preprius

The pressure to activate the clamp is up and toward the piece your clamping. This tries to pull the base out of the hole. Then as the clamp starts putting pressure on the clamping piece it then puts pressure the other way. So pressure changes direction from the aspect of the hole. The toggle clamp has to be adjusted within a 1/4 inch to actual work correctly. The better clamp is the one thar you pull down away from the clamped piece. my joint using a scroll saw does work well. If I do another one it will be with 1/2" purple heart. instead of 3/4" poplar.

I got a harbor freight workbench. It has holes for clamping. These are called dogs holes. I got this idea that harbor freight's toggle clamps could be used as dog clamps. So I created a base for the toggle clamp. I got 3/4" dowel and then cut a slot in the dowel. Now I can cut half rounds in a wood base to match the dowel. It would be hard to do this by hand but scroll saw worked very well. It turns out this specific toggle clamp sucks big time for this application. But the dowel and base works pretty well. I will just cut off the toggle clamp.

Welcome to the village. I am Mark from California. The experts in the village has helped me many times. When I got stuck I asked questions and attached pictures. Having functional scrollsaw projects makes for good challenges. Please share your projects. I would love to see them. Me. Mark Eason

I started here with lot of frustrations. Only 4yrs ago. I ask lots of beginner questions. Within just about a year, I was getting good enough for Me. A few of the experts told me to use the pattern as a guide. If a piece breaks off during cutting just make it look like it was cut and move on. It, the pattern, is only a suggested guide. This was the biggest statement to overcome my own attitude toward my quality of work. Another expert said to relax your shoulders and go slow and let the tiny little blades do the work. After doing a couple of simple fretworks, I moved on to intarsia. That was a whole nother level of frustration. Because I made my own butterfly pattern and it was a bit hard for beginners. The gaps between pieces was my frustration. But I shared it with the village and the said it was good enough. People won't be taking it off the wall to examine the gaps. Then I attempted with bowls. Simple shapes. I got expert advise to start with flat pieces top & bottom. It helped my gap issue. Bowls are another type of project that you can have fun with. It gave me the confidence that I can do ok with scrollsaw. Fretwork letters are really scary to try. And my attempts sucked. But the experts here also mentioned that fonts are many. So my cuts may not be exactly like the letters but it who cares it might become your own font. Yep even letters are just a guide. Part of wood work is surprises of both good and bad. Surprises of the good kind come in cool patterns of grain. Internal wood blemishes show up in bowls which is nice. Bad surprises are a challenge of how to recover from mistakes or broken pieces. In most cases the villagers can help you recover from the bad surprises. Like my high school math teacher said, show your work. We can help better with pictures. If you don't want to share with everyone you can send private message to who ever you want. Then he can share with specific people if needed. One more note: search on this village helps a little bit. But if within 20 mins, you can't find good results just post a new question. Search results can be a frustration issue also. My comments from your work above. These are great. You have explored the people and pets and then created some new animals. Good stuff. I have seen lots of animals in town, at banks tellers, my Dr's office, at 2 different restaurants. These are not mine. I wanted to make something different, so I made some micro drawers and give them to places I visit. See my 2 How to articles. Can my stuff compare to Dave Monk or Frank EV ? Nope. But it is good enough for Me. Me. Mark Eason

Yes nice and pretty. I have the 26" version. Right now it has a #1 pegas mg blade installed.

I have 2 projects not finished. Over 2 years now. 1) Probably 2 or 3 days of work to fix it. 2) Maybe 2 days to get it done. and 2 more projects just starting.

Seth welcome to the village. I joined here about 4 yrs ago and learned so much. These guys and gals helped me through some interesting problems. They like pictures a lot. Ask question, share pictures, and teach us new stuff. I am Mark, from California.

ooh, nicely done with the cholla spikes. Is that also a young Joshua tree ? I was wondering how to do Joushua trees. Yes. it resembles the arizon flag.

So my work in progress on my hat rack is under question. here is the link to that post. I have decided to make a 20 mule team on the front of the rack. The flat panel is 35 inches long 4 inches high. I want to make this more of an art piece. @FrankEV I printed a good old picture on line of the 20 mule team in action in the desert. I glued this the the wood. The problem with using old photos and a long object is detail. But this will work well on my piece of wood. The picture has a slight angle that shows a 3d effect on wagons and mules team. Question... To enhance this 3d feel I want to either add the pieces to the flat wood, OR should I just cut the pieces to emboss (relief) the animal and wagons. The size of the wood prevents me to true angle cut to do the relief. I would need to only angle the left and right parts of the objects. the second and 3rd picture shows the add on pieces technique. This has a 15 degree angle cut to try to show they mules are going away. All wood is 3/8 thick. I plan to stain the animals and wagons to make then stand out even more. Ok now for open end questions. What else can I do to enhance this project? The mules can be painted instead of stained. This adds a lot of work to try to get the harnesses and ropes. Painting will also be able to get the human details. I traced a real horshoe and cut 2 of them for possible ends. All suggestion welcome. Even the 20 mule team can be thrown out for a better idea. Me. Mark Eason

Nice cutting. The bloodwood is really hard. That does look like 3/4" thick. Thanks for saying 20 to 30 min per blade. What protective finish did you will do on the "bloodwood"? Shop question: Did the insulated garage door help? My door face south and they are not insulated. Me. Mark Eason.

Now thar is a nice looking ship / boat. I like how it shows the crosswinds. All flags and smoke seems to be consistent.

Welcome to village. There are some great tips and tricks all from the experts. There also some great artists hanging around here. I am a visual only Backyard astromony. Also read "cloudy nights" forum a lot. Me. Mark Eason in California

with the bad edge is could be rounded off. so you don't have to plane it down.

Hi villagers... I finally decided to do something. But I ran into some small hurdles. Those hurdles were really small because I remembered some tips I read in the village. I wanted to make a joint that slides into another wood. This one is is at 45deg. So I remember someone saying single bevel cut, you can only do with spiral. So you cut without spinning the wood. Using all sides of the spiral blade. Here is the fit check. It is too tight need to sand it. Here is my scrollsaw sander / file. The other tip was great , another piece of this project was longer than my 26" C arm . . So I remember to turn the blade so it cuts backwards. No picture. But a great tip. So it was a simple project but I am not done. A simple towel rack. But it won't be holding towels. I had to do a size check before I continue. Actual placement on the wall. I have to shape the corners and decide what fretwork to add. Suggestion for fretwork are welcome.

fraud. stop talking these guys.

nice and clean cuts. good southwestern feel.

one of my favorite characters. He had the best lines. For your project it looks great.

New ideas, if I remember your buddy is young. To keep his interest try to tap into his imagination. Cartoons he watches. Disney characters? What toys does he have. Can you add a toy something to enhance other toys? Toy story movies are based on old toys from us old guys era. what would story story be 30 years from now? What would the Woody character play with now? Have you seen people and pets scrollsaw theme? Simple and cute. Olympics are coming up, maybe do some events with the same type of people. Search for bandsaw boxes. Those will get your wood imagination going. Scrollsaw boxes are better than bandsaw boxes. For outside of the box, not for youngsters , the tattoo artistry is another way to get ideas. My dad would make up stories about road signs "Falling rock". It was an Indian looking for his horse named "Falling rock". He had side stories about life lessons. Make up a character, have your buddy name it and draw it. Then run it through the scroll saw.

I am a Titebond III user. Rarely do I use other titebond. Yep the nozzle can get clogged. I takee a needle nose pliers to pry up the cap. Then I unscrew the top and use same pliers to pull the dried glue out. I have been tempted to try the silicon brush applicator set from rockler. But I think that it won't help with Titebond III. I might try keeping the bottle upside down. As suggested above. But I won't change glues. My hats have 1/8 inch in butt joints only. They have survived 3 summers. I even experimented and left it in the car in the desert on a 107 deg day. It also survived 2 rain day experiments. I might try this... https://www.rockler.com/rockler-precision-glue-applicator-bundle

inexpensive but , Fabulous and fancy also frilly

for me, lack of ideas. or lack of decision of what to do next.

Finished project..

It turns out there is another part of this project that my daughter in law wanted. A tree that she goes to on hikes. She sent a tree picture. So I had some lacewood that the grain patterns now looks like leaves. The height of this wood is 4 inches. Thickness is 1/2 inch. All cut with spiral blades. I mixed #2 with #00 to help with contouring of branches.

my brother has been in woodworking and was a Rockler store manager. He told me to check "General finishes" out and try them on my wooden cowboy hats scraps. I tried water based general finished side by side with oil based finished from "General finishes" Arm R Seal is oil based wipe on wipe off. The oil based is so much better to bring the magic of black walnut. When I did the tiny feet drawers I tried the Osmo (oil based) hard wax. side by side with Arm R Seal. Both look great. The wax Osmo won't be as durable be it will make it feel like furniture polish. Kid toy safe. I also did this side by side on the recent feathers I did. All 3 feathers were different wood. I went with Arm R Seal because of the softer wood Butternutwood I wanted it to be stiffer. Osmo is very expensive but it does not need much. It is also considereal toy safe. Kids can chew on it.

Arm R Seal or Osmo