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Here’s a quick pic of the tool chest case dry fit together. still need to chop mortises in the sides to accept the case’s “innards”, but it’s coming along nicely.

I’ve started a personal project at the shop. I am currently storing all my hand tools in a tupperware container, and to say the least, that’s not working out so well. I’ve designed a tool chest with 5 drawers to hold my marking and measuring tools, chisels, planes, saws and sharpening stones. The drawers will be piston fit, so the back of the case will be open to allow the air to escape and the other drawers won’t ghost open. The case, dividers and drawer sides will all be Black Walnut, with the drawer fronts and back being a contrasting wood - probably Zebrawood or possibly Ambrosia Maple… Here’s a peek of one of the case sides with dovetails already cut. More photos coming soon…

I finished the hall table I’ve been working on today, and I’m pretty pleased with how it turned out. Going to be applying a finish the next couple of days, then it will get to go to it’s new home. Hard Maple base, with a Wenge top that has a “bowl” carved out for keys, change or whatever you want to put in it. I’ll put up more / better pictures after the finish is applied, but for now, here’s a peek.

This is going to be a long 90 days….

Hey folks, just a quick update to let the world know that the rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated… I’ve just been insanely busy. Keeping one business creeping along, phasing myself out of the daily operations of a second one, while simultaneously trying to start two completely different new ones taxes a person a bit, in my honest assessment. Good news is one of the new businesses is getting shelved for a bit (it’s a good thing, trust me…) and my daily commitments to the bike shop ended early this month, so I am down to only 2! Piece of cake, right? Hell, I might even have enough free time to go ride my bike one day this week….

I’ve also managed to hack a few more hours out of my schedule to get back in the wood shop, and have been chipping away at a new project. Here’s a glimpse of it…. more photos and updates coming soon, so check back soon. Lots of new stuff going on, looks like 2010 is going to be a very exciting year… stay tuned!

Alright, alright… I know. I said a lot of things were going to happen. Some of them have, and I just failed miserably at letting you people know, and some of them, unfortunately, haven’t happened yet. But I’m working on it, so be patient with me. I’ve gotta get some stuff finished, some stuff photographed, some stuff programmed, and some stuff designed, but rest assured, it’s all in the works and you’ll be the first to know as things come off the finishing table. In the meantime, here’s a little tease of the Black Walnut and Zebrawood table I just completed… still needs a little final sanding and a finish applied, but otherwise the piece is complete… more photos to follow.

So the final piece for the fellas (which I am apparently now included in that classification, at least part-time) over at Hammerhead Bikes is finished. I know that sentence made little to no sense, but screw you, it’s Saturday. Point being, the short deadline, shorter budget project is wrapped, and I can finally get back to the projects at hand. I have been working on getting the backend of the Revolution Woodworks site finished, and plan to move my “process blog” over to there, shine it up and make it slightly more professional. Not entirely sure what the end product is gonna be, but in one fashion or another, it’s happening. Which will either result in this site returning to the glory days of randomness and bike related failure, or alternatively it will simply become a blind portal to the Revolution site… not sure yet.

Also, anyone know anyone who wants to buy a wood lathe? Let me know if ya do…

Other changes in my life include (finally) evicting the birds that built a nest in the light fixture outside my office door, so that I can now enter and exit the shop without fear of poop-age, and the addition of Lone Star to Primizie’s beer list (yessssssss……..). That is all, good day to you.

If anyone ever tells you it’s a good idea to cut dovetails in plywood, that it’ll be easy, people do it all the time, no problem… punch that person in the face. They are a liar. Sleep was lost, meals were skipped, patience was tested… but the front counter is finished, and it turned out pretty damn good, all things considered. For an extremely budget friendly piece, I think the guys will be very happy with this piece up front to greet their customers. I’ll get some kind of progress picture gallery set up soon to see the progress of things, but for now, here’s the final piece. Not too shabby for something made entirely of plywood.



And a detail of the dovetails.



One final piece to complete for these guys, then it’s back to the good stuff. Stay tuned…

Making steady progress on the small job currently in the shop. If everything continues to go to plan, I’ll have the 3 minor pieces finished by Monday or Tuesday, and then I can start the final piece and get it all out the door by the mid-March deadline… hopefully sooner. Once that happens, we’ll get back to the hall table and desk projects (I promise)… I’m excited to see those two pieces come together. I’ll be in some this weekend to try to get a little further along on this… for now, I’m just wishing I would finish my outfeed table, so I can finish my crosscut sled, so I can cut dados in a way that doesn’t cause me to lose the use of my thumbs for the next 4 days… check back for progress on Monday… hopefully I will have some stuff wrapped up.

This. This is why we don’t buy the cheap bags for the dust collector. If you’ve never seen a geyser made of wood chips and chaos (and why would you…), let me assure you it can be a disconcerting thing. After I recovered from my initial assumption that a giant swarm of bees had somehow gotten into the shop, I realized that in actuality the dust collector had blown a hole in the bag, and was spraying sawdust everywhere. Guess I’ll be cleaning my shop for the rest of the day. Awesome. Here’s the shop, quite literally, after the dust settled…