The miter gauge holder

Rinse and repeat

I found a short and wide piece in my wood rack, rather flat and nice – but it had a slight cup and needed to be cleaned up. I have an old wooden plane that is EXCELLENT for just such work. It is long enough to bridge small hollows, and since it is a wooden plane it is light and glides effortlessly over the surface.

I marked the high spots and worked on them first, then worked on getting down past the lowest point in the middle of the board. The ends had a slight taper, so I decided to chop those off later on to keep the thickness. I am not going to need the full length anyway, and there are some sap wood at one corner that I want to get rid of.

I then grabbed my crude but effective twist sticks – two pieces of gash I planed on two sides and drew black markings on with a permanent marker – and checked the piece for twist.

Sighting down like in the next image, it is easy to see which corners are higher. By working the corner(s) and checking the progress, I had a twist free piece in no time. A quick skim with the smoothing plane to clean it up and make it dead flat (sans the ends), and job’s a good’un.

Yes. I do want to make some posh twist sticks eventually. But twist sticks just need two flat sides. Those two sides does NOT have to be parallell, as long as the two sticks has the same profile and you orient them the same way. They could be trapezoid bordering on triangular in shape, and they would still work as long as the two sticks are identical.

I then squared one edge to the now flat face. The mighty No. 7 made sure the edge is dead straight, too.

I then marked where the tapers on the end were, and marked for the cut using a combination square and a steel ruler – I do have a bigger combination square, but this method does work perfectly. My longest steel ruler is 1 meter (3′ 3 3/8”), so I can mark pretty big stuff using this method.

My Spear & Jacson 9500R with modified handle chopped off the ends in no time flat.

I then shot the ends square.

Again I used my band saw as a crude thicknesser. I adjusted the fence to the thinnest corner and ripped off the cupped part of the board. Click on the images to see a big version.

Using my bigger combination square, I marked the width using the narrowest part as my reference point. By inserting the point of the pencil inside the groove in the ruler of the combination square, I get a dead on mark even if the point of the pencil is becoming somewhat “blunt”.

I ripped off the excess using the band saw, then cleaned up the side – and then this happened:

The grain changed direction on me, and I got some nasty tearout! And how do we deal with that? I could plane in the other direction, but it is hard to stop at the right spot. I also would have to be vigilant, checking the exact width. But there is an easier way, and I call it “the gnat’s nadger method”. Basically you set the cap iron on your plane as close as possible to the edge, leaving only a SLIVER of silver visible:

I also swift-swoffa’ed the edge over the strop a few times, so the edge was really sharp. I then just went ahead and planed the edge square. The shavings approached dandelion fluff! And the finish on the wood was pristine! Remember, from where the left end of the shaving rests, I am going against the grain! The shaving is cut against the grain!

Try to do THAT with a power tool!

Here’s a nice way to check your width – at 46 years of age, my vision is not the best and I need new glasses – but this is a dead on method that works – even if you are blind!

I start by putting a piece of wood at one edge, feeling with my finger until it is dead flush. Your fingers are amazing, they can feel the height of the ridges of your fingerprints! WAY more accurate than what you need in woodworking!

Pressing down on the small batten, I nick the corner on the opposite side, flush with the side of the piece I am measuring. I then move the batten to the opposite end of the piece, “click” the marking knife into the nick I made and slide the batten until the marking knife rests against the side of the piece. I then feel the other edge. If the batten is proud, the piece is wider at the other end. If the piece is proud, that end is wider than the other.

I was Dead On!

One of the edges was not quite square, so I had to do it over. I always chamfer one end to prevent tearout, and in this case I was expecting problems because the grain is becoming VERY short on the exit side. Since the long sides of the piece were dead parallell, I should’ve just shot the end grain – but habit got to me and I used the original side as my reference.

And sure enough, a small sliver of wood broke off!

A very small piece indeed.

I could’ve ignored it and moved on, as I probably won’t need the full length of the board anyway – but I had the piece and thought it was worth the effort to glue it back on to preserve the board. The experience will come in handy someday, and I always treat my shop projects as opportunities to practice my skills. A drop of glue, a piece of tape to hold the splinter in its place and a clamp to secure it.

And with that done, I switched off the lights and headed for the coffee machine.

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