Travis

Great cuttings! I really like the Tied Together. The long dimensions really make it stand out. Did you have to make a custom frame for that? Good job!

Hi kardar2. Welcome to the Village. I really like your portable workbench. Plus, when you scroll in the driveway, there's much less sweeping. I'm going to have to think about finding a nice portable system. It would be really cool to scroll in my backyard. Hrmmmm....now you got me thinking. Your cutting looks great! I can't wait to see some more. Be sure to check out the Pattern Library for some more stuff to cut. Lots of good stuff there. We'll keep you busy for quite some time...

Welcome to the Village, Butch. We're glad to have you on board. I think you'll have a lot of fun here. Lots of talented and friendly folks here. You'll fit right in. There are a few scroller clubs that I know of in PA. You can find a nice list on the wiki. Hopefully one of them will be close enough for you. Clubs are a great way to meet other scrollers and learn new techniques. I wish I had one close to me. Oh well. I look forward to seeing some of your work. Have fun!

Well, Ron, I've tried playing around with it. I didn't have any luck. I think the installation is intended for Unix users. It requires a lot of command line arguments, which is a bit beyond my skill. Unless someone else knows how to do it, I'm pretty much clueless. But don't worry. From what I can gather, the User Manual you downloaded is for version 2.4. The current version of GIMP is 2.6. I'd pretty much stick with the online version of the manual. It will more likely be up to date sooner than the downloaded version. Besides, the downloaded version is 40+ megs, which is a lot of space. I'd much rather use that to store patterns. You can find the online version at http://docs.gimp.org/en/. I hope this helps.

Wow, that turned out awesome! Good job! Make sure you throw that in your User's Gallery. That really deserves to be showcased. I don't mind the butt joints at all. Miter cuts along the edge of a board might be a bit tricky (at least I've never had good luck with them). Finger joints would look good too. Plus you could cut that with a scroll saw. Nicely done!

The lessons will be available all of the time, so you can work at your own pace.

I hope everybody had a wonderful Easter! We had a lot of fun in my home. Big family dinner with lots of kids running around and getting hopped up on sugar! Here's some bunny cars I made for my son's Easter basket. Very simple, but he's thrilled.

Hi Ron, I'm not quite sure what the problem would be. I'll give it a try when I get to work tomorrow and see what I can come up with. I normally use the online documentation (which seems to be down at the moment). But I usually find that to be the most up to date and easiest to get. But I'll fiddle around with the downloaded version in the AM and see what I can figure out. One thing I could throw out for you. It is a bz2 file format. That is a type of file compression (the help files are 40+ megs, which is another reason I prefer online documentation). I think WinZip opens it up. But you can do a search for the bz2 file on your computer. I would think it would download to your desktop. But you can check your My Documents folder too.

That's great! Congrats on the sales! Its nice to see a little positive cashflow. I would love to see you put together one of those rockers. I think those are really neat. I look forward to the pictures!

Every little bit helps the wiki. That's the great thing about a wiki, you may add raw info and somebody might come along an organize it (and usually in my case, they come along and fix my spelling errors ) Thanks for adding to the wiki. It truely is a collaborative effort. Without a community adding to it, its nothing more than empty pages.

LOL....I do what I can. I'm glad everybody's enjoying the video series. I know I learn by watching.

Hi Lesley. Welcome to the Village. I think you'll have a great time here. Its so nice to be able to meet new people who share the same interest. Folks you probably wouldn't have the opportunity to meet otherwise. There is so much talent and very knowledgeable and friendly folks here. You'll fit right in. When you get done with your craft show, you should give us a little update. I love hearing how people's shows went. I have never had the chance to participate in a show, but I will someday....when life slows down a bit. Welcome aboard. We're glad to have ya.

The first thing I removed was the foot too. I hate it. In my opinion, it's not worth having unless you're teaching kids how to use a scroll saw. Since I don't have a scroll saw stand that came with it, I use a workmate bench instead. I prop a 2x4 under the back end of the saw. This tilts the saw just slightly toward me which makes it easier to see and cut. Then I clamp down the saw to the bench. I also made a blade holder which I really like. Nothing more than PVC tubes with endcaps in a MDF holder. Works great! Lastly, I keep a bunch of business cards at hand. If I need a zero clearance insert, I just cut a slit into the card, feed the blade through, and tape it to my saw bed. Works great for delicate work.

The class will be available all of the time so you can go through it at your own leisure. The videos will be posted in the forums as well as Scroll Saw Goodies. You can continue to ask questions in the forum long after the class is officially done and I'd be happy to answer (no surprise that I'm always on to answer questions ) But I think the real value would be to participate as the class is in progress. Open discussions and brainstorming ideas is where you can learn a lot. After the class is over, the participation and discussion might be significantly less. Gimp is a bitmap/raster graphics program. Like blame said, it's available at gimp.org. Another free program that's really nice is Inkscape. Inkscape is a free vector graphics program available at inkscape.org.

Good tip, Christina. I do the same thing, but with Photoshop. Works really well if you need to modify a PDF to fit your own needs.

Hi Chkorte! Welcome to the Village. I know what you mean about collecting patterns. I stopped counting my patterns and started measuring the thickness of the stack! Collecting patterns is about as much fun as cutting them. There are so many talented designers out there. Its really cool to be in a hobby where everybody helps everybody else out. Anyway, welcome aboard! We're glad to have you. I look forward to seeing some of your work. You can set up a User Gallery to show off a little. You can find a tutorial on how to set one up here. If you have any questions, just ask. Everybody's very friendly here and will help you out. Happy scrolling!

There is a trivia game (often played with booze) called Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. The premise is that every actor can be linked to Kevin Bacon in 6 steps or less. I'm horrible at the game, but my friends did really well with it. Which usually meant I was passed out on the floor before 11pm Ahhhh...the college days. Here's how it goes: Shirley Temple was in Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm with Ada Lynn who was in JFK with Kevin Bacon Harold Lloyd was in Sin of Harold Diddlebock with Angelo Rossitto who was in Smokey Bites the Dust with Rance Howard who was in Frost/Nixon with Kevin Bacon Eminem was in 8 Mile with Eugene Byrd who was in Rails & Ties with Kevin Bacon André the Giant was in The Princess Bride with Christopher Guest was in A Few Good Men with Kevin Bacon

Sweeeet

OK. I think I have this worked out in my head now...LOL. I have a roughed out syllabus which I think might work. Here's the trick. I want to combine Scroll Saw Goodies podcast with the forum-based class. I'll be offering the videos on SSG as well as in the forums. The forums will be the only place to find things like written instructions, self-quizzes, source files, and Q&A. This will also be the place to get feedback on a personal/final project. The class will be structured by having lessons tackle specific aspects and each forum thread will talk about only that lesson. But as far as participation, that will be somewhat open-ended. Basically, if someone learns of the classes 2 weeks in, or even 1 year after the fact, they can still participate. With that said, it might be better to follow along with the class as its happening. That way an active discussion could help answer questions, troubleshoot problems, or maybe even come up with different techniques. So here's the run-down. The class will start on May 4th. It will run 6 weeks, with 2 lessons each week (Tuesday and Thursday). We'll be all working off the same picture. It will be a portrait that starts off as a color photo. Since it is a portrait, and I wanted to do a celebrity, and the class runs 6 weeks, I decided to call this class: 6 Weeks of Kevin Bacon LOL...I find that really amusing. Does anybody get that reference? Or am I the only one?

Along those same lines, you can use a closet rod or large dowel and slice them up with a miter saw. That would be a pretty easy way to make wheels.

That's the great thing about this hobby, there are many different elements that make it enjoyable. I enjoy designing patterns, but I know not everybody does. My dad either has me design patterns for him or he buys them from Wooden Teddybear. He has no interest whatsoever in designing his own. Besides, patterns aren't terribly expensive anyway. Plus the tend to be pretty well put together, so you don't have to worry if it will or will not work. I belong to the Windfield Collection Pattern Club and naturally I buy every scroll saw magazine. Plus I buy lots of books. So I know how easily it can add up. I only cut a small portion of them, but I still enjoy them. I look forward to seeing you finished pieces. If you feel adventurous, you should take some work-in-progress pix of your chandelier or candelabra and post them in the Works In Progress forum! I'd love to see them being put together.

Great work, Blame! We're starting to get some good info in there! I encourage everybody to add to the wiki. Its really easy to do. Just click the Edit button and add your two cents. There are lots of areas that need more information. Don't worry about breaking it or doing it wrong. Its pretty bulletproof.

Boy, those are really cool. You did an awesome job on those. There are several kids riding in style now. Nicely done!

Hi Shelayla! Welcome to the Village. I think you'll have a great time here. Lots of friendly folks here and enough patterns to keep you busy for quite some time! Boy, you don't mess around when buying a scroll saw! The Excalibur is a really nice machine. You're going to love it! I can't wait to see some of your work. You can set up a User Gallery to show off a bit (you can find a tutorial here). Anyway, we're glad to have you on board! If you have any questions, just ask. Everybody is very knowledgeable and willing to help.

If you have a table saw, you can cut down your own. Just find a hardwood dealer near you and they sell ply in 4x8' sheets. Much cheaper that way. You can use Woodfinderto find a dealer near you. This is how I get my plywood, anyway. My other suggestion would be Sloans. They have very good service and the stuff I bought from them was top notch. You could also check eBay. I know there are a lot of lumber dealers there too.