And so it begins.

Last night I made some sawdust.

It was good sawdust.

I cut a 2' by 4' piece out of a big sheet of luan. That will be the cutting board for the small model.

I also started ripping the 1*6 that will become the cleats around the temporary frames. I cut one lefty and one righty, for balance. I don't know if I did much to raise my heartrate, but I can feel it a little in my shoulders this morning.

Finally, I marked out my guide lines on the sheet that will become the model boat and started thinking about marking, cutting, and assembly.

Things I learned last night::

The orange big box has better pine and molding pieces than the blue big box. But the blue big box sells "white" oak and has better plywood. If I go with hand-ripped oak wales they will come from the big blue box. If I use precut trim it will probably come from the big orange box store.

The Vaughn Bear pullsaw really does cut a lot faster than my old Stanley crosscut saw.

Drywall screws really do make excellent temporary clamps.

If I do not use a cutting fence (1*3 screwed to the plywood), I can not cut a straight line in plywood.

I have to pay very careful attention to my cut line if I am going to cut a straight line in a pine board. And if I don't want to bevel my cut I am going to need some sort of ripping fence here as well.

I am thinking about getting a couple of straight-edged 1*x planks, some bolts, and some wingnuts to make into a ripping brace.

Relax and let the saw do the cutting.

The big take home is
1, use a fence to guide the saw
2, let the saw do the cutting

I think I can manage that. At least for straight lines.

Posted by Red Ted at August 21, 2007 11:38 AM | TrackBack