Some Woodworking Updates

In the past couple of years I've made a few wood projects I'd like to share here.

A box for Dana

 Our friend Dana passed away in 2021. His daughter, recalling the cherry tree in their yard when she was young, asked me to built a cherry container for some of her father's cremains. The box was constructed using mostly hand tools.

I wanted to try bending wood. After seeing some tool totes online I decided to make one using an oak dowel for the bent handle. I soaked the dowel in water plus fabric softener for a week, then in hot water for about an hour. I placed it into a rough jig and clamped it overnight. The rest of the tote is made from old shelving (the bottom and ends) and leftover tongue-and-groove paneling (the sides). No nails, screws or glue were used.

Tool Tote

I also wanted to try working with greenwood (i.e. freshly cut, not seasoned). A neighbor's maple tree lost a large limb in a storm, so I used two pieces of it to make a stool. The ends of one piece were sealed with shellac to keep it from drying, and set aside. The other piece was split with froe and maul for the legs, which were shaped using drawknife and spokeshave. When the legs were ready, the other piece was split and barked to make the seat, then drilled for the legs to be inserted. Because the legs were drier than the seat, they swelled as they absorbed moisture from the seat. And the seat shrank as it dried. That's how greenwood furniture joints become tight without use of fasteners or glue. After nearly a year the legs are as tight as ever.

Maple greenwood stool

The Inside Passage

After a long pandemic hiatus Susan and I recently resumed travel, taking a small ship cruise through part of the Inside Passage in Southeast Alaska. On a friend's recommendation we booked with Uncruise (https://uncruise.com/pages/alaskan-adventures). We were delighted with the voyage, the locations, the wildlife, the expedition leaders and ship's crew, and the activities. Highly recommended.

Having travelled to Patagonia we suspected the Inside Passage environment would be similarly elemental and beautiful, and it is. An advantage of the Uncruise approach is the off-ship activities available each day. They included kayaking, hiking and bushwacking, skiff tours and paddleboarding. Wildlife is abundant: we saw bald eagles, sea lions, seals, otters, bears and several humpback whales (one from a kayak). Our fellow passengers were friendly nature-lovers and our expedition leaders were well-informed and enthusiastic. It was an amazing trip. 

Mountain from Tracy Arm

 

Near Elfin Cove

Elfin Cove sunset

Forest Floor, Kuiu Island

Margerie Glacier, Glacier Bay NP

Ice in the stream

Out walking recently, I found intriguing ice patterns in a small stream. My guess is that the stream level was dropping and ice formed at different levels as it fell. The picture was taken under a footbridge, which shows as dark bars reflected in the water. I don't always love frigid weather, but this was a good morning.

Ice in a Stream

Woodworking

After winding up my folding desk efforts, I've made a few more projects.

This is a shaker style table with a birch plywood top, red oak aprons, and laminated pine legs.

A yard sculpture titled "Blue Tensegrity", after Buckminster Fuller's term for structures using isolated compression elements and tension elements. Made of two-by-two pine construction lumber and one-sixteenth inch stainless steel cable.

A paper towel dispenser with half-lap joints in pine, with a cherry handle.

Plans for folding desk, by Dean Wight

Links to plans for folding desks are at the end of this post.

Update January 31, 2021: Someone asked for photos of desks, so I'm posting a few here. 

Modified Desk, folded

Modified Desk, partially open

Modified Desk, open position

Update January 16, 2021: Plans for the modified folding desk are at the end of this post, together with the original plans. Feel free to add comments and suggestions.

Update January 11, 2021: I have made modifications to the folding desk, and I will revise the plans shortly. In brief, the changes are (a) switched to non-mortising hinges because they are lighter and fold slightly flatter than door hinges; (b) removed plywood cross-braces and replaced them with 2 by 2 braces mounted in-between, rather than on top of, the legs, reducing weight and allowing legs to fold flatter; (c) removed about 3 pounds of material using cutouts in the back panel.

Non-mortising hinges

Back panel with cutouts

This link leads to a PDF of plans for the modified folding desk:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1McVcGjI1rEaR4GnTgM2t0dBIYqUrl1q6/view?usp=sharing

This link leads to a PDF of plans, drawings and photos of the folding desk developed for Desks by Dads in Gaithersburg MD.

 https://drive.google.com/file/d/15WAL9oG1CaBKSEEipo8VNOVb0UVCp1A6/view?usp=sharing

Calf Creek, Escalante Canyons

East of Bryce Canyon and west of Capitol Reef national parks lies a large rugged region known as Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. A mosaic of BLM and state lands covering more than 1,500 square miles, it was the last area in the continental U.S. to be mapped. We had just one day to see some tiny portion of it. As always, a visitors center gave us great advice: we decided to hike Calf Creek in the Escalante Canyons area. It's a "moderately strenuous" in-and-back hike totaling six miles, with a 120-foot waterfall at the turnaround.

Calf Creek trail

As in much of southern Utah, the rocks and topography are spectacular.

Rock Wall, Calf Creek canyon

Calf Creek prominences

After three miles uphill in warm weather, through a lot of deep sand, the waterfall and pool were a very welcome oasis.

Lower Calf Creek Falls

You ought to give Iowa a try

Before our latest cross-country trip we had never spent time in Iowa. We didn't know what we'd see, except the Andy Goldsworthy sculptures near Grinnell and in Des Moines. I assumed in my ignorance that Iowa would be flat. It's not. And the rolling hills were lush with corn in mid-September, making for lovely landscapes.

Iowa cornfield

Iowa cornfield 2

We also visited the Neal Smith National Wildlife Refuge, which preserves tallgrass prairie, oak savanna and sedge meadows. It too was very beautiful, and we enjoyed their educational center as well (did you know that some prairie grasses have roots 12 feet deep?). Wild sawtooth sunflowers combined with grasses and other wild plants to form a lovely mosaic. They use fire, seeding and, in one 700 acre enclosure, bison to reconstruct and preserve the prairie ecosystem. Very cool.

Neal Smith National Wildlife Refuge