A Little Iron Work Some Quick Twisted Spindles

This afternoon a friend asked me if I had a good way to draw twisted iron spindles similar to the one on the left in the photograph. I hadnt really thought about drawing an iron railing before but I realized that drawing these twisted spindles could utilize a method similar to the finials I drew a little while back.

Three plugins will help to make quick work of this. They are DrawHelix 1.4, Weld and Extrude Edges by Rails. Im also going to divide the spindle into smaller components to keep the file size down. I think this is important since in a typical model, the spindle would only be a small part of the entire thing.

In this example I am creating a spindle that is 3/4 inches square.

The first step is to create the helixes for the twist. I activated DrawHelix from the Draw menu. The plugin asks for start and end radii, pitch and the number of turns I calculated the radius by multiplying 3/4 by 0.707. I set Pitch to 8 inches and set the number of turns to 1. The helix is drawn as a group centered on the origin and starting on the red axis. Next I rotate/copied it through 90°.

Next, with the Line tool, I drew a line between the bottom ends of the two helixes. I then divided the line into four segments and immediately after, I welded the segments together. Although the line will look the same as before this divide and weld step is required for the Extruded Edges by Rails step coming up. I chose to divide the line into four but it could have been 2 or more. The more segments you choose, the smoother the twist will be but that comes at the cost of a larger file size.

The helix groups were exploded and then the entire model was scaled up by a factor of 100. I drew a 1 inch long line off to the side a bit and measured that with the Tape Measure tool. I typed 100, hit Enter and clicked on Yes. Later, when it is time to scale back down, I just repeat the process but type 1.

Now it is time to start the extrusion. Activate Extrude Edges by Rails from the toolbar. The plugin directs you to first select the profile, then the first rail followed by the second rail and finally it asks for a melding profile. The line at the bottom is the profile. After it is selected it shows in cyan. The helixes are the rails and show in two shades of magenta after they are selected. For this profile, well click on the profile line for the melding profile.

After the extrusion is made you have to make some choices. Most of the answers will be no but you should answer Yes to deleting coplanar edges, reversing faces if the back face is on the outside, smoothing edges and deleting original lines as those are no longer needed. the extrusion is made as a group.

Scale the model back down at this point. Then explode the group and make it a component. Doing this after scaling back down ensures that the component definition is set at the correct size.

Rotate/copy the component 90° and make three copies to complete the four-sided twist. We now have a twisted square section that is 8 inches long.

Make a Move copy the four sides up 8 inches and make two additional copies. Now we have a 24 inch long twist with three turns. The spindles overall length is to be 34 inches so I moved the twist components up 5 inches.

For the ends of the spindle I drew a square across the end of the twisted portion. Then I made a 1/8 inch Offset to the outside.

I used Push/Pull to pull the outside down 1 inch and the center down 5".

To create the grooves around the square block I drew an arc to create a profile for Follow Me. Note the arc only has 4 side instead of the default 12. the grooves are very tiny details and dont need a lot of segments to read correctly in the drawing. Reducing the segment count here helpd to keep file size down.

The arc is copied down for the second groove. Follow Me is run around the block to create both grooves and the spindle end is made into a component.

The spindle end is copied to the top and flipped along the components blue axis. Then all of the components are selected and a nested component is created. This component is then saved for later use.

The spindle component drawn as I have done here makes a component that is only about 47 Kb. If it were drawn without using components for sub-assemblies, it saves out at over 450 Kb. By itself thats not all that large but when combined with other parts in a larger model, the total file size could get to be quite large. A component of less than 50 Kb will have miniimal effect on the overall file size.

Dave

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Unisaw Quick October 20Fine Fine Update

This past weekend I finally had a chance to put another coat on the Unisaw case - next up is a bit of wet-sanding then another coat and Im calling it done.

Ive started assembling some of the interior parts - still deciding about the motor - I have new bearings for it but may put everything together and do the motor later. This project has been taking so long that Im getting to the point where I just want to get if off the floor (it takes up a lot of space and I have to hear someone complain about it every time she walks by).

-- John

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Finally I have a motorized plane

This is a hand plane? Not exactly. Its a Super Surfacer, which surfaces wood with a fixed blade, but on a much larger scale. And a motor drives a belt to feed wood through the blade rather than you feeding the blade over the wood.
Photo: Matt Kenney
When it comes to preparing a surface for finishing, nothing beats a hand plane. Its way faster than sanding and can leave a perfect, glass smooth surface. (And dont forget that hand planing is far more pleasant that sanding--no dust, no noise.) Thats why Ive heard over and over that theres no power tool thats the equal of a plane for surface prep. In a way thats true. There is no commonly available power tool thats up to the job, at least not here in the States. But in Japan, there is one. Its an odd machine thats looks to be the offspring of a drum sander and giant hand plane. Theyre commonly called super surfacers. How do they work? Well, there is a gigantic and extremely sharp fixed blade. A belt feeds a piece of wood past the blade and the blade takes a whispy full-width and full-length shaving. Thats right a full-width and full-length shaving off any board that fits into the machine! And like a plane it leaves a great surface.
Id seen one on video before, but had never seen one in person until last week. One of the editors at Fine Homebuilding is retiring and moving back to California. He was lightening his tool load and offered up a Hitachi FA-700 Super Surfacer to whoever would get it out of his garage. I jumped at the chance and now its in my garage. As you can see from the photos, it needs some cleaning and tuning, but it runs and I cant wait to see the first shaving come flying out the top. The blade is about 10 in. wide! Once I get it working properly, Ill shoot some video and post it. (Ill be the guy jumping around excited as a 5 year old.)
In the meantime, check out this YouTube video of a Super Surfacer at work.

On a side note, this machine and another one made by Makita were tested and reviewed in Fine Woodworking #38 by one of our former editors, Paul Bertorelli.

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Steven Kennard Turning Blackwood Boxes

Steven Kennard is not an easy man to pigeonhole. Born and raised in England, where for many years he built furniture and restored antiques, he also lived for nearly a decade in France, where he turned wood and took photographs. Now he and his Canadian-born wife, Ellie, live in Nova Scotia and work in a renovated barn on their property.
Kennards earliest woodworking included building sets for theatrical productions. Along the way he also built kitchens, French-polished pianos, and ran a successful business building portable tables for physical therapy and massage. In the late 1970s he bought a lathe so he could replace broken parts on antiques; within a few weeks he had turned his first box, and since then, he says, amidst the wide array of work hes done, one constant has been his passion for turning boxes.
These days, in addition to photography--a blend of fine art photos and shots of work by other artists and craftsmen--Kennard devotes much of his time to box turning. In this slide show, he talks about turning and presents several dozen of his remarkable boxes.

Kennards work was featured on the back cover of Fine Woodworking #220.






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Rough Cut Director Gets Emmy Nomination

Tommy MacDonald and Rough Cut director Laurie Donnelly
Photo: Courtesy WGBH Boston
Rough Cut--Woodworking with Tommy Mac is getting some attention from the TV industry. The show just won a Bronze Telly Award, which honors the best local, regional, and cable TV commercials and programs. But thats not all. Director Laurie Donnelly has been nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award in the Outstanding Directing in a Lifetyle/Culinary Program category.
The show, produced by WGBH Boston and sponsored by Woodcraft, features woodworker Tommy MacDonald, a North Bennet Street graduate and pro woodworker, who demonstrates traditional woodworking techniques in a truly Bostonian manner--wicked accent and all.
Donnelly, who is executive producer for lifestyle programming at WGBH, is not new to industry accolades, having won both Emmy and Peabody Awards in the past. "It is a great honor to be recognized in this way. Rough Cut has come together, thanks to the hard work of our host, Tommy MacDonald, and an amazing production team,” Donnelly said. “Together weve aimed to push the envelope in the world of woodworking as its presented on-air. We are also deeply committed to delivering something meaningful for anyone who has the passion to pick up a tool in their workshop---or to be an armchair participant watching and learning from home."
Rough Cut begins its second season in October. Emmy winners will be announced June 17.
I wonder if the statue is available in mahogany...

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Unisaw Quick Mid April Update

Only had a few moments to work on the saw during the last week or two - I did begin some sub-assemblies (front trunnion bracket) and painted the second coat on a few parts (feet, cranks, blade dust shield). Ive been messing with a couple of magnetic starters to use on the saw - these are all three phase so Ill be converting for use as single phase 220. So far Ive collected an old Allen Bradley, a Cutler Hammer and I may be purchasing a Square D just to make things interesting. More photos to come.

As usual, all the other stuff I do has been interfering - Ive also been working on a bird house (my woodworking club is having a little contest this morning during our regular Saturday meeting) and the yard. My current project is to dig out the space beneath the rear deck (by hand I might add - shovel load at a time), then wheelbarrow the dirt out to various areas in the yard that need filling (weve lost so many trees that there are somewhat dangerous holes all over my wooded lot). I also moved 8 tons of dirt (by hand once again) out at the rental property (thanks to my friend Allen who took pity on me and helped move about half of it) to back-fill the rear drain after the water-proofers were done coating the wall.

-- John

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Wood Carved Jhoola Indoor India Swing Bench

Done and ready for the next one

Close Up Finished Jhoola
I just finished making & carving this unique indoor India swing bench, for a customer, it is also known as the Oonjal or Jhoola. This type of swing bench is not readily available without an overseas order. These types’ of wooden carved swings were used by Kings in their palaces and were considered a sign of royalty and are still considered even today.
This type of furniture is a wooden swing with brass chains suspending it from the ceiling of the inside of their home. I glued together three planks of solid African mahogany for a 72” x 24” x 3” think size bench. I turned the feet on the lathe and I hand carved 18 floral ornaments along the outer edge. It took me about 4 ½ hours for each individual carving.

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