One of the main obstacles here, is the different variety of timbers that are readily available.
The woods here are absolutely unknown to me, such as gidgee, red gum, kaori, myrtle, houn pine and countless others.
Glen Rundell and Alistair Boell have worked very hard and exercised a great deal of ingenuity to make the available woods suit the windsor form. It makes me realize just how lucky I am to live where there is such an abundance of suitable chair wood.
Because the available woods don't split well, the spindle and arm stock is sawn first while green, being careful to follow the fibers. Once in billet form, it's on to the shavehorses, where the wood, a form of ash, behaved reasonably well.
Since I've been here, I've learned a lot that I look forward to sharing, and in the tradition of classroom innovation, some of the differences here have spurred on new thoughts that I'll take home to advance my own work.
One especially interesting technique that Glen and Alistair have developed, is this strap for bending the continuous arm bow. Even the most well behaved local timber won't bend without some form of strap, and these straps that they've come up with are ingenious, and work great!
Given the limitations of the wood, this class has proven itself to be a hardy lot, and quick with laugh to boot.
6 comments:
I like that seat for the shave horse!
Whoa Nelly. That's some shaving horse!
(Or as they say in northern New England Hoss.)
And hasn't Melbourne put on its finest weather for you.
Hi Pete
yep its can be a difficult wood to bend, cooking it longer may help, a couple of other chair makers in Australia may be able to advise what sort bends easy for them, try www.rarechairs.com.au this guy did say what type of tree he used and www.rbhchairs.com.au . Enjoy tour stay hope you get to see plenty of this beautiful country and looking to the chair conference
MiM. 0409179905, (03) 54281355 if you are up in the Macedon Ranges area.
I would like to see what the final chairs look like.
That houn pine is a very tight grained wood as far as I remember.
I think I might want one of those straps as well.
Haha. I like the horse foot on the shaving horse. That must be a first
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