On Friday afternoon I arrived home to find a package containing 10 freshly-printed copies of the Oct/Nov Woodcraft Magazine which includes the feature story on my shop!
It went something like this:
Navin R. Johnson: The new phone book’s here! The new phone book’s here! Harry Hartounian: Boy, I wish I could get that excited about nothing. Navin R. Johnson: Nothing? Are you kidding? Page 73 – Johnson, Navin R.! I’m somebody now! Millions of people look at this book everyday! This is the kind of spontaneous publicity – your name in print – that makes people. I’m in print! Things are going to start happening to me now.
[the Sniper points to Navin's name in the phone book] Sniper: Johnson, Navin R… sounds like a typical bastard.
I was especially happy to see this issue includes an article comparing the Saw Stop and new Delta Unisaw…should be a pretty popular issue.
I’ve finally had a chance to clean the shop…so I took some time this evening to “photosynth” it. Click the image below for the result and let me know what you think!
Last Friday, Woodcraft Magazine Editor-in-Chief Jim Harrold spent the day visiting my workshop to supervise a photo shoot of the shop for an upcoming issue. With him was Chicago-area photographer Mike Crews, his assistant John, and numerous road boxes filled with some pretty slick photography gear.
Left to right: Mike, photographer; me; Jim Harrold, Woodcraft Magazine, assistant John(?)
A Dust-free Dust Collection System
The process actually began the day before the shoot. Thursday afternoon, Jim stopped by, followed shortly by Mike. After introductions, they surveyed the space. Mike was pleasantly surprised by the lighting situation and they continued to plan for the next day. Though I had spent nearly every spare moment the previous week preparing the shop, I still found myself working late Thursday night, per their request, vacuuming dust off of my dust collection piping! Seriously.
My shop hasn’t been this clean since the day it was completed!
Shooting the drill station
Wide Angle
After a couple “welcome” shots of me standing in the entryway, Mike shot some overviews of the shop. While I’m not completely unaware of modern photography, I’d never before realized just how effective a good wide angle lens could be. My shop is only 14′ x 22′. In the past when I’ve attempted to capture a general “overview” of the space, I’d been frustrated by my inability to get much of the shop “in the shot” from within. Typically, when I think of a “wide angle” lens, highly distorted images come to mind. I think “fish-eye”. Consequently I was seriously amazed at how he could include all of the machines on the North wall in a shot with the camera aimed mainly west/northwest, with no obvious distortion. Brilliant! They then moved on to close shots highlighting some of the specific fixtures Jim plans to highlight in the article.
Outer Space
After lunch, the morning clouds had dissipated and we were enjoying a gorgeous, sunny afternoon. One of the shop’s features I’m most pleased with is its external dust collection closet. By keeping the monster in it’s own heavily-insulated cell, both me and my neighbors are spared the bulk of the noise generated by its 3HP motor and the resulting rush of air. Shots of the way the shop and this system integrate into my modest suburban home were next on our list.
Mike carelessly ignoring the high-voltage warning stickers on the side of the power box on the corner of our lot.
Dressers
From there, it was back indoors. This time, we moved Mike’s gear to the kid’s rooms to shoot some of the pieces I had built for them. Sadly we only had time for two of the three dressers — Annalise’s Butterfly Inlaid Dresser and Nathan’s Cherry and Walnut Dresser. My comment to Mike: these pictures look nicer than the pieces!
I sure do wish I could have shots like this take of everything I build. Sigh.
It’s a Wrap…
By 4PM it was “in the can” so to speak. Mike loaded his gear and Jim packed up for the airport. I had a great time with this. Jim is a very down to earth and incredibly interesting guy with a long list of accomplishments — and the stories that invariably go with them. Mike’s knowlege and skills were impressive, though what impressed me most of all was the way Jim and Mike worked together as if they were longtime partners, though they’d just met for the first time the day before.
Thanks to Jim, Mike, John and the folks at Woodcraft Magazine for this experience!
UPDATE
I forgot to mention that I was informed that the issue these shots will appear in will be out sometime in October/November timeframe.
See also: http://tenonandspline.com/blog/archives/188
Shooting the drill station
Mike took some exteriors shots of the shop and dust collection closet.
Left to right: Mike, photographer; me; Jim Harrold, Woodcraft Magazine Editor-in-Chief, Mike’s assistant John(?)
My little shop got a workout this weekend when gal pals Kathy, Cathy and Tracy spent Saturday building new cabinet doors. “The Angels,” as they’re known to workout pals, picked up irons of the domestic variety to apply preglued birch edgebanding to simple plywood doors for a client of Kathy’s. I think Charlie would have approved.
Over the last couple months things in the shop have been fairly quiet…mainly due to things in the house being more noisy! Of course, our now 5-month-old son Nathan’s an absolute joy and easily the least-demanding baby of the three. This weekend I snuck away for a bit to put the finishing touches on my new hide-away blade storage rack.
Hidden Blade Storage
When I originally designed the shop cabinets, I kept the drawer sizes and placements open figuring I’d work the final dimensions out during the build, letting their ultimate contents dictate their sizes. This worked very well, with one notable exception: two tall and narrow openings on either side of the RAS base cabinet. Early on I was thinking that I might mount some narrow drawers for router bits in this location…but the RAS counter overhang made that impractical and they wouldn’t be in a terribly good location for these frequently-accessed accessoies. Early on these holes began attracting my table saw blades and accessories. So I hit upon the idea of a tuck-away blade storage rack. And here it is….
The design is based on this one I found online from Wood magazine. That plan calls for a 60-degree angle, which looks fine in their photos of 7-1/4″ blades/dado chippers, but wouldn’t work in my cabinet as 10″ blades at that angle take up more width than I had (8″). I built mine at 80-degrees — and, even if you don’t need the “tighter” arrangement, if you plan on storing 10″ blades, I’d advise an angle closer to mine. I’ve uploaded my Google SketchUp sketch for my version in case you’re interested. The article also suggests cutting the slots with a bandsaw or jigsaw. I made a quick jig for the router table and cut them with an 1/8″ straight bit…which made for much straighter, smoother and more consistent cuts than you’d ever get by these other means.
Roll-away Jointer
From the beginning I designed my jointer to “tuck” underneath the shared RAS/CMS counter. This was definitely a good decision, but walking the jointer in and out of its cubby was a bit awkward. A few months back I built a mobile base for it based again on plans I found online…this time from a fellow lumberjock. Instead of swivel casters, I mounted rigid ones on my version that would help track the based appropriately. The early version of this used a simple outrigger in the back with a “pin” that rode in a track in the floor. Unfortunately, this was unsatisfactory as the pin would frequently hang up on the floor at any high point — which meant it required more force to more the tool than I’d originally envisioned. A couple weeks ago I set out to remedy the situation. I wound up replacing the pin with a small caster. This did the trick, and I can position the jointer with one hand.
Around the same time I begain the planning for my new shop, I started using “igoogle” for my browser homepage. I also discovered a couple cool “craigslist” widgets for igoogle that display search results for preconfigured searches on your homepage. So, for example, if I’m considering the purchase of, say, a new dust collector, I’ll add a craigslist “dust collector” search widget to my igoogle homepage. Since I basically live online weekdays it’s unlikely I wouldn’t catch a new relevant post within, say, the first hour of it being posted. This is how I got my rather old but very competent 3HP 2100CFM dust collector for $225.
This is also how I found my latest workshop addition: A Grizzly G1066 24″ Dual Drum Sander for $400. Brand new these machines run about $1,500 delivered. Now the machine I got is not even remotely new — the copyright on the original manual (yeah, the seller had the original manual) is dated 1992 and the “Grizzly” logo is an older variety — but the insides were all there and it runs beautifully. Included with the machine were 2 new 150 grit rolls and 1 new/1 half used 100 grit roll of sandpaper. Considering these cost >$40 each, I figure I actually paid less than $300 for the actual machine. I consider this a very good deal, indeed.
Heavyweight
Finding the machine was the easy part. Since this machine weighs in at over 400lbs., getting it home and in place was a bigger challenge. I was lucky that the seller had a couple pretty big guys pickup up some other equipment a the same time as I. The 4 of us (seller, two “big guys” and me) basically muscled the thing into the back of my minivan. I nearly passed out on the last push and am fairly certain that, were anyone looking, they’d have seen my eyes bulging out of their sockets. I’m not kidding. Fortunately, lowering it out of the van, with the help of my brother-in-law and a couple of his football-player sons turned out to be a bit easier than I’d feared…and my load-in ramp for the shop easily supported the weight. It was in!
Power
When designing the shop, I saw fit to have a total of (4) 240V circuits installed. Two 15A and two 20A. One is for the dust collector, a second for my Grizzly 17″ bandsaw. This leaves one 15 and one 20A circuit available. The 5HP motor on this monster demands 240V @25A minimum. This meant installing a new dedicated 240V/30A circuit in the shop. Since I already had the 10ga. wire on hand, the expense was minimal (some 1/2 conduit and a breaker) and in about 2 hours yesterday afternoon I installed the new line.
Test Run
Much of the comments I’ve read on drum sanders dealt with frustrations over either burning wood like cherry, or tracking issues. These left me a bit apprehensive about what I would encounter when using this tool. I decided to track down a current owner if I could and solicit some advice. Based on some of his prior posts, it appeared that a fellow “Lumberjock” (Todd A. Clippinger) who’s work I’ve admired (and partially ripped off) had at one time owned this exact model. Todd took the time to provide me with a weath of information that I was able to put to immediate use. (Thanks!) So, after loading up the drums, per Todd, with some new 100 (front roller) and 150 (rear roller) grit, I picked up the first >9″ (minimum length per docs) piece of scrap I had at hand — a ~6″W x ~10″ long piece of cherry. I fired up the dust collector (a must) and then the machine and ran this piece through, cranking up the table until the piece just made contact with the drums. It was a beautiful sound and after multiple passes without any burn or apparent strain on the machine, I eyed the cherry and walnut side panels I’d recently completed for my current project.
Beautiful! A few passes and the joints were dead flush and looking gorgeous. I’m hooked!
Did I mention how I love craigslist?
UPDATE: Todd responds here with some additional helpful information and photos.
If you read my last post you might recall how I decided to purchase an X10 “Powerflash Interface” to test out as a controller for my dust collector. My skepticism about how the unit worked turned out to be well-founded. The Powerflash device sends an X10 “on” signal when 6-18VDC is applied to the contacts — but once the voltage is removed, the unit immediately sends an “off” signal. What I was looking for was a way to use a single momentary switch to toggle the collector on and off…so that won’t do. In fact, the plan was to mount multiple doorbell-style pushbuttons around the shop and have it wired so that I didn’t have to turn the unit off at the same station where I turned it on. Since the Powerflash unit didn’t support this, I set out to basically build my own.
I’m not an electrical engineer and couldn’t design a circuit to do what I wanted, but I had no trouble finding a few options online. As a kid I used to quite literally spend hours loitering at my local Radio Shack store and would frequently spend what money I had on their “Engineer’s Notebooks” and specialty ICs to tinker with. So while I don’t fully understand the specifics of the circuits, it wasn’t much trouble reading the schematics or assembling the circuit. Of the three circuits I found online, my local Radio Shack store only stocked all of the required parts for one of them. This was, naturally, the most complicated one. It is succinctly if not aptly named Alternating ON-OFF Switch, #2.
A big box of parts…
After a couple after-work evenings, the “DustBunny 3000″ was born…
Hooked up to the “Powerflash” for testing…
Labeled and plugged into the volt meter showing ~4.74vdc on the output
And here’s the video demonstration of the system in action:
OK, so maybe not exactly a “monster,” but the old Woodtek 3HP double-bag dust collector I bought sure does sound like one…and appears to live up to its 2100CFM (free-air) rating.
I’ve finally finished the main duct work runs and over the weekend I cut the hole from the shop into the external “dust collection closet” and ran the 6″ main through. As I had feared, the dust collector argued mightily against being confined in such cramped quarters. The closet is <30" deep and ~60" wide with a standard 36"x80" door. The two-bag collector simply wouldn't make the tight turn through the doorway. Fortunately I'd half suspected this would be the case and was already mentally prepared for the situation...which likely saved my neighbors an earful.
The solution: disassembly.
I removed the upper-half, post-fan section that holds the bags to the blower and then removed the lower half, including the motor from the base. I’d already purchased a length of 6″ flexible hose that I’d planned to use to join the collector to the 6″ S&D piping…figuring that it would likely be a rather convoluted angle and possibly too tight a fit for a hard plastic 90-degree elbow. By mounting the base directly to the floor of the closet, I also gained an additional couple inches – making it now possible to use rigid fittings. Ultimately the hookup turned out to be “do-able” using rigid piping as well, eliminating the need for the rather pricey 6″ flexible hose. Anybody need any 6″ hose.
Though I don’t have any tools for measuring CFM or static pressure, my quick test sweeping some sawdust piles into the floor sweep at the very furthest end of the longest/narrowest run and hearing the swooooosh as the debris found its way swiftly into the waiting collection bags was enough to convince me that the system should do just fine. I’m hoping to do a test using the planer tonight — if it can keep up with the 13″ planer, it should have no trouble with the other tools.
My one real disappointment is with the on/off mechanism. I outfitted the 240v 20A circuit with an X10-controllable outlet and programmed the “D” button (for “Dust collection” of course) to send the appropriate on/off commands. It worked the first couple times I tried it, turning the collector on and off as expected. However, the third time I tried using the second keypad (linked to the first) and this time…nothing. I went back to the first and tried it a few more times. Again, nothing. I recall reading some forum posts (don’t recall where) by some unhappy woodworkers/X10 enthusiasts complaining about the poor reliability of X10 — specifically in the context of dust collection systems. I was planning on purchasing a “Long Ranger” or similar system and using a combination of manual switches and blast-gate mounted microswitches in the future…apparently this will need to happen a bit sooner than I’d anticipated.
As usual, the entire installation process — well, the indoor portions at least — was covered by my trusty D-Link wireless cameras. Here’s the finished video:
UPDATE: Last night I completed the “planer†test as planned. I hooked up my Rigid 13†planer to a port at the end of the run and took some fairly decent passes on a 9†piece of poplar. The dust shroud was empty. I opened a couple other blast gates and repeated the test. Still clear. Looks like this “monster†will do the job!
I’m not what you would call a “neat freak.” However, I do try to keep things generally organized and find it near impossible to work in a cluttered shop. Not only do I find it technically difficult to work in an unorganized mess – I find it hopelessly depressing as well. Consequently, when the shop is cluttered I will typically avoid doing any woodworking until the mess is resolved.Keeping the shop organized is especially difficult when the thing you’re working on is the shop itself. For the past couple months our garage and the new shop space has been a jumble of scraps of lumber and sheet goods, plastic bins of random hand tools, power tools, hardware, etc. somewhat haphazardly-arrange throughout. Need a hammer? Time to go routing through the bins. Double-stick tape? I just knowit’s here somewhere. Not fun. Coupled with the scarcity of available “shop time” and basically nothing hasbeen done since Thanksgiving.
To turn this untenable situation around I took a week-long vacation from my real job beginning January 7th. As luck would have it, this happened to coincide with a major “January thaw” with temperatures soaring into the 50′s and 60′s early in the week. After spending a day cleaning out the garage and setting up a temporary table to somewhat organize my tools/supplies, I set out to complete the job. First priority was the cabinetry. I had completed the carcasses and counter tops in November but hadn’t even planned the drawers. Drawers. After spending way too much time agonizing over their arrangement (do I make 3 or 4 drawers in this bay? One very deep or 2 shallower?) I settled on a design and slapped together some boxes out of 3/4″ ply and pocket screws. Not very “fine” I know, but I’d prefer to just get the shop done and get down to business on pieces bound for the house! Ply banded with 3/16″ maple bullnose serve as drawer fronts. After that I installed the ceiling-mounted speakers, running the wire through the 2″ PVC I ran before the walls were finished. I also ran RG-6 and Cat 5e cable to the 4 boxes placed around the shop, patching the works together, neatly, in the crawl space before hooking up a home run back to my communications panel in the main basement.
While I frequently use Google SketchUp to design my projects, I find that working things out on a whiteboard can be extremely helpful in the shop. I frequently use a whiteboard for my cut-list — writing large enough to be visible across the room. The one from the old shop is roughly 18″ x 36″. For the new shop, I wanted something a bit bigger, but “real” dry erase boards can be rather pricey. A quick google search turned up this page http://wiki.xtronics.com/index.php/Shower_Board_as_a_white_Board. For $10 plus some scrap pine I was able to build my own custom board for the shop. I installed a 4′x4′ sheet in the middle of the back wall and still have 1/2 sheet left for future uses. Lastly, I installed the TV on a wall-mount (for NYW and Woodworks, natch!) and moved the metal paint cabinet into place beside the slop sink.
As usual the process was covered by a couple web cams and I’ve edited together a brief time lapse…I only wish I could have completed the actual work in only 5 minutes.
Note: The angle of the cameras, properties of the lighting and advanced image compression may make it appear to the untrained observer that my hair is a bit thinner at the top. I assure you this is merely an optical illusion.
Over the years I’ve made many bone-headed mistakes.
Cut a piece too short because I “knew” the measure and didn’t feel the need to consult the drawings I spent hours preparing. Put a dado at the wrong height, the wrong length, or worse, the wrong side! Glue a part on backwards. I’m not quite old enough to say “I’ve made them all,” but by now I’ve definitely made my fair share of them. And while I tend to make fewer and fewer mistakes as time goes by…and thankfully don’t typically make the same mistake more than once (OK…maybe a couple times)…there’s usually at least something that requires special attention (repair, “design-around” or re-do) in just about every project.
This one’s unfortunately no exception.
A few months back, while visiting my folks in Florida, I read a magazine review for something I just had to have. I was so concerned I’d forget about this miracle device that I immediately went online and surrendered $40. It’s called the Wixey Digital Angle Gauge. This is incredibly cool – due to both it’s utility and utter simplicity. Place it on the tool’s table, zero out the measure and then place it on the blade to verify/adjust the angle. Quick, easy, AWESOME! That is, when you actually use it.
This past Saturday I began my day in the shop (after helping my wife with the kids’ breakfast, of course) by cutting out the various parts for the new 22′ long cabinets/work bench/miter saw fence for the shop. After lunch, it was time for assembly. I had cut dadoes for the cabinet bottoms and tops and was looking forward to the satisfaction of dry-assembling the pieces and lightly “banging them home” with a mallet. Things were going swimmingly until I went to attach the top supports. The top was nearly 1″ wider than the bottom!
How could this be???
After some choice words and a bit of grumbling I decided to have a closer look at my tools…and noticed the blade on the table saw read some 2-3 degrees off 90…which led to cabinet bottoms angling the walls a bit beyond their intended target. With the glue already curing and available time short, I decided to basically force the sides square and call it a bench. Truthfully, as mistakes go this one’s not too awful — there’s enough play in the dadoes to allow for the readjustment — but hopefully this will serve as a reminder to verify the dang blade angle before starting a new project; even when it looks 90 degrees.
Oh, and by the way…I also managed to assemble the right-most cabinet mirror-image to the design with the wider drawer compartment closest to the right-hand wall. No matter…I’ll just tell people I planned it that way.
