A HUGE beam

Been eyein' a wonderful old timber at the architectural salvage site that i pick through on my lunch hour near work most of the winter. Kept thinking it would make an old European style woodworking bench top with its heft.

Impulse and fair weather made me throw down some dosh for the sweet thing before it rotted in a pile of underachieving hippie debris. Love the bill of sale:



What kept me from an earlier rescue was mostly logistics. It's very heavy and 21 feet long.



I rented a CityCarShare truck for 90 minutes yesterday morning with a plan to break the beam down into 2 8' segments with a remainder left over for some other project. That short candle is smeared across the face of my Ryoba blade for smooth operation. thing cut though the beam in short order, leaving a few AM crustaceans picking over architectural debris incredulous.



I'm quite sore today after getting them to sanctuary here inside the pleasing compound. Rain in the forecast, so need to get them in the garage soon. They need to dry out for a while, but the plan is to have the two 8' sections laminated together for the bench top. While I was at the salvage yard, I also found these two old growth timbers on the top of the stack which could form the legs for the bench. We'll see.

A Good Day 'Round Briones Reservoir

Temps: 75degF, Wind: mild, Road: open

an excellent manual lathe craftsman

Ratka's Sewing caddy finished

Gratuitous photos








A gap exists between the frame and the base of the sewing machine on the right there to allow for the power cord.










I included a little bubingawood letter opener attached to the roof here as a joke, we'll see when she notices it, hehehe

Getting a handle of it

More head scratching; surely there is a better way to center some holes in this carcass than my half arsed hairy eyeballing.

here are the reinforcment bearings out of mahogany for the handle arm pivots. There's a pair on the inside of the sarcofagus, too. Oak pegs drilled and tapped into the assembly reinforce


Now rotating the hadle and arm assembly clamped together through the arc of the bearings. Just want to test to see how out of coplanar the opposing sides are. Seems I can compromise to a certain extent at a consistent width, give or take.




Tapped some bubinga wedges into the oak doweling shaft when I finally glued the arms to the shaft. Should help lock it into place and look kinda cool, too.



Testing fitment of the handle with the arms again, this time with tenons cut into the handle. I think I'll drive another pin through the tenon on the outside of the arm to lock it into place when I finally glue this part up. For now, just testing. And I'll have a 3/8" washer on the interior backed by a cotter key going through the shaft to keep the arms in place when it's all said and done...


...On second thought, I can secure the arms from the inside just using a wood screw like so

strong arm

More time spent shaping the mahogany arms for the handle. Yep, another test in precision. First getting orthogonal holes drilled into the arms for the axle without a drill press! Dowling jig to the (approximate) rescue. And again with drilling pilot holes for tenon of handle. Now! How to make sure these bearings through the hull are collinear? Hmmm.. will have to think on this one...

sussing out a handle

A simple but sturdy handle for Ratka's sewing caddy. I tested 1/2" thick mahogany with a 3/8" oak dowel for sheer strength by holding onto the mahogany piece suspended while the protruding dowel hooked the edge of a stud in the garage wall. Should be sturdy enough for the pivoting arms. Then through-tennons holding the horizontal member to the pivoting arms, probably made of this fine old doug-fir i resawed here a while ago. Cardboard mockup of pivot arms below to test proportions...





I got these nice cast-off pieces of African Mahogany from the local hardwood place. Very handsome and a true joy to work with. These will be the "arms" connecting the handle to the carcass