The Shop > Wood & Stuff
More wood butchering from Ross, Scarf Joint
vtsteam:
--- Quote from: Pete W. on October 20, 2013, 10:01:11 AM ---Steve, I hope Ross won't mind my asking this in his thread but is there a thread illustrating the building of your house, the one you pictured in my 'Tin Shed Project'?
Is so, please give us a link - if not, why not?!?!
--- End quote ---
Well building my house would be an example of barn style carpentry, not joinery. And for why I haven't ever done a thread on it..... well, no reason except I never thought there would be any interest in that. Also, I have to admit, secretly, I find that kind of thing boring to myself -- I'm not too interested in it -- I just needed a house so I built it. Now machining -- that's fascinating -- probably because even after a decade it's still new, and also I'm not that good at it. Go figure.....!
RossJarvis:
Hiya guys :wave:, thanks for all the comments and advice :thumbup:.
RGY, Yep a drawing would be interesting, any new bit of knowledge comes in handy.
Generally traditional European framing uses various "scribe rules" to fit joints. This is a way of using non-square/parallel timbers. Each joint is fitted to each other, so nothing needs to be square, straight or parallel, but it is time consuming and uses plumbs, levels, rods, dividers and a fair bit of thinking. In the States I understand "square rule" carpentry is the norm, but I'm not too familiar with this. It was explained as "imagining a perfectly square bit of wood inside the timber being used". Apparently the Japanese have some magical way of cutting the joints separately and they fit!?! However I saw a video on Youtube and they tend to have some very large mallets!
I'm thinking mainly of fitting the joint to itself at the moment. I did get the block square and parallel to a good extent (well, to the thinnest feeler gauge across 3" although the thinnest one now is not the thinnest one it came with, I think that's still in the tappets of my Honda :palm:), but overnight this has changed a bit. Humidity is everywhere at the moment, the lid on my new toolbox has siezed up and warped again, so there must be an expansion of a couple of thirty seconds or sixteenths across 12"
Meanwhile, back at the ranch; Unusually for me “ahem”, progress has been slow for the past couple of days, could be due to the weather;
I had managed to split the wood into two bits, I had intended to cut diagonally to save on waste and had had some good suggestions on how to do this, but in the end I just cut ‘em square(ish);
Next I planned how to mark the joints out. There are some conventions to do this, based on the width of a Japanese square (15mm), which helps speed up and accuratise (that’s not a word is it!) marking out. Not having one of these I sort of approximated. I made the length of the slope 3x the width of the wood, not including the “noses” and did everything else in English;
…and then knifed this into the wood, highlighting in pen;
I’ve marked a face and face edge on both bits of wood to try and mark from the same reference, initially I was going to mark both out before applying saw, but I really couldn’t be bothered so will mark part 2 from the finished part 1. The weather cleared, so I ran out, set up the “bench” and started a bit of ripping, following the order in the book only to completely go off line and create a compound curve inside the wood;
….ho hum, I could always go back to plastic models for a hobby! I cross-cut out the waste;
…bashed a chisel with a hitting stick;
…started to plane the slope to the knife line, with a 60 ˝ and the heavens opened, so I called it a day, Sunday I think I called it!
PS. Pete, I roasted the first batch of chestnuts as per my instructions, one detonated at 13 mins. I eventually had about 3 where the skin fell straight off, but these didn't taste too good, a couple of nice ones where the skin wasn't too difficult to take off and a lot of blood sweat and tears for little reward. I now know why they come in tins.
vtsteam:
Well you got me making videos now :zap:
Don't know if this will help, but it shows what I do using a Japanese saw to make a square cut on a piece of scrap. The cut is marked with a machinist square and a sharp scriber all the way around. Checked for truth (making sure lines all connect). Then the saw is used to cut slightly into the piece at the scribed lines all around. Finally it is cut through.
The resulting cut is square when checked on all 4 sides, using no miter box, poor quality scrap wood ripped from a stud, no vise, and a pretty wobbly hold, too. (I was trying to keep it in view.)
About 2-1/2 minutes to mark out and cut -- and that was slow to make it a demo.
[embed=600,400]<iframe width="600" height="400" src="http://player.vimeo.com/video/77343287" frameborder="0" webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen></iframe>[/embed]
vtsteam:
Because the video is not very good resolution, here are still shots of that cut, from all 4 sides:
Side 1
Side 2
Side 3
Side 4
RossJarvis:
VTSteam, thanks for the time and effort in putting that together :thumbup:
It makes great sense. So far I'd read and understood the technique where, at least it appeared that a cut is made part way through one face, rotate and do the next line part way, rotate etc. Doing that I was just undercutting on four lines :palm:. I'll try your technique next.
I think I'll try this on the rip cut for the next piece, cutting a kerf as far down each side on the line as I can.
It's nice to see someone else working outdoors, though that's what I'd expect from the other side of the "pond". You also seem to have better weather.
Thanks again,
Ross.
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