The other day I was thumbing through a copy of a woodworking magazine at the newsstand and an article on installing a ball catch caught my eye.
While I was looking at the photos & reading the supporting text for them I kept coming to the conclusion that it seemed to be a bit over thought or complicated to me.
It also brought me back to an email I received awhile back from Orion where a customer wrote him to show off a jig he made to do the same thing.
The reason for Orion sending it to me was that he was a bit confused on how it exactly worked & he was wondering if I could walk him through this.
So a few days passed & one day while on my way home, while stuck in traffic, I started thinking about both of the examples (which I do realize both work) and that there had to be a simpler way.
Currently I’m finishing up on a federal card table project. I am at a point where I need to make a decision on what to do with the hardware. After looking at a lot of photos of card tables, it seems that the tops were either hinged using traditional card table hinges or butt hinges.
A few months ago Chuck Bender of Acanthus Workshop posted a video of how he makes his stringing. (See below)
Well I tried that out and it worked like a charm. I even posted something on the blog about it and I’ve used the heck out of the stringing I made.
Then I needed more. (Seems I didn’t make enough!) So I decided to take a few minutes this weekend to cut some. The only thing is while Chucks way works, it’s a bit to set up and I’ll admit I’m lazy!
So knowing I was going to make my string Sunday afternoon, I went out in the shop around 10pm Saturday night and built a quick jig. This jig is really nothing more than a wide push stick that keeps my hands away from the blade and pushes both my string and cut off away from the blade.
Now all I do is clamp on an auxiliary fence so the stringing wont get caught in under my stock fence. Then set my fence up for a 1/16″ and cut away using my new jig.
When the Woodworking Channel first started up Glen Huey and I were contacted about showing our Woodworkers Edge DVDs on their site. It was a good match. They got free content and we got free publicity! But over the years they’ve be bought out and the site and content changed for what everyone hoped was for the better.
So now it seems they have changed yet again. This time it looks like the site has become a haven for people looking for a different kind of wood!
After completing it, my wife fell in love with it and encouraged me to build more from this style.
Well since then, I’ve built furniture of other periods for myself, others and for a couple of books.
Now I’m trying to figure out what to build next. With that I’ve ordered “American Furniture, the Federal Period” by Charles F. Montgomery. This book I’m told is an excellent book into the world of Federal Furniture.
Once it comes in I plan to review the book and to pick the next piece of furniture for my new home!
Note: This table was built based on a the table Glen Huey built in Issue 148 (June 2005) of Popular Woodwork Magazine.
” by Charles F. Montgomery. This book I’m told is an excellent book into the world of Federal Furniture.
