Don Williams, the primary force of nature behind “To Make as Perfectly as Possible,” is a man of few vices but many vises.
He doesn’t drink, smoke, curse or even drink coffee. But the man will travel to the ends of the earth to examine pianomakers’ vises. This peculiar, beautiful and woefully undocumented form is featured prominently on H.O. Studley’s workbench. And so Don has spent weeks researching, restoring and examining original pianomaker’s vises.
He has been documenting his findings on his blog. Have you bookmarked it yet? You should.
At my current pace – about three significant pieces a month – I have enough rough lumber to keep me busy for the next two years.
But when I walked into Midwest Woodworking Friday morning, I knew I was going to buy more. Frank David and his employees had sorted through the shop’s stores and come up with a lot more incredible stuff, including a cache of 4/4 sugar pine that I’d never seen.
As we unpacked that particular pile, I pulled six 16”-wide (or wider) 100-percent clear 16’-long boards aside. At less than $5/board foot it was a steal. And I made it only one-third of the way through the pile.
Customers hit the amazing cache of 5/4 mahogany.
Then I hit the mahogany – I picked up enough 8/4 for eight Roorkhee chairs.
And then, the Sipo (Entandrophragma utile). Midwest has a half-dozen planks of 16/4 that are 24” wide and 14’ long. Beautifully figured. Clear. Completely dry. And about $9 a board foot.
Daryl of Midwest attempts to cut a Sipo plank on a radial arm so. No dice.Daryl tries a recip saw on a Sipo plank.
I bought a plank – about 128 board feet worth – and needed to crosscut it to get it into my truck. Neither radical-harm saw at Midwest would do the trick the Sipo was too thick. Then we tried a recip saw. It was slow. Finally, one of the other customers loaned me a little battery circ saw that was the solution. I cut through both faces with the circ saw. Then removed the waste between with the recip saw.
What’s the Sipo for? I am thinking ahead: H.O. Studley workbenches.
After hoisting each plank onto my personal pile, I said aloud: “That’s it. I’m done.”
Five planks later, everyone around started mocking me.
I took my wood home and unloaded it.
Today I returned to Midwest to help other customers. Somehow I ended up unpacking that pile of sugar pine again. And I got down to some 18”-wide boards that had been there for 40 years. After pulling every plank, I told myself: That’s it, I’m done.
Five planks later… I really was.
The wood and machinery sale was a bittersweet affair for me and Andy Brownell, who did a huge amount of work organizing the event. The owner, Frank David, was there on Friday and it’s clear his health has deteriorated. It was great talking to him and catch up.
He’s suffering from congestive heart failure and is staring death in the face with the same pluck and optimism he used to run Midwest for decades.
“They say people can live with this for eight to 10 years,” he said. “We’ll see.”
I’m not sure what is in store for Midwest, the lumber inventory or the machinery – it’s none of my business, really. But I can say that the legacy of Midwest Woodworking and Frank David will live on through my work for at least the next five years as I pick through the incredible pile of lumber that takes up an entire wall of my shop.
I am wed and bred to the traditional tool chest. I’ve been working out of one since 1996 and have no plans to suddenly switch to storing my tools in stacking rubber boxes.
Sure, I’ve experimented with other systems (like when I experimented with lesbianism in college). But after giving them a year or two in parallel with my tool chest, I always went back to the warm embrace of of the big floor chest by my workbench.
If you hate tool chests, that’s cool with me. But you need to come up with a way to hold your tools that makes it easy to work at the bench. Since publishing “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest,” I’ve been asked about once a month to please, please, please design a wall-hung tool cabinet that is the equal of a floor chest.
Now that I’m juggling two book projects, I’m really not equipped to design a complicated piece of tool storage and give it a real-world test. But perhaps you are.
When I consider tool storage, here is a list of the things that are important to me. Other woodworkers at the extremes (French-fitting neat-nicks and those who are casual about tool care) will disagree. That’s cool. Write your own book.
1. Tools protected from rust, dust and damage. I spent a lot of time fixing up tools or saving up the money to buy my tools. So I’ll be damned if I’m going to let them rust or get cruddy. Good tool storage should keep the tools protected. Period. This is why I don’t like open tool racks (which I’ve experimented with a lot). The tools on the open racks are more likely to get rusty or (more important) go missing.
2. All tool can be grabbed instantly or by moving one sliding/swinging layer in front. Your tool system should not be a Chinese puzzle box. H.O. Studley’s toolbox is cool, but it is a tool-storage nightmare.
3. Tools aren’t obscured from view in drawers. When tools go into drawers, they seem to disappear from memory. I like tools in the open because of this simple fact: When you can see all your tools your memory about their location is much improved. I have to nudge my marking knife to grab my carpenter’s pencil, so it’s easy for me to remember where the knife is – I’ve seen it 100 times that day.
4. The storage is flexible without distinct spots for everything. I tried French-fitting my tools. It was a chore to make all the little racks and holder bits. Then I decided I wanted the shoulder plane somewhere else and so I had to change it all.
5. The tools should be in smallest space possible. When your tools are in a compact area you won’t have to walk across the shop to pick them off the rack across the room. It’s all right there, just within arm’s reach.
6. The storage should be inexpensive and movable. I’d rather buy more wood for furniture. And someday I might have a cooler shop on Russell Street.
This is a quick back-of-the-napkin list. But I think it’s pretty good.
Now you can read about all things Don by visiting donsbarn.com – the web site of Don Williams. For those of you who aren’t frequent visitors here, Don is the mastermind behind the A.J. Roubo translations and the author of the forthcoming book on H.O. Studley.
He’s a former conservator for the Smithsonian and expert on all things waxy and shellac-y.
His new site will feature lots of the public-domain articles he wrote while at the Smithsonian, plus a blog on the things that go on at his extremely huge barn and a store for buying some of the things he makes – like the polissoirs from Roubo.
So bookmark the site, add it to your reader and enjoy the articles that are already there. Don says more are forthcoming.
I hate the vinyl banner that we hang up at woodworking shows.
While we had the vinyl sign made locally, I’ve never liked having a plastic sign for a company that is all about wooden objects.
So when we decided to exhibit at Handworks in Amana, Iowa, one of my first tasks was to commission a proper corporate sign for Lost Art Press. So we hired David Bignell, a talented Dayton, Ohio, woodworker to carve us a low-relief sign in the spirit of British pub signs.
He’s started work on the sign and you can check out his progress on his Facebook page.
We’ll have the sign at Handworks, along with H.O. Studley calipers and (if our luck holds) a special T-shirt that we’ll sell at Handworks and to customers who cannot make it to the event.
