The sliding bevel factory has been cranking out these tools as fast as possible. We got two more batches in this week. You can purchase one here. If they sell out, don’t worry. We will have more next week.
— Christopher Schwarz
Editor’s note: We get asked all the time about ordering from overseas. We don’t ship outside the United States, so we typically send people to one of the international specialty stores that carry our books and tools. But maybe you want something that they don’t carry, or won’t have for some time; there’s a solution. We asked our friend and long-time overseas customer Mattias to write about it. — Fitz
I’m in Belgium. I’m also a multiple return customer with Lost Art Press and Crucible Tool. And while all the LAP retailers in my neck of the woods are shops that I frequent, well, frequently, they don’t stock every LAP item. Some are not available to them for good reasons. Others they chose not to carry, again for good reasons. And sometimes I just can’t wait the month or so that it usually takes for a new item to get over here after it is released in the U.S. So I buy directly from LAP.
How is that possible, when LAP don’t do international shipping? Through a re-shipper or forwarding service or whatever you want to call it! This is a company in the States that, when you sign up with them, provides you with a valid postal address **in the U.S.**. You then give this as your delivery address when you order from LAP, and your goods are sent there. On arrival, your things are checked, declared for customs and forwarded to your home address. That’s it in a nutshell. Now for some more details.
First I should perhaps say that the forwarding company I use is one in Florida called MyUS. When I first decided to try this way of buying from Chris & Co., I asked around a bit – Klaus Skrudland, who should be familiar to readers of this blog, said he’d used them with success – and also did some general research with the help of Google. Based on this I decided to try MyUS, signed up with them, and put in my first order. It worked an absolute treat, and has continued to do so every time since, so for my part I’ve seen no need to look elsewhere. As they say, though, other options are available. So should you want to explore this possibility, you might want to spend some time with Google too, and shop around to see what would suit you, your wallet and your final destination the best. For my part I have been so happy with what I first went with that I’ve seen no need to check out the competition.
And just to be totally clear: My only affiliation with MyUS is as a contented customer. No sponsoring. No discount. No nothing. Nor, for that matter, from LAP, for writing this. And the only reason I mention MyUS by name is that they are what I know about from experience.
Back to our regular programming.
Are there no drawbacks, then? Well, yes. It is usually more expensive than buying from your local LAP retailer, and tends to take a bit longer, too.
The first reason that it is more expensive is that you pay postage twice, once from the LAP fulfillment center to the forwarding company, and again from them to you. The second reason is that in most places of the world, and certainly here in Europe, you will also be hit by customs clearance fees, customs and import duties, local sales tax (VAT) etc. (the latter often calculated not only on the value of the goods but also on the postage and duties too).
How much more expensive? Well, it varies of course. Here’s an example. Last year, I bought a Crucible Card Scraper, a Lump Hammer and two Iron Holdfasts. Costs for the goods was $240, and postage with UPS to Florida came in at $63.30 (the package weighed 14 lbs after all). I then paid MyUS $85.99 for shipping to Belgium with DHL Express and also $2.99 for insurance. On arrival, I was charged a further €82,75 ≈ $99 in fees, duties and taxes. Total cost: $491.28.
As for time, I put the above order in on February 25th 2020, it shipped on the 27th, arrived in Florida March 3rd, was turned around by MyUS the same day and finally delivered to me here in Belgium on March 5th 2020. And those timings are pretty typical in my experience.
If I were to buy the exact same things today from Rubank Verktygs AB in Stockholm, I would pay SEK 4095 ≈ $448 plus postage but no further fees or taxes, and I would expect to get my items in one or two days.
Depending on destination, MyUS offers a fairly large selection of different courier and freight companies for the onward delivery. I believe (although I cannot say for sure, as I have no real way to compare) that as large customers, they get very good rates with them. For my part I have always opted for DHL Express, as that company is fast and reliable to where I am, but there are less expensive options, and you might also want to consider which couriers have a good reputation where you live.
The MyUS basic service level, which is what I use, is free, but additional services are available for a monthly fee. I don’t use the service enough, though, to have found it worth the extra cost. But all of that one can find in full detail on their website, same as for their competitors. Google, and ye shall find! Read, and ye shall know!
It should also be noted that MyUS (and I assume the same will be true for the competition) will **always** open your package when it arrives at their premises in Florida. This is to make sure that the goods are OK, both to be exported from the U.S. *and* imported into your country, and to prepare the customs declaration. Again, all details are on the website. In any case, since last year, I have had a total of 29 packages from the U.S. forwarded to me through MyUS. Not all of them from LAP, mind, but in every case they have all been handled with due care and speed, opened and repackaged carefully and correctly, with turnaround times varying between 12 hours and three days, and postage between $36.98 and $92.37.
In conclusion, buying from your local retailers will (almost) always be the better deal, and they’re worth supporting too. But when the itch for the latest Lost Art Press or Crucible Tool offering becomes too much to bear, and you can’t get it locally (yet), well, as you now know, there **is** a way to have it scratched!
— Mattias Hallin
There was a lot of stupid macho bullcrap in the shops where I worked, likely because of the stupid macho woodworkers who worked there. (Hiya, Meatfart! Remember me?)
The basic flavor of the crap: “If you can’t do this operation as well as I can, you ain’t a real woodworker.”
Sadly, we see a lot of students here who torture themselves when they plane up boards or chop dovetails. They want their parts to look like they came off the cover of a book or a video on YouTube – even though that level of perfection won’t affect the look of the assembled piece.
This blog post seeks to help you forget a few things – parlor tricks, mostly – that aren’t important. And perhaps it will help you enjoy the work a little more.
Sharpening
We all know there’s a sharpening cult that preaches that your edges should slice newspaper or shave your arm hair (I think the cult’s goal is keep us hairless and uninformed, like mushrooms). I honestly never have tested my edges with these methods. Instead, I just go to work.
If the tool does its job, then it is sharp.
Just remember the mantra of Tony Konovaloff: “Grind, hone, get back to work.” Sharpen and work. Sharpen and work. Do both, and you will get better at both.
Last week I watched two carpenters repair old double-sash windows at Larry’s, our local dive bar. One of the carpenters ground the bevel of his chisel on the pavement and then polished it off on the granite step of the bar with the help of a loogie. Then he went back to work, doing a nice job.
Inspecting the Garbage
When you cook a fine meal, do you judge your success by the quality of the scraps of food in the sink and compost pile? Nope. Neither should you judge your woodworking by the thinness of the shavings from your handplane. Instead, focus on the work, not the waste. Take the thickest shaving you can manage while still having the wood’s surface look good.
Thin shavings are for occasional situations where the wood won’t behave with any other treatment.
Want to work five times faster? Shoot for a .005”-thick shaving instead of a lacy, lighter-than-an-angel-fart .001”.
Inside, I’m a Wreck
I have never understood why people get so worked up about a little torn end grain inside a dovetail joint. The inside of a joint is a personal matter between you and the furniture conservator 300 years in the future.
When you chop out waste, and some of it is unsupported, you’ll get some torn-off chunks. It happens to me all the time. Sure, I could pare and pare and pare to get my insides looking as good as my outsides. But it’s pointless.
Knock out the waste, assemble the joint and spend all the time you saved making the show surfaces look nice.
Shimmering Meaninglessness
When you get a little skill with a handplane, it frequently becomes a game to make your boards look perfect right from the plane. Sometimes, the wood behaves, and this is an easy task. But most of the time, wood demands the following regimen, which has been practiced for hundreds of years.
Yes, planed surfaces look beautiful without finish. But after you put a finish on, things change. A well-sanded surface looks indistinguishable from a planed one.
I love my handplanes – they are faster than sanding in most cases. But I have no desire to plane a tabletop for two hours. That’s madness. Plane, scrape, sand and move on.
Piston-fit Nothing
This is perhaps the king of the parlor tricks: piston-fit drawers, lids and trays. People get goofy-eyed when you close one drawer and another drawer is forced out by the movement of air.
Quite frankly, I have found that this is usually an indicator that the drawers are fit too tightly and will stick when the humidity level rises. Drawers should move smoothly, but there are many ways to avoid the piston-fitting nonsense.
French Polished Drawer Bottoms
I don’t finish the insides of most case pieces that are hidden during use. The inside carcase of a chest of drawers doesn’t have to be finished. Heck, it doesn’t even have to be sanded. Put all of your effort into the surfaces that will be seen and touched by the user. The remaining surfaces can be left pretty rough – right from the jack plane or the electric planer.
The Caveat
I know that some woodworkers will object to this blog entry because they are doing woodworking for pure enjoyment or therapy. So they are happy to sharpen to 10,000 grit, treat every surface like a show surface and generally go overboard.
And that’s great. Please go right ahead. Godspeed, even.
But a lot of us have limited time in the shop. You might have children or grandchildren. Plus a difficult job. And you still want to get that dining table built by Christmas. In that case, the above “shortcuts” are perfectly acceptable in my shop and in the shops of many fine professionals.
Do the best work you can – just don’t make a clock out of everything.
— Christopher Schwarz
We have just receive a 500-pound package of Lost Art Press Chore Coats in all sizes. These coats are made in Cincinnati by a small firm called Sew Valley. With this year’s batch we are using a slightly new cotton fabric from Britain. It’s a little smoother that last year’s twill.
Black chore coats are the uniform of furniture makers, joiners and carpenters in France. And I absolutely adore mine. I can wear it in the shop, dust it off and go to dinner with Lucy with no problem. The price – $165 – is a fantastic deal for a jacket that is made here in the United States by well-compensated employees.
A note on sizing: I usually recommend people order one size up from normal if they are going to have more than a T-shirt on under the coat. I usually wear a large (tall) shirt or jacket. With our chore coat I prefer an XL (shown above). I’m not swimming too much in it, and I can wear a shirt and vest under it with no problem. Complete sizing details are available in our store.
— Christopher Schwarz
The following is excerpted from “Carving the Acanthus Leaf” by Mary May.
Various styles of rosettes have been used since the Roman Empire as decorative accents and are often used as appliqués (applied to a surface) to adorn furniture and architectural features.
Here are some of the design elements for rosettes:
• They are symmetrical and can be circular, oval, square or rectangular.
• There is a small bead in the center that is either plain or carved.
• In oval or rectangular designs, this center bead is also oval.
• Square or round rosettes that are symmetrical can be turned on a lathe before carving to establish the basic profile.
• There are typically four primary leaves evenly positioned around the rosette.
• The leaves start at the center bead and flow outward toward the edge, with the tips of the leaves defining the outer edges.
• For square or rectangular rosettes, the tips of the leaves end at each corner.
• The midribs or center stems get narrower as they reach the ends of the leaves.
• They often have small, secondary leaves that are between and appear to be positioned under each primary leaf. This example does not contain these secondary leaves.
HOW TO DRAW THE LEAF This design has similar structural elements to other leaves, but some details, such as positioning the eyes, will need to be visually located without guidelines.
STEP 1: Draw a square. This example has slightly curved edges. Draw the center circle and the midrib (center stem) of each leaf ending just before each corner. Notice for this design that the midrib connects from one leaf to the next. This is often done to create a continuous flow between the leaves.
STEP 2: Draw the eyes close to the center circle. These eyes represent where two leaves overlap.
STEP 3: Draw eight circles as shown that intersect and slightly overlap at the pointed end of the eye. These locate the edges of the overlapping lobes.
STEP 4: Erase the parts of the circles that are no longer needed. The remaining lines should extend from the pointed end of the eyes. The dotted lines represent the edges of the lobes underneath.
STEP 5: Erase the dotted lines. Draw the two eyes on each leaf about a third of the way up the leaf at a slight distance from the midrib.
STEP 6: Draw circles as shown that represent the overlapping secondary lobes. The edges of these lobes should extend from the eyes drawn in STEP 5. The dotted lines represent the parts of the lobe that are underneath. Sometimes drawing the edges of the lobes first can help locate the eyes, so steps 5 and 6 can be reversed.
STEP 7: Erase the dotted lines. Draw the pipes that start from the eyes drawn in STEP 5 and curve and flow them alongside the midrib.
STEP 8: Draw the lines that locate the serrations as shown. These are typically positioned perpendicular to the center veins on each lobe, but in this design there are no center veins on the side lobes. Draw these lines at an angle located approximately halfway between the eyes and the tip of each lobe. Note that the center lobe has two of these guidelines that are perpendicular to the midrib. After learning how to position the serrations in the next few steps, these lines are usually no longer necessary as guides.
STEP 9: Take a deep breath. It really isn’t as complicated as it looks. Draw small circles that locate the serrations along the edges of the leaf. These lines should start at the edge of the leaf and curve down to meet the guidelines drawn in STEP 8. The dotted lines show the correct direction of the curve. These circles are simply used to show the curvature of the serrations. Erase the parts of the circles that are not necessary. This process of drawing the circles is often not necessary after learning to understand the shape and position of these serrations.
STEP 10: Erase all lines that are no longer needed. Complete the edges of the leaf by connecting the serration lines as shown and also complete the tips of the leaves.
STEP 11: Erase any unnecessary lines.
STEP 12: Draw lines starting from the inside corners of the serrations that flow down each lobe. These lines represent a high edge (or high corner) in the leaf.
