ShopNotes

May 2003

publisher Donald B. Peschke editor Terry J. Strohman associate editors Bryan Nelson Vincent Ancona contributing editor Phil Huber

art director Cary Christensen sr. graphic designer Kurt Schultz senior illustrators Roger Reiland Mark Higdon

creative resources

Creative Director. Ted Kralicek • Sr. Project Designers: Ken Munkel, Kent Welsh, Ryan Mimick, Chris Fitch • Shop Craftsmen: Steve Curtis, Steve Johnson • Sr. Photographer, Crayola England

special publications

Corp. V.P.: Douglas L. Hieks • Art Director. Douglas A. Flint • Sr. Graphic Designer. Chris Glowacki • Graphic Designers: Vu Nguyen, Jonathan Eike • Senior Editor. Craig Ruegsegger • Asst. Editor. Joel A. Hess • Editorial Intern: Cindy Thurmond

circulation

Subscriber Services Director. Sandy Baum • New Business Dir.: Wayde J. Klingbeil • Circulation Marketing Analysts: Kris Schlemmer, Paula M. DeMatteis • Renewal Manager. Paige Rogers • Sr. Graphic Designers: Mark A. Hayes, Jr., Robin Friend

• Billing & Collections Mgr.: Rebecca Cunningham • Promotion Analyst: Patrick Walsh

corporate services

V.P. of Finance: Mary R. Scheve • Controller: Robin K. Hutchinson

• Sr.AcctLaura J. Thomas • Accts. Payable: Mary J. Schultz • Accts. Receivable: Margo Petrus • Prod. Dir.: George Chmielarz • Electronic Pub. Dir.: Douglas M. Lidster • System Admin.: Cris Schwanebeck • P.C. MainL Tech.: Robert D. Cook • Pre-Press Image Specialists: TYoy Clark. Minniette Johnson • New Media Mgr.: Gordon C. Gaippe • Multimedia Art Dir.: Eugene Pedersen

• Web Server Admin.: Carol Schoeppler • Web Content Mgrs.: David Briggs, Sue M. Moe • Web Designer. Kara Blessing • Research Coordinator. Nicholas A.Jaeger • Prof. Dev. Dir.: Michal Sigel • H. R. Asst.: Kirs ten Koele • Office Mgr.: Natalie Lonsdale • Facilit ies Mgr. : Kurt Johnson • Admin. AsstJReceptionist:iosx\\\Q Johnson • Mail Room Clerk: Lou Webber

mail order

Operations Director. Bob Baker • Customer Service Mgr.: Jennie Enos • Warehouse Supr.: Nancy Johnson • Buyer. Linda Jones • Admin. Asst.: Nancy Downey • Sr. Cust. Serv. Reps.: Tammy Truckenbrod, Anna Cox, Deborah Rich, April Revell • Cust. Serv. Reps.: Valerie Jo Riley, Kim Harlan • Warehouse: Sylvia Carey

woodsmith store

Manager. Dave Larson • Merchandise Marketing Mgr.: John Siberell • Asst.Mgr.: Tim Thelen • Sales Staff: Wendell Stone, Larry Morrison. Gregory Kauzlarich, Mark Johnson, Brian McCallum • Office Mgr.: Vicki Edwards

ShopNotes® (ISSN 1062-9696) is published bimonthly (Jan., March, May. July, Sept., Nov.) by August Home Publishing, 2200 Grand, Des Moines, IA 50312.

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EDITOR'S NOTE

Cutoffs

Metal — as woodworkers we don't give it much thought. But from cutting to clamping, metal plays an important role in everything we do in the shop.

It certainly played a big part in several of the projects in this issue. Take the router table fence featured on page 16 for instance. From the start, we wanted a fence with adjustable, sliding faces. This makes it easy to adjust the opening in the fence for different size router bits. Which makes a lot of sense.

However, there's a drawback to a two-piece face design — alignment. If one (or both) faces shrink, swell, or move in any way, you can end up with an inaccurate cut.

The solution to this problem was to use metal in the fence design. By adding a piece of aluminum angle to the bottom of the fence, we created a rail for the faces to slide along. This metal rail keeps the fences aligned.

Now I know that using aluminum in a project isn't all that unusual. We've used it quite often in the past because it's a relatively "soft" metal that's easy to work with. And it's

commonly available — most home centers and hardware stores have a rack filled with various shapes and sizes of aluminum.

In addition to the aluminum, you'll find steel bars and rods in the same rack. Because steel is so hard, about the only thing we've done with it in the past is to take a straight piece and cut it to length with a hacksaw. But I've often wondered if there would be a way to form those pieces of steel into different shapes.

Bending Jigs - That's the idea behind the two bending jigs in this issue. First there's the scroll-bending jig on page 22. It's used to bend steel into smooth, graceful shapes. We've also included a press for bending steel at precise angles.

With one (or both) of these jigs in your shop you'll be able to turn out steel handles, hangers, S-hooks and brackets in dozens of different sizes. Best of all, these jigs can be built with a few scraps of wood and — you guessed it — metal.

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Be included, as a part of the ■FTT!^lITl¥9PrV7

Woodworking Shop Tours

Visit other ShopNotes subscribers' workshops and see photos of the shop projects they've built. It's all online at Woodworking Shop Tours the ShopNotes web site: www.ShopNotes.com

We want you to be part of our shop tours! To sul photos of your favorite ShapNotes projects or views of your shop, just follow the instructions you'll find on our web site.

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ShopNotes

No. 69