Journal Competition: Wood working
Have located beer. Have decided that when focused on woodworking it's appropriate to drink beer. Went secondhand book shopping in Devonport for Mina's birthday, and now instead of one I am the proud owner of three books related to woodwork.
These are as follows:
"A History of English Furniture: Volume I: The Age of Oak 1500-1600" Percy Macquoid (Dover, New York, 1972)
"Woodworker's Handbook" Roger W. Cliffe (Sterling Publishing, New York, 1990)
"Home Handicrafts, Needlework & Repairs" ? (London, The Fleetway House/The Amalgamated Press, ?)
This last looks to be an early twentieth century book, and is quite interesting but slightly tricky to follow because it's all listed alphabetically by subject, so suddenly you'll leap from a particular embroidery stitch onto how to create your own telescope onto how to decorate glass, but there's some bits tucked in there that I hope will be useful.
The Woodworker's Handbook looks to be quite useful as it gives a rundown of handtools, power tools, techniques and some projects, including how to build a mitre block which I suspect I'll need.
Have not had as much time as anticipated to focus on my projects and would quite like an extra day free in the week.
Spent some time at work yesterday* looking at chest images online from the lardatter site, and a bunch may have accidentally slipped off the printer. Unfortunately, these confirm my thoughts on chest making, which run along the lines of "these are awfully complex, I'm totally screwed".
However, there are some simpler designs from Tyrol, but I think this might be southern Germany and I need to check on a map. The French ones are still by far the prettiest though, and I htink at least a couple of them have been constructed as box first, with carvings inset afterwards, which should make things easier. No dimensions, other than that they're obviously pretty big, but I'll email one of the key museums that has a lot of them and ask for general dimensions.
Was quite pleased as they have proved an unexpected resource for my French hood research, as several have side-on busts carved into them, with good detail of how the head gear is working. Am less pleased because the majority of the specifically French chests ("coffres" or "meubles") are blazoned somewhere with a coat of arms, and I don't have one. Maybe I can leave that bit blank and carve it later?
In a fit of boredom at work** I may have bought a portable workbench off TradeMe. It's one of those ones with the wheely clampy things, and Dad's always had one in the garage, and I remember him using it lots, and since I don't have a workbench and therefore nowhere to mount a clampy thing (vicegrip?) I am hoping it will be doubly useful.
This was followed by a fit of enthusiasm yesterday afternoon whereby I went to Bunnings and bought tools. I now own a small handsaw, a set square, some more nails of a different size from the lot I used to fix my book case, some wood glue, and some wood chisels. These last should be useful on the woodcarving side of the my chestmaking, but also I needed them because Mistress Katherine and I want to make a deck of period playing cards using woodblock printing.
I may have therefore also bought some wood. An 18mm square strip, and a long wide bit, to make cutting blocks from as these will be necessary for that project, plus hopefully there will be enough for a mitre block, which they were selling cheaply at Bunnings but which I want to make because I need some easy starter projects.
And then I also bought another narrow strip of wood to practise woodcuts on.
Except I think I will have to talk to people who built and make things out of wood, and find out if there's a cheaper and better place to buy wood, because this stuff was awfully expensive for cheap pine. However, if this proves to be a standard price it may restrict me to pine for my first chest. Which is probably a good idea for an experimental object anyway. Also I think I'll need wider bits than what Bunnings have got for the chest sides. I don't know. Research on wood types used, wood properties, and tools, remains at approximately 2%, despite disproportionate spending on tools etc. Most of the chests appear to be either oak or walnut, however none pine and certainly no chip board or plywood.
Have also resolved to type journal entries into blog, as like writing by hand, but this is becoming illegible too quickly, and if I type it then at least for the handwriting part I can revert to complete illegibility for everyong but me. Next year's project will be calligraphy.
*Not that I ever would, of course
**See above