Open Segmented Bowl – The Jigs Part II

The final jig runs in the left miter slot on the table saw and is used to cut the pieces a specific length at the required 10° angle. 

Table Saw & Jig

With one exception it’s pretty straightforward to build.  I started with a piece of hardwood cut to fit snugly in the miter slot in the table saw and screwed it to a particle board base.  One problem I did run into was that I was having a hard time making the runner run smoothly along the entire length of the miter slot.  The runner would have a good fit and then jam depending on where it was in the miter slot.  Some close examination and measuring revealed the miter slot was not a consistent width from end to end.  There were also little scallops of varying size remaining all along the slot from when it was machined. 

 

Scallops in Table Saw Miter Slot

The fix was to take a 10” metal file hold it flat against the sides of the miter slot and carefully file the face getting rid of the high spots. 

 

Filing Edge of Miter Slot

It took less than 10 minutes and made all the difference.   I just had to hold the file square and keep an even pressure on it from one end of the slot to the other.

 

Filed Miter Slot

With the runner mounted to the base I marked the saw blade path through the jig, mounted front and rear braces keeping the screws away from the blade path.   Hitting a screw with my good cutoff blade would be an expensive mistake and make me say bad words.  I then made the initial cut in the jig going only far enough into the jig so as to be able to cut the segments.  The last piece to be mounted to the jig is the fence.  This is the most critical part and the one that you can count on taking some time to get just right.  Process is to mark the 10 degree angle off of square to the saw blade, align the fence to the line and on the right side screw the fence to the base with one screw.  That screw that will act as a pivot and allow for the fine tuning to come.  Next, swing the left side of the fence down so the angle is just slightly more than the 10° and on the left side of the fence screw a stop block to the base below the fence.  The photo below will help make this all clear. 

The fence will still rotate because it’s only fastened at one end.  This is planned so that the needed fine adjustments can be made.  Next, clamp the fence to the block to hold it in place for our test cuts.

Prior to making the test cuts I added a couple of toggle clamps.  The one on the outside sets the segment Outer Face Length and the other clamps the blank in place when it gets short.  The second clamp also acts as a guard to help keep my fingers out of the blade path. 

 

Both Toggle Clamps Installed

Before setting up the jig I ripped a scrap piece of plywood 1½” wide for my test blank.  The right toggle clamp is then used to set the stop block for the Outer Face Length at about 1¼”.  I did add a thin spacer under the stop block to help keep sawdust from getting trapped and impacting the accuracy.  Cutting process is to first trim the end of the blank to get one angle. 

 

End of Blank Trimmed to 10 Degree Angle

Second, flip the blank over and cut the first segment. 

 

First Test Segment Cut

Third, is to flip the blank over and cut the second segment.  The process is repeated until you have cut 18 pieces to be put together for a test fit.  

 

Second Segment Cut

Why 18 pieces and not 12 since I am making a bowl with 12 segments per layer?  It’s because the bowl is an open segmented piece.  Remember for an open segmented piece each solid segment covers 20 degrees plus the 10 degree gap equals a total arc covered of 30 degrees.   So, 12 pieces times 30 degrees each equals the 360 degrees in a circle.  However, for our accuracy test we need to make a solid ring.  With each piece cut at 20 degrees I need 18 pieces to equal 360 degrees.  Making the test fit requires clamping up the 18 pieces in a ring.  For me using a hose clamp works the best.  

 

First Set of Segments Test Fitted

Getting a perfect fit requires some trial and error since there are so many cuts.  Just think, for the above ring there are 18 pieces with two angled cuts.  This means that whatever error you have per cut gets multiplied by 36.  This is why a tiny error in each cut becomes a real problem.  Because I set the stop block so the fence was just a bit more than 10 degrees I can sneak up on the correct angle by adding thin shims between the stop block and the fence.  Playing cards to start with and masking tape at the end.  It is an iterative process of cutting pieces, assembling for a test fit and adjusting the fence as needed.  When the ring fits together with no gaps the fence is securely screwed to the base.  The good thing is that you only have to do this once.  When the jig is adjusted perfectly the pieces go together in a circle and there are no gaps at any of the joints like this ring. 

 

Final Test Ring - No Gaps!

Next up – Material Selection, Preparation and Setup

Open Segmented Bowl – The Jigs Part I

Now that I had the design and a cut list I needed to build four different jigs to cut and assemble the pieces.  Rather than show a completed picture and say, “I built the jigs.” then let it go from there I had planned on spending a little time going through the jig building process.  The jigs are important since if they are not right the piece won’t be either.  However, as you can see this post is titled The Jigs Part I which means there will be a Part II.  As I developed the jigs the build process got a bit more complicated than I thought and the information grew.  It finally got to a point where I needed to break the material into two posts.  So this post covers the jigs that get mounted to the lathe.

The process starts by making some drawings to get the design down and figure out what I need in the way of materials.  Three of the jigs get mounted on the lathe. 

Drawing of Jigs for Lathe

The first and easiest is an indexing wheel.  It along with the second jig is used to accurately set the individual segments every 30 degrees and to offset the adjacent layer by 15 degrees.  I printed out a paper copy of an indexing wheel made for a 12 segment design, glued it to a piece of thin plywood cut it out on the bandsaw and sanded the edges smooth.  

Index Wheel Drawing and Paper Glued to Plywood & Cut Out

The jig is mounted on the rotating part of the lathe.  Its location is shown in the left photo by the red line on the spindle shoulder.  In my case all I needed to do was drill a hole the same diameter as the spindle shoulder and set it in place, middle photo.  When I thread the face place onto the spindle it will act as a clamp and hold the jig firmly in place, right photo.

The second jig is used to align the guide lines on the index wheel to a specific point and as an extension of that the bowl blank mounted to the lathe.  When clamped to the index wheel it holds the bowl blank in a fixed location so the segments can be located and glued in place.

Alignment Guide Jig Parts

There are just a few pieces in this jig:

1.  The alignment guide made out of clear plastic.

2.    A plywood backer to support plastic.

3.    The top crosspiece that goes across the lathe ways to which the alignment guide and its backer are screwed to.

4.    A spacer that goes between the ways to keep the jig square to the spindle axis and hold it a fixed distance away from the lathe headstock.

5.    A clamping bolt that when tightened holds the jig in place.

6.    The bottom crosspiece which goes below the ways that the clamping bolt is threaded into.

Only a couple of pieces need to be cut and located carefully.  The top of the alignment guide needs to be right at the centerline of the spindle.  You want the line on the index wheel to be parallel with the top of the alignment guide.  If the alignment guide top is above or below center then it will never be in correct registration.

Alignment Jig & Index Wheel in place

The other piece is the spacer that goes between the lathe ways.  To keep the jig square it needs to be moveable but not a sloppy fit.  I spaced mine the thickness of a playing card (about .01”) less than the ways spacing.  The piece in the photo is long enough for both this jig and the next one. 

Alignment Jig and Gluing Jig Spacer

Its length needs to be cut so when it butts against the headstock it holds the plastic alignment guide about 1/16” out from the index wheel.  Lastly, the spacer and top crosspiece are fastened together at 90 degrees.

To make the clamping bolt knob here is the process I go through.  I start with a template to layout the shape, bandsaw it close, finish shaping on the disk sander, cut a square mortise for the carriage bolt lugs, drill a hole for the threaded shaft of the bolt, round the edges, sand smooth and finish.

The clamping bolt goes from the top crosspiece through the spacer then on through the bottom crosspiece and typically into a nut.  To me that’s just one more piece to lose or fumble around trying to get my hand between the ways without dropping the nut so I can get it started on the clamping bolt.  For me an easier way is to use a metal threaded insert set in the bottom crosspiece.  Here is what it looks like installed.

The inserts often come with a slot that would lead one to believe they can be easily installed using a screw driver.  To that all I can say is, “Fat Chance!” I tried and it was a disaster.  I have had good luck with this method:

1.    Threading an insert on a threaded rod and holding it in place with a jamb nut

2.   Mounting that assembly in a drill press

3.    Use the spindle feed handles to start the insert and put some pressure on it.

4.    Turn the drill press chuck by hand to run the insert in to the desired depth. 

One thing, just don’t turn the drill press on to run the insert in.  If you do it will be thrilling but not the kind of thrill you really want.

The last jig that gets mounted to the lathe is the Gluing Jig.  It makes sure the segment is set parallel to the layer center line and that it is at the correct distance from the layer center point.  While the actual size of the jig is not critical I made it large enough to be rigid when clamped in place.  My base ended up being 12 ½” x 14”.  As with the last jig there are a few things that are important such as keeping the pieces square and plumb with the lathe ways. 

Gluing Jig

However, the location of the aluminum angle at the top is the one item to really pay attention to.  The top corner and its horizontal cut edge needs to be right on the centerline of the spindle because that is your reference point for setting the outside edge of the segment.  If it is off then so will your layer diameter which impacts the gap size and the size of that little glue joint which holds everything together.  The long part of the angle needs to line up with the center line across the face plate.  If it’s out of parallel with the ways, too high or too low then the segments will be twisted when you look down on the ring. 

Aluminum Angle Aligned to Centerlines

This completes the jigs necessary to accurately locate and glue the individual segments in place.

Completed Jigs Ready to Use

Next up – The Jigs Part II

Open Segmented Bowl - The Start

At the end of the Maloof Chair blog I had talked about another project I had in mind.  I did not mention what, but it was some low voltage exterior lighting fixtures.  I finished up the design, built a mockup and  was ready to go.  However, because of escalating project costs I reviewed my cost estimate to make sure I had everything and found I had left out one item, the nearly $200 of wire needed to connect all the lights together.  That pushed the project out of what we had budgeted.  At that point it was back to the drawing board where we found some quite nice solar LED lights.  They have a soft yellow color and provide enough light to meet my goal of highlighting the limits of the driveway for less than 20% of my final estimated cost.  Also, the idea of digging several hundred feet of trench by hand was not all the appealing.

This all led to the next project on my bucket list, a segmented bowl turned on the lathe made with gaps between the segments.  I have done several solid segmented wood turning pieces and  wanted to see if I could do one of these. 

 

I started out using SketchUp to make a general profile drawing of what I wanted the bowl to look like.  The next step is to take that profile turn it into a 3D rendering  and take a critical look at it.  It’s then back to the profile to edit as needed, create a 3D rendering, evaluate that and repeat the process until I get the final shape.  “Final” shape is a rough term as things can and often do change as I go through the building process.  With the aforementioned “final” shape done I made the decision that there would be a one piece top and bottom with 6 individual segmented layers between.  The top and bottom layers would be 3/8” thick and the segmented layers would be a ½” thick.

Before I go into the specifics of the math needed to size the individual segments here is the finished drawing of the piece.  I include it here to help out with the visualization of the following series of decisions I made .

My next step is to decide how many segments per layer.  I want the segments to be big enough to work with but not so few as to make the piece look clunky.  To get the outer face sizes meant I needed to create an Excel spreadsheet to run the geometry calculations.   I made one assumption in the calculations, and bear with me as I go through the logic.  Each piece in the open segment layer would be 2/3 the angle of a piece needed for a solid layer leaving a gap between segments equal to 1/3 the angle of a solid piece.  Got that?  To help here is an example, if there are 12 pieces in a solid ring each piece covers 30° (360° in a circle divided by 12 pieces).  This means each of the 12 pieces in the open segment piece would cover 2/3 of 30° or 20° and the gap between the segments would be 10 °.  The drawings below should help out, a solid ring on the left and the open segmented ring on the right.

I chose a 10° gap as a balance between openness and strength.  The bigger the gap the more delicate and airy the piece is but the less glue surface there is holding it all together.  Remember, when I get the ring layers all glued together I am going to mount it in the lathe and spin it at well over a thousand revolutions per minute.  Once at speed I will then shape it freehand using a lath chisel.  The piece needs to have enough strength to hold together and not fly apart due to centrifugal force or from the impact shock when that steel chisel starts cutting away.  After all, that little 5° glued overlap between pieces is all that is holding everything together and if it lets go pieces will fly!  Exciting, yes but not the kind of excitement I am after.

With that one assumption I built a spreadsheet to give me the outer face segment length for each layer based on two entries, the number of segments in the layer and the layer radius .  The radius for each layer comes from the final profile drawing  as does the segment width by layer which I will use later.

In reviewing the calculations it looked like a 12 segment ring would make the smallest piece just under an inch wide, which for this piece is a good size to work with.  Also, since the pieces are tapered this is the largest dimension, the inside face will be smaller.  With the number of segments set I had the calculated outer face length and from the drawing I got the segment width by layer.  Plugging the segment width by layer into the spreadsheet gives me the inner face length.  Using all the data gives me the needed board length for each layer  required to cut the segments.  With this I had everything needed to generate my cut sheet that showed everything I needed to build the piece.

It was using this data I created the final drawing shown above and here below.  Note the Material column is blank.  I have not yet decided what wood to make it out of although the stack of leftover scraps from the Maloof chair do come to mind....  While the drawing gives a good idea of the overall shape it does not show all the corners cleaned up and smoothed together.  However, it’s good enough to proceed on with the project.

Next up – The Jigs

Maloof Rocker - Finishing

At long last I have come to the final post on this project. It's been awhile getting here with the good times where things went smoothly and then there were times where frustration and bad words were directed at the piece.  Fortunately there were no problems that could not be resolved or worked around.

The last operation is finishing and because of material differences I will utilize two different types of finishes.  Since the construction lumber I used had knots, some other flaws, a few oops as a result of my practicing plus the wood is not really much to look at I decided to putty the flaws and paint it.  That also meant I did not have to sand it to the same level as the actual piece.  I am not sure where it will end up although my wife has hinted on putting it out on the front porch.  On the other hand I may keep it in the shop area.  In either case I wanted a durable finish so decided to use a fairly heavy body opaque deck stain.  The color I used is a dark green and with two coats I am happy with the way it came out.  One chair down and one to go.  As the photo shows it has ended up on the front porch although it may end up back in the shop later. J

Test Chair Done "Temporarily" on Front Porch

Ready to Start Spraying Finish

The actual chair gets a sprayed on nitrocellulose lacquer finish and preparation of the surface is key.  I start by using compressed air to get as much dust off as I could then wiped it down with a clean old tee shirt.  Next is to wipe down the workbenches with a wet cloth to capture dust, cover the spray area with a piece of cardboard and set the chair upside down on padded blocks.  The blocks are to put some space between the arms and the cardboard to minimize blowback of overspray onto the arms.  Spraying lacquer requires some protective gear.  I always wear a pair of nitrile gloves, a long sleeve shirt and a respirator with cartridges rated to remove the hazardous vapors.

To start I used a small air brush to do the bottoms of the rockers, arms and put a seal coat on the seat bottom.  Three coats of lacquer on the bottom of the rockers and arms gave me a nearly final quality finish and good base to work from.  I used 320 grit sandpaper to smooth the transition between what I already finished and the raw wood.  On the seat bottom I did a light wet sanding using 1,500 grit.  I have better luck wet sanding a finish as I don’t end up with hard chunks or corns of finish on the sandpaper.  However, you can’t wet sand unsealed wood as the water will raise the grain.   Also, now that the bottom of the seat has a seal coat on it I signed and dated the piece there.

Seal Coat and Underneath Side of Seat Signed

With the bottom of the rockers done I could flip the chair over and work from the top down.  I will use the larger Fuji HVLP (High Volume Low Pressure) sprayer for the rest of the finishing.  There are a couple of reasons for the change in equipment.  The seat is really too big to get a good finish with the air brush and the headrest nearly so.  Additionally because there are few sharp edges where I can break the application of finish I need to keep a couple of “wet” edges going and to do that need the speed of application I get with the HVLP gun.  However, to keep the overspray down I adjusted the controls from the broad fan shaped pattern I usually use to a smaller more circular one.   With everything ready to go I mixed up a batch of matte lacquer, thinner and retarder then shot one coat onto the chair.  With that done I quit for the evening.

I let the finish cure overnight and when I checked on it the next morning was shocked.  Almost none of the areas had the smooth surface I was used to getting.  The vast majority, probably 95%, of the finish in no way resembled what I had expected and was totally unacceptable.  The seat felt like someone had thrown 80 grit sand in the lacquer before it dried.  There were other problems but all in all it was a disaster.  In this photo the chair looks fine but trust me it’s worse than awful.

First Coat Finish Disaster

I had changed from the broad fan shape spray to a circular spray to minimize overspray and had adjusted the flow and spread to what I thought looked good and seemed to work on the test board I did.  Not so in actual practice.  My only recourse was to see if I could level the surface and retry.  Out came the wet sandpaper and I started to clean up the mess.  A few hours later I had probably removed 90% of the finish I had applied and had the surface back smooth.  I mixed up another batch of lacquer made some adjustments on the spray gun and gave it another coat.  Next day the results were better but I was still plagued with problems.  For the areas that were not acceptable out came the wet sandpaper again to clean up the problem areas.  Right now a wipe-on poly/oil finish looks really appealing.  In fact, for a couple of days I seriously considered stripping off all the lacquer I had applied and starting over.

I may be a little slow but I was not going to go through the spraying process again without making major changes.  Giving it some thought I decided to take a whole different approach.  To start with I used the small airbrush to spray the slats.  They are small, close together and the airbrush gave me more control and less overspray.  That worked just fine and once they were done I moved onto the arms and seat.  Here I made two changes from the earlier setup.  First, I went back to the fan shaped pattern I typically use.  Second, I altered the lacquer mix by increasing the amount of thinner.  This time when I sprayed the results were what I had expected.  That left the headrest, rear legs, seat bottom and rocker tops to do.  The next day I shot them using the same process and they turned out just fine.  There are not many photos during this phase of finishing for a couple of reasons, photos just don’t convey how rough the finish felt and I was preoccupied with finding a solution.

From here I only had to do a light final wet sand using an 8,000 grit pad.  If I had used a gloss finish I would have used the 12,000 grit pad.  Really the only thing it’s doing at this point is removing any dust that gets on the finish.  Now that the lacquer finish is done I am happy with it.  The matte sheen fits the piece and I know it will give me more protection than a wipe-on ploy/oil blend.  However, given what I went through to apply the lacquer and thinking about the probable use the chair will get I doubt that the extra protection is worth it.  Had I to do it over or if I build another chair (that's a BIG if) I probably will go with the wipe-on ploy/oil blend.

Completed Rocking Chair

Last step is to let the finish cure for a couple of weeks to let the lacquer gas off and then move it into the house.  How does it feel?  The back support is great, the arms are contoured and just fit, the chair as a whole is very comfortable and it takes minimal effort to rock.

The question that frequently comes up when I build pieces is, “How long did that take?” and on about half my projects I do not track my time.  However, this project is anything but normal so given the scope and that my estimate was for a 4 to 6 month build I decided to track my time.  I recorded the days worked, how many hours I worked that day, if it was on the test or actual piece and what I did.  First the disclaimer, this project had a lot of skills and techniques that I had not done and had to learn.  This was the main reason I built the test piece.  It’s better to mess up a piece of 2x6 construction lumber than a piece of 8/4 cherry.  Anyway from start to finish the project took 348 ¼ hours done in 102 working days spread out over 5 months.  Of that time 110 ½ hours were on the test piece and 237 ¾ hours on the actual chair.  The test piece has a lot less hours because it is not finished to as high a degree as the actual chair.   Remember all the sanding and my poor fingers. Also the patterns and jigs are all included in the actual chair.  For those into a more detailed breakdown here it is:

Item	Actual	Test
Arm	27.25	6.75
Back legs	15.25	11.5
Epoxy	1	0
Finish	13.5	0
Front legs	15.25	13.25
Headrest	16.75	9.5
Paint	0	6.75
Patterns & jigs	21.75	0
Plank work	9.75	0
Rocker	38.5	25.5
Sanding	19.75	0
Seat	27	20.25
Slats	32	17
Total Hours	237.75	110.5

The other question I get is would I do anything different and I can think of only three things. 

1. Given the problems I had with the sprayed lacquer finish I would probably use a poly/oil wipe-on blend.
2. While the chair fits me it is just a little tall to be comfortable for my wife.  If I were to build another I would likely shorten the legs a bit, maybe an inch or so.  
3. The rocker to leg joint is held together by ½" wood dowels.  I think I would seriously consider using ⅜” steel threaded rod instead.  That would leave a bit more wood at the joint for leg and rocker strength while the steel though smaller would be considerably stronger than the wood dowel.  I would use the threaded rod versus smooth rod to provide the epoxy with additional bonding area.

In the end I think that I should not give up my day job although from what I have read the chair currently made by Sam Maloof Woodworker Inc. runs about $25,000 and there is a three year wait to get one.

So for now I will sit in the rocker and relax - for a bit.  Then again I have my eye on another project that looks interesting....

dave

Maloof Rocker - Final Sanding & Flaw Repair

My poor fingers, I think they will never, ever talk to me again.  My thumb and forefinger were so tender that it was difficult to button my shirt.  I just had to let them rest for a few days after working on the transitions between the rockers and the legs.  Because there are just not too many flat surfaces on this piece that can be machine sanded this means that most of the sanding is done by hand.  

Fortunately for my fingers due to the type of finish I will use on the test piece it does not require any additional sanding.  However, the cherry still has quite a bit of work left.  I started by setting the chair upside down on the work bench and began with the bottom of the rockers working my way from 120 grit sandpaper to 150 and ending up with 220.  I will stop there until just before finishing then go over the whole chair one more time using 320 grit.  If I had gone with a coarser more open grained wood like oak I would probably stop with 220 grit.   However, my experience with cherry is that stopping at 220 grit still allows very fine scratches to show up through the finish.  One of the things that showed up as I moved to the finer grits was the occasional scratch that did not sand out.  The fix is go back to the previous coarser grit, sand that spot then go on to the finer grit, sand and see if it is gone.  If so, you’re good, if not repeat.  While upside down I examined the leg to seat joints and had to back up a bit.  What I thought was fine at the time ends up being not as good as it could be.  I think the experience of sculpting has taught me as I did more of it.  Anyway, I needed to refine the joints with a small file before doing the finish sanding. 

Finished Front Seat to Leg Joint

Rear Leg to Seat Joint - Not Quite Done

 As I was sanding the legs another wrinkle popped up.  The plugs covering up the screws are made out of katalox which is a lot harder than cherry as a matter of fact its Janka hardness is nearly 4 times that of cherry.  In addition I installed the plugs so the exposed part is end grain which is even harder.   The result is when I did the sanding the cherry being a lot softer sanded away quicker than the katalox.  This gave me a slightly raised plug rather than one dead on flush.  The fix is to use to use sandpaper backed by a hard surface to sand smooth.  Not really hard to fix but it did take some time.

With the underside of the chair done I flipped it over and started on the top side of the rockers and those infernal leg to rocker transitions.  From there I worked my way up to the seat and ended up with the top of the seat.  Not many photos here because the only thing more boring than shots of sanding is watching paint dry.  At this point I have only two things to do before applying a finish.  First is to fix the thorn in my side better known as the flaw in the side of the seat and second is to go over the chair with 320 grit sandpaper just before I put the finish on.  Have I mentioned that there is a lot of hand sanding on this project?

At this point I have two chairs nearly ready to finish.  The one made out of cherry and then the test one made out of 2x4 and 2x6 construction lumber.  They are nearly identical with these differences:

1. The construction lumber pieces are thinner at just under 1½” thick while the cherry is a fat 1¾”.
2. The construction lumber rocker has 5 back slats versus the cherry one having 7.  There are two reasons for that.  First is the splay angle for the rear legs on the test chair is less than the cherry resulting is less width at the headrest.  Second, I just did not want to make 7 slats for the both so the construction lumber chair has slightly wider slats but 2 less.
3. The construction lumber chair’s back is a few inches shorter because the lumber I had was not long enough to make the back legs the same length as the cherry.  It’s a test piece remember, and at first all I was going to do was test out the sculpting process for the seat.

Since I was still undecided on how to fix the flaw in the side of the seat I thought I would do some sample fixes and see if one stood out.  I took a leftover piece of cherry and drilled four ¼” holes (roughly the same size as the flaw) in it about the same depth as the flaw.  I then filled them using 4 different methods:

  A.  Super glue and fine cherry sawdust.
  B.  Translucent tan epoxy.
  C.  Same tan epoxy and 50% fine cherry sawdust.
  D.  Black epoxy.

I let everything cure overnight then sanded them flush and worked through the various sandpaper grits to 400.  When that was done I put the sample against the flaw and made an evaluation.  At this point "C" the translucent tan epoxy and 50% fine cherry sawdust looked the best. 

Next was to give the test piece a quick coat of lacquer to see how it looked against the dampened flaw.  I dampened the flaw to simulate the color after the finish is applied.  With these changes the fix that looked the best was "B" the translucent tan epoxy.  Since this epoxy is translucent it lets the structure of the flaw show through albeit softened but provides a smooth surface.  

With the decision made I mixed up a small amount of the epoxy, packed it in the flaw, let it set overnight to harden then carefully filed it down flush with the wood and sanded it up through 800 grit sandpaper. 

Finished Patch of Seat Flaw

With that done I started on the FINAL sanding with 320 sandpaper in preparation for finishing.   To reduce the darkening of end grain when I finish I hit those areas with 400 grit.  One good thing about the finer grits is they don’t sand the skin off my fingers quite so fast and my poor abused finger tips really appreciate that. 

Chair Sanded and Ready to Finish

After the sanding was done I thoroughly cleaned up the shop dusting off all the equipment, sweeping the floor and while I was at it dumping both dust collectors.  Since I will be doing the finishing in the shop I wanted to get as much dust cleaned up as possible.  Last steps are to vacuum the floor, blow any residual dust off the chairs then set the air cleaner to run for 6 hours and call it a day.

Shop all Cleaned Up and Ready for Finishing

Next up, the final step – Finishing