Artie,  pm me what you have in mind.  Maybe i can help you out a little.

 

I will John, but,I’m at least a month before freeing up some time. Thank you for the offer. I do have some near future ideas, if this goes well 

 Define "Normal" 

"Normal" and "Woodworkers" seem to be mutually exclusive terms. 

1 hour ago, Gene Howe said:

"Normal" and "Woodworkers" seem to be mutually exclusive terms. 

I represent that!

4 hours ago, Larry Buskirk said:

 Define "Normal" 

 

don't worry you can sit back down, wasn't referring to you.....  

There are woodworkers who have a CNC and can use it creatively,  and "normal" woodworkers who don't (maybe can't?).

I've worked with other furniture design professors who couldn't/wouldn't cross what may be a distinct barrier to CNC use, despite appreciating what could be done using a CNC. 

 

I've got a shop full of tools, and over the years have come to understand them and master them to help me make complex creative projects. I realized the challenging cuts were simply about controlling how the wood approached the cutting/spinning blade of the router or bandsaw or table saw.  Flat 2D/2.5D work on a CNC bed isn't much of a challenge, and often could have (would have/should have) been done without one. The 3D carving, and complex joinery possible with creative mounting of parts under the CNC bed is what tickles my genes.

 

We have a large 5'x10' Multicam CNC in the fab lab where I teach, and although it is certainly used what is (usually) done on it bores me.  What I can do with a Probotix 2'x4' CNC and its open frame design is a bottomless pit of potential that almost daily rewards me by doing something previously impossible or at least so hard to do it seemed so. 

 

Lately I've been challenged to adapt/toolpath a (fairly complex) student design into something that could be completely cut on a CNC then assembled directly.  One bit for everything including profiles and pockets and mortises and tenons and countersinks for the screws that will be used.  Add that once assembled there should be no obvious evidence (like dogboned corners) that the parts were cut on a CNC. No follow up processes like rounding over edges, etc. Any required were done with that same bit on the CNC.  Yes, you can cut countersinks with an end mill. 

 

4D 

7 hours ago, 4DThinker said:

There are woodworkers who have a CNC and can use it creatively,  and "normal" woodworkers who don't (maybe can't?).

I've worked with other furniture design professors who couldn't/wouldn't cross what may be a distinct barrier to CNC use, despite appreciating what could be done using a CNC. 

 

I've got a shop full of tools, and over the years have come to understand them and master them to help me make complex creative projects. I realized the challenging cuts were simply about controlling how the wood approached the cutting/spinning blade of the router or bandsaw or table saw.  Flat 2D/2.5D work on a CNC bed isn't much of a challenge, and often could have (would have/should have) been done without one. The 3D carving, and complex joinery possible with creative mounting of parts under the CNC bed is what tickles my genes.

 

We have a large 5'x10' Multicam CNC in the fab lab where I teach, and although it is certainly used what is (usually) done on it bores me.  What I can do with a Probotix 2'x4' CNC and its open frame design is a bottomless pit of potential that almost daily rewards me by doing something previously impossible or at least so hard to do it seemed so. 

 

Lately I've been challenged to adapt/toolpath a (fairly complex) student design into something that could be completely cut on a CNC then assembled directly.  One bit for everything including profiles and pockets and mortises and tenons and countersinks for the screws that will be used.  Add that once assembled there should be no obvious evidence (like dogboned corners) that the parts were cut on a CNC. No follow up processes like rounding over edges, etc. Any required were done with that same bit on the CNC.  Yes, you can cut countersinks with an end mill. 

 

4D 

I would like to follow that project.

5 hours ago, Artie said:

I would like to follow that project.

 

X2!

One only needs to look at Jesse's superb creations to see the utility of hand held devices. Yeah, such devices are not as precise and, don't offer the repeatability of a CNC but still, a lot of creative fun. However, if you are interested in production runs, a CNC is the way to go. 

I've got a student who came in with considerable woodworking experience, but it was mostly carving.   Beautiful for the most part, but lacking the thoughtful awareness of wood properties and appropriate joinery for the structural load the projects will eventually see.  He's tackling a chair design this semester and has already bumped into wood that is fighting back against what he doesn't know.   I've helped him CNC cut some parts, including complex shapes and joinery details between sides, back, and seat.  We have lengthy talks about grain direction conflicts and how to deal with them.  He is after a contoured/carved look and knows how to do the final carving, but is struggling to understand the static and dynamic loads his chair will see, and need to resist. He is a rare exception among my students, with most knowing zero about woodworking when they start. 

 

I encourage all to challenge the technology we have.  What used to be done by craftsman that started as apprentices to master carvers and was a lifetime education just can't be attained in 3 semester courses.  I do get the rare students who at least can imaging the fanciful, but our only path to seeing their visions created is by cutting them out on a CNC. 

 

4D 

9 hours ago, Artie said:

I would like to follow that project.

Hiding dogbones is about not making through tenons, and making a shoulder on the tenons end that hides any t-bone cuts you made on those tenons. The shoulder also hides the t-bone cuts you made on the mortises.  Using a 3/16" bit in 18mm plywood rather than a 1/4" or larger bit keeps the dogbone/t-bone cuts small.  Using a 1/8" bit rather than larger in 1/2" (12mm) plywood has the same benefit. 

When I'm making countersinks I use a circular array of short vectors and the fluting toolpath to move the endmill down and up to match the underside slope of flat head bolts. 

 

When I'm using the small CNCs where I can clamp boards vertically or at any angle under the bit I rarely need to bother with dogbones as fingerjoints and dovetails and tenons can all look "conventional".  Blind tenons get round corners to match the round corners of the mating mortises I'll cut for them.  If the mortises get cut with our dedicated square chisel mortising machine I'll leave the tenons square to match. 

 

I make pockets for inserting square nuts using a 1/8" bit and minimal dogbone corners.   Above that I'll make a cleaner rounded pocket that can be filled with matching plugs I'll also cut using the CNC. 

 

There is a narrow area where joinery made with a CNC can look classy/refined on finished hardwood projects. Radial finger joints between oak and walnut dowel sections in a coat rack design to celebrate that material transition is one example. 

 

4D 

I've just finished a small table sample to show my Workshop 1 students this Spring semester. The top was the only piece I cut out using my CNC.  It's profile shape could have been bandsaw cut then sanded to final shape. The bottom surface though is complex beveled using the moulding toolpath in Aspire to meet the legs at 90 degrees despite their angled approach. The legs have an unusual cross section but that was cut on my table saw. The stretchers half lap in the middle to meet the legs on their inside face. The half lap was also cut on my table saw using my fancy miter gauge. Tenons on them were cut with my CNC as were the matching mortises cut for them on the legs.  This joinery didn't need to be cut using the CNC, but I could so I did.  

 

The point of mentioning this is that the parts and joinery of this table could have all been made without a CNC.  I likely would have skipped the fancy bottom surface of the top though, and used figure 8 plates to screw the legs to the top.  I can quickly iterate within Aspire to help visualize more complex shapes/surfaces though, and I know I can cut them out using my CNC.  This encourages me to not be afraid of or intimidated by the complex. 

 

What I know my CNC can do gets mixed with what I know all my other tools can do.  This arms me with a more colorful palette of possibilities when I'm considering how to turn a sketch into an actual product.  A sketch often inspires a new clamping strategy or fixture that would be needed to make it using my CNC. This new clamping strategy then gets added to the "how to" database for future project application. 

 

4D

A pic of that would help me visualize what you've done...

On 1/3/2022 at 7:37 AM, Cal said:

A pic of that would help me visualize what you've done...

I'll try and remember to snap a pic of it once classes start the 18th. I've already dropped it off in the fab lab where my classes will meet. 

 

On a related note, I got an unexpected request from my dept. head this morning. He knows I'm retiring after this semester. The request is for me to record somehow my CNC knowledge in creating creative CNC cut joinery solutions for students.   My leaving has created a disruption (his word) and somehow I have to minimize the damage by leaving a magic book.  Open this book and apparently you'll receive 40 years of woodworking experience, and 15 years of CNC experience focused on perceiving the needs and inventing, then jigging for, then creating tool paths for realizing the CNC cut joinery solution. 

 

4D    

The older I get, the more I can relate to what the elders told me when I wuz a yung’un. Knowledge can be so hard to get, and so easily lost. The history books have all the facts and views and positions of WWII, but those lessons are best taught by those that were there, and now there are so few left. So yeah, you have earned the right to retire, and you deserve to be able to retire, but no one is gonna be able to step in and have your knowledge, and ability to impart it. They will have to learn it over time as you did. If you do find a way to make this magic book, I may try to find some magic beans I can trade for it. I hear it’s nice to be a wise old sage, I hope you enjoy it. (And of course stick around here to explain CNC to those of us who are technically challenged. I am of course referring to meself.  )

Thanks for your wise words Artie.  The young dept. head has also decided that despite having me on contract until the end of this semester, that I won't be teaching any classes.  He suffers from an over-inflated ego and the inability to know and admit when he is wrong. After meeting him with the Dean of the college and explaining clearly why he shouldn't have interfered with the well establish furniture design curriculum, (which the Dean agreed with) he decided to take it out on me by making other folks teach my classes.  I'm OK with that, as I've nearly finished the magic book and that'll leave me with a semester worth of paid play time. 

 

4D   

7 hours ago, 4DThinker said:

I have to minimize the damage by leaving a magic book.  Open this book and apparently you'll receive 40 years of woodworking experience, and 15 years of CNC experience focused on perceiving the needs and inventing, then jigging for, then creating tool paths for realizing the CNC cut joinery solution.

 

 

You are a class act!!!  Had I been informed of such a request the conversation would have gone like this:

 

Ya know, I really don't mind you smoke crack.  What I do mind is that you failed to share so I also can enter into this fantasy land you speak about.

 

 

 

"I would like you to document your process for the CNC joints you have found to be the most effective over the years. This
documentation should be in both written and graphic format taking a student through a step‐by‐step
process of creating that CNC joint."

 

Above is a direct quote from the email sent to me by my dept. head. 

All the CNC joints I've created over the years have been effective. 

No two have been the same, unless they were simply duplicated or mirrored parts on the same project. 

I don't have a process.   I do have a talent for looking at a proposed design and seeing what the connections will need to be to satisfy the expected forces. I know from experience what type of joint will work best with the wood being used, grain direction, and type of forces encountered.  I know from just looking at it how the joinery can be cut. If the CNC will be used I've already determined what vector view of the connections I'll need, and how I'll be clamping the boards into a CNC.  The rest is a little drafting to get to the top down view of what I'll be cutting, be it a simple pocketed area around a tenon, or a tapered dovetail slot. Some auxiliary plane projection of orthographic views. 

 

Now I just need a way to transplant this knowledge into a college student's head. 

BTW my dept. head has his own CNC, yet has only done flat work on it.  He thought that was easy to learn, and by extent believes that what I know about using a CNC should be easy to learn. He just doesn't understand how I do it. 

 

4D

That's a big part of the problems 4D.  Their idea of starting at the bottom is Vice President or Dept Head.  Book smart and people dumb.  Same in private business today.  Seems the days of starting at the bottom and working your way up thru the ranks to understand the process is gone.