Wednesday, January 10, 2007

Busy Bee


Hi Folks
The carpentry job went well in Wales, two satisfied customers. Which is good, as they are my Mum and Dad!
The weekend saw me working with that horrible (but cheap) material, MDF. We needed some custom shelves for my daughters room and, hey, you get in that workshop and make some. Yes, the Wife actually wanted me to go into the workshop ;) I used a can of spraypaint to finish them which left the workshop with a slightly pink tinge (don't ask) but they turned out well and there goes another satisfied customer.
Thought I'd better give the workshop another good clean-up and it didn't take long. That's the advantage of not letting it descend into total chaos, I guess ;) I had a spare 15 minutes so decided to search for something quiet (and not MDF related) to do. Ended making some drawer dividers for one of the toolchest drawers.
Took an offcut of cherry, planed it smooth (using my new/old woodie jointer-what a great plane!!), cleaned up one end on the shooting board (which is now permanently mounted on the end of the long bench with the #9 ready to go), marked off the width with a knife, sawed to length, cleaned up on the shooting board and chamfered with a block plane. Simple hand skills, peaceful work and a delightful push fit. Made a couple more dividers, added some cork sheet into the drawer bottom to stop things rattling around-job done!
It was a real pleasure to spend a few minutes doing this. Near silence, the swoosh of the plane. No need to think about which tool to use or how to use it. Just doing something that felt natural. It is the little things sometime that mean so much.
You'll never get me to part with my power thicknesser, though ;)
Cheers
Philly

1 comment:

rookster said...

A very busy bee. You make me feel like a slacker and a slug!