Popular Woodworking 2003-06 № 134, страница 35

Always After Amazing Wood

Maloof always has been picky about who works in his shop - just like he is picky about his wood. After a visit to his shop you can see how it is a never-ending obsession.

Maloof's pieces are made predominately from walnut, though maple and zircote are also strong sellers. While beautiful, Maloof doesn't really like working with zircote because of the toxic dust.

Right before lunch that day, a local land-scaper stopped by to chat with Maloof. He was taking down some Torrey pines (five or six feet across and maybe 100 feet straight). He'd found trees for Maloof in the past and wanted to know if he wanted these. Sure, Maloof says, and they worked out the arrangements. But Maloof also brought up a particular walnut tree he'd seen and wanted to know when he could get that one. The tree wasn't scheduled to come down any time soon, but Maloof knew where the good wood was, and he was keeping his eye on it.

Of the buildings on his property, two are dedicated to lumber storage, and Maloof is currently overseeing the construction of a third. He designed the new structure with a peak to mirror the San Gabriel mountain peaks looming directly behind the building.

The wood storage sheds hold thousands of board feet of quilted maple, figured walnut, rosewood, ebony and zircote. It's more than most woodworkers could use in a lifetime, but not Maloof. "Those pieces, you can see how wide they are (five-feet wide and easily 2" thick), those are beautiful. They're fid-dleback walnut, and I'm making a dining table for the kitchen in the other house and the other will be a conference table."

In "Sam's shop" (more accurately the machining room) templates for a dizzying array of chair designs line the wall. Standing at the ready is a 20" planer, 12" jointer and tucked in the left of the photo is a Laguna 20" band saw, one of four band saws currently in the shop.

On the opposite side of the room above is a 12" table saw and heavy duty shaper. More templates adorn the walls (they're fixtures in most of the rooms) and a chalkboard and props stand at the ready for weekend lectures where Maloof walks attendees through the construction processes of one of his chairs.

Building a Maloof Piece

David Wade describes the process in making a piece of Maloof furniture. "Sam does all the sculpting on the band saw, does the joinery and the wood selection and puts everything together. But it's a continual back-and-forth process. He'll put a seat together, then I'll get it and carve out the shape, then it goes back to him. He puts the back legs on, then it goes to Mike or Larry and they start shaping it. When that's shaped it goes back to Sam and he'll do the arms. Everyone gets their hands on it."

The process starts in one of the wood stor

age rooms with Maloof picking 5"-to-7" width, 8/4 material for the seats in the rough. Backs will be 12/4 or 14/4. Maloof heads straight to the band saw to cut the lumber to size, then lays out the pieces using one of the hundreds of patterns hanging in the shop.

Maloof rough-sculpts the pieces on the band saw. He also will use the templates as shaping patterns, nailing the template to the piece, then heading to the shaper and using the template to guide the shaper as with a flush-trimming router bit.

"It would take me a lot longer if I didn't cut them out like I do on the band saw (free

handing the large chunks of wood rapidly through the machine)," Maloof says. "I can make a couple items in 15 minutes, but if I were doing it all by hand it would probably take me four or five hours." But he doesn't recommend his freehand shaping method because of the safety factor. "I didn't know any better when I started ... It's sorta dumb. You can say that, too. It's sorta dumb."

He's had his choice of band saws throughout the years, working his way up from a 14" cast-iron Rockwell band saw with an extension block, to his current 32" Agazzani.

"I use machines wherever possible," Maloof

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