Sunday, May 16, 2010

Maloof Inspired Rocker, Charles Brock Plans 5

I didn't put up a post last weekend, so today's post will cover two weekends. Last weekend I did complete shaping the arms, fortunately they did end up both being the same shape. That was one of my biggest worries about this build because every time someone sits in the chair they would notice that. I'm sure that there will be many imperfections that no one but me will notice, but if the arms weren't right I feel like everyone would notice.
I had roughed out the shape of the left arm and glued it in place, I used this one as a visual guide to rough out the right arm, once I was happy with the shape I attached the arm in place again with glue and a 3 inch #10 spax screw.
The next day I refined the shape of both arms with the microplane shaping tool, some files and rasps, followed by powersanding. I've found that using the microplanes with the rough blades shapes very quickly, using the fine blades and cutting with the grain smooths the shape by removing some wood, but mostly by removing the cut marks from the rough blades. I then refine some of the transitions and tighter curves with round rasps and 60 grit sandpaper wrapped around a dowel. After this I started with 60 grit discs on the random orbit sander, then 80, 120, 180, 220. If you don't like sanding, do NOT attempt this project, I've turned more wood into dust and shavings that any other project.
The seat is now complete, even the pommel detail with a nice upsweep. With the arms attached and the seat finished I moved on to the headrest for this weekend. Following Mr. Brock's instructions for the headrest I cut it to size and then came up with a shape I liked for the bottom of the headrest. Leaving the top square I marked the positions for the holes I needed to drill for the top of the spindles to go in to.
With the holes drilled and the bottom shaped I then cut a curve into the top of the headrest and drilled into the sides of the backlegs to attach the headrest. After removing the headrest I started shaping the headrest first with the angle grinder and the cutzall blade, then a sanding disc, some touch up with microplane and on to the 60 grit random orbit sander. Once I was happy with the shape I attached the headrest and started shaping the horns on the backlegs and the top of the legs blend in with the headrest. The blending was mostly done with the microplanes, I got it mostly roughed in today, but I have to tell you that all this shaping is manual labor, I sweated through a couple of shirts today. Here it is, next weekend I'm cleaning up the headrest and the horns, finishing sanding on the back legs and hopefully starting on the spindles.



It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be.
J. K. Rowling

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