While working on my federal table last weekend, I set my sites on inlaying the curved string on the apron. After several attempt at trying to make the radius buy misting the string and using a soldering iron (and breaking each and every string) I gave up. I was licked and all was lost.
At this point I was seriously wondering why in the world I didn’t just go with three rectangles on my apron instead of getting fancy and laying out curved ends.
So I stomped into the house and started digging up all my books, magazines, printed internet articles, DVDs, VHSs anything do to with inlay methods of work and found – NOTHING!
That was until I sent a distress email to Glen & Chuck asking what in the world I could be doing wrong. (After all I had bent lots of stringing using an iron before.)
Then the suggestion came to think bigger! So with that I traded in the soldering iron for a piece of pipe and torch. And the following is a step by step process on how I was able to make the curved inlay.
Step 1: While soaking my inlay in hot water I put a piece of pipe, about the same size of the bend I want, into a vise and heat it using a torch.
Step 2: After the pipe is heated I take a piece of string and using a piece of flashing as a backer I set the middle of what is to become my curve on the pipe.
Step 3: Using constant downward pressure I slowly pull the string around the pipe. (You will hear sizzling at this point.)
Step 4: I hold the two sides together with one hand while rubbing the back of the flashing with my other. (Think of it as trying to rub out a crease. But be careful because the flashing will be hot!)
Step 5: Release the pressure and take a look at your curve. Make sure it doesn’t have any cracks or splits. (If it does you either did step 3 too fast or the pipe has cooled down too much.)
Step 6: Cut it length and install it.
Once I completed this I went back through all my resources and I found at least 3 different places where this method was demonstrated. (Why is it you can never find anything when you need it?)
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This year on New Years Eve day I decided it was time to move the Federal Card Table I was working on along. It had felt like forever since I last worked on it due to the holidays and having to get a second shot for tennis elbow.
After many long discussions about how to complete this with power tools (that would involve elaborate jigs, much set up time, etc..) I decided to break out my Steve Latta stringing tools I purchased a while back. Armed with them (and 96 Rock playing on the radio) I set out for an afternoon of using nothing but hand tools. (Those of you who know me, know this is a big step for me!)
Having already completed the layout work and gluing on my temporary backer blocks I started by setting up the radius cutter and plowing out the curved ends. (Below you can also see where I used a dental pick to help with the clean out.)
From here I set my straight cutter and simply connected the two half circles for each of the 3 sections.
I have to say even though I’m a power tool guy, I did have an enjoyable (and semi-quiet) day of woodworking in peace! I might have to expand on this!!
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Recently I’ve been working on a new Federal Card Table for my home. While working on it I decided to use my Lie-Nielsen radius inlay cutter (based off Steve Latta‘s design) to make my apron inlay circular vs rectangular. (Photos of that to come)
So prior to just going hog wild on my apron itself I applied a piece of veneer on my apron cutoff and started playing around with the radius cutter. After trying the layout a couple of times I was happy with the job the cutter did but boy I didn’t like the center point hole that was left behind.
After thinking a bit I overcame this by deciding to do all my layout work and mark my cross hairs in pencil on the apron. After that I cut a few shims and marked a set of cross hairs on them and then broke out the hot glue gun to attached the shims to my apron making sure to align the cross hairs from the shim to the cross hairs on the apron.
Now I have a piece of wood that will receive the center point hole that I can remove with a little heat and have zero marks left behind!
Do you have a different way that you would have (or have) attacked this type of issue? Is so share them in the comments below.
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Woodworking and research goes hand and hand so much that we have developed so many ways of doing it. Seems we are always doing the following:
- Collecting every how-to book we can find on a topic
- Subscribing to every woodworking magazine we can find
- Scouring the web for every free plan we can dig up
- Buying museum books covering a specific time period
- Or a combination of all
Now I’ll be the first to tell you I refer to my museum books (and Glen Huey’s) all the time. They are an endless resource of detail and information when I can’t get my hands or eyes near a collection to study for a project.
Tome Reader by Ozyman
Well as the years go on those books are being publish less and less and the ones that are out there are becoming harder to come by and if you find the one you want or need it costs a small fortune!
So with the graces of the internet, more auction houses and bloggers are posting beautiful photos and details online. Now the problems with this is keeping track of them and let’s face it when you need them your computer will crap out and you’ll lose your bookmarks. (Personal experience it talking here)
To help get around this I found a wonderful free tool on the internet (on for my iPhone) that does all that but more for you. It’s called Evernote and if you haven’t seen it, it’s worth its weight in gold!
Some of its features are the following:
- “Type a text note. Clip a web page. Snap a photo. Grab a screenshot. Evernote will keep it all safe.”
- “Everything you capture is automatically processed, indexed, and made searchable. If you like, you can add tags or organize notes into different notebooks.”
- “Search for notes by keywords, titles, and tags. Evernote magically makes printed and handwritten text inside your images searchable, too.”
I’ve used this so much that I’ve graduated from the free version to the pay version. By doing so I’m now keeping track of woodworking projects, work ideas, home photos, blog ideas, you name it and it can’t be easier to use. (NOTE: For $5 a month you get more monthly allowance for uploads & storage with the pay version but if you don’t use the crap out it you’ll never need to think about the pay version!)
I don’t want to waste your time with a tutorial on how I put it to use. I’d rather you go take a look at it and see how great it is.
And no, I’m no way associated or get paid by them. It’s just too cool of a tool to not share!
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Here is the base of the table I’m working on. I had just finished installing the brace after dovetailing the back.
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Did you know that back in the day Federal Period furniture builders had a grading system in place for customers who purchased their works?
I didn’t but it made since once it was explained to me. This is a brief explanation of how it works with card table legs.
The system was based on two things:
- The amount of stringing you wanted & where.
- The amount of coin you were willing to part with.
Using a 4 leg card table as an example, if the customer didn’t want to spend much money, they would get fronts of the front two legs of their table stringed and a simple oval inlayed.
This would be considered a “C” customer.
If the customer had few more dollars and wanted to fancy up their piece they would get fronts of all four legs stringed and have a fancier oval inlayed into the two front legs.
This would get you upgraded to a “B” customer.
Now, if you were just showing off how much cash you were tripping over you’d get the front and out sides of you back two legs stringed. In addition you’d also get the front and both sides of your front two legs strings as well as a fancier oven inlayed.
This would get you to the top of the class as being an “A” customer.
Now this was just an example of the legs. The same theory held true for the amount (and how fancy) of stringing you wanted on the aprons and tops.
In addition I found that the cabinet makers of old didn’t always make their inlays. Just like we mail order for them or buy them from Woodcraft/Rockler, they had craftsmen who did nothing but made inlays for them to buy and use in their furniture. (The main difference was they didn’t use CNC machines to make theirs.)
- Photo #2 given to me by Glen Huey
- Photo #3 from Maui Woodworker’s Guild from their workshop with Steve Latta
- Photo #1 was found many months ago on Google and I have yet to find it again so I can give proper credit
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A few weeks ago I attended a class with Steve Latta on making federal card table legs. In this class he showed off and demoed from a bench he designed to do inlay work on. (The main reason for the bench is to get the work elevated off your bench to help eliminate back pain.)
After getting an opportunity to work on his elevated bench in class I decided I had to go home and build one. But in typical Tim “The Tool-man” Taylor fashion I had to make it better to make it mine.
Once I set out to make this I had 3 things in mind:
- I was determined that I was going to use what I had on hand to make it. (lumber, vise, etc)
- I was going to modify it to hold wide boards as well.
- I was also going to build different sized bench dogs to accommodate any clamping range.
I built my version of the bench to be 9″ x 9″ x 45″ overall. It consists of a 1 3/4″ poplar top and a pair supports for that are I-beam shaped and constructed from two 1 1/2″ x 4″ pieces of pine with a 1″ thick piece of plywood connecting them.
Once I had the bench assembled I routed 3/4″ diameter holes (4″ on center) down the center of the top to accommodate holding card table legs. I then routed two more rows near the outside of the bench to accommodate holding wide boards (such as spice box doors) for doing inlay work. In addition I stole a vise from another bench I no longer use and installed it on one end.
I didn’t want to use the steel dog included on my vise as the only way to secure my work. To get around this, I elevated the board I installed on the vise jaw to give me 9” of space for clamping pressure.
By doing this, I was able to change this from a simple leg bench to something that I can utilize more when doing inlay work.
(P.S. No I don’t do any inlay work in plywood. It was just used to in the example.)
LESSONS LEARNED – Actually prior to assembling the bench I took the top over to my drill press so I could drill 3/4″ holes but the bit deflected/broke and bored an oval that I had the joy of plugging. Stupid mistake on my part!
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A couple of weeks ago I spent a weekend at Marc Adams School Of Woodworking in the Inlay a Federal Card Table Leg with Steve Latta. I’ll be posting a review of both the class and the school shortly but I wanted to post Steve’s list of suppliers he passed out to us. (They will also be added to the Resources Links page.
Dremel Accessories
Drill Technology – End Mills
StewMac – Router Base #5260
Hardware
Ball & Ball
Horton Brasses
Londanderry Brasses
Hide Glue & Finishing Supplies
Homestead Finishing – Transtint dyes
Olde Mill Cabinet – Best prices for glue.
Inlays & Banding
Acute Marquetry
Armstrong Inlay
Dover Designs LLC
Inlay Banding
Tools
MSCDirect - three square Swiss pattern needle file #60236924
Woodcraft – Swissmade Palm Chisels #3-12mm #05Y05 & #-3mm #05y32
Veneer Suppliers
B&B Rairwoods – .9mm natural white sycamore/colored veneers
Berkshire Veneers – Holly/dyed black anigre
Certainly Wood
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