Story of a Perfect Day in the Shop
There are all kinds of perfect days… a perfect day hunting, or fishing, at the beach, even at work. Any more, my best times are working in the shop, but I don't often get to put in a full day. Either I get dragged off for errands or find I can't stand all day. Today was an exception. I got to put in a full 9 to 5 and never noticed it was happening that way, I was enjoying myself so much.
I went down with actually no specific goal in mind, just knowing there were things to be doing. I'm hoping to do a bow this weekend, and the thought occurred that I should give the air hose bow press another chance. My first effort with it was a bit of a disaster. I needed to install crib washers on it, and I wanted to do the job right. I also needed to replace the crib fingers on my old form, which I had put on with wood screws that were wearing out their pilot holes. I decided to put the new washers on with 1/4" through bolts and butterfly nuts.
OK, to do that, I needed to set my drill press up with outboard support. Hmm, some time ago I bought a table enlargement for the drill press that t I had never installed. Why not now? So, I installed that. Aren't Chinese instructions fun? It's a cheap item, but actually works fairly well. I think I can come up with a better way to fasten it to the press bed, but for the moment, it works.
So, that done, I drilled side holes in 24 one and 5/8 inch fender washers, then got out the bottom half of the bow press form and marked and drilled holes for the 1/4" bolts, installed the bolts and washers, then repeated the process for my old clamp form. Big improvement in layup capability.
What next? Hmm… If I want to run a bow this weekend, lets get some components going. I don't' want to use really fancy woods or stuff on what amounts to another test run with air press, so what do I have on hand? Ah, here's a stack of cedar lam blanks left over from making "Out of the Closet". I selected four, not the fantastic grain that Closet had, but reasonably interesting pattern areas of both red and white… definitely usable and worth grinding out.
Grinding out… Oh, yeah… I meant to change the paper roll in the drum sander. Let's do that… Did that and then ground out the lams. In talking with Kenny, he told me that he no longer uses a sled for parallels, but grinds directly on the sander bed. Why not give it a try? Hey, works great! Look at that, two pair of perfect .070 outside lams! Hmm… need a core… Ah, there's a full length lamboo lam left over from Orion. Let's use that for a tapered core. Grind, grind, grind and that's done.
Hmm… a riser… Let's see, there's that piece of Sapele I laminated up and was saving. Ooops, it still has glue boogers all around it. OK, let's get Monstro the sander out into the driveway. Boy, I sure do like that new retractable 40' extension cord I mounted on the ceiling! Grind, grind, grind. Yeah, that's looking good! Hmm… maybe too good. It kind of overpowers the cedar lams. Oh, well, set it aside. What else do I have? Yeah! A nice 2x2 length of cherry left over from Cherry Pie. Let's make a riser out of that. Have to thin it to 1 1/2 x 1 1/2 and layout the overpass riser to avoid a knot, but it's doable. Get out the bandsaw. Boy, I sure do like that new retractable 40" extension cord I mounted on the ceiling! Saw, saw… grind, grind…
OK, there's a set of lams and a riser. What else can I do? Never made a power lam before, why not try it on this bow? Here's a length of lamboo from a lam that didn't work out. Cut it in half and use the taper sled and make two 18" power lams… grind, grind, grind… a bit thin on the butt end, but they ought to work for a first effort.
Now what… Well, with power lams you're supposed to have a tip wedge. Never did that,. either. Let's try to make a set. Cut a couple of short lam blanks out of the cut out part of the cherry riser and then grind, grind, grind on the taper sled. Ooops! That didn't work out too well. Too thin… Obviously, you need a steeper short taper sled. Oh, well….
Gosh, look at that! it's getting late! Time to put all the tools away and clean up the shop. Tomorrow's another day, with the making of a new tip wedge sled, reassembly of the air press and a whole new bow layup to do.
It ain't always so, but often, life can be pretty darn good!
Topic: Reflection on a Perfect Day in the Shop (Read 624 times)
