I felt like I'd just been clothes lined. I choked down a wad of air, then exhaled as the room regained it's focus and mustering the last ounce of the cavalier in me coughed out 'yeah, I figgered it was about time I knocked out one of those .. <wheeze>.. I mean Grace *is* the only grandaughter in the family.' It was a conspiracy alrighty. I easily formed this thought from my vantage point on the starboard bridge wing of the HMS Titanic. No backing out now, Cap'n a voice sed from the flooding engine room.

To make it short, I settled on the Woodsmith plans because I liked the way the horse looked. Having the issue helped too. Mistake number one. Don't ever make one of these critters because you like the way it looks. Choose one that's butt ugly. That way you can make it in a reasonable amount of time (say three months) with the toolage you have on hand. The 'flatter' the horse the better. The Woodsmith rocking horse in issue #65 isn't one of those. At least the way I approached it.

Things went off the tracks from the git go. The plans call for pine 2x12's for the horse's body and legs. Right. I called a buddy who's got enough walnut stashed in his basement to re-do the top three floors of the Coca Cola Bldg and who had their first born on the way. (Timing is everything, Daddy sez.) Turns out he's a bit short on 8/4, but will sell me some 10/4 for the same price. Heh, gonna have us a healthy ol' rockin' horse, yessiree! The next day, I'm home with the walnut.

The first thing you do is cut the wedges that allow the legs to kick out from the body. In typical Woodsmith fashion, an 'almost' foolproof method is shown to do this. You need... uh, 20 of these wedges, five to each leg. I make the setup and promptly cut out 20 of these from that 10/4 stock. About this time, b'fast is ready, so I run up stairs to catch a bite with the Mrs. Forty five minutes later, (Ten of those spent reliving my prowess with the TS in having the wedges all cut) I'm back down in the shop. I notice several of the wedges aren't wedges anymore. They look like footware for a tasteless elf. Damm, what kinda moron would recommend cutting the stoopid things across grain like that anyhow?

A closer look at the plans and I learn I've just made a big batch of doorstops. I also learn who the maroon is and the fact that he's a close relation.

Stay tuned.
Part the first is in the thread 'Rocking Horse'. I figgered as this is a narrative of my 'experience' building the Woodsmith issue #65 (since burned) rocking horse, and little value to anyone considering the construction of one, or just plain little value, this post is outta place over there.

So to continue. (This is rather theraputic, I'm finding. Like I could rant to anyone who'd listen, but they'd just stare, slack jawed holding an empty clue bag.) Well, I'd discovered that I was the person who cross cut all of those miserable damm wedges that were now curling into pretzels almost before my eyes. Luckily I had enough of that blank to cut out twenty more, and as I hadn't yet torn up the set up, fired up the saw and within a short time was back on schedule. I glued up the things with a Bessey K body and wax paper. Not a big deal, but getting the alignment spot on took some care.

Next on the hit parade, was cutting out and glueing up the body blank. Did I mention the walnut I scored was 10//4? This was the key to my subsequent aquisition of a Laguna 16HD. You see, I discovered after stashing all of that 10/4 walnut in the shop, that my widdle Bosch barrel grip jigsaw wasn't going to cut it. Literally. I probably could have borrowed a friend's Sawzall and done the deed but somehow that just seemed frightfully out of place. Kinda like turtle hunting with a ball pean hammer. Nope, if you're going to carve up 10/4 walnut, ya gotsta have a proper band saw. And boy, did I.

Sooooooooo, I grabbed the poster board template and began to trace the outline of the body... I did the first half then realized I couldn't see the damm lines anywhere. Fabu. I started lookin' around for something that would contrast with the walnut. I raided my wife's studio next door and came up with an old gray water color pencil and that worked like a charm. Also got some tailor's chalk which I used for the larger markings that didn't require a crisp line, such as 'right leg' etc..

Anyhoo, I cut the first leg out and was having so much fun, started to cut out the other legs too. Then it dawned on me that I'd better cut out the body next. That way if someone wanted to know if I was making any progress, I could truimphantly say, 'well, I've got the body done, won't be long now.' Heh, 'won't be long now'... if I had only known, but alas my clue bag was empty too. Stay tuned.


OK, fellow insomniacs here we go... everyone strapped in?
Lessee... where did I leave off... hmmmm... I had just got the body cut out and was feeling pretty good. I still had three of the legs left to go, (this critter had four real legs) but decided to put those off for the next day. I wanted to give my new osciferrating spindle sander a real try on the real thing. As it turned out, the body wasn't perrfectly flat when it came outta the clamps. A few swipes with my trusty # 5 1/2 (not the L-N version) took care of that. This prior bit of work paid some dividends now as the body laid nice and flat on the cast iron. Oh yeah!

I approached the spindle sander with all the confidence one has after sucessfully sanding one six inch long piece of 1/2" pine to a line the previous evening. IOW, I was scared fairly shitless, I suppose you could phrase it. This wasn't pine but was much harder and about four and a half times thicker and hung off both ends of the table. Oh, and the cost was more plus my investment in time to that point. To mitigate my fears somewhat, I chose a 2 inch drum and loaded it with a 180 grit sleeve figgering when the screw up came, it wouldn't be catastrophic, just moderately disasterous.

So, after hikin' up my pants, I flipped the switch and went at it. The sander took off a comfortable amount of material and I quickly found that I could control it pretty easily. If I kept the piece moving. Constantly. The body had large flowing contours and the only way to keep them that way was motion of the perpetual variety. I was also reminded that the inside curves were a lot more forgiving than those on the outside. Just like driving a blimp. Well, sorta.

As such, the first half hour flew by pretty quickly. I was so focused on that little white line, (anyone remember 'Night Driver'?) that I became somewhat oblivous to everything else until I realized that the drum wasn't cutting much because the dust cloud had subsided. I put the body down and shut off the sander. Whew. The drum spun to a stop and looked about as smooth as a brass door knob. Time to give that freebie sanding belt eraser stick a workout, which I did. Afterwards I decided to up the ante, so I switched the sleeve to 120 grit and went back at it.

Yeeha! The new sleeve cut about twice as fast as the first. Or so it seemed. Anticipating this, I initially made really light passes, increasing the pressure as my confidence returned. I was really making progress now, but was creating a bit more dust. Ah well, I'd be done pretty quick, so who cares? But, I was entering my second hour at the spindle sander. This caused me to rethink the wisdom of leaving a 1/8" margin to the good of that little white line when I had cut the piece out the day before. (BTW, this was just one of many things I was rethinking at this point, believe me.) That wasn't gonna happen on the three remaining legs I solemnly vowed. Nosirree Bob.

Anyhoo, I was closing in on that white line, but decided to take a break. I shut the machine off and removed my fifty cent paper 'dust mask'. I looked inside the mask. Big mistake. I was now afraid to lick my teeth. I instinctively reached for my coffee cup, but noticed a facimile of a tropical isle in the middle of it. Little caffine powered waves breaking on it's shore. Yuck. I emptied the cup and it's prepubescent eco-system into the shop john and flushed mightily. Later I wondered had I left it alone, how long before foliage would have sprouted. Alas, we'll never know.

With a fresh cuppa joe, I took stock of the sitch. The shop looked like an M-80 had gone off in a box of Nestlie's Quik. Well OK, mebbe a mortar and a case of Quik. The sander has a dust port, and it's built in collection system works fairly well. Just that due to the stock's thickness, it was a tad overwhelmed. (All of the dust the TS and BS had set free still lingered as well.) Whatta mess. Earlier, I couldda hooked up the shopvac, but the trade off in decibels just wasn't worth it. I needed a real respirator. Bad. Something that filtered dust a bit better than a chain link fence might and didn't fog my specs any. (I also needed a bigass dust collection system, but y'all know that.)

Oh yeah, the fog. Yep, the fog was a little treat I spared y'all from above, but make no mistake, it didn't forget me. Nope. It coated my lenses quite nicely it did, teaming with the walnut dust to obliterate most of my vision. After about two hours, the lenses warmed to room temperature, so the fog subsided to the point where it was just a major annoyance.

A bit before lunch, I finished sanding the body to the line. Wow. All that work and it hadn't changed much in appearance. Gee, and all I have left to sand is every single living #&$^%@ part except this one. Fabu. Just wunnerful. I gave the bod one long glare, grabbed a 'leg', and flipped on the band saw. Heh, this is what it's really all about... the creation! I was driving that 3/8" 4 tpi blade thru that 2 1/4" walnut like a hot wire thru butter. No resistance at all. This was more fun than a skunk in church...

That's the problem with 3 hp... your're done before ya know it.... I'd cut out the three remaining legs in about 10 minutes. Now what? I went up stairs and grabbed lunch. An hour later, I was back in the shop, starring at the sander, using a leg as a 'cane'. Yug. I put the leg down, grabbed the broom and started to clean things up a bit instead. The shop has light colors on the walls and floor and I'm always amazed at how much and how far dust travels. The walnut stood out rather graphically and the stuff was almost everywhere.... I noticed the sides and bottom of the JDS unit were nicely coated. JDS unit??? Doh!!! Distracted by my trepedation prior to the sanding marathon, I had totally forgotten to turn on the ceiling mounted air filter. Arrrrrrrrrrrrrgh!!! I went outside, found a brick, and applied it to my forehaid. Stay tuned.

Good'evenin'. Y'all are wearin' me out with this tale. Tonight's might be it for a couple days but I wanted to thank you for the cheery words.

I'll tell y'all one thing, making a rocking horse will create a box full of the weirdest looking offcuts you can imagine. Lotsa pieces with curves or segments thereof. Being walnut mine resembled what you might find at the bottom of a package of Oreos... if the Oreos were the size of manhole covers. Quite a bit different than the straight thin incredibly boring tomato stake / blockish offcuts that cabinetry creates. They'll probably be the subject of an upcoming post at some point. Not sure whether to ask what makes the goofiest offcuts or what to do with them afterwards. But, ah digress.

Well, I now had just a wee bit of sanding to do, but as it was mid week, figgered I'd put it off until the weekend so I could buy a good respirator before making another assault on my senses. I shore didn't need another experience like what I had just gone thru with the main body in addition to my main body. No sirree Bob. What I did need was a mask that could filter a few microns past a gnat's butt and not fog up my steenking (safety..) glasses. In the interim I decided to pick thru the lumber rack and see what was available to build the rocker base. I could start on that and make some progress there, while I waited to get my respirator situation taken care of. Hmmmmm...

The weekend arrived. Several eves before I had announced at dinner (OK, pronounced ) that because of the concern for the health of my respiratory system and peripherals including nostrilae, gums, teeth, etc., that I needed a proper dust mask to wear when sanding with the osiffiricous spindle sander. This suggestion was met with a round of affirmative, enthusiastic hoots (responses) from all, causing a lump to well up in me throat. Later I wondered if a few lumps had well'd up in other places, like the clothes dryer's lint filter. But, as my Mama didn't raise no foos, I didn't ask. Saturday was proclaimed as 'the day', and after an early breakfast I was off like a herd of turtles, on my way to Highland Hardware.

Highland Hardware (HH) is over on the east side of d'town Atlanta in a district called Virginia Highlands. An old, quaint, now semi-funkified part of the City. I've heard you can even get tofu (whatever the hail that is) there. Lotsa edjumicated young folks live in the environs and older gentry as well. A nice place. It's about 20 odd miles (not as the crow flies) from Marietta. This is a good thing for several reasons, IME, primarily the growth and well being of a marriage, savings account, ya know, that kinda stuff. Also for me a great opportunity to blow the carbon outta the Cherokee's engine and see if 5th gear is still functional. Especially on a weekend, because few are doin' under 80 mph on I-75 South (except folks with OH tags). FWIW, we live and work within a five mile radius, so we 'don't get out much'.

HH is a local treasure for a variety of reasons one of them being product knowledge. It's been rare IME, when the first person I've asked a question to couldn't give me an immediate answer. Or rest until I got the answer from another staffer. That's why I was there, being partially clueless about respirators, although I did check the archives of a ww'g forum or two and peeked at a few catalogs. IOW, I knew enough to ask a few intelligent questions, and confuse myself beyond that. I figgered I'd be in good hands.

As my luck would have it, I was asked if I needed help right off the bat, just as I got my nose comfortably pressed against the glass case holding the L-N shoulder planes. Damm, but I hated efficiency like that. 'Uh, I need a dust mask' I blurted out. So much for the question part. Hopefully the intelligent part would come soon. 'A respirator for organic vapor, particulates, or perhaps both?' came the reply. FWIW, the staff at HH can take a bit of getting used to sometimes. In a good way. Each major edition of their catalog features pictures of the staff members, and their backgrounds. If you have one, take a peek. Lotsa BAs, and a few MAs thrown in the mix. IOW, the person you're conversing with about some aspect of ww'g may be equally at home leading a seminar discussion regarding: Follicular Formations in Fluptulant Flukes. Or something.

My keen mind quickly pegged 'particulate' as 'dust'. Or at least heavier than air.. something you would manuver with a broom eventually. 'Organic vapor'... a fart? Hee! I wondered that, but not aloud. 'Uh... organic vapor... you mean like fumes, huh' I asked. I got a nod. I could see by the twinkle in this young man's eye that there was a lot more to this that I probably didn't need or care to know.'Fumes' worked fine for this ol' boy. I was making progess. I knew kinda what I wanted to filter, now the question was with what?

'Howz about this' he said, handing me a full face shielded helmetish aparatus complete with AM/FM, multi media dual stage filter, harness, hose, battery pack / butt cushion (and sleeping bag?) 'This is The Racal' he proclaimed, ' *the* cat's jammies... totally self contained, the ultimate in comfort, safety, comfort and freedom of movement. Did I mention it's comfortable too?' W O W, I thought. Pretty darn cool! 'Is this the model that has the face shield wiper option and tandem cup holders?' I asked, stiffling a laugh. 'Oh, you must be thinking of the 3M version or possibly an import' he said. Uh huh, that's it... the 3M version. Right. That would figger.

Once upon a time as a kid, my favorite characters included Captain Nemo. What an opportunity come too late. I didn't even bother to say 'how much'? It had to be in the stratoshere. But, not wanting to put a price tag on my lungs, asked, 'well, I'm a semi serious hobbiest who, on the very rare occasion, has cause to employ abrassives of various types. What would you recommend as an appropriate application for the casual user?' (I sensed the intelligent part sloshing it's way to the surface. Finally.)

'Well yes of course.... I apologize for getting a bit carried away there. That Racal is an awesome unit tho. I wear one myself when I moonlight at a professional turning shop some weekends' my young friend confided. 'Yep' I added, not knowing enough about turning to comment further. 'But, a lotta guys wear this one' he said, handing me a half face unit that looked rather Darth Vaderish with it's triangular mouth piece. I thought the protruding roundish filters looked menacingly cool too. Yep, I could see why this puppy was popular. 'Uh... but..'. I looked at the pile of nylon strappage looping in all directions around my fingers... 'Here ya go' my assistant said. In a heartbeat he had the thing on me and I was drawing my first breath of activated charcoal oxygen before I knew it. 'Hooooo heeeesh hooooo' I breathed. 'Haayth, thiith feeth puuthee oood' I said not realizing I was unintelligable. 'Hooooo heeeesh hooooo', Maashaaa Shywaakuu?' Heehee! I was having some kinda fun now! Yehaa! I wore it over to the cashier. 'Hooooo heeeesh, oow muush?' I thought she was gonna wet her pants. I was dyin' too. I wanted to wear it home. Stay tuned.

There I was, armed with four legs, preparing to edge sand these things to the line. Normally I'd use a two inch (diameter) sanding drum chucked into my DP. But not to sand 45+ linear feet of 2 1/4" thick hardwood. If I had done that, I could use that DP to make one inch holes with a quarter inch bit afterwards. Luckily, I had the foresight back in the Fall to score my osifferious spindle sander from Wwr's Supply of Everywhere while they were giving them away for $179 and tossing in the spindle kit and caddys for 'nothing'. The caddys are especially important because with them the silly design of the base suddenly looks a lot less silly. Purposeful even. It's nice being able to buy a tool without having to construct shop furniture to hold all of the bits and pieces to make it convenient to operate. Kudos to Delta.

Come Saturday AM, I donned my spanky new dust mask, grabbed one of the horse's legs out of leg inventory, and commenced the marathon with an 80 grit sleeve. Hoooooo heeeeesh hoooooo.... boy, this mask was nice. 'Thet owrsh cursh forsh Daygobah, Amerahall! Hee! I was watching the dust drift around on the table like the plains of Tatooine and breathing none of it. Plus I had been operating the sander for going on ten minutes without fogging my specs. This was *great*! Yep. Fabulous in fact, recalling my experience sanding the body.
The end of the first hour approached. Fabulous had dwindled to ho hum as the novelty of breathing thru the respirator and sounding like Mr. Vader had worn off. Fogless specs were no longer a big deal either. Before two hours, I began to look forward to those infrequent sessions with the rubber abrasive cleaning bar. This allowed me to set the leg down, grab a gulp of coffee, get rid of some, and stretch a bit. Then get back and clean the damm sleeve off. Every other stop, I'd remove the sleeve and turn it upside down, evening out the wear. Only because it took longer, not because I'm a genius.

The drone of the spindle sander was one like the neon lights' in an office environment. You don't notice them until some sadistic egg sucking twit mentions the buzz, then they sound like a swarm of Cessnas on bad gas. Not like this thing was quiet or even subtle sounding, but it had a rhythm to it that wasn't all that unpleasant after about nine weeks or so. IOW, it kinda grew on ya like an elbow wart.

After a while you'd try to invent phrases that would match the two tone drone of the beast. You could make up almost anything and it would fit. 'Tire go flat?' 'Want fries - with that?' I won't go any further into how *my* mind wanders during these types of soul deadening drills. But, when you start pondering whether this year's Halloween treat is gonna be Hershey's Kisses, Snickers or Toosie Roll Pops, you've been at it far too long. The horror of running outta stuff to think about before I was done sanding loomed large.

Eventually, I got the legs edge sanded. (Was in all the papers.) If any are curious as to what happened to the wedges, (OK, I saw one hand go up in the back row, so the rest of y'all can skip this.) they were double back taped to the legs and band sawed as a unit. As such, I felt it best to leave them in place while I edge sanded the upper end of the legs. Of course the wedges caused the hoof end of the leg to be up off the table, adding to the convenience of this whole miserable operation.

To continue, I found myself guiding the legs against the sleeve with one hand and holding the opposite end up with the other hand. The fat end of the taper, combined with the leg made for a cross section passing thru three inches. Damm good thing the spindle sleeve was 4 1/2" , eh wot? After I got the upper end done, I popped the wedges off so's I could sand the lower part of the legs without having to support the opposite end with my hand. (I figgered the latter part out all by my self after the second leg.)

I think it was at this point that the monumental folly of my chosen material became crystal clear, although I can't remember if this epiphany occurred while sanding a rear leg or a front one. 10/4 walnut was *not* what you wanted to construct a rocking horse from. At least not this particular Woodsmith (#65) plan. My only consolation was the good fortune I had in finding walnut a lot cheaper than my first choice: Maple. Just imagine sanding the end grain on *that* stuff? While not exactly tantamount to constructing a Philly highboy outta knotty pine or MDF, a very poor material from a producability standpoint. Especially 10/4. And to think I stoopidly scoffed at the recommend choice... 2'x12" construction grade pine. (Why didn't I think of 2x SYP???)

Yep, I was on the receiving end of a first class double whammy alrighty. Not only was this hardwood causing me to eat a good bunch of winter's yard work free shop time, but it put a minor dent in the tool dollar account as well. Plus, since it was walnut, you treated it with a lot more respect, being extra, extra careful, because it's so darn purty. And heavy, and well, stay tuned.
 
 
Part the first is in the thread 'Rocking Horse'. I figured as this is a narrative of my 'experience' building the WoodSmith issue #65 (since burned) rocking horse, and little value to anyone considering the construction of one, or just plain little value, this post is outta place over there.

So to continue. (This is rather therapeutic, I'm finding. Like I could rant to anyone who'd listen, but they'd just stare, slack jawed holding an empty clue bag.) Well, I'd discovered that I was the person who cross cut all of those miserable damm wedges that were now curling into pretzels almost before my eyes. Luckily I had enough of that blank to cut out twenty more, and as I hadn't yet torn up the set up, fired up the saw and within a short time was back on schedule. I glued up the things with a Bessey K body and wax paper. Not a big deal, but getting the alignment spot on took some care.

Next on the hit parade, was cutting out and gluing up the body blank. Did I mention the walnut I scored was 10//4? This was the key to my subsequent acquisition of a Laguna 16HD. You see, I discovered after stashing all of that 10/4 walnut in the shop, that my widdle Bosch barrel grip jigsaw wasn't going to cut it. Literally. I probably could have borrowed a friend's Sawzall and done the deed but somehow that just seemed frightfully out of place. Kinda like turtle hunting with a ball pean hammer. Nope, if you're going to carve up 10/4 walnut, ya gotsta have a proper band saw. And boy, did I.

Sooooooooo, I grabbed the poster board template and began to trace the outline of the body... I did the first half then realized I couldn't see the damm lines anywhere. Fabu. I started lookin' around for something that would contrast with the walnut. I raided my wife's studio next door and came up with an old gray water color pencil and that worked like a charm. Also got some tailor's chalk which I used for the larger markings that didn't require a crisp line, such as 'right leg' etc..

Anyhoo, I cut the first leg out and was having so much fun, started to cut out the other legs too. Then it dawned on me that I'd better cut out the body next. That way if someone wanted to know if I was making any progress, I could triumphantly say, 'well, I've got the body done, won't be long now.' Heh, 'won't be long now'... if I had only known, but alas my clue bag was empty too. Stay tuned.

OK, fellow insomniacs here we go... everyone strapped in?

Lessee... where did I leave off... hmmmm... I had just got the body cut out and was feeling pretty good. I still had three of the legs to go, (this critter had four real legs) but decided to put those off for the next day. I wanted to give my new osciferrating spindle sander a real try on the real thing. As it turned out, the body wasn't perfectly flat when it came outta the clamps. A few swipes with my trusty # 5 1/2 (not the L-N version) took care of that. This prior bit of work paid some dividends now as the body laid nice and flat on the cast iron. Oh yeah!

I approached the spindle sander with all the confidence one has after successfully sanding one six inch long piece of 1/2" pine to a line the previous evening. IOW, I was scared fairly s&*less, I suppose you could phrase it. This wasn't pine but was much harder and about four and a half times thicker and hung off both ends of the table. Oh, and the cost was more plus my investment in time to that point. To mitigate my fears somewhat, I chose a 2 inch drum and loaded it with a 180 grit sleeve figuring when the screw up came, it wouldn't be catastrophic, just moderately disastrous.

So, after hikin' up my pants, I flipped the switch and went at it. The sander took off a comfortable amount of material and I quickly found that I could control it pretty easily. If I kept the piece moving. Constantly. The body had large flowing contours and the only way to keep them that way was motion of the perpetual variety. I was also reminded that the inside curves were a lot more forgiving than those on the outside. Just like driving a blimp. Well, sorta.

As such, the first half hour flew by pretty quickly. I was so focused on that little white line, (anyone remember 'Night Driver'?) that I became somewhat oblivious to everything else until I realized that the drum wasn't cutting much because the dust cloud had subsided. I put the body down and shut off the sander. Whew. The drum spun to a stop and looked about as smooth as a brass door knob. Time to give that freebie sanding belt eraser stick a workout, which I did. Afterwards I decided to up the ante, so I switched the sleeve to 120 grit and went back at it.

Yeeha! The new sleeve cut about twice as fast as the first. Or so it seemed. Anticipating this, I initially made really light passes, increasing the pressure as my confidence returned. I was really making progress now, but was creating a bit more dust. Ah well, I'd be done pretty quick, so who cares? But, I was entering my second hour at the spindle sander. This caused me to rethink the wisdom of leaving a 1/8" margin to the good of that little white line when I had cut the piece out the day before. (BTW, this was just one of many things I was rethinking at this point, believe me.) That wasn't gonna happen on the three remaining legs I solemnly vowed. Nosirree Bob.

Anyhoo, I was closing in on that white line, but decided to take a break. I shut the machine off and removed my fifty cent paper 'dust mask'. I looked inside the mask. Big mistake. I was now afraid to lick my teeth. I instinctively reached for my coffee cup, but noticed a facsimile of a tropical isle in the middle of it. Little caffeine powered waves breaking on it's shore. Yuck. I emptied the cup and it's prepubescent eco-system into the shop john and flushed mightily. Later I wondered had I left it alone, how long before foliage would have sprouted. Alas, we'll never know.

With a fresh cuppa joe, I took stock of the sitch. The shop looked like an M-80 had gone off in a box of Nestlé’s Quik. Well OK, mebbe a mortar and a case of Quik. The sander has a dust port, and it's built in collection system works fairly well. Just that due to the stock's thickness, it was a tad overwhelmed. (All of the dust the TS and BS had set free still lingered as well.) Whatta mess. Earlier, I couldda hooked up the shopvac, but the trade off in decibels just wasn't worth it. I needed a real respirator. Bad. Something that filtered dust a bit better than a chain link fence might and didn't fog my specs any. (I also needed a bigass dust collection system, but y'all know that.)

Oh yeah, the fog. Yep, the fog was a little treat I spared y'all from above, but make no mistake, it didn't forget me. Nope. It coated my lenses quite nicely it did, teaming with the walnut dust to obliterate most of my vision. After about two hours, the lenses warmed to room temperature, so the fog subsided to the point where it was just a major annoyance.

A bit before lunch, I finished sanding the body to the line. Wow. All that work and it hadn't changed much in appearance. Gee, and all I have left to sand is every single living #&$^%@ part except this one. Fabu. Just wunnerful. I gave the bod one long glare, grabbed a 'leg', and flipped on the band saw. Heh, this is what it's really all about... the creation! I was driving that 3/8" 4 tpi blade thru that 2 1/4" walnut like a hot wire thru butter. No resistance at all. This was more fun than a skunk in church...

That's the problem with 3 hp... you're done before ya know it.... I'd cut out the three remaining legs in about 10 minutes. Now what? I went up stairs and grabbed lunch. An hour later, I was back in the shop, starring at the sander, using a leg as a 'cane'. Yug. I put the leg down, grabbed the broom and started to clean things up a bit instead. The shop has light colors on the walls and floor and I'm always amazed at how much and how far dust travels. The walnut stood out rather graphically and the stuff was almost everywhere.... I noticed the sides and bottom of the JDS unit were nicely coated. JDS unit??? Doh!!! Distracted by my trepidation prior to the sanding marathon, I had totally forgotten to turn on the ceiling mounted air filter. Arrrrrrrrrrrrrgh!!! I went outside, found a brick, and applied it to my forehaid. Stay tuned.

Good'evenin'. Y'all are wearin' me out with this tale. Tonight's might be it for a couple days but I wanted to thank you for the cheery words.

I'll tell y'all one thing, making a rocking horse will create a box full of the weirdest looking offcuts you can imagine. Lotsa pieces with curves or segments thereof. Being walnut mine resembled what you might find at the bottom of a package of Oreos... if the Oreos were the size of manhole covers. Quite a bit different than the straight thin incredibly boring tomato stake / blockish offcuts that cabinetry creates. They'll probably be the subject of an upcoming post at some point. Not sure whether to ask what makes the goofiest offcuts or what to do with them afterwards. But, ah digress.

Well, I now had just a wee bit of sanding to do, but as it was mid week, figgered I'd put it off until the weekend so I could buy a good respirator before making another assault on my senses. I shore didn't need another experience like what I had just gone thru with the main body in addition to my main body. No sirree Bob. What I did need was a mask that could filter a few microns past a gnat's butt and not fog up my steenking (safety..) glasses. In the interim I decided to pick thru the lumber rack and see what was available to build the rocker base. I could start on that and make some progress there, while I waited to get my respirator situation taken care of. Hmmmmm...

The weekend arrived. Several eves before I had announced at dinner (OK, pronounced ) that because of the concern for the health of my respiratory system and peripherals including nostrilae, gums, teeth, etc., that I needed a proper dust mask to wear when sanding with the osiffiricous spindle sander. This suggestion was met with a round of affirmative, enthusiastic hoots (responses) from all, causing a lump to well up in me throat. Later I wondered if a few lumps had well'd up in other places, like the clothes dryer's lint filter. But, as my Mama didn't raise no foos, I didn't ask. Saturday was proclaimed as 'the day', and after an early breakfast I was off like a herd of turtles, on my way to Highland Hardware.

Highland Hardware (HH) is over on the east side of d'town Atlanta in a district called Virginia Highlands. An old, quaint, now semi-funkified part of the City. I've heard you can even get tofu (whatever the hail that is) there. Lotsa edjumicated young folks live in the environs and older gentry as well. A nice place. It's about 20 odd miles (not as the crow flies) from Marietta. This is a good thing for several reasons, IME, primarily the growth and well being of a marriage, savings account, ya know, that kinda stuff. Also for me a great opportunity to blow the carbon outta the Cherokee's engine and see if 5th gear is still functional. Especially on a weekend, because few are doin' under 80 mph on I-75 South (except folks with OH tags). FWIW, we live and work within a five mile radius, so we 'don't get out much'.

HH is a local treasure for a variety of reasons one of them being product knowledge. It's been rare IME, when the first person I've asked a question to couldn't give me an immediate answer. Or rest until I got the answer from another staffer. That's why I was there, being partially clueless about respirators, although I did check the archives of a ww'g forum or two and peeked at a few catalogs. IOW, I knew enough to ask a few intelligent questions, and confuse myself beyond that. I figgered I'd be in good hands.

As my luck would have it, I was asked if I needed help right off the bat, just as I got my nose comfortably pressed against the glass case holding the L-N shoulder planes. Damm, but I hated efficiency like that. 'Uh, I need a dust mask' I blurted out. So much for the question part. Hopefully the intelligent part would come soon. 'A respirator for organic vapor, particulates, or perhaps both?' came the reply. FWIW, the staff at HH can take a bit of getting used to sometimes. In a good way. Each major edition of their catalog features pictures of the staff members, and their backgrounds. If you have one, take a peek. Lotsa BAs, and a few MAs thrown in the mix. IOW, the person you're conversing with about some aspect of ww'g may be equally at home leading a seminar discussion regarding: Follicular Formations in Fluptulant Flukes. Or something.

My keen mind quickly pegged 'particulate' as 'dust'. Or at least heavier than air.. something you would maneuver with a broom eventually. 'Organic vapor'... a fart? Hee! I wondered that, but not aloud. 'Uh... organic vapor... you mean like fumes, huh' I asked. I got a nod. I could see by the twinkle in this young man's eye that there was a lot more to this that I probably didn't need or care to know. 'Fumes' worked fine for this ol' boy. I was making progress. I knew kinda what I wanted to filter, now the question was with what?

'Howz about this' he said, handing me a full face shielded helmetish apparatus complete with AM/FM, multi media dual stage filter, harness, hose, battery pack / butt cushion (and sleeping bag?) 'This is The Racal' he proclaimed, ' *the* cat's jammies... totally self contained, the ultimate in comfort, safety, comfort and freedom of movement. Did I mention it's comfortable too?' W O W, I thought. Pretty darn cool! 'Is this the model that has the face shield wiper option and tandem cup holders?' I asked, stifling a laugh. 'Oh, you must be thinking of the 3M version or possibly an import' he said. Uh huh, that's it... the 3M version. Right. That would figger.

Once upon a time as a kid, my favorite characters included Captain Nemo. What an opportunity come too late. I didn't even bother to say 'how much'? It had to be in the stratosphere. But, not wanting to put a price tag on my lungs, asked, 'well, I'm a semi serious hobbyist who, on the very rare occasion, has cause to employ abrasives of various types. What would you recommend as an appropriate application for the casual user?' (I sensed the intelligent part sloshing it's way to the surface. Finally.)

'Well yes of course.... I apologize for getting a bit carried away there. That Racal is an awesome unit tho. I wear one myself when I moonlight at a professional turning shop some weekends' my young friend confided. 'Yep' I added, not knowing enough about turning to comment further. 'But, a lotta guys where this one' he said, handing me a half face unit that looked rather Darth Vaderish with it's triangular mouth piece. I thought the protruding roundish filters looked menacingly cool too. Yep, I could see why this puppy was popular. 'Uh... but..'. I looked at the pile of nylon strappage looping in all directions around my fingers... 'Here ya go' my assistant said. In a heartbeat he had the thing on me and I was drawing my first breath of activated charcoal oxygen before I knew it. 'Hooooo heeeesh hooooo' I breathed. 'Haayth, thiith feeth puuthee oood' I said not realizing I was unintelligable. 'Hooooo heeeesh hooooo', Maashaaa Shywaakuu?' Heehee! I was having some kinda fun now! Yehaa! I wore it over to the cashier. 'Hooooo heeeesh, oow muush?' I thought she was gonna wet her pants. I was dyin' too. I wanted to wear it home. Stay tuned.

There I was.. armed with four legs, preparing to edge sand these things to the line. Normally I'd use a two inch (diameter) sanding drum chucked into my DP. But not to sand 45+ linear feet of 2 1/4" thick hardwood. If I had done that, I could use that DP to make one inch holes with a quarter inch bit afterwards. Luckily, I had the foresight back in the Fall to score my osifferious spindle sander from Wwr's Supply of Everywhere while they were giving them away for $179 and tossing in the spindle kit and caddys for 'nothing'. The caddys are especially important because with them the silly design of the base suddenly looks a lot less silly. Purposeful even. It's nice being able to buy a tool without having to construct shop furniture to hold all of the bits and pieces to make it convenient to operate. Kudos to Delta.

Come Saturday AM, I donned my spanky new dust mask, grabbed one of the horse's legs out of leg inventory, and commenced the marathon with an 80 grit sleeve. Hoooooo heeeeesh hoooooo.... boy, this mask was nice. 'Thet owrsh cursh forsh Daygobah, Amerahall! Hee! I was watching the dust drift around on the table like the plains of Tatooine and breathing none of it. Plus I had been operating the sander for going on ten minutes without fogging my specs. This was *great*! Yep. Fabulous in fact, recalling my experience sanding the body.

The end of the first hour approached. Fabulous had dwindled to ho hum as the novelty of breathing thru the respirator and sounding like Mr. Vader had worn off. Fogless specs were no longer a big deal either. Before two hours, I began to look forward to those infrequent sessions with the rubber abrasive cleaning bar. This allowed me to set the leg down, grab a gulp of coffee, get rid of some, and stretch a bit. Then get back and clean the damm sleeve off. Every other stop, I'd remove the sleeve and turn it upside down, evening out the wear. Only because it took longer, not because I'm a genius.

The drone of the spindle sander was one like the neon lights' in an office environment. You don't notice them until some sadistic egg sucking twit mentions the buzz, then they sound like a swarm of Cessna’s on bad gas. Not like this thing was quiet or even subtle sounding, but it had a rhythm to it that wasn't all that unpleasant after about nine weeks or so. IOW, it kinda grew on ya like an elbow wart.

After a while you'd try to invent phrases that would match the two tone drone of the beast. You could make up almost anything and it would fit. 'Tire go flat?' 'Want fries - with that?' I won't go any further into how *my* mind wanders during these types of soul deadening drills. But, when you start pondering whether this year's Halloween treat is gonna be Hershey's Kisses, Snickers or Tootsie Roll Pops, you've been at it far too long. The horror of running outta stuff to think about before I was done sanding loomed large.

Eventually, I got the legs edge sanded. (Was in all the papers.) If any are curious as to what happened to the wedges, (OK, I saw one hand go up in the back row, so the rest of y'all can skip this.) they were double back taped to the legs and band sawed as a unit. As such, I felt it best to leave them in place while I edge sanded the upper end of the legs. Of course the wedges caused the hoof end of the leg to be up off the table, adding to the convenience of this whole miserable operation.

To continue, I found myself guiding the legs against the sleeve with one hand and holding the opposite end up with the other hand. The fat end of the taper, combined with the leg made for a cross section passing thru three inches. Damm good thing the spindle sleeve was 4 1/2" , eh wot? After I got the upper end done, I popped the wedges off so's I could sand the lower part of the legs without having to support the opposite end with my hand. (I figgered the latter part out all by my self after the second leg.)

I think it was at this point that the monumental folly of my chosen material became crystal clear, although I can't remember if this epiphany occurred while sanding a rear leg or a front one. 10/4 walnut was *not* what you wanted to construct a rocking horse from. At least not this particular WoodSmith (#65) plan. My only consolation was the good fortune I had in finding walnut a lot cheaper than my first choice: Maple. Just imagine sanding the end grain on *that* stuff? While not exactly tantamount to constructing a Philly highboy outta knotty pine or MDF, a very poor material from a producability standpoint. Especially 10/4. And to think I stoopidly scoffed at the recommend choice... 2'x12" construction grade pine. (Why didn't I think of 2x SYP???)

Yep, I was on the receiving end of a first class double whammy alrighty. Not only was this hardwood causing me to eat a good bunch of winter's yard work free shop time, but it put a minor dent in the tool dollar account as well. Plus, since it was walnut, you treated it with a lot more respect, being extra, extra careful, because it's so darn purty. And heavy, and well, stay tuned.

(THEN DARINB EMAILS HIM WITH A QUESTION)

Looks great! - nearly all the blood sweat and tears buffed right out eh ...

Hee! Yeah, even managed to steam out the dents my forehead made in it's hind quarters too. What a friggin' night'mare' that thing was. I wish I had a better bunch of pictures, because the curly maple in the rockers isn't clear.

I probably missed it in the reading assignment, but how'd you finish it? That shine is gorgeous...

Thank you. First let me say that I usually don't entomb my work in polyuristain, but my sister wanted a gloss finish. So... one coat of BLO to pop the grain, a coat of orange shellac to accent the reds in the wood and three coats of sprayed on General Finishes high gloss poly. I leveled the first coat with 400 grit wet/dry paper.

I leveled the last coat of poly with 600 grit wet/dry paper, then rubbed it out with 0000 steel wool and mineral oil, then rottenstone and mineral oil. The result was well, blinding. Slick too. I think the first time my niece crawled onnit she slid right off, landing on her little butt. A Kodak moment, if ever there was one.

[Alan S]

Make the horse now, and leave it in the living room as a decoration.  Your granddaughter will let you know when she's ready for it.

I can't compete with BobZ's story though.  It sounds like the part I always wanted to read that somehow got left out of the Illiad -- how did they construct the horse?

[fredhargis]

Make the horse now, and leave it in the living room as a decoration.  Your granddaughter will let you know when she's ready for it.

I can't compete with BobZ's story though.  It sounds like the part I always wanted to read that somehow got left out of the Illiad -- how did they construct the horse?