00243 Pieces ready and frames rebated

I've sanded down some pieces I bough to give a much more pleasing look and used the table router at the woodwork class to dash off the frame rebates:



The frame pieces need to be cut in half, then mitred when I have the laser cut boards back. Hope the boards work out, if they measure up they'll look amazing.

Meanwhile the barstools are already in use daily:

00240 Stools coming to an end

I've now cut down the stools' legs to the right size and I've begun waxing the seats to stop the kids from greasing them up. I'll probably do the legs,too, although they could probably do with some extra sanding first. Meantime the tops continue to warp a little, which, while it isn't a nightmare, still causes me some aggravation as they are making the legs sit unevenly on the floor. I'll wait 'till they're done moving and then I'll trim them some more.



Generally speaking they're a great success and I'm now waiting for the wood to arrive to start my backgammon board. Mmmmmm,can't wait.

00237

I've actually done with the stools, bar a little finishing (anding and oiling), but haven't taken any pics, but here they are before the legs are cut down to fit the island:



and here's a view of them from the Sketchup pre-viz I did:



Not bad at all.

00234 Stool progress

No not an update on my constipation, but the images of the stool seat. I've got this leftover oak from the shelves in the house and they've been cut down and biscuit jointed together to make a large enough surface for a seat. Then I've laminated the leftover reclaimed French railway oak from the living room floor to each biscuit jointed seat and compressed it like so:



Then, once dry, Dave, the woodwork supervisor has set me up with this rig for routing out circular shapes and voila, circular seats:





Next up, it's putting a curve on the edge of the seat and beveling the legs and then treating them and screwing them on. Probably take the rest of the year and that backgammon board isn't going to make itself.

00228 I've got the legs

After receiving the legs that I'll be making the stools out of and reviewing the materials that I have for the seat, this is the latest iteration of th bar stool:



Here's Cara with all the legs and a close up of a finished surface:



The legs taper - which I wasn't expecting. And so it seems that without an even remotely simple way to straighten them without revealing the screw holes at the top of each leg, I'll have to stick to the current shape. The only other option is to slim them down, but keep the taper. We'll see.

I'm going to the class tonight, where I'll be giving Barry the oak to be thicknessed down to make the seat.

00226 The best laid plans ...

So after deliberating for weeks on the design of the board I was going to make during the course of my evening classes, I was faced with the revelation that the school in which we were attending the classes was undergoing a minor spring clean, the result of which was that 40 laminated table legs were now available for anyone who was interested. Barry, the course tutor, suggested that someone might like to think about a bar stool project.
So I did the Sketchup thing:



Funny thing, really, seeing as we need two custom sizes bar stools for the island. Anyway, long story short, this will be the new project and THEN I'll do the backgammon set.

Should I be pleased? The funny thing is that I SHOULD be, but I can't help dwelling on the weeks I spent obsessing over something trivial.

Oh, did I forget to post up the legs available? They're really nice:



Oh, and the other thing that I forgot to add was that all of these ideas for the stool were based on a design by Alvar Aalto