22 minutes ago, DuckSoup said:

 

  Worked as a helper in a pattern shop years ago and the pattern maker used the term "draft" to imply angles which I tend to use from time to time.

  I used the same formula when I made this and was just curious if you had a different technique. My problems were that the pieces were to small ( 3/8-5/8) for the angle so I left the small ones straight and cut the larger angles at 18* to get my circle.

That's one slick looking American Legion medallion Duck!

 I would have done the same thing as you, those pieces are small enough, to try to cut those at the mathematical angle would have been fruitless, nobody will ever know. Great call on that!

50 minutes ago, John Morris said:

if I had enough room and funding for a second band-saw that's the way I'd do it, but not.

I've considered the little Ricon 10" benchtop model for the same reason.

2 minutes ago, Gene Howe said:

I've considered the little Ricon 10" benchtop model for the same reason.

Hmmm, not a bad idea, I'd need some pretty good power though on that second BS. If I could get a second BS that could be a bench top, high quality, some good power, I may look into that.

Yeah, 1/3 hp is a little anemic. Some of my BS boxes are 5+" thick and 1/3 hp might not cut it...so to speak.

If you find one with more power, holler.

3 minutes ago, Gene Howe said:

Yeah, 1/3 hp is a little anemic. Some of my BS boxes are 5+" thick and 1/3 hp might not cut it...so to speak.

If you find one with more power, holler.

It may have to be ARN Gene, if they exist.

ARN???

2 minutes ago, Gene Howe said:

ARN???

ARN= e.g. "Old Iron"...just guessing here

I repowered my 14" BS from 1 hp to 1.5 hp and hooked it to 220v.  what a difference. then bought a 12" Wen for the benchtop. that way if I am set up to resaw, I can use the small saw for making jigs and misc. cuts.

Herb

I continued sanding the radius of the headrest while the second rocker sets up in the form. 

I think I finally have it to where it needs to be.

2 hours ago, Grandpadave52 said:

ARN= e.g. "Old Iron"...just guessing here

correct..

put your cursor over the letters...

5 minutes ago, Stick486 said:

correct..

put your cursor over the letters...

I don't see any correlation between the abbreviation and the meaning. Whats up?

11 minutes ago, Dadio said:

I don't see any correlation between the abbreviation and the meaning. Whats up?

Sorry, I need to change it to Old Arn for the acronym definition. It's slang for Old Iron. Iron in a southern accent, Arn.

4 minutes ago, John Morris said:

Sorry, I need to change it to Old Arn for the acronym definition. It's slang for Old Iron. Iron in a southern accent, Arn.

Thanks, I figured it was something like that. We had an old fellow when I was growing up we called "Old Arn", his name was Arnie.

This reminds me of when I was in Boot Camp I had a bunk mate from Vermont. Since I smoked PallMall cigarettes at the time,he brought me a couple of cartons and just gave them to me. I asked why and he told me this story in his heavy Vermont dialect: When ever I go to the PX to buy Palmolive soap, they hand me a carton of PallMalls instead.

Herb

7 hours ago, Dadio said:

I repowered my 14" BS from 1 hp to 1.5 hp and hooked it to 220v.  what a difference. then bought a 12" Wen for the benchtop. that way if I am set up to resaw, I can use the small saw for making jigs and misc. cuts.

Herb

Hey Herb, thanks for the suggestion, I am open to all!

The headrest is almost ready to mount into the chair. I have the top and bottom curves cut and faired, and it's cleaned up pretty good.

I glued up the second rocker this morning, while waiting for it to set up I got the headrest pretty well ready.

 

With the front of the headrest curve faired and true, I took my scribe and used the front of the headrest as a reference, I set a line for the rear headrest cut at the bandsaw. 

 

After I scribe a line, I like to darken it with a pencil. By the way, that ol scribe is my dads he gave to me 30 years ago, he had it since the 70's, and it was given to him by an old friend who at that time was well into his 80's, and he had it since he was a teen. The scribe is a Keen Kutter, and it still has the markings and label on it. It has to be over a hundred years old. The original scribe is long gone, but I inserted a finish nail into it for the scribe.

 

I make the cut at the bandsaw, and it was another successful cut.

 

And we have a headrest at final thickness.

 

The surface is rough, and wobbly because of my bad coordination at the band saw, so I have to take the lumps out with my block plane, this lil ol plane sure gets a ton of use.

 

 

The lumps are gone and the rear of the head rest is ready for sanding when the time comes. Note the shavings, they are little tubes because I approached the planing perpendicular to the grain, not with the grain.

 

After all is good, I trued up the edge that has not been trued yet, I did this on the table saw, since I have a good reference edge at the fence from earlier jointing.

 

 

Now its time to cut the sides of the headrest to fit between the rear legs, this is a trial by error process, I have to sneak up on a good fit. Since no two chairs are alike, they all have to be fitted in many aspects of the build.

The jig above that is sitting on my Flying Dutchman, is a six degree jig, you may remember in another post, I stated there are six degrees all over these chairs.

 

The photos below show a nice fit, finally, it took about 4 sneak ups on the Dutchman.

 

I strapped the headrest to the rear legs to drill my pilot holes.

 

Then the head rest top is kerfed for a limit line where the the top arc will begin and terminate when I draw the arcs out.

 

 

I like using simple things around me in my shop, to draw a radius on the headrest I simply backed a screw out of the top of my bench that was holding down the top skin of the bench, and tie off a string to it, and measure out a radius that I think will look good, I tried radius's from 36 inches to 42", and I finally settled on a 41" radius.

I don't think a pattern would work for this because all headrests are different. So my lil string and pencil works good. 

Nothing is set in stone with these chairs, much of it is just making adjustments as you go, and working with what you got.

 

After I cut my nice radius's off with my bandsaw, I had to again take the lumps out, my block plane once again steps up to the task. I took the lions share of the lumps out with my plane.

 

Nice and true now.

 

The bottom of the headrest is concave, so I used the cut-off piece with 60 grit sandpaper to fair that curve, it took a long time, sanding end grain as you know, is tough! The picture is deceiving, the edge really is concave, and the cutoff piece is the mirrored convex shape that was left over form the bandsaw. 

 

After all the shaping, fairing and truing, I am happy with it.

 

 

Simply amazing John! It's really taking shape. Your detail and craftsmanship are enviable. I'd say pretty productive weekend thus far.  Thanks for all the detailed explanation and pics...all makes some sense to me now seeing the pieces parts connected. 

12 hours ago, Grandpadave52 said:

Simply amazing John! It's really taking shape. Your detail and craftsmanship are enviable. I'd say pretty productive weekend thus far.  Thanks for all the detailed explanation and pics...all makes some sense to me now seeing the pieces parts connected. 

 Plus one on this.

Wow!  Wonderfully done.

The headrest saga continues, yesterday I did not get as much time as I thought I would in the shop. But I did manage to get my back brace holes laid out and drilled, and my headrest in location for final shaping.

I chucked up a 10mm brad point bit for the back rest holes.

 

After the holes were drilled I laid out a few pencil lines by hand to my eye satisfactory, there are no set rules with sculpted furniture, not all chairs are the same, and the layout differs from chair to chair in many aspects. After laying out some lines to cut to, I free handed the cut on my band-saw.

 

One of the wonderful things about working with solid wood, is the ability to get rid of sloppy lines and sloppy hand work, as you can see in the image above my cut was not the best, but it will be shaped out in time. I installed the headrest with screws only, no glue, for final fitting and shaping. Once I got the head rest in place, I took my right angle grinder and shaped the round into the headrest, and blended the tops of the rear legs in with the headrest.

 

I then took my ROS and shaped it further as you see below.

 

You can see at the bottom of the headrest, the transition radius is not quite shaped yet. But it will be later.

 

After I took the bulk of the material down with my grinder, and my ROS with 80 grit, I blended and smoothed the headrest in closer to where it needs to be, the final shaping is done by hand once again with a block, and paper.

 

I left the chair yesterday as you see it here, on its back and needing more attention, but alas, other duties caught with me, and this will have to wait to later this week.

 

Thanks for checking in folks!

That chair is really awesome looking. I cant wait to see the finished product