My wife and I alternate making Christmas ornaments for the grandkids each year.   This is my year.   At first, I made some "log reindeer" (my father had one in his yard in his later years).  They seemed very delicate in ornament scale, so I looked for an alternative.   Found something like this on YouTube.   Showed it to my wife and she said, "Oh, Plaited hearts, those are very traditional." (She sews and quilts a lot).   So off I go.

 

The size of the square is 1.5" x 1.5" and the woods are two of my favorites to match, walnut and hard maple.    The YouTube video showed the guy using a cross-cut sled on his bandsaw.   I'm wondering why that never occurred to me, I use my crosscut sled on the table saw all the time.   So made one of those while the glue on the 'brick' was setting up.

 

I probably have enough for 15 or 20 more that I'll do and go in next year's church Xmas bazaar.

 

I'll post final photos once the finish is applied (I'm trying 3 different ones to see which I like best)

 

 

 

 

 

What a cool way to use up scraps! Those are gorgeous.

Great idea. I could never get a even cut like that but maybe sand to shape.

I like those.  I'm not that good on a band saw.

Very cool Keith.  How thick are they?  Looking forward to seeing them with finish.

I got a new bandsaw blade today and finished up.  Total count 40.  I like the shop where I got the replacement blade, he gave me next week's Black Friday 10% discount, then another 10% for being in the ww club, then handed me a free $9.65 tape measure for being a good customer.

 

They are 5/16" thick and the square is 1.5"x 1.5"

 

I got the first batch in the finish room yesterday.  I dipped them in some boiled linseed oil, let them drip for 15 minutes, then wiped off.

 

I was thinking they'd make great coasters if a bit bigger, Titebond III and a film finish.   Maybe next year

 

My next project is to do a Lone Star quilt pattern from wood.  It took me some searching and figuring to get a pattern that I could make from wood.   The one in progress has 4 different woods (walnut, qswo, cherry, and butternut) and will have a border of maple.  Strips in glue up now.  Hoping my joints line up better than this.

 

That looks like an ambitious project (for me).  Looking forward to your pips Keith.

Well, yesterday I made a sliding miter table to cut the pieces.  It took some head scratching, ciphering, and a couple of tries to get the dimension right and had JUST ENOUGH wood to cut all the pieces.  First real application for the MatchFit dovetail clamps I got for Xmas last year.

 

 

 

Got the 32 pieces cut and glued up in pattern to 8 segments.  Will need to trim 2 pieces off each edge once they glue is dry to make a large  4x4 diamond shape.  By the time I got to the end of it, I was getting competent with which piece went where and how the diamonds lined up.

 

 

When I worked in the software industry, they told the salespeople, "Never do a live demo -- too much can go wrong."   I'm hoping this all works out OK, or I'll be embarrassed.

 So Keith, am I correct in saying you left your jig in place after the crosscut & just flipped the narrow piece over and cut again leaving the diamond shapes?

Dry fit before glue-up. Making sure all the grain goes the way I want it to.  Four joints with edge grain and four with end-grain, alternating.

 

When I was reviewing in my head before making cuts, I conferred with my wife, the quilter.   She said she'd never made one that complicated.  Now she tells me.   

During dry fit she asked if some of the adjacent wood was the same.  I had to explain "geometric metamerism"   When you view from one angle, some of the wood of the same species appears darker and the other lighter.  Rotate 90 degrees and they are the same.  Rotate another 90 and the light and dark sides have switched roles.   Something I learned early on trying to touch up veneered surfaces.   Check from all angles.   I saw the same thing, oddly enough, with certain fabrics (rayon chenille) if they got water spilled on them.

 

 

So the steps so far:

1.  Cut 5 strips of exactly equal width and thickness.

 

2. Glue the strips up in a particular order 

The species are arranged in the strip glue-up:

   1  walnut  (dark)

   2  white oak  (light)

   3  butternut (medium light)

   4  cherry (medium dark)

   3  butternut  (medium light)

3.  All the strips are cut in sequence in the cut off jig.  No flipping.

 

4. Strips then stacked together and glued like (x=blank spot)

   x 1 2 3 4 3 

   1 2 3 4 3 x

   x 3 4 3 2 1 (piece flipped top to bottom)

   3 4 3 2 1 x  ( ditto )

 

5. Then the edge columns are trimmed off in the same jig, yielding
 

   x 1 2 3 4 x 

   x 2 3 4 3 x

   x 3 4 3 2 x

   x 4 3 2 1 x 

 

Next steps:

6. Glue together two of the edge-grain joints.

 

7. Glue the "wings" onto the two pieces from #6.  End grain joint.  This yields two halves of the star

 

8. Fine tune the remaining glue line to ensure tight joint.  With 16 cuts, if you are off just a fraction of a degree, there might be a wee gap.

 

9. Cut the triangle and square parts for the borders

 

10. Glue everything onto substrate.

 

11. Sand.  Apply finish.

 

12.  Make and install in frame.

Wow!  That is an endeavor.  So many pieces.  Well done. 

OK I am dizzy just reading about it

42 minutes ago, Gerald said:

OK I am dizzy just reading about it

+1

That is surely coming together Keith.  Going to be one absolutely gorgeous piece of art when completed!

Got the last glue up done this afternoon.  Next is to cut pieces to fit for the corners and edges.  Interesting.  With all the edge cut-off pieces I made three star ornaments.   I could have had 4, but one piece of butternut had a knot in it.  

Edited November 23, 20205 yr by kmealy

This is interesting but the closest I have come was stars I made a few years back. This was made as a blank and then the stars are cut off.

43 minutes ago, Gerald said:

This is interesting but the closest I have come was stars I made a few years back. This was made as a blank and then the stars are cut off.

Yes, I made some similar to those a few years ago.  Again alternating maple and cherry.   Frank Klausz has an article on this.  So does Steve Ramsey, but I like Frank's better.

 

Dec 1998 American Woodworker Magazine. (Issue 70, pg 70-75)

Not much time in the shop today, but got some sanding done, did a trial run on some finish to see what I like best, and trimmed the edges.  Picked out some wood for the border frame.   Otherwise, working on specs for framing some artwork for a Christmas present.

Here's a picture of the wood with a bit of naphtha on it to preview what a finish will look like.  A little over 20" square without frame.

 

AWESOME!!!

 

Quite impressive!   I like it.   Danl