Music Stand part 2

Having left the back leg on the bending form all week, Saturday morning saw it unclamped and removed from the form. From the side view here you can start to get an idea of what the stand will look like when finished. After trimming the back leg to match the width of the front legs I glues the two sets together and let them sit while I prepped the Mahogany for the cross ribs by resawing stock to 3/8th inch thick and running them through the drum sander to clean off the saw marks.

Once the clamps were removed I trimmed the legs flat by setting the stand on the assembly table and using a block of MDF for a gauge marked a line on each side then trimmed the feet with a handsaw. I then cleaned up the edges with a block plane and a smoothing plane and finally some sandpaper. I used a small router and a 1/4 inch round over bit to ease the edges, where I couldn't get the router I used a strip of 80 grit sandpaper and rounded the edge.

I made a gauge block out of a strip of MDF and a small piece of 1/4 inch plywood so that I could cut a groove across the stand at 2 inch intervals using a dado blade set at 3/4 inch deep. In these grooves will fit 5 Mahogany ribs that will hold the sheet music.

This is the only picture I took of the glued up stand but if you look closely you can tell that there is a taper. Before gluing the back leg to the front I used the jointer to run a 3/8th inch taper along the length where it contacted the front legs. When I dryfitted the legs I wasn't happy with the bulky look of the top of the stand so I decided to add the taper and if I cut if off the back of the back leg the laminates would have been visible, so I cut it from the inside of the back leg, it turned out great and in the final post I'll take more detailed shots of it.

I made two routing templates to cut the inside and outside curves for the ribs. Here you can see the inside curve template, a blank, and a blank with the inside curve rough cut. I ran the "downhill" cut on the router table and then flipped the blank to avoid tear out from the flush trim bit. After running all the ribs I marked out for the cuts that will fit around the stand. Working without a plan and just a rough sketch if freeing in a way as you can make changes along the way. Next weekend will see the ribs completed and sanded and assembled to the stand, then a nice oil finish will make this wood glow. I hope that the finished product lives up to my vision.

"Happiness lies in the joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort." Franklin D. Roosevelt