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One of my hobbies is woodworking. I got the bug a long time ago, after watching Norm Abrams on The New Yankee Workshop and seeing him turn out beautiful projects.
Circa 1990. I started small, learning how to use a router. One thing that helped me a lot was the book Router Basics by the late Patrick Spielman, a master woodworker from Wisconsin and author of many woodworking books. Eventually I made my own router table and increased it's versatility. The only other power tool I had at the time was a jigsaw, so I would rip boards to rough size with it and then trim them with the router and a flush trimming bit. | ||
One of the things I experimented with was making picture frames. But since I didn't have a table or miter saw yet, I was making them out of one board which wasted a lot of wood. Yes, the photo here was one of mine - another hobby of mine. |
This is one of my early router projects. I used a store-bought inexpensive pine shelf as a template and a flush trimming bit to replicate it in red oak. Red oak is my favorite wood to work because of it's finished beauty. I ended up making more of these in longer lengths for an Aunt and Uncle. |
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I was experimenting with a dowel jig, and this little knick-knack house was the result. I was still learning how to control the router to avoid the black burn marks you see here. |
1995. My parents had talked of getting a glider, and when I saw this one on the cover of WOOD Magazine I decided to build them one. The plans are still available here. My dad had an apple tree in his yard at the time, so the theme was perfect. Made entirely of western red cedar, I realized the only way to feasibly build this is if I had an easier way to rip the boards to the various widths. So I bought my first table saw, a portable model. It struggled with some of the boards as they weren't dry enough, but it did the job. I still ended up using the router to plane the sawn edges. | ||
The steel hinges were cut and shaped by hand, then painted. All the screws are stainless steel to prevent rust stains. The apples were cut with a jigsaw and the inside edges painted red and green. |
The whole thing was sealed with Thompson's marine varnish. It has held up well, but it is under a patio roof so it doesn't get full sun or rain. |
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I'm proud to say this is still in use today almost 18 years later. |