More Patterns

I completed the rest of the patterns today.  They were cut from plywood of various thicknesses depending on their purpose.  Fortunately, most of the patterns don’t need to be too exact since the parts will need to be sculpted and shaped later.  No, I won’t provide the patterns in the blog.  You will have to buy them just like I did!

I also completed the 6 degree jig for the table saw.  The printed drawing of the 6 degree angle was a bit off.  I used two different methods to ensure I had a true 6 degrees.  I compared a protractor and a printed angle gauge I use for my scroll saw.   All in all, it’s probably not that critical.  Maloof uses a 5 degree angle on the back legs.  I doubt that anyone can see the difference between 5 and 7 degrees anyway.  The only remaining piece I need to make is the form for the laminated rockers, but I’ll have to get a sheet of 3/4” plywood first.

One frustration I have with the plans is that there is not a complete set of dimensional drawings.  For instance, there is no drawing for the back leg front profile.  You have to watch the video and take good notes to get all of the information you need.  All of the information is there.  I just think it could be presented in a way that makes it easier for the user.

I came across another blog for the build of a Hal Taylor rocking chair.  It’s interesting to see the differences in the designs.  The Hal Taylor seat isn’t coopered, but the headrest is.  There are no “ears” on the back legs.  The spindles are a different shape.  And the arms are shaped by making coves on the table saw.  It uses the same Maloof inspired bridle joints, but it is definitely not a Maloof copy.  That’s fine.  It’s a beautiful, unique design of its own.

Patterns

I noticed that the number of people viewing my blog increased significantly this week!  It appears that Charles Brock provided a link from his site.  Thanks Chuck!  Knowing that people are actually reading my blog is a big incentive to get more done on my chair.

Unfortunately, I’m in a bit of a holding pattern while I wait for some new tools to arrive.  I mentioned before that I needed a new router to accommodate the larger bits required for this project.  I bought a Triton plunge router that has a lot of nice features.  It was rated very highly in some of the woodworking magazines.  I also picked up the 3/4” roundover bit, but the 1/2” rabbeting bit wasn’t available in stock.  (The nice folks at my local Woodcraft store made a valiant effort looking for it though.)  So, I ordered the bit online.  Since the next step in the process is to make the rabbets in the seat, I’ve had to move on to other tasks.

I spent today creating a baseplate for the router so it will fit into my homemade router table.  I used 1/4" lexan which is easy to work with.  I scribed crosshairs on the plate to mark the center, and then I used a forstner bit to make a 2-1/8” hole for the large bits.  Even using a slow speed on the drill press, the forstner bit still caused melting, so I switched to using the scroll saw to complete the hole.  After a bit of planing and filing, I was able to get it snugged into the table.  

The rest of the day I spent cutting out some of the rocking chair patterns from plywood.  I expect to finish that up tomorrow.  While this is not as fun as working on the actual chair pieces, it’s a necessary part of the process.  

The Seat (Part 2)

I completed milling the seat boards so that the seat width is now at 20”.  The next step is to mark and drill the aliment dowels.  There are many possible ways to do this joinery.  Brock uses the Festool Domino.  It can also be done using a biscuit joiner, but be sure to use big ones.  Maloof used 1/2”x3” dowels and this seems like the right choice for me (since I don’t own a Domino, or a biscuit joiner).

I followed the Maloof video for the layout which is: one dowel near the back of the seat and in the middle of the board, then two dowels 3” and 5” from the front and 1/2” from the bottom.  The dowels are staggered slightly on each joint.  Maloof said that this arrangement adds strength because the dowels “fight” one another.  I’m not sure I follow the reasoning, but hey, he built these chairs for decades and they never fell apart, so why argue with success?  Here is a picture of the locations.

In the Maloof video, he uses a huge horizontal boring machine to create the dowel holes.  I’ll have to make due with a small benchtop drill press.  Boards 2 and 4 are beveled such that the faces are still parallel, so they can be drilled with no special setup.  Due to the angle of the bevels on the other boards, I had to create a jig.  After doing some calculations, I found that I needed 3/32” to set the correct angle across the thickness of the board.  I decided to do this the quick and dirty way, so my “jig” consisted of just taping two 3/32” drill bits to the bottom corner.  I still need to get some dowels before I can see how well this technique worked.  Here is a picture of the hole layout.

The next step was to cut the leg slots in the seat.  The seat is still not assembled or glued yet.  This allows me to cut the slots in the end boards (1 & 5) individually.  The rear legs slots are made with just two cuts on the table saw.  The front leg slots could be done with a dado blade, but I decided to follow Brock’s method and use my crosscut sled to cut the slot in multiple passes one kerf (blade width) at a time.

The Seat (Part 1)

This weekend I started on the chair in earnest!  I started by jointing and planing all the wood to make sure it was true (flat and square).  I then ripped the seat pieces to width (4.5”) on the table saw, and to length (22”) on the compound miter (“chop”) saw.  

[SAFETY TIP:  Always wear safety glasses!  As I was cutting the wood on my table saw, I hit a knot and even though I was standing to the side of the blade, a piece flew out and hit my safety glasses just over my left eye. ] 

Here’s a picture of the completed pieces.  It may look silly to number each piece, but believe me, it’s necessary.  As you work each one, they are juggled around and it’s very easy to lose track of which piece is which and what the correct orientation is.  I chose some walnut with the lighter heart wood and placed those at the outside of the seat.  I like the contrast.  I hope it still looks good when it’s complete.  The center board has a knot in the middle.  I placed it so it will fall just behind the pommel.  This way I should be able to carve most of it away.

My next step was to cooper the seat pieces.  This is done by beveling some of the edges so the seat curves slightly.  Maloof beveled the edges on the table saw and didn’t joint them.  Brock bevels his on the jointer.  I use a Forrest Woodworker II blade on my table saw and it leaves a nice clean edge, but not as nice as the jointer.  My table saw was one of the first power tools I ever bought, and although it’s served me well, I hate it.  It’s a Delta contractor style saw and it has no soft start.  You hit the switch and…BANG!...it’s at full speed.  It’s scary.  It’s also underpowered for cutting this 2” hardwood.  It was vibrating terribly when I ripped the pieces.  Because of all that, I chose to bevel my seat pieces on the jointer.  

I set the fence at a three degree angle (transferred using a protractor and a sliding bevel).  Then it only took three passes to make the edge.  I like to mark my wood with chalk so I can see how much progress the jointer is making.  The first picture here shows the edge chalked before jointing.  The next picture shows the edge after the first pass.  Be sure to mark the board ends to show the direction of the bevel.  And then be careful to select the correct orientation of the board to get that bevel.  If you joint the board from the wrong side, you will not be happy.

After all the proper edges were beveled, I clamped the pieces together to show the “smile”.  The Brock plans call for 3 degree bevels on only some edges which creates a very gentle curve.  

Maloof used 3 degree bevels too, but on every internal edge.  This resulted in a 6 degree change at each joint and a more pronounced curve.  I decided that I wanted the bigger smile, so I quickly jointed the remaining edges and you can see the difference in this photo.  I placed a straight edge along the top so you can see that the outer pieces remain flat and parallel.   

Lesson Learned:  The plans called for the seat pieces to be 4.5” wide.  With 5 pieces, that makes the total seat width 22.5”.  After coopering, the measured seat width was 22”.  The problem is that the plans call for the seat to be only 20” wide.  No worries since I can always remove more wood, but this is 4/10” off of each board.  I’m assuming that extra material was designed in to account for any mistakes along the way, but 2” seems like a waste to me.  Next time, I think I’ll reduce the board widths to 4.25”.  That would give me 20.75” after coopering.

Getting Started

Last week I finally purchased some wood!  I bought a stick of ebony for the screw plugs at Woodcraft, and then I bought 21 board feet of 8/4 black walnut at Crosscut Hardwoods in Seattle.   I’m always impressed with the vast selection of rough cut woods at Crosscut.  The plans say that the chair will require approximately 40-50 board feet of wood.  So, why did I only get 21 bf?  For starters, I only needed this much to create the seat and the front legs.  Also, these pieces were in the best shape and had the grain patterns I liked.  The stock is always turning over, so if I go back another time, I can probably find some with grain I like better.  A piece of furniture this nice deserves nice wood, so be picky and get wood without knots or imperfections.

The plans call for 10/4 wood for the arms and headrest.  Crosscut doesn’t carry 10/4 in the walnut, but they do have 12/4.  [For you newbies, rough cut wood is measured approximately in quarter inches.  So, 8/4 wood is approximately 2 inches thick, 12/4 is approximately 3” thick, etc.  A board foot is a measurement of volume consisting of 144 cubic inches.  A board that is 1” thick, 12” wide, and 12” long is one board foot (12x12x1=144).  A board that is 2” thick, 3” wide, and 24” long is also one board foot (2x3x24=144).]

I’ve watched the videos and read the plans several times now.  I highly recommend this.  Although I was taking notes and sketching during the videos, I still learned something new each time.  Sometimes, as I thought through the assembly, I would have a question and have to go through the video again.   There are several differences between the Maloof design and the design in the Brock plans, so I had to sort out those differences and then decide which method or design feature I was going to use.  I will try to point out those differences as I go through the build.

One revelation I had was that the router bits required for the saddle joints are so large that they require 1/2” shanks.  My router only has a 1/4“ collet.  Darn…I guess I’ll have to buy a new router.  :)  The other thing I realized is that the front legs require turning and are 19” long.  My Jet mini-lathe only has a 14” capacity.  While this sounds like a great excuse for a new lathe, I really don’t have the room for a full-size lathe, and I don’t do that much turning.  I think in this case, I’ll just try to find a friend that will let me borrow his/hers for a little while.

Speaking of friends… if you are new to woodworking, or just want to hang out with like-minded woodworkers, look into local clubs and guilds.  I’m a member of the Northwest Woodworking Guild in Seattle.  Besides being inspired by the other members amazing work, I also get to learn a lot at each monthly meeting.  In addition, for the small annual dues, I get discounts at Woodcraft, Rockler, and Crosscut Woods. 

Resources (Part 2)

The references I cited in the last post provided chair making wisdom directly from the master himself.   In this post, I want to look at helpful information from others who have followed in his footsteps.

I initially (and naively) thought that I would just use pictures of the Maloof rocking chair and create my own patterns from scratch.  That idea was quickly crushed once I realized the time and effort required.  This is a fairly complex project and I did not want to spend half of my time experimenting with patterns when there were some readily available.  Sure there is some cost involved, but the savings in hassle more than outweigh the expense.  Commercial patterns can be purchased from several sources over a wide price range.  I'll discuss some of those options here:

The first hit on a Google search of “Maloof rocking chair patterns” leads to the Scott Morrison website.  Morrison makes chairs for sale from his shop in Montana.  There are several different Maloof style furniture pieces for sale here as well as DIY patterns.  The DVD and patterns can be purchased for $129.98.  There is no book in the package, but the DVD does have 6 hours of instruction.  The gallery shows some beautiful chairs.  The only differences I see between Morrison’s chair style and Maloof’s are the back legs that don’t extend up past the headrest (crestrail).  Not a big deal since this can easily be customized.

Another chair design that is referenced quite often in newsgroups comes from Hal Taylor of Virginia.  He has chairs for sale, but also sells the plans.  A book on chair building runs $50.00, a 3 DVD set for $90.00, and patterns are $50.00. The Taylor rocking chair also has the rear legs that do not extend above the headrest.  I noticed that the rockers tend to have a simple curve as opposed to the S-curve (a.k.a. cyma curve) on the Maloof rocker.

Another major chair website is owned by Charles Brock who sells a bundle through Highland Woodworking.  The bundle includes a 90 minute DVD, booklet, and full-sized patterns for $89.99.  Brock started a new woodworking school in Georgia just to train how to build this type of rocker.  He now offers a kit with precut wood pieces for $1,499.99. That would definitely speed up the process, but where’s the fun in that?  I enjoy woodworking because I get to WORK THE WOOD.  The Brock rocker is described as “Maloof inspired” and is not 100% the same as an original Maloof, but it sure looks like the most accurate copy to me.

There are other sites out there, but I saw these three referred to over and over again.  I spent quite awhile thinking about which plans would provide me with the chair I wanted, and I finally decided on the Brock bundle.  The chair style closely matches the look I want, and the bundle was the least expensive.  I ordered and received the plans about a month ago.  The quality of the materials is quite good.  The booklet doesn’t just echo the DVD, but rather compliments it with more detailed information.  I believe that these materials, together with the references I listed in the previous post, will allow me to be true to the Maloof style, yet still tweak the design to be my own.