Monthly Archives: December 2016

Electronics, Found Materials, Restoration

Fixing a Broken Power Switch

My dad’s old record player had been out of use at my mom’s house for years because of a bad power button. He had good taste in AV equipment and I didn’t like seeing it sit unused. I offered to trade my mom a working but nothing special Technics SL-BD2 for a broken Phase Linear turntable.

I started testing things out and found a problem very quickly. The power button was sticky at best, and never seemed to click and move. The action should have been similar to a click top pen, but there was hardly any movement.

Getting to the switch was a pain. I had to take the turntable completely apart to get into the switch. Outwardly there did not seem to be anything wrong with it, but clicking it directly I felt the same resistance as when it was installed. It wasn’t the button cap causing the problem, there was definitely an issue with the switch itself.

Continue reading Fixing a Broken Power Switch →

CAD, Design, Guitar, Woodworking

Bassman Amp Design – CAD Model

Motivation

The recent find of some good looking 3/4″ plywood was the swift kick I needed to get the ball rolling on a long dormant project. A few years ago I started down the road of building a Fender Bassman clone based on the 5F6 circuit. I was going to do this remotely with a friend. He would handle some electronics analysis for some mods we had in mind, and I would guide the mod selection and build the cabinet. I even went so far as to buy a chassis.

Unfortunately the project never went much further and the chassis sat in the corner of my room for a long time. Then, looking for a CAD project to practice on, I picked it up and got a sheet metal part about 80% done. It was a full box with one of the three faces completed with punched holes.

Getting Started

Knowing I had the chassis model nearly done I started to put together a model of the plywood cabinet. I’ve never had much luck modeling larger assemblies from the ground up and wanted to try something new. I had heard the term “top-down” in relation to CAD models and it seemed like the way to go.

Step one was to do a little research on Fender cabinets similar to what I had in mind. I wanted to skip the 4×10 configuration the Bassman is known for in favor of a much more portable and apartment friendly 1×12 combo. I used a few pictures and drawings of the 4×10 configuration to get an idea for the parts involved, then changed the baffle design and size to fit a single 12″ speaker.

Continue reading Bassman Amp Design – CAD Model →

Carving, Outdoors, Textiles, Woodworking

Carving Net Making Tools

With my recent haul of wood scraps to carve I started looking for another small project to work on. While looking around I came across a Ray Mears video showing how to make a sort of shuttle or bobbin to use in net making. In other words, this is a project with an immediate follow-up, a perfect choice.

I recently fixed a chipped edge on a hatchet recently and was still itching to put it to use. I grabbed the leftover limb from the letter opener I carved and went to town. The first split left two pretty unequal halves, so I split the larger again. The piece I ened up using was the smaller of the first two halved.

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Net-tools-shuttle
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Net-tools-collection

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Step one was to clean up the split edge and try to get a relatively flat surface to work with. The tool I was carving had two sections, a straight section with two “horns” at the end, and a section with a needle carved out of the center that came to a point.

There were several knots in the limb to work around. I found the longest knot free section to use as the more intricate side of the tool with the carved out need. The base of this need would be just ahead of a knot, and the “handle” would extend on the other side to the next knot.

This project was definitely a step up from my usual projects as it incorporated a free floating inset piece. Working on something so delicate definitely encouraged me to go slow.

After getting the net spool together I used another small scrap to make guide. The guide will ensure equal spacing when it comes time to test this out and make a net. It is essentially a plank of wood with a somewhat airfoil shape.

Next up is testing these out.

Carving, Crafts, Woodworking

Spoon Carving

After finishing my first couple of wood carving projects I was looking for the next one. I had seen a few spoon carving DIY posts about carving spoons so I decided to try it out. I also happened to need some new big kitchen spoons for cooking.

After spending a minute on Amazon I opted for a two sided hook knife from Morakniv. I chose this specifically because both sides of the blade have an edge, and since this is my first and only dedicated carving knife, I wanted to make sure it would do as much as it could.

The next night while eating dinner my girlfriend got an invitation to, of all things, a spoon carving party. The hosts are avid outdoors-people and one is particularly into wood carving. Of course we agreed to go, and of course I told everyone about how crazy the timing was for me. Unfortunately my knife didn’t come in time for the party, it was waiting for me when I got home, so I used some of his knives during the party.

The idea of the party was that before anyone would eat, they would carve a spoon. Fortunately for the guests, they didn’t hold us to that. We may not have eaten until midnight if they had.

We got to work pretty much right as we walked in. I grabbed what turned out to be a piece of cedar to carve, which was fortunate because it was one of the easier pieces to carve. In fact, I was the only person, save for Luke the master carver and host, to finish a spoon by dinner.

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Spoon2-side
Spoon2-back
Spoon2-standing
Spoon2-natural-habitat

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Seeing my spoon while we ate, everyone who had at that point given up on carving decided that they wanted to finish. After eating we all had a second go at carving. I picked up a second piece of mystery wood and starting working. This piece is darker and noticeably harder than the cedar. I got a good way through, but did not finish that night. Fortunately I had to tools to finish it at home.

Over the next week I would put a little bit of work in at a time while watching TV. The result is a much sturdier, but also much more refined spoon. It looks like it will be a really good soup/ramen spoon.

I did a quick sanding on the cedar spoon, which gave a cool dimpled pattern by only subtly breaking the edged of each cut. For the darker spoon I will sand out the inner bowl, but leave the hand carved finish for the rest. They will both get some mineral oil to seal the wood, then they are ready to go.

Found Materials, Woodworking

Found Supplies: Russian Birch Plywood

Perusing the Craigslist free section has turned up a few good finds for me. This week it provided me some nice 3/4″ Russian Birch plywood. I was able to pick up four pieces of plywood, each roughly 9″ x 80″.

I’ve had a few projects kicking around in my head that requires plywood, but since this looks like some nice wood I’m thinking it may end up a a cabinet for a Fender Bassman chassis I’ve had for a while.

Found-materials-russian-birch-plywood-full
Found-materials-russian-birch-plywood-length
Found-materials-russian-birch-plywood-width
Found-materials-russian-birch-plywood-edge

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I guess it’s time to start looking into amplifier cab designs again and get an idea for dimensions…

Carving, Woodworking

Carving a Letter Opener

As I near 30 and make some serious changes in my life I’m looking for things that I have had a continued appreciation for. One of those things is wood working. I spent a lot of time playing with bows and arrows as a kid, then building skateboarding ramps and larger plywood projects as a teen. I’ve taken on a few projects in the years and I’m working on wood carving, which I haven’t done much since I was a kid with a  pocket knife.

I’ve picked up right where I left off, sharpening some pocket knives and going to work on some tree branches. During a trip to Ace to pick up some fasteners for my guitar rack I noticed some tree trimmings by their dumpster. I grabbed three branches. One was about an inch and a half in diameter and two feet long. The other two were about four inches in diameter, the shorter one about eighteen inches, the long one about two and a half feet.

My first project was inspired by a whittling book I found at Powell’s. It showed some intro projects and among them was a letter opener. I picked a good spot on the thinnest branch and found a section with knots pretty evenly spaced on opposite sides of the branch. I decided that would make for an interesting pommel and started thinning what would become the blade.

Letter-opener-profile
Letter-opener-blade-spine
Letter-opener-blade-edge

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Taking the blade down reminded me what I enjoyed so much about carving wood. The way the solid wood peels away in delicate flakes and strips. The way the wood is slowly peeled back to expose each new layer, and the way the grain lines create a sort of topographical map of the carving.

Before too long I had slowly worked my way down to a relatively flat section about 1/4″ thick. I started shaping the wood and remembered something that always plagued my spears and arrows from childhood; the center wood was soft and inconsistent the surrounding wood. As I shaped the blade I needed to be very careful to minimize the effect of that soft wood on my blade shape. I couldn’t eliminate it completely and the blade still shows a slight “chip”, but overall I’m pretty happy with the shape.

I sawed the knife off the longer limb with a pruning saw and called it complete. I had considered removing the bark or carving the handle, but have decided to leave the natural look and look ahead to future projects.

Carving, Outdoors, Woodworking

Carving Wooden Hooks

Another Ray Mears inspired whittling project that I have taken on recently. Using some of the scraps from my recent letter opener project I carved and tied some hooks.

There’s not much to say about these guys. I used knot free sections that had split off during other work. I cleaned them up and carved them to shape.

Fish-hook-collection
Fish-hook-weave-closeup
Fish-hook-weave-collection

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The first hook I carved was pretty large and I used a cut off finishing nail to form the point. I tied this on with the inner strands from some 550 paracord.

I carved a few more small hooks, using small wooden spikes for the points. I had wrapped one with hemp cord as well, but when pulling the tag end through the windings on the shaft I caught the hook and broke it.

Uncategorized

Found Supplies: Chopping Stump

I’ve had my eye out for the right size log to use on my patio when carving or splitting wood. That’s right, this is for my second floor apartment patio. That means size is king. What I’ve been hoping to find is a log 12″-18″ in diameter and height.

Finding a single log for something like this isn’t as easy as hopping on Craigslist as most of these types of listing are for larger batches of firewood or recently felled trees. Looking for a single log means most of these people aren’t interested in setting up a time for you to come grab one.

Fortunately for me, as I was walking home from the gym I happened across a huge pile of woodchips in front of someones house. What initially grabbed my attention was the aroma. The sharp smell of the cedar cut right through the morning air and make me perk up.

I took a closer look at the pile and saw a few rounds sticking out. I kicked one, expecting it to be a longer piece of log, but found that it had been cut down to about 18″ tall. It was my dream log.I excitedly  went home to get my old lady shopping cart to wheel it home.

Once I had it out on the patio I had to take a glamour shot of it with my recently sharpened hatchet.