I haven’t been getting to the shop as much lately. A friend I’ve made there called it my sanctuary. It is.
Tonight, I went with the intention of trying something. The larger goal is to make a kerf-bent plywood stool. For most of tonight, I was cutting wood but not all the way through. The idea is to create a gap that the wood can fold itself together into. The trick is to cut just deep enough and space out the gaps just far enough that the outermost laminations stay intact while the rest of the board bends into a curve. It’s a fine balance between the thickness of the saw blade (the kerf), the depth, the spacing, and the fibres of the wood.
Because I went in without expecting to leave with a finished product, but instead to walk away with some learning and new ideas, everything I tried was a success. All of my time, and all of the wood, went toward something useful. It’s an interesting way to spend your time, staring at 1/8” wide gaps, that are no more than 3/8” deep, in a piece of plywood while trying to figure out what’s different between them.
Of course, my impatience obstructed some of my progress. I wanted to do something tonight, to materialize an idea I’ve had floating around in my head. I couldn’t get ahead of myself, though, because I have so much to learn. And, learn is what I did.
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