Post 16 in a series.
Last time, I left off at the point at which the draw bars and their associated mortises had been prepared:
Next on my rapidly dwindling list of tasks to complete were the shachi sen, tapered wedging pins. I prepared some slightly oversize stock for the pins, chopped the pieces to length, and then used a simple jig in my router table with a dovetail bit to process the pins into a parallelogram shape:
Then it was a matter of fitting the pins one by one, to their trenches, shachi-mizo. Here, I’ve fitted two pins to one side and am reassembling the connection:
Back together:
In goes a third pin:
And a fourth:
Another view:
The pins are not fully fitted yet – my purpose here is to fit them sufficiently so that the joint could be tightened up and I could work on completing the shaping of the re-entrant corners, which had been left with extra material on them during the CNC stage to prevent tear-out by the cutter.
It just so happens that another woodworker in the building bought a used oscillating spindle sander a couple of weeks back. He cleaned it up and re-painted it, in what I must say was perfect timing in regards to my project needs. That sander looked like a good way to deal with shaping these re-entrant corners, a detail I frequently incorporate. In the past I’ve used a combination of rasps, files, gouges, scrapers and dragging a piece of sandpaper around a metal pipe to work these areas.
Let’s have a go with the oscillating spindle sander, a Grizzly product:
Another view:
I gotta admit, that worked really well. No tear out, and a decently smooth finish. A minor amount of scraping and it will be done:
Here’s a look at the topside
Jeez, have I slipped over to the dark side? I now need to get one of those spindle sanders – definitely the best tool for that particular job. Come to think of it, it was an oscillating spindle sander that I witnessed in use shaping bracket blocks at Kongo Gumi, a temple building construction firm I visited in Ōsaka years back. Now I feel a little better.
In time, I had all four corners done, and assembled the entire frame as a unit:
Flipped over, here’s a view of what the completed table top frame will look like, sans finish of course:
One other minor task on the list was ticked next – fitting the T-nuts inside the legs, to which will be attached the levelers:
All for today, thanks for coming by. Your comments are always greatly welcomed. –> on to post 17
Chris, you might consider making yourself a range of nankin kana to shape those curves and leave a very nice surface right off the bat. A tighter radius one would do those shown easily, and no doubt that you would find a myriad of uses for it. I can't recall seeing any shown in your pics. Second only to the smoothing plane in terms of useful hand tools for furniture work, imo. Surprising that a lot of guys into Japanese tools don't use them. Not a carpenter's tool per say, perhaps that is why.
Hi Dennis,
good suggestion. I do have a Lie Neilsen curved base spokeshave, and it would work in this particular case. I usually do much tighter curves on those iri-zumi portions, and haven't found use for that shave in such cases, and therefore haven't generally associated using a shave to the job.
And you're also right that because of my carpenter background, I don't have the diverse array of spokeshaves that many furniture makers might have one hand. I've not had a chance to use a Nankin ganna, but have thought about making/acquiring one more than once.
Thanks for your comment and hope you're keeping well.
~Chris
Heh-heh, that was “many furniture makers might have ON hand”, not “…one hand”
I am very prone to that particular typo for some reason on/one…
The coffee table top looks like a real nice shape as well, I neglected to mention that.
Most kind of you Dennis.
I enjoy reading your post here. Your project seems to be successful and the finish product of your work is so great. I can see that you have an art in woods. I think you are also great in timber framing.
Maine,
that's most generous of you – thanks~
~Chris