Yandles Woodworking Show

This afternoon I set my stand up at the Yandles Autumn show. I always get here in plenty of time as they put out the stocks for the show and it gives me a chance to have a look before the rush.
 No wonder I'm smiling these two slabs of brown oak are wonderful and will give me numerous panels or box lids.
The wood has not been seasoned and to avoid excessive cracking and speed up the drying process I will resaw them into 1 1/4" thick boards. They will inevitably warp especially the outer boards but on balance it's definitely worth it to achieve the minimum of surface degradation.
Last year I bought some equally stunning burr walnut slabs and I'll be using these on a project shortly, watch this space!

Timberline wood yard

Today I called in to Timberline wood yard in Tonbridge. This is one of my favourite yard and I've bought some wonderful timber from Bob over the years. He specialises in exoctic timbers but does also stock home grown wood.

Since the arrival of Hamish (see below) it is now the most tidy and well organised wood yard I've ever seen.

Here is the machine shop, they supply a lot of fine instrument making blanks.

I came to buy some dark timber for the slab legs of a bench I'm making. The legs needed to have a finished size of 13" wide and 1 3/4" thick and this board of Wenge was perfect.

I knew Bob had some Anderman Padouk which came from Alan Peters workshop and I bought  a board last time I was here. This is rare stuff and very expensive but I couldn't resist buying this lovely plank which was bang on quarter sawn and ideal for making boxes or wall cabinets. James Krenov made some beautiful pieces from this fine timber.

High Angle Smoothers

Here is the last of the batch in Indian Rosewood, this one has lovely lighter streaks reminiscent of Brazilian Rosewood.

A pretty backside!

This plane was saved to last as the mouth turned out a touch too wide to sell. Adding a dovetailed brass insert  sorted  it out. The mouth is now extremely narrow and suitable for the finest work on the most figured woods.

Here is one of the batch of Rose Bubinga planes just completed, they all have Rosewood cross pins and brown oak wedges just to add a touch of contrast. They turned out very nicely.

Wood Storage

My wood store is a mess! I have about 200 cube of timber (about 2,500 board feet for those in the US)

Wood piled upon wood, I wonder what's at the back.

This was not a very safe place, I think this shelf and it's support are at their limit!

The following pictures are some of the wood that resurfaced, above is a board of figured Cuban mahogany.

A thick plank of rippled olive wood, without any cracks.

More olive wood, imagine what this would look like book matched.

Zirocote transitioning from the sap to the heartwood.

Some lovely brown oak, one of my favourite woods.

This piece of figured ash was bought from the Edward Barnsley workshops at the end of my two weeks there, this was the last piece of a whole butt of wonderful wood.

Madagascan rosewood at it's best, with black lines and varying shades.

Some rippled English walnut bought from the workshops of the late Alan Peters. With wood like this I must stop making so many tools and make more furniture.

After a days work things looked a bit more organised and safer!

I can now see the wood from the trees (sorry!)

During the tidy up I filled 26 sacks of wood for the fire, a combination of trimming up waney edged boards and getting rid of unpromising timber, I should be be this ruthless more often!

Jointers finished

After a few diversions the latest batch of jointers is finished. This one is for left handed use and is on its way to California. The fence is shaped and fitted to the right hand side of the plane.
As the Indian Rosewood was so dark I decided to make the knob and cross pin from Concalo Alves to give a nice contrast. The wedge is oak which has good spring for firmly gripping the blade.

The rosewood came up very nicely with 4 coats of Melamine Lacquer, an oil finish would have lost the definition of the grain.

Here is one in Bubinga, the heaviest plane in this batch. It's pictured with the fence attached ready for work.

Bubinga has a strong tendency to blotch with an oil finish, this is avoided if the wood is sealed with shellac or lacquer as I've done here.

The last wood I used was Concalo Alves and this turned out nicely as well. This responds very well to an oil finish and came up with a nice soft sheen.
It has a streak of brown so typical with this wood.

Weekend in London

This weekend we went to London to celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary. We walked through Sloane Square and came across the showroom of David Linley. The furniture on display was very nice but all veneered, not my cup of tea. The humidor top left was £16,500, that's a good enough reason to give up smoking!!

A few doors along there was a posh antique shop with a pair of these massur birch cabinets.

In the next window of the same shop was a Nakashima armchair. The shop was closed so I couldn't go in and have a closer look, shame.

On the road to Buckingham Palace we saw the guards on parade, it was a lovely day.

Outside Buckingham Palace, the flag shows the Queen was in residence, but we didn't see her!

Website Upgrade

My website has been updated to include my popular mini smoothing planes as well as jack plane which is a really good all-round size.
I've updated my courses at West Dean college with one coming up in November and another in May.
My new DVD has also been added and the the shows I'll be doing have been revised..
Please visit  http://www.davidbarronfurniture.co.uk/david_barron_tools.htm

I should update my website more often but it's costly, that's the beauty of having a blog, it's free!!