Popular Woodworking 2006-04 № 154, страница 18
1-800-966-3458 • www.gorillaglue.com Extra Thick. Extra Stick. New Gorilla Tape sticks to things ordinary tapes simply can't. 1-800-966-3458 • www.gorillatape.com CIRCLE NO. 126 ON FREE INFORMATION CARD. Q & A continued from page 14 Just cutting. Lots of 90° cuts. Get good at cutting square and to a line — and then cut dovetails. Box joints are a fantastic machine joint designed for the advantages that machines provide (repeatable square cuts in this case). Dovetail joints are designed to be made by hand. The complications arise when we try to cut a hand joint by machine or a machine joint by hand. — Christopher Schwarz, editor How Should I Secure the Joints For a Door Frame That Will Be Outside? I have a pair of 150-year-old, massive mesquite doors from Mexico and am building them into a courtyard wall. I've framed them using heart pine beams that are mortised together. To fix the heart pine mortise-and-tenon joints, would you recommend: • Hardwood dowels, possibly drawbored through the tenons? • "Bed bolts" through the horizontal beams, tenon and into the vertical members? • Something else? Bob Owen Junction, Texas First, I'd pick up a copy of "Modern Practical Joinery" (Linden) by George Ellis. This inexpensive book is a gold mine of traditional joints for both cabinetry and house joinery. Ellis shows door frames for large doors (such as those for a warehouse) built using through-tenons that are then wedged. He also shows pegged tenons as an alternative. For your doors, which would be outside, I would avoid using bolts, which will certainly rust and will not expand and contract with the frame like a solid-wood solution. — Christopher Schwarz, editor I'm not an expert by any stretch of the word on finishes, but I've determined what works well for me on various items. I agree that using cyanoacrylate glue isnt a great idea. At best it would be smelly and expensive, and it could make a mess of your lathe bed and face shield. Having said that, it would make a very hard, shiny finish, but should be used with great care. There are many finishes on the market that are used as a French polish-type finish (Hut Crystal Coat is one of them); most are shellac-based sealers. I'm not all that happy with these as a final finish on a pen, perhaps because too many labor-intensive coats would be required to achieve a good result. For my pens, I use one of the sealers first (Hut Crystal Coat, Behlens Woodturner's Polish and Mylands Friction Polish are examples; there are other brands), applied with a clean rag as the piece spins on the lathe, then buff it dry. I follow this with a coat of hard wax (I use Hut Pen Polish), also applied with the workpiece on the lathe and buffed out. This finish is very smooth and even, and has a nice sheen, which I prefer to a hard gloss. It seems very durable, but keep in mind the finish on a pen probably receives harder use than that on almost any other item made of wood. Along with the natural darkening of the material, this means the appearance of the pen is likely to change over time regardless of the finish used. Also, any user who wanted to keep the pen as pristine as possible could regularly apply and buff a paste wax finish on top of this or any other finish. PW —Judy Ditmer Finishing Tips Needed for Turned Pens I recently started turning pens, and am using Hut Crystal Coat (a mix of shellac and wax), applying two coats and heating each coat in. This stuff seems to be reacting with my body oils because it tends to dull after use. Some guys at Woodcraft told me to seal the wood with cyanoacrylate glue before applying the finish. This doesn't seem right to me. A couple books recommended a French polish, but then didn't provide a formula. What do you recommend? What is the formula for French polish? Tim Miller Milford, Ohio WRITE TO US Every day we get questions from readers on all subjects about their woodworking. Some are letters; many are e-mail messages. We are more than happy to share our woodworking experience with you by answering your questions or adding some clarity to whatever aspect of the craft you are unsure about. In addition to the hundreds we answer privately every month, we want to share the best questions here with readers. Send your questions via e-mail to popwood@fwpubs.com, or by mail to: Q&A • Popular Woodworking 4700 E. Galbraith Road Cincinnati, OH 45236 16 Popular Woodworking April 2006 |
