Author: Kara Uhl

Editor’s note: Our Mind Upon Mind series is a nod to a 1937 Chips from the Chisel column (also featured in “Honest Labour: The Charles H. Hayward Years”), in which Hayward wrote, “The influence of mind upon mind is extraordinary.” The idea being there’s often room for improvement. To that end, we’ve asked you what else you have thought of, tried out and improved upon after building projects from our books. To submit your own idea, email kara@lostartpress.com. You can read more about the submission process here.

Today’s pick is from Nick Stanchenko. Thanks, Nick!

— Kara Gebhart Uhl

After a few chairs, I decided I was ready to try the armbow miters, as illustrated — but not really explained — in “The Stick Chair Book.” (Turns out, I wasn’t quite ready.)

The first challenge was getting the angles to match. This is easy with a router and a dovetail bit, but unfortunately I had sold my router a year ago to focus more on hand tools. After a bit of head scratching, here’s what I came up with:

Clamp the two parts together, draw an angled line using a bevel gauge and cut in one go.

This kind of worked, but wasn’t super accurate. The saw tends to pivot a little after the top part is cut through. Oh well. Time for another approach:

Make an angled block. Then clamp it to each of the mating parts and refine them with a wide chisel. (The lap joint itself was cut with a saw and flattened with a router plane.)

This time, I had a perfect match and rushed to glue up. Bad idea! Glue gathers in the sharp corner and prevents the parts from coming together tightly. In fact, the whole assembly slides around as you try to clamp it. It was devastating, but obvious in hindsight.

I removed the clamps, let the glue dry, scraped it off and trued all the surfaces again. Now what?

“Pinch dogs” would have been a great solution to hold the joint in place. But I couldn’t remember what they were called, and I don’t think they are sold where I live anyway.

Here’s another method to keep the parts from moving: Pin them!

I found a regular pin more or less satisfactory, although you can also drawbore it (i.e. offset the holes by a tiny amount) to pull the joint together more tightly.

Now the glue-up:

Much better.

Finally, I present to you the resulting joint after a bit of clean-up with a spokeshave, a rasp and a card scraper. (OK, it’s the best of the four I’ve made so far.)

The cool part is that a stick will go through where the pin is, so there will be no trace of it left. Well, it does not really matter, but it feels nice.

Good luck!

— Nick Stanchenko

p.s. Needless to say, pinning will also help with non-mitered lap joints.

Editor’s note: Our Mind Upon Mind series is a nod to a 1937 Chips from the Chisel column (also featured in “Honest Labour: The Charles H. Hayward Years”), in which Hayward wrote, “The influence of mind upon mind is extraordinary.” The idea being there’s often room for improvement. (You can read the entire Chips from the Chisel column here.)

To that end, we’ve asked you what else you have thought of, tried out and improved upon after building projects from our books. We’ve loved reading all your submissions!

Today’s pick is from Matt Williamson.

I have been messing around with “The Anarchist’s Design Book” and have made a few adjustments that you might find interesting. These are probably not improvements so much as solving problems caused by my desire to use what I have in lieu of greenwood I have yet to source.

For the staked stool, the seat is from a 13-1/2”-wide 9/4 pine joist I pulled from dumpster when a historical building in the neighborhood got rehabbed. For the staked chair, the hardwood I had included some 4/4 red oak and some 6/4 red oak that, again, I dumpster dove for in the neighborhood. These 6/4 scraps were not big enough to make a seat, but I thought they would add strength to the 4/4 seat panel and give the legs something to hold onto. It is a bit heavy.

I did not have any greenwood that could be bent for the staked stool back so I used a piece of apple wood from a tree I cut in the fall that basically followed the 12″ curve. I kind of liked it and found another piece to use when I made the staked chair a little while later. 

Did you change up one of our projects or do you have a clever idea for an improvement? Email kara@lostartpress.com. You can read more about the submission process here.

— Kara Gebhart Uhl

Editor’s note: In our new Mind Upon Mind series, we ask readers of our books, blog and Substacks what else they’ve thought of, tried out and improved on? You can read more about the series here.

Today we’re featuring an idea from Sam Robinson. In our books and blog posts, we don’t have the time or space to share every technique out there. Instead, we highlight what works well for us. Here’s a time-honored approach for reaming and drilling leg mortises, explained by Sam. Thanks, Sam!  

This technique requires carefully positioning the sliding bevel gauge and engineer’s square.

The bevel gauge is positioned on a line drawn at 90° to the sightline from the center of the mortise to be drilled. You have to sight down the edge of the bevel gauge to check it’s bang on the line, as the curve at the end of the tool means you can’t just set it on the line. The bevel gauge is taped in position only 2″-3″ away from the mortise so that it’s very close to the drill when you are drilling. 

The engineer’s square (the bigger the better) is likewise set exactly on the sightline.

Next, use tape to create a centerline on the back/side of the drill (such that the top of the tape aligns with the center of the drill bit/reamer). Do the same for the top of the drill if it doesn’t have a centerline on it already.

The trick is to align your eye with the engineer’s square/sightline/top centerline on the drill and keep them in alignment while you are drilling (I hold the drill against my body to resist the torque). At the same time, keep the pointed tip of the bevel gauge in line with the top of the tape on the side/back of the drill.

This means you can see everything you need to see from above.

Do you have a clever idea for an improvement? Email kara@lostartpress.com. You can read more about the submission process here.

— Kara Gebhart Uhl