George T. (Terry) Chapman

Terry Chapman is a Professional Engineer (Civil) and Land Surveyor who lives south of Atlanta. He has done woodworking for many years and particularly enjoys bowl turning and making Windsor Chairs. He currently works as Site Development Manager for a local affiliate of Habitat for Humanity and has one son who pastors a Church in Connecticut. You can email him at cdeinc@mindspring.com.

Building a Windsor Chair with Peter Galbert Day 3: Seat Cushions Please

Oct 252010
 

Working in the Mine at the High

Remember in Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs where the dwarfs come marching home at the end of a long hard day in the diamond mine? Well there are seven of us (do not even ask me which one of us is Grumpy or Dopey) and we were glad to march out of the High after six o’clock tonight. There is zero chance we will not get these Windsor chairs built.

We started out this morning on the shaving horses making spindles with drawknives. By the time we finished making spindles and shaping the blank for the back bow, I can tell you that my bottom was heartily sick of the hard seat on that shaving horse. I can also tell you in detail what makes a good drawknife, and what makes a good shaving horse. (Start with a cushioned seat!)

Clamping it up

A drawknife is a wonderful tool and will do impressivework, but when you are not used to it, most of a day driving one gets to be quite a task. I think all of us were glad when we finished. We cranked up the steam box late in the afternoon and cooked the back bows for about 40 minutes. We pulled the bows out one at a time and bent them quickly and easily around prepared forms and set them aside to cool and dry.

We will continue digging tomorrow and work some more on the spindles, and then we will start the seat. Four days to go.

Click here to read about Day 4 of Peter Galbert’s Build a Windsor Chair class.

Or, start at the beginning with Day 1 of Peter Galbert’s Windsor Chair class.

Building a Windsor Chair with Peter Galbert Day 2:TMI, TMI

Oct 242010
 

”TMI” means Too Much Information for you people without teenagers in the family. You want to see how I felt about lunchtime today — the picture below is my brain on chairs. Day two of seven and we continue tomorrow with each student building their own Windsor chair, and I must admit I am a little intimidated.

My Brain on Chairs

Today Peter finished putting his demonstration chair together. He started out this morning with digging out the seat and shaping it with the adze, scorp (is scorping a word?), travisher and any other thing he needed to make it work. He shaped the outside by sketching a line around the edge with a pencil and then making some pretty darn aggressive cuts with the drawknife. It didn’t take very long to make a lovely, symmetrical seat with hand tools only and just a few lines sketched on the seat. It was marvelous to watch. I’ll let you know how mine goes later in the week.

After the seat was almost finished, we watched Pete add the legs. We were only lacking the smoke because the mirrors were much in use and the way the stretchers go in, there is not much room for error. We spent a lot of time learning about making the mortises and tenons so they would fit together tightly.

Shaping the Seat

After the seat was legged up, Pete moved on to the back and the spindles. Remember we bent the bow yesterday and it was in the form overnight, so he shaved the ends gently and precisely and then mounted it in place. After that, he moved on to installing the spindles. With some sweet little tricks for getting the lengths correct and drilling the holes in the bow in the right direction, all it needed was wedges to hold it together for the next 200 years, and a lot of finishing. We can talk about milk paint later in the week.

In the meantime, I have been collecting cool techniques and sayings from Pete (born in Atlanta, but currently living in New York State) and from other chair makers he knows around the country. Try these:

When he finishes sharpening his draw knife, he strops it on the end grain of the pine seat as the last step. (Maybe one day when I am 110 years old I will get where my draw knife needs stropping on a piece of soft pine.)

Legs Almost Ready

Go past the edge now and then so you will know where the edge is.

When you can turn really well and get a great finish with the tool, it will be so smooth you will have to sand the part so it will accept finish. (I should get so good.)

We only sand what we don’t understand.

There is a reason we call it abrasive.

Wish me luck!! See you tomorrow.

Seat, Legs and Back — Just Some Finish Left

Click here to read about Day 3 of Peter Galbert’s Build a Windsor Chair class.

Or, start at the beginning with Day 1 of Peter Galbert’s Windsor Chair class.

Building a Windsor Chair with Peter Galbert Day 1: Peter Galbert in the house

Oct 232010
 

Peter Galbert is in town and teaching a class on making a Child’s Windsor Chair and I am there.  Today was the first day and we covered a lot of stuff.  In fact, we covered a whole lot of stuff.  (Do you believe he drove all the way down to Atlanta from New York in an old pick-up truck?  Had to bring his stuff, you know.)  We are going to start with a chunk of a tree and make a chair out of it.  In this day of power tools and mass production it is still hard to grasp that you can take a tree from the yard and make a Windsor chair out of it.  Shoot, I’ve done it before and I can still hardly believe it.

This piece of log is our “Before”.

Eleven of us gathered this morning in the seminar room at the High for a high intensity demonstration of what it takes to make a Windsor chair.  We started out hearing about splitting a log into the pieces needed to make the legs and spindles for a chair.  Pete then pulled out the froe and mallet and demonstrated for us how to split out the blanks from a log he brought with him. There’s more to it than you think. He then used a drawknife with the shaving horse to make the rough shapes for the spindles and the back bow. Since the bow must be bent, he and his assistant put it in to cook in the steam cooker set up with a wallpaper-steaming unit for power.

Splitting out the Blanks

Steam Cooker

After the blank cooked for about 45 minutes, it was a simple matter to pull it around the form shaped for the back and it was done.  The actual bend took about 45 seconds but will take a day or more to dry.

Completed Bow

After that, we moved to sharpening.  There are oddly shaped hand tools needed to make a Windsor chair quickly and efficiently and sharpening them well is a real skill.  Starting with the draw-knife, we moved to the scorp, the travisher, and spoke shave  as well the other chisels we will need.  There was plenty to learn in the sharpening session, I can tell you.

We then moved on to turning and the world is not a fair place.  I have been turning for a good while, but my skills are minimal when it comes to spindles and skews.  I need a class in skews.  A fellow could get discouraged pretty easy watching someone this good make a spindle turning.  Pete is good.

Six days to go.  This is going to be interesting.

This is the “After”:

Click here to read about Day 2 of Peter Galbert’s Windsor Chair class.

Galbert Windsor Chair Class

Oct 192010
 

Well, I signed up for the Windsor Chair class at Highland next week and I can’t wait.  We start out with Peter Galbert doing two days of demonstration and lecture and then we spend the next five days actually making a chair by hand.  I took a chair-making class last summer up in New Hampshire and it was really enjoyable.  I presume that many of the basic principles are the same (I mean if the basic principles are not the same, then you might end up with an apple pie, right?), so maybe I will not have to re-learn everything.  My first Windsor was a “sack back” and it is a beautiful and lasting object.  This class is about making a child’s Windsor and it looks to me as if it will be a thing of beauty (and a joy forever).

I went over to Galbert’s web site to see some of his work and to get to know the guy a little bit before the class.  I think I like him already – anybody who keeps goats can’t be all bad.  He writes on his blog about the class upcoming at the High and it turns out what he will do is take the first two days, Saturday and Sunday, to actually make a chair as a demonstration.  I like that.  I am a visual person and I look forward to seeing the whole process all the way through and then doing it myself in the week after.  One thing I will do during the class is take lots of pictures and notes, since I failed to do that last summer and have regretted it since.  There is just a whole bunch of information to be absorbed and it is difficult to remember all of it.

There is still room in the class, so pack up your tools, order the ones you don’t already have, come on down to the High, meet Peter and end up with a beautiful handmade child’s Windsor chair.  You realize of course, this will open up all kinds of future projects because “If you can build a chair, you can build anything”.  Go ahead and revise your will too, because the grandkids are going to fight over who gets this chair when you are gone.  By the way, I will be blogging it each day so your picture will likely end up on the Highland blog.  This is going to be fun!!

The Galbert Caliper

Sep 202010
 

When Peter Galbert comes to the High next month to teach his class on Windsor Chairmaking, I am sure he will bring his Galbert Caliper with him. He should bring it with him so you can buy one.

The High loaned me one a couple of weeks ago to try out and let me tell you about this little gem. This is a neat little tool for gauging the diameter of a turning as you turn. Now everyone has his or her little tricks for checking the diameter and matching a pattern when turning. I have seen people use open-end wrenches as a “go no-go” and outside calipers are very common. I am sure there are many other methods since getting one turning to match another is to my mind a very difficult task.

I am fond of Shaker Candle Stands. I love the overall shape of the table and the center post is a subtle, delicate, difficult piece of pure joy when shaped correctly. Roy Underhill had a show a couple of seasons ago where he resorted to someone else’s pattern so he could get it right. I have seen an original at Old Sturbridge Village (well worth a special trip if you have never been) and I just love the thing. Knowing I would not be able to freehand the shape, I bought a plan from the New Yankee Workshop and made a pattern in SketchUp. I tweaked it in the computer until I liked it and then printed it out full size and traced it onto a piece of eighth inch ply. After cutting it out very carefully and smoothing the edges on the spindle sander, I measured the width at critical points in the shape and noted them on the pattern. Going from the pattern to the final shape is where the Galbert fits into your shop.

Shaker Candle Stand, Pattern and Turning Blank

I set my turning block of cherry on the lathe and rounded it off. I then took the pattern, marked the location of all my measurements, and while the lathe was turning very slowly, penciled in lines all around the piece. Using a parting tool and the Galbert, I made grooves in the piece to leave the proper pattern diameter at the bottom of each respective groove. The Galbert is perfect for this operation with only a few cautions.

First, since this was my first time using the Galbert, I was hesitant to use it while the lathe was running. I think with more experience, I would be comfortable using the Galbert without turning off the lathe.

The other issue was when I made the grooves with a parting tool; there is a depth beyond which the Galbert will not bottom out in the slot because the bottom front edge of the case bumps against the side of the slot.

Blank with Measured Grooves

You have to make room for the case to slide into the groove to get an accurate reading. That made a problem in a couple of areas since making the groove wide enough took out my marking lines. Since I am right handed, I tend to start on the right end of a spindle and work left. The extra width of the case of the Galbert is on the left side as you use it. Part of the solution is to work from left to right and generally, you will be cutting away enough material for it to slide into the grooves.

Just a Little Sanding Left

Altogether, it took me about an hour to make this center post. Last time I made it, I spent over twice as long. Not sure the High will get this little toy back — I may just have to send them a check.

Check out Peter’s video to see a real expert turner use the Galbert, then send in your order before the class.

Man with the Plan

Sep 132010
 

A few years ago I wrote a little rant about using plans to make projects.  Because of my training and background, for a long time I thought the only way to build a project was by using a set of plans. Listen to the recording below and see how it was a Windsor chair class which changed my life. Come to the Windsor Chair Making Class at the High in October and change your life!

Man with the Plan (click here for audio!)

By the way, in case you have not seen them, there are a couple of hundred tips and articles on all sorts of woodworking stuff on the Highland web site. Some fascinating stuff in there.

The Best Bowl Gouge

Aug 182010
 

I just went down to the shop and counted my turning tools. I have 19. Most of them I never touch. Some of them I don’t use well and some of them are so bad that I will not use them, and some I have yet to learn how to use. I have one favorite and I use it for 95% of the turning I do and I recommend it to you highly. I really like the Oneway brand lathes and tools and the one bowl gouge I love is the Oneway Mastercut 5/8″ Bowl Gouge available at Highland. Now it is not cheap – the single ended gouge without a handle is $87.99. Then you will have to buy a handle for another $57.99. But once you put the two together it is a real gem and in my opinion, the best bowl gouge I have ever used.

I particularly like the weight of it. The tool and the handle have the heft and the length to damp out vibration in the cut and I just turn better with it. But wait, you say, how can you do delicate work with a 5/8″ gouge. The answer is that tool control is so positive that delicate work is even easier with this tool than with a smaller one. Case in point, last week I thinned out a bowl to a measured 3/32″ thickness. Now I know there are those who can beat that, but that’s pretty good for me and every bit of it was done with this one tool.

(All right, go ahead and say it shattered on me, but I am going to say that I opened it up for you to see how thin it was. (Actually, it had a small crack and I took it apart before it flung a piece in my face.))

Oneway makes two different handles, and I like the 17-1/2″ Sure Grip Hosaluk.Plus for all you people north of the Mason-Dixon line, the handle does not get so cold in the winter in an unheated shop. It looks but does not feel like one of those braided steel sink connection pipes you might use in your home. This tool is just the best and if you don’t have one for your bowl turning efforts, you are missing out.

In my land surveying career, I went to a real estate closing one time and the seller (a woman, OK) came in wearing a beautiful fur coat. The agent, admiring the coat, asked what it cost. The seller thought about it a moment and said “Oh, about an acre.” Go ahead and get one of these tools, and if you do some decent work, it will only cost about a bowl and a half.