How do I hold down a small log?

Re: How do I hold down a small log?

Jim in Burlington Ontario

>Mounting them with screws on a board out of the question? Bench dogs come to mind. Using 2 bar clamps to make legs and then clamping them down to the bench. Just some thoughts.

Re: How do I hold down a small log?

Todd O. Cronkhite Native of Maine

>No Jim, I really don't want to mount them with screws, bench dogs, well possible, but they'd have to be tall. Don't quite follow the idea of making legs out of bar clamps, would you elaborate on this idea for me?

I'm formulating in my mind something along the lines of a baseboard with two uprights, one on each end, with threaded rod going thru one end to push the log up against the other end.

Guess I've got something to sleep on tonight eh?

Todd O.

Wedges (long, rambling - are you surprised?)

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>When I did the railings for the porch project, half of them were too long for my bench. I fastened a 2x4 to the bench by running a carriage bolt through the 2x4 and then through a bench dog hole and bolting it down; and propped up the other end, which cantilevered into free air from my 5 foot long bench, with some metal laundry-tub legs, overlapping each other (half upside down, so the "feet" pointed up on one leg and down on the other), screwed to the underside of the 2x4 and vise-gripped together where they overlapped (hey, it's what I had, and I had to disassemble it at the end of every shop session because I couldn't shut the shop door otherwise, so I needed convenient).

I then screwed blocks of 2x4 to the top surface of this beam and used plastic carpenter's shims to wedge each railing section in place. "Folding" wedges seemed to work best - two wedges facing in opposite directions, so that their outer faces were parallel, and pounded alternately to tighten up.

Worked fine, including holding the railings on their curved edges, though I had to be careful not to get too carried away with the planes when they were up "on edge."

Scaling this approach up and using more substantial materials and connectors than I did oughta get the job done, and would be historically kinda correct. Eric Sloane was the first to teach me that old-timers used wedges a lot.

I'm not sure how large the flats are that you propose to make, but you should consider wasting the wood away in the most efficient possible way: axe, drawknife, etc. One technique I've used in the past that works well though it's funky is to scribe my lines on both sides of the work; cut down through the waste to short of the line on both sides, at regular intervals spaced based on what feels right; then, observing grain direction (DAMHIKT), whack off the waste in blocks with my chunkiest chisel. I then progress to drawknife, scrub plane, or whatever is the appropriate technology before moving on to jack, smoothing plane, etc. The technique is CLEARLY shown in the highly refined engineering-grade drawing below.

Digression: I've wanted to try this for roughing cabriole legs but haven't gotten a round tuit, not because I don't have other alternatives, but to test my hypothesis that, had I but known, I could have made cabriole legs for our coffee table all those years ago and made LOML happier.

Re: How do I hold down a small log?

paul womack

>I'd just make a coupla' big 'v' blocks.

BugBear

Re: Wedges (long, rambling - are you surprised?)

Ernie Miller Topeka

>Why not scribe the line and get out the trusty rip saw and have at it then you will have a board to plane and not a log. Bill Gumbine did a post on the pond showing a jig he made for holding logs to cut bowl blanke for the lathe with a chain saw I think this would work here. If you get lazy you could even use a chain saw to rip the log but that wouldn't be very nander of you.

Re: How do I hold down a small log?

Jim in Burlington Ontario

>I was thinking you'd like to plane the flatest side first. So if you put 2 bar clamps on the rounded side the length of the log to make the top sit nice and solid for planing. Then clamp them to the bench. Once the top is nice and flat it will be easy to hold it down with bench dogs. I'm picturing something similar to runners on a sliegh with the clamps bieng the runners.

How's about a

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA

>Jig that is fashioned after a lathe bed (I'm thinking 2x4 here and you could screw into the center of the log ends. Not a lot of good wood in at the logs center I imagine.

V blocks and pinch dogs

Bob Hackett

>Cut some V blocks out of 4x stock as Bugbear suggested and either use bench dogs or what we called pinch dogs or block dogs.We generally made them from re-bar forged to a point on each end and then bent alittle more than 90 deg at the ends to from a square shaped C looking dog.Spike one end into the end of the bench and the other into the endgrain of the 1/2 log.If you bend the ends of the dog past 90 they will draw the log tighter to the bench as you drive them in.

Come to think of it,you could just rip a V into a big enough piece of beam to serve as the bench and just drive the dogs into that instead of puttin` holes in the end of your lilywhite,not so much as one gluespatter bench.

Oh yeah,I`m talkin` to Todd O here.Sorry homeboy,drive on.

Mainely,Bob

Re: V blocks and pinch dogs

paul womack

>Come to think of it,you could just rip a V into a big enough piece of beam to serve as the bench

Nope - that only works with UNIFORM round objects.

BugBear