Router bit question

Re: Router bit question

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

No idea what a dart is but using a silicon carbide grinder you can reshape carbide router bits. However, the flat ground on a vee bit might not cut and if it didn't cut it might burn unless under cut.

Re: Router bit question

Bruce, a MN Galoot

How about, like Bill’s suggestion, find a chamfer bit and grind off the stem that holds the bearing.

Re: Router bit question

Barry Irby

Bill, doubt if I can describe a dart. Imagine you cut the corners off a square leg making it an octagon. Then you cut a point on the pieces you cut off, maybe five inches long, and glued them back on so the ends of the legs are squares and middle is an octagon.

I am trying to figure out how to do it without cutting the corners off. If I had even a little carving skill I could do most of it with a router and then shape the dart part with a hammer and chisel. I may try it. Each leg has 8 darts, 32 per char and there will be six chairs. So by the time I do 192, I will either be really good or really bad.

Might be time for a redesign?

I ordered a used like new bit and will remove the bearing and shaft for the bearing. Damn Amazon, $17 for that, so cheap I ordered a replacement for a reducer sleeve, just because I could not find it. I store all my stuff at Amazon.

Re: Router bit question *LINK*

John McGaw

I'm still trying to figure out your precise definition of "dart". Is this feature straight or curved? Is it anything like the "lamb's tongue" sometimes seen in square-to-octagon (or simply chamfered) features? When turning a square-to-round transition on turned legs it is usually done with a slight saw cut to prevent tearout and then finished with a gouge or skew but, being on a spinning lathe, everything is rounded.


Lamb's Tongue

Re: Router bit question *LINK*

Barry Irby

Wow, I like the lamb's tongue.

I am trying to post a link to the table I copied. I am posting the table because it is easier to see the dart on the table than on the chairs. You can poke around on the site and find pictures of the chairs.

I like the lamb's tongue because it appears it would be durable and not prone to cause an injury. Not sure it would be easy to do. It appears Lee Valley advocates doing it by hand.

My son and DIL are both military, he's a Major in the Army and she is a Major in the Air Force. They will be moving a lot. They want chairs that will take some abuse.

I am considering making chairs like the ones on that website shown with the table. With changes. I would make the legs similar to the table legs, have a padded seat and eliminate the padded back, substituting curved backrest slats.


Oak table

Re: Router bit question

John McGaw

OK. Now I know what you mean.

And I don't see any easy way (or any way at all for that matter) to do that detail without a lot of manual intervention. The easy(ish) way would be to fudge and use a simple chamfer guided by a jig to achieve the lead-in and lead-out but that would eliminate the "raised edge" that seems to be the big selling point in that detail. There is a big reason that I prefer Shaker-inspired furniture -- it doesn't have so many fiddly bits to contend with.

I might be over thinking this....

Barry Irby

I usually do.

I am slowly coming to the conclusion that I am the only one who would ever notice the difference in what I can cut with a straight spiral router bit and what they have and even if someone notices, I don't think they would care.

I want to find an efficient way to do this. Even if I only make six chairs, that 24 legs, 96 chamfers and or 192 lamb's tongues or darts.

And, I am a long time admirer of Shaker Furniture for the same reason.

Just looked at Plunge Ogee bit....

Barry Irby

Looks like a Whiteside Plunge OGEE bit 3608 or 3606 would do this nicely and leave lamb's tongue at the end.

The 3608 appears wider and would cut the chamfer in maybe two passes.

This may be the ticket. Thanks.

Re: Router bit question

Mike in Zuni VA

Barry,

A couple of questions and comments:

First, can the darts be applied? It does not to appear it would be difficult to apply the darts to the leg. Then you could jig up for the darts.

Second, the chairs in the link you provided does not appear to have darts. I am not for sure, as the picture quality was some what fuzzy. Also the description also called for a stopped chamfered leg , which to me indicates no darts.

Just my observations.

Mike in Zuni VA

Re: Router bit question

William Duffield

I've always shaped my lambs tongues by hand. I can't even imagine how I would do it successfully with a router. If you are not really good at carving, final shaping is helped by a half round file. There are lots of articles and videos out there on carving them. A quick search did not turn up the video I learned from originally, but this one shows basically the same technique and advise:

http://www.woodsmith.com/magazine/extras/153/a-lambs-tongue-chamfer/

Yes and a question for Mike?

Barry Irby

Mike, you may be right. The pictures are pretty poor, I will look again.

Let me ask you a question. I have some oak 2 X 4's, If I make the legs out of them it would allow the back rest to lean back about two inches. Does that seem like enough? I have wider oak but want to be frugal here.

Re: Yes and a question for Mike?

Mike in Zuni VA

Barry,

From my Windsor chair training I usually make dining chairs with a 10 to 12 degrees back lean. I had to go back and look at the pictures again as I thought the back was vertical, but indeed they have some back lean. Just eyeballing the picture it does not appear a 2 x 4 is big enough. Depending on how wide your wider stock is, you should be able to get multiple pieces out of 1 piece with less waste than a single piece (nesting them when you lay them out).

Barry, in the pictures the legs appear to be greater than 2 inches in thickness. Do you plan on a design change or are going to glue stock up to get the additional thickness?

Mike

Re: Yes and a question for Mike?

Barry Irby

Mike, I have some thicker wider stock. Some of it may have gently curved grain that would work well for those back legs.

The problem is there is about a 1000 BF of white oak sitting on top of it and I have not good place to put it, nor the strength and energy to move it.. It's the remnants of a huge tree that fell on my rental house. There are several pieces in there that may become the top of a natural edge river table. It's also the wood the table was made of, so it will match nicely.

As for the legs of the chairs, they do look like they are more than 1 1/2" square. I will make them out of whatever my stock is. Not necessarily 2 1/2" square, but large enough to look beefy and yet not too heavy. This is part of the struggle to make very sturdy chairs that will hold up to military moves and be serviceable without causing hernias.

Re: Yes and a question for Mike?

Mike in Zuni VA

Barry,

I had figured as much. Just wanted to make sure you were observing what I had seen.

Mike