Berea Trip Report #3: Nemot00ls meets Adam Cherubini

This is the last Berea trip report, I promise. I had the great opportunity to sit in on a couple of Adam Cherubini's lectures. He's a unique personality and very knowledgeable. His mortise chopping technique was very different from Frank Klaus's, and I think I may try melding the two together.

First, Adam only scribes one line with the grain, not two, and chops to the line. This makes sense. If the mortise chisel is the width of the tennon, what other mark do you need? I know that I have had slight accuracy issues when my mortise marker was not exactly set to the width of my chisel. Which of the two lines to follow? Stick to one or the other? Try to stay in the middle? Getting rid of one of the lines just simplifies the issue.

Secondly, he pares, bevel up, a shallow groove to outline the mortise before chopping. This serves to help further in aligning and registering the chisel. His technique, if I can describe it properly, was to hold the mortise chisel like a pen in one hand, with that elbow flat on the bench for bracing and orientation, and while holding the handle with his other hand, leaning into the chisel with his shoulder. This sounds like serious contortion, but it looked pretty easy. I'm going to try it. If I can get a photograph of myself doing this, I'll post it. I will say that the big broad handle of the pig sticker mortise chisel lent itself to nesting against a shoulder so maybe Adam's contention makes sense that paring with your shoulder leaning into the chisel is the ergonomic way to do it.

My only concern is that a high bench would be the best choice for this technique, but a low bench works best for planing. Does this lead you to a need for two benches?

Berea Woodworking in America Road Trip Report #2

Well, my trip to Berea is starting to look like a hunt for celebrities. It wasn't intended to be like that. Still, since Roy Underhill was here, I took the opportunity to get a photo op. He was very gracious and patient. He is also a very entertaining speaker. Every seminar had some comic relief in it that generally involved a source of inappropriate beverages. In one, he had a giant wooden plane prop with a hidden compartment in it for hiding a liquor bottle. He was also very supportive of the other speakers on stage with him, helping them with camera work and tools and generally playing second fiddle even when he was the big celebrity. I appreciated his maturity in that regard.

He and Frank set up a demo of chopping mortises in which a glass panel was clamped to a board which allowed us to see every stroke of the chisel as it went into the wood. This was displayed overhead via a digital camera. It's interesting to note that Frank's method of chopping a mortise was very different from Adam Cherubini's, which I will explore in my next installment. Frank just started whacking a little inboard of the top of the line and worked his way down to near the bottom line. He didn't drive in deep, but made several passes. On each pass, he started and finished a little closer to the end line until he finished right on the line. He managed to lever out chips as he went and kept a relatively flat bottom. I've been starting in the middle and working my way to the ends. I seem to always get a big hump in the middle which I have to work to lever out.

Berea Woodworking in America #1

As promised to my woodworking friends on Wood Central, here is the first installment of my trip report about the Woodworking in America conference in Berea, KY. My first experience was running into Ellis as he walked in to the registration desk. I recognized him immediately, though he had no idea who I was. Like a star-struck groupie, I grabbed him and forced an unfortunate bystander to take our picture together. I was probably more thrilled than either Ellis or the other poor schmuck. But, hey, it's all about me, right?

My plan for this convention was to learn as much about cutting dovetails as possible and to that end I managed to attend three seminars about dovetails. Frank Klaus put on a great demonstration of the pins first method. I've always been a tails first kind of guy, but one look at his techniques and I'm a convert. I'll post a demonstration on the blog, here soon.

More updates coming.....crossing paths with St. Roy, Adam and more.