Steve's Blog

My Workshop

Tue, 12 Jul 2011 07:12:00 GMT

My insurance company recently asked for some photos of my modest empire. They'll give you a bit of an idea of where I work hidden away in the Australian bush.

Click this photo to see the slideshow

Customer has a Great New Woodworking Idea

Thu, 07 Jul 2011 07:54:00 GMT

Julie-Anne runs a local business making cakes for special occasions. It seems to be quite successful and keeping her busy.

A recent request was for a 80th birthday cake for a sailor. She had tried to make an anchor from icing sugar but it kept collapsing. So she contacted me for a wooden one.

This gave me an idea.

Julie-Anne wanted a hole drilled into the top of the wooden anchor which I had simply cut out of a solid piece of timber with my band saw. She was going to thread some string through the hole and wrap it around the timber anchor. The whole thing was then going to be stuck into the top of the cake.

Could I use this idea to create a cheap sailing trophy that I could market through my sailing trophy web site? Yes I could.

With the vertical bit sitting on top of the two cross pieces there is room to wrap a nice length of white cord around the anchor.

The anchor is glued on to a backing , in this case a nice piece of silky oak which is slotted into the base so the whole sailing award is free standing.

So now all I've got to do is sell some of these new sailing awards. I've yet to add it to the trophies web site but I reckon it might go okay. We shall see what we shall see.

Spotty Fish makes me Money

Thu, 07 Jul 2011 06:54:00 GMT

I've always liked this spotty fish pattern even if it hasn't been a great seller.

But, when recently, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority approached me for a trophy to give to the local school that had done the most to protect our reef I decided to resurrect this design.

I put together on the computer a couple of mock-ups for them to choose from. The spotty fish and a shark flying out of the water with a palm tree in the background. Realism hasn't really been my thing?

"reefED" is the logo of the educational department. Quite clever.

But this was the mock-up they chose.

As they only had a couple of hundred dollars to spend I told them I'd have to simplify the design and it would be about 200mm (8") wide. They said okay so this is what it turned out like.

And being a government department they came up with a really snappy title for the trophy which I had to fit on one engraved plaque.

Reef Guardian School Annual Award, Fitzroy Catchment
Effort in Reef Resilience, Care and Protection
Presented by the Cap Coast Local Marine Advisory Committee (LMAC)

I use octagonal bases so the customer can add annual plaques. And the backing is slotted into the base.

And both the customer and I ended up happy and that's the main thing

Scroll Saw Blades - What You Should Know

Sun, 21 Nov 2010 07:34:00 GMT

Chris sounds as if he's on a steep learning curve with his scroll saw.

Hi Steve,
Got the computer for my 60th and the scroll saw for my 61st (Oct). Can't manage either but think the computer might be easier. Keep breaking blades and can't cut a straight line, practice, practice, practice. Have ordered a few books from library so that will help.
Your work is fantastic.
Regards
Chris

I suspect he's using the wrong blades. These are the blades I've tried.

An assortment of blades that I've collected from around the workshop.

As you can see, blades ain't blades. A few things to look for.

Pinned Blades. Some scroll saws require pinned blades. As the blade on the left. I think it's just cheaper saws that use these pinned blades. I don't know of any of the better models that use anything but plain blades. What I do know is that there is a much greater range of plain blades. I think it's possible to adapt saws that normally take pinned blades to take plain blades.
Regular and Skip Tooth. The pinned blade shown above has regular teeth. The top right blade is skip toothed. It has every other tooth missing. This makes for a larger throat between the blades which allows the waste material to escape more easily. Skip tooth blades don't clog up and therefore cut better. In my humble opinion. Something you should test for yourself using your timber.
Tooth Size. Size is everything. Teeth size range from the smallest, 00, up to size 12, the biggest. I'm guessing the pinned blade above is a number 12. The packet doesn't say. Cheap blades. The next one up, it's really hard to see the teeth, are skip tooth number 00. The third one up is a No. 12 crown tooth and the top blade is a No. 9 skip tooth.
00 Size Teeth. I have to feel which way the teeth point on these blades because they are so small I can't easily see them. I don't know how many teeth per inch but it will be a lot. I use these blades occasionally for cutting veneers. The veneers I use are about 0.6mm thick. Approx 3/128". I think! Anyway pretty thin. Ideally you need a few teeth per the thickness of the material if that makes sense. Try cutting veneer with No.12 blades and you get a lot of tearing. Very messy, don't even think about it.
No. 9 Teeth. My favoured size for cutting 20mm (¾") thick timber which is what I mainly use for intarsia. If you use too small a tooth for the thicker timbers you will be wandering off all over the place and breaking blades. This is probably Chris's problem.
Crown Teeth. As you can see in the image above the second blade down from the top has paired teeth. One side pointing down and one side pointing up so it doesn't matter which way you put the blade in the saw. And when it gets blunt you can turn it upside down and get a fresh set of teeth to use. Sounds wonderful but I've tried them and don't use them. Skip tooth are better.
Reverse Teeth. If you look closely at the top blade you will see the first 6 teeth from the end point the opposite way to the rest of the teeth on the blade. So when you put it in your saw these bottom 6 teeth face up while the rest of the teeth face down. (Scroll saws cut on the down stroke.) But these blades with the reverse teeth cut the bottom of your wood in an upward direction giving a much cleaner cut on the bottom surface of your piece of wood.

And the blades I use.

Cutting Veneer - Olson - Skip Tooth - No. 2/0
Cutting 20mm (¾") Intarsia Timbers - Olson PGT - Skip Reverse Tooth - No. 9RG (Olson 459R)

You can find both these blades on the Australian Carba-Tec site. (I have no connection with Carba-Tec other than being a satisfied customer.)

Outside of Australia just Google for your local supplier.

I haven't tried every blade in the world and there may well be better alternatives. If you know of any please feel free to post a comment below.

Drum Sanders for Easy Dolphin Sanding

Sun, 21 Nov 2010 06:12:00 GMT

I've just received this question from Ron who's working on the dolphin bookends.

I have just cut out the Dolphin book ends, and can you or any of your colleagues tell me how other than wrapping sandpaper around my finger to try and get the dolphins to look rounded.
Yours Sincerely.
Ron

Good question, Ron. This is how I do it.

Fingers are good if a little slow. These cheap drum sanders that fit your bench grinder are much quicker.

Drum Sanders on a Bench Grinder

I set up this bench grinder with a pneumatic drum sander on the left hand end and a solid drum sander, with the white sand paper, on the right hand end.

I set it up this way because the pneumatic sanders I could buy locally, 100mm (4") diameter, came with a left hand thread and the solid sanders, 75mm (3") diameter, had a female right hand thread so screwed straight on to the 5/8" shaft of the 8"(200mm) bench grinder.

They wouldn't fit a 6" (150mm) grinder which have smaller shafts. About ½" dia. Also more recent imports into Australia had metric 16mm shafts. The imperial 5/8" thread starts to go on and then gets stuck.

Drum Sanders in a Drill

These smaller solid drum sanders that chuck into your drill are often sold in sets. Make sure you get the ones with a slot and a key so you can use plain sandpaper. You can see the slot in the image on the left.

This way you can cut up sheets of sandpaper to the right size when you need replacements. Which you will need to do quite often as the smaller sizes wear out quite quickly. Especially the ¾" diameter size which I use a lot to get into tight curves.

But even taking into account the time to change the sandpaper they are much quicker than using just your fingers.

The video below has footage of me using one of the small size drums to sand the edges of the dolphins.

Where can I buy these sanders?

It's worth looking in your local hardware store especially if you are after the smaller solid sanders for your drill. But make sure you buy the ones with the slit down their length to take plain sand paper. Some of these sanders require custom made sleeves which could get expensive.

You may have to look farther afield for the pneumatic drums. Sometimes called bladder sanders or inflatable sanders.

If you live in Australia you can buy them from Carba-Tec.

For the rest of the world there's always Google!

But if you want to take it slowly those five rubbery digits at the end of your arms are just fine. And cheap.

You might find these little flap sanders useful too although I much prefer the big ones. In fact I like them so much I not only built one for myself but for the boss too. Bless her little cotton socks. (You know who I'm talking about. She who must be obeyed.)

I'm using the large drum and the flap sander is the other one.

Now that's what I call a flap sander. But flap sanders are another subject for another time.

A Fishy Video

Fri, 12 Nov 2010 09:17:00 GMT

I've just found a great online resource for creating video slideshows. What do you think?

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

Sculpture with a Scroll Saw - Is It Possible? Yes It Is.

Fri, 27 Aug 2010 05:36:00 GMT

Marc sent me this photo of his work last year.

I've lost Marc's email, sorry mate, but saved the images because they look so good. Click here to see both the photos Marc sent.

He has taken one of the dolphins from the Dolphin Sculpture Plan and mounted it on its own base using a perspex rod. Too easy and looks wonderful.

So how did Marc make this just with a scroll saw? Well he did have to use a few other basic tools very similar to making intarsia projects. A drill and a sander but not much else.

I'm going to make a video soon showing how easy it all is but until I get around to that here are a few diagrams taken from the comprehensive instructions that come with the plans.

Cut out the plans - with your scroll saw

Paste the cut out plans on to a 20mm (¾") thick board of your chosen timber.

Drill out the locating holes

The separate pieces are glued together after being positioned with dowels in the locating holes.

After some sanding fit the fins and tail

Probably the trickiest bit. Drill holes in the body and chisel out to form a mortise. Hand carve tenons on the ends of the fins and fit into the body. Detailed instructions will guide you through the complete process.

You can do the same as Marc and start off with one of the baby dolphins. Or jump right in and make the complete family, mum and two babies.

The guy who designed all our sculpture projects, John, used to make and sell these finished dolphins. He reckoned he could sell as many as he could make. He was getting $800 per set and this was 10 years ago. But he got bored and moved on to even more amazing sculptures that appeared magically out of his head. Oh to be truly talented.

But for the rest of us these sculptures could be a steady income.

So if you'd like to give this innovative system a go you can get a free download of the baby dolphin sculpture
right here. This includes a full set of the accompanying instructions along with the templates for the small dolphin. You should have no difficulty in making the single dolphin as made by Marc.

Or if you'd like to jump right in and try your hand at the full dolphin family that might well bring in a decent income you should visit the dolphin sculpture page. Choose "PDF Download" or "Paper Pattern" from the drop down box and then click "Buy Now". When you get to the checkout enter the discount code sailability and you'll get a 50% discount.

(And if you're not familiar with Sailability it's a great way for disadvantaged kids to experience freedom on the water. Just like dolphins. And where I help out in my spare time.)

Persian Pyrography

Wed, 18 Aug 2010 04:42:00 GMT

It's not often I get emails from what used to be Persia and is now Iran. Five years I got one from Mastanah Shakibi who was enthusiastic about intarsia and asked me some woodwork questions. Emails have been flowing between Australia and Iran ever since.

Most of the woodworkers I deal with are mature gentlemen. Not all by any means but the majority. Guys getting around to doing all that stuff they never had time for when they were working.

Now my knowledge of the Farsi language is non existent so I'd just assumed that Mastanah was a male name.

After a few emails I got around to asking Mastanah to tell me a bit about himself and could he send me a photo. Which I duly received.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that Mastanah wasn't a guy after all. She had just graduated as a biologist from an Iranian university. There being very little work available she turned to her passion, woodwork.

I traveled through Iran way back in the late 60s and found it a fascinating country. Friendly people with a long history in arts and crafts. I had been presented with this hand beaten copper dish in Tehran and had completely forgotten who it represented.

Now I know it is a likeness of Abu Ali Sina, philosopher and doctor, who a thousand years ago, would have been a dead cert for Brain of Persia. Or Brain of the Then Known World.

Check out some of Mastanah's intarsia, scroll saw work, and pyrography at her gallery.

Double Sided Intarsia

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 06:33:00 GMT

I often get asked what I use for the backing of my intarsia projects. In my case the answer is plywood. In Ian Christie's case the answer is nothing.

On the left is the front of his intarsia. On the right is the smooth back.

I asked Ian about the different coloured noses on the front and back views of this Swaggy. He'd chosen a piece of wood that had heartwood on one end and light coloured sapwood at the other end. From the point of view of contrast I much prefer the back view. Along with the lighter cheeks the whole face stands out much better than the front view where the colours are not so defined.

Ian makes it work because of his accurate cutting out. The individual pieces fit together so well that by using a good quality glue it all stays together.

Which begs the question, what is the best way to present such a piece? If you hang it on the wall you can't see both sides. Maybe some sort of stand that supports it freely on a desk top. Or it could be hung from the ceiling.

I've observed potential customers looking at my work when it was hanging on the walls of a local gallery. Many people touch the pieces and quite a few want to turn it over and have a look at the back. Which is why I always try to have a well presented back side. (Maybe I should rewrite that phrase, stop giggling, you know what I mean.)

You can check out some more of Ian's intarsia at this double sided gallery.

If you've got any thoughts about Ian's work why don't you let him know by adding a comment below.

One Man's Prolific Output

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 02:12:00 GMT

Terry recently sent me a few photos of his work. Well, more than a few really, 60 photos. That's right, sixty.

The quality of some of the photos is not the best (sorry Terry, I've tried to improve them as much as I could) but they will give you a good idea of the range of subjects available for intarsia.

This motor bike is a beauty. I wish I'd designed it. You can see the rest of Terry's images here.

Lots of New Intarsia Addicts after another Mackay Workshop

Tue, 13 Jul 2010 03:01:00 GMT

Local intarsia enthusiast Tom Lynn has been busy enthusing the Mackay Woodworkers club about Intarsia.

There were a couple more students as well and they all made Lazy Koalas.

Tom lives locally and has been making intarsia for many years. I've been meaning to start up intarsia classes but never got around to it. It took someone like Tom to actually do it.

He's traveled to Mackay a few times to hold classes for members of their local woodworking club, most of whom had never previously made any intarsia.

Check out some of their work here.

Beginners First Kookaburra

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 06:49:00 GMT

Gloria sent me this image of her first attempt at the Kookaburra design. (Click the thumbnail to see a larger image.)

I am worried about the one eyed teddy bear. But he did donate his eye to a good cause.

She attended a workshop up the coast at Mackay in Queensland. Good attempt Gloria.

Sourcing Different Coloured Timbers

Fri, 27 Aug 2010 01:23:00 GMT

A few days ago Maz from Australia asked, "Can you tell me where I can buy the wood here in Australia to make these great projects?

Before I answer Maz's question let me tell you a story.

A few years ago we used to travel around the country (Australia) exhibiting at many of the major woodworking shows. Someone might come up to me at our stall and say, "It's okay for you living up in Queensland. You have such a huge range of timbers to choose from up there. But you just can't get different coloured timbers around here".

Half an hour later a different person would look at our work and say excitedly, "I'm so glad I've seen your patterns. They are perfect for us local woodworkers because there are such a lot of different timbers to choose from here".

A glass half full, glass half empty moment.

Back to Maz's question. You are looking for small quantities of interestingly coloured wood. To start off you should probably aim to accumulate a small stockpile of the following colours. The species I've listed are the ones I use here in Australia. Maybe someone out there can help with suitable species from the northern hemisphere.

Timber Species from Australia

Red or at least reddish brown. Red Cedar. New Guinea Rosewood. Beefwood. Mackay Cedar.
A light colour, say creamy white. Quandong. Cork Bark.
Very dark brown if not black. Rosewood. (Acacia Rhodoxylon). Brigalow. Bauhinia. Desert Oak.
Yellow. Leichhardt Pine can be amazingly, wonderfully, bright yellow.
Brown. Lots of common timbers.

I'm sure you will be able add to this list.You are not going to find these at your corner store. You are going to have to ship them in. But as you only need very small quantities of timber for these projects this is not going to be prohibitively expensive.

Sources

This list will point you in the right direction. And if anybody you speak to says they can't help you always ask them if they know some other place to try.

Australian Woodworker magazine. The copy I have in front of me, not the latest, has about a dozen ads for timber in the classifieds and the ad directory towards the back of the magazine,
Yellow Pages. Look up Timber, Saw millers, Wood Suppliers, Wood Veneers and anything else you can think of.
Your local saw doctor. Mine is really helpful and is in touch with local woodworkers.
Local woodworking clubs.
Local joinery shops. One I spoke to in Brisbane told me I could rummage through the skips outside to my heart's content. Any time I wanted. No need to ask. Take what you want. Please don't hassle us again! Mainly offcuts of Red Cedar. Perfect for our plans.
Earlier this year we bought half a cube of Red Cedar and a cube of Leichhardt Pine from a guy we met at a local swop meet. Bargain prices too. Wonderful.

I hope this helps. Because your initial timber selection can make a huge difference to your projects. An intarsia made from different shades of brown just isn't going to cut it against one with reds, yellows, light and dark. Good contrasting colours make for a great project.

How Much Can I Sell My Finished Woodwork for?

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 01:46:00 GMT

This is the question I get asked all the time. So I know that at least some of you out there are considering trying to sell your work.

So how much are they worth?

Early Days - A Typical Scenario
You've started on a new and exciting woodworking skill called Intarsia. You can't get enough of it. Your family and friends are really impressed with the stuff you are making. So every new piece easily finds a new home.

You are happy to give your finished pieces to your close family and friends. But then friends of friends start wanting pieces.

It occurs to you that while you certainly enjoy making them there are costs involved other than your time. And even though you don't feel you need to be paid for your time it would be nice to get some sort of return for your labours.

Mid Intarsia Crisis
Well maybe not a crisis but now you do start to think it might be good to sell a few intarsia pieces to recoup costs. And how much easier is it to get the boss to agree to a new machine in your workshop if you are showing a return. "Well dearest heart, Ive made a few bob already and with that money I can buy a brand new - insert your preference here - so I can make my intarsia even more efficiently and then I'll easily be able to get around to making that new coffee table you've always wanted and so richly deserve." Woffle wofle woffle.

The Big Question

How much are they worth? How long is a piece of string?

The golden rule. "They are worth whatever customers will pay for them"

Which doesn't actually tell you anything. So let's look at a couple of pricing scenarios.

The Academic Approach
A Masters degree in Business will tell you to do something like this. First calculate your total cost of production.
Material Costs

Timber including any waste $ Very little
Plywood backing $ A tiny amount
Hangers from a framing shop a few cents

Consumables

Sandpaper $ more than you'd first imagine but still not much
Glue a few more cents
Varnish or oil finish $ a few dollars

Overheads

Workshop rent - it might be your garage but somebody some time had to pay for it.
Telephone
Electricity
Broom for sweeping up
yadda yadda yadda

Marketing

Cost of stall at local flea market / car boot sale
Traveling cost to get there
Your time sitting behind the stall all day

Profit
The cream on the top that you deserve over and above your wages for running your own business.

And now the big one
Labour
Your local mechanic charges $50(or $60 or $70) per hour to fix your car. And it's probably the first year apprentice that's done the work anyway. It's taken you 84 hours to make your masterpiece (you've carefully noted the hours) and it looks fabulous. You're not greedy so maybe $20 per hour is okay. That makes $1680 plus the $50 for all the materials etc. $1700+. Probably not going to get that at the local market.

Okay lets be less ambitious and work for $5 per hour, I don't actually need anything, this is just a hobby. And I'm sure I must have got those hours wrong, lets pretend it was only 40 hours work. So $200 plus a bit extra for materials, let's call it $220 all up. Now that sounds more reasonable.

So not-with-standing the business degree what we've actually done is made a guess at the price. Surely there's a better way. You're right, there is.

The Two Month Rule

An aside
Sitting all day in the hot sun at a local flea market hoping a punter with $220 in their pocket will happen by is okay occasionally but not a regular, reliable income stream.

Oh, you say, but if you take your work to a local gallery they take 40%, or 50% or more for themselves. And all they have to do is hang it on their wall, I had to do the hard yakka to make it. Highway robbery.

But if you go the gallery route you don't have to hang around all day, every day looking for a customer. They do that. That's what you pay them for. And they have to spend the money to make their gallery look good, not you. We always tried to make quality woodwork so we could interest the best galleries in the land. Way to go. Happy to pay their cut as long as they keep them trucking over.

Back to the two month rule.
I used to take my finished woodwork to the local gallery and talk to the owner. After some discussion we came to an agreed starting price and his percentage. Listen to the owner. If they are any good they know their market. Your beautiful intarsia gets hung on the wall.

Hopefully the first thing the customer sees when they first walk into the gallery.

If the work sells in less than two months it is too cheap.
If it takes much longer than two months to sell it is too expensive
And you guessed it, if it sells in about two months the price is just right.

The first time I did this I took along 2 frog intarsia on Thursday. They both sold that weekend. Price too cheap but I knew there was a market.

Okay, so now you know the price you can sell them for. But you are still only going to be earning $5 per hour based on the time it took you to make that first one. So what have you gained? The knowledge that you can't expect your customers to pay for your inefficiency.

So what can you do about it. There are lots of ways to streamline your production. You will make your 20th frog a lot more quickly than the first one. As you get more experienced you will come up with all sorts of short cuts.

But that's another blog.

Exporting Woodwork to Finland

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 03:16:00 GMT

A few years ago I would have laughed at you if you'd suggested that the boss, bless her little cotton socks, and I could have created an export business out of our humble home in the Australian bush. But a couple of days ago we sent our first timber sailing trophy to Finland. And here it is.

The Finnish sailing club sails trimarans and catamarans which I've tried to depict in timber. I also made their club logo out of different coloured woods. Which is where my experience with intarsia comes in. You can see their actual club logo here.

http://www.jvs.fi

And this is what I came up with. As Australia doesn't have blue coloured timber I compromised.

While I was making this I was thinking about other sporting club logos. Football, cricket, baseball and golf. Among many others. Military badges as well. There's probably an opportunity lurking away there somewhere. If only there were more hours in the day.