Making Miniature Furniture

Today's blog is a sequel to the last blog I wrote on 16th January. I made a miniature wooden chair last time, with plywood. It looked good but I wanted to make it with real timber.

I asked Juno and got some American Walnut which was good texture. I drew a chair in real size using a software ViaCAD and reduced it into 1/6 scale. I put a printing of the drawing onto the board and cut it using an electric scroll saw.

Then, I sanded the edge of the cutouts neatly. Putting every part in the correct position is difficult and I paid close attention to do the right work. I know this is just a hobby but I was doing it very seriously.

Juno gave me an idea to hold small timber with sticky tape. I don't know if it is a common way to do it, but this was a really good idea and worked well.

The first chair's backrests were glued on the frames of the chair, this time I caught backrests in the frames. This procedure is awkward and took time but looks better than the first one.

Luckily, we have lots of small clamps, they were just a good size to hold my miniature chair.
I took almost a day to complete the chair. Here it is, this is my second wooden chair of 1/6 scale. The tote bag on the chair is also 1/6 scale.

The next day that I made an American Walnut chair, I made a miniature outdoor bench because there were narrow pieces of offcut timber. I was going to cut the timber by the electric scroll saw as I did before, but Juno suggested that I use a CNC router. He imported the DXF data and cut the bench frames. It took about 20 to 25 minutes. It's easy and noisy.

After cutting the frames, as I did the day before, I sanded and made sure the size of each frames. Then, routed the edge of narrow timber, these timber would be the seats and the backrests.

The next step was the last step, putting the narrow timber onto the frames and then, I was finished.

I really enjoyed making miniature furniture. I would like to make 1/12 scale miniature next time.

Yukari

The Effective Utilization of Timber Offcuts of Puzzles

In our workplace, there are plenty of timber offcuts. Silver Ash, Queensland Maple, Zebrano, Jarrah, each of these timbers is beautiful and I haven't wanted to waste them. I have been thinking what I am able to do with them and one idea came up in my mind. I love miniatures but haven't made any miniatures with wood. All right, let's make miniature furniture using those cutoffs!

I like chairs, I don't know why, I just like them. Therefore, I have decided to make one.
I asked Juno that if there were suitable timber cutoffs, then I would draw a chair by a software ViaCAD as Juno always does when he makes puzzles. It's very convenient software. I printed out the drawing and put it onto the board and cut it by an electric scroll saw. This electric scroll saw is my treasure, it's called "General." I heard this model is the same as "Excalibur," which is sold in the U.S. and Canada.

The size of the chair I made is 1/6 scale. I was at a loss at first to decide between 1/6 scale or 1/12 scale. 1/12 scale is the worldwide standard size of dollhouses but I thought it's small and difficult to make, then I chose 1/6 scale. Anyway, this time is a trial. I was going to make a prototype and am going to see how it will be, therefore I used plywood.

As you see in the picture below, there are some holes. If I compare plywood to a ham sandwich, some parts have no hum! (see the red circle in the picture)

I was a little disappointed but the prototype looked good.
 (Later, Juno fixed the hole! Thanks.)

I'm going to change the size and design a little bit and am going to make miniature chairs with real timber. I will show you when I have finished making them.

Yukari

Making Checkouts of Puzzle Pieces Safely

Last time, I wrote about the safety measures of our table saws and this time, I'm going to write about the safety measurements again. You may think that my explanation is long-winded but you want to keep eight fingers and two thumbs, don't you?

As you know, puzzle pieces have complicated checkouts. Making these checkouts accurately and safely, we need a jig called a sled.
Here is a sled that Juno made and the next picture is a dado* cutter.

Dado cutters have thick blades and they turn at high speed, therefore it's important to make the working environment safe. Please take a look at the picture below. The red part which I circled is one of the covers for safety. Under the cover, there is a dado cutter.

As the next picture shows, if there is no cover the dado cutter can be touched easily and it's really dangerous.

The next safety measure to show you is a stopper. (see the blue circle in the picture)

In case of pushing the sled too far back, even if there is the safety cover, the dado cutter comes out and there's a possibility to touch it by accident. This board on the back end of the table saw acts as a stopper and you may not push the sled too far. Another point is to keep the sled moving the distance it needs. If it can cut the pieces as they are needed, it is not necessary to push the sled a lot further.

The next attachment is the panel which is fixed on the back end of the sled (see the green circle in the picture). As I wrote, the dado cutter turns at high speed and it scatters sawdust and debris. It is not often but sometimes the tip of the blade breaks and small metal piece might fly toward you at high speed. This panel prevents these things from flying.

The last trick to introduce is this small rectangular block with a handle.

This block is for holding puzzle pieces stably and also works to prevent touching the blade.

As you see, the dado cutter is just underneath these puzzle pieces. The blade is so close to fingers and it is extremely dangerous to hold these pieces by hand, therefore it is turned by using the holding block.

Juno makes holding blocks in conformity to a thing to make.

See you next time!

Yukari

*Dado: A kind of wide checkout. It is commonly used by burr puzzles.