Sometimes I plan out the topic of the podcast, other times it's entirely made up (sorry, not sorry). For others, the topic comes out of the chitchat John, Logan, and I have before we hit 'record.'
Mortising Bits
That last one is how this episode started. Logan is building a set of church doors. The plans will end up in PopWood. What's interesting is how similar and totally different entry doors are compared to cabinet doors.
Logan used a cope & stick shaper cutter for the frame pieces. Since these are heavy exterior doors, he's using loose (floating/slip) tenons to carry the load. His tool of choice is the Pantorouter. He ordered a 6" long end mill. However the geometry doesn't quite work. So it's back to a conventional spiral upcut bit.
I prefer a plunge router and a shop-made jig for large mortises. I use the Jessem Pocket Mill for small mortise and tenon work.
Woodsmith has featured several door plans over the years. This Craftsman style exterior door is easy to make and offers a good lesson in building big.
Hardware Choices
Logan and the church are sorting through options on the hardware. Budget plays a role, but on exterior doors that are the face of a building, quality matters.
I'm facing a similar, though smaller decision on a box project. On small projects, the hardware faces closer scrutiny. I believe it pays to go with higher quality hardware.
I see a lot of boxes, chests, tool chests that incorporate locks. However, I question how often those locks actually get used to justify the price of a quality lockset.
Lumber with Personality
Speaking of projects, perhaps I have too many going on at once, I'm making a toolbox to hold carving gouges. As I was milling the white pine, the planer revealed blue staining along the sap wood. The streak is wide enough that I plan to work it into the design of the box. The wood is sound and the stain lines up with a natural division point in the box.
The mahogany in Logan's church doors have some worm holes. He's cutting around some and others will get blended into the door construction. Part of admitting that wood is a natural material.
Knots, sapwood, color variations, mineral streaks, spalting: all of these can enhance or detract from a project. For many pristine material is where it's at. I find that these marks add to the challenge of building an intentional and beautiful piece.
Transcript
Here's the transcript for this episode.
Phil (01:01.062) Hey everybody, it's the ShopNotes Podcast episode number 233. I'm your host Phil Huber joined by Logan Whitmer and John Doyle. Logan is the editor in chief of popular woodworking magazine. John Doyle is the designer in residence here at woodsmith and shop notes, among many other talents. On today's episode, we're going to talk about mortising bits.
and mortising techniques. We'll also be talking about flaws, blemishes and personality in your lumber choices. Really appreciate you listening and subscribing to Woodsmith, ShopNotes and Popular Woodworking magazines. What brings this all together makes it possible for us to be here for the podcast. Also want to do a little reminder that for those of you who who enjoy your podcasting on YouTube that the ShopNotes Podcast is moving to its own podcast channel. It's @ShopNotesPodcast when you're on YouTube. So you want to search for that. Don't forget to like and subscribe to make sure you get all the updates when new episodes come out. Alright. Also appreciate any questions or comments or smart remarks that you have for each episode because it's what
drives us. It is the rage that we feel in answering criticism that keeps us keeps us going throughout the week, frankly, this is how we get to Friday. So thanks for that. One more is a thank you to our sponsors, who also enjoy the shop notes podcast. This episode is brought to you by Harvey Industries.
Good enough is not good enough. See all of our new woodworking tools at harveywoodworking.com
Alight, last week's episode had just a few comments. Elphita says, you've heard of Jeeves? Logan's butler is Mr. Chips. As in Mr. Chips, this goes in the chipper.
Phil (03:53.554) because Logan be fancy like that with his shop butler.
Although it goes with John's side hustle that he was going to start. It's a franchise business, I believe, shop buddy, LLC.
John Doyle (04:06.601) shot, buddy. Yep.
Copyright pending there. Trademark.
Phil (04:22.838) U N J J E says I have a like new pair of lineman pliers just like John's saw with a little notch in the cutter. So
John Doyle (04:32.928) Turns into a wire stripper. Yeah, you went from a cutter to a wire stripper. That's how they make them.
Logan Wittmer (04:33.002) We call those wire strippers. Yeah.
Phil (04:35.154) Right. Yeah.
Logan Wittmer (04:39.446) Yeah.
Phil (04:43.506) Ian McCullough says, So what I'm taking away from this episode is that some modified saw modifications are just shocking.
Phil (04:54.938) you
Logan Wittmer (04:56.212) You know what you did.
John Doyle (04:57.758) Yeah, see yourself out.
Phil (04:58.354) Yeah. We are not above dad jokes on the shop notes podcast. That's for sure.
All right. Kick things started just before we started recording here. Logan was talking about his church door project, which is.
Logan Wittmer (05:22.933) Mm-hmm.
Phil (05:27.548) What I find, I've built several passage or entry size doors and it's really interesting to me how very similar it is to building a cabinet door in woodworking, but also extremely not the same at the same time. Yeah.
Logan Wittmer (05:45.76) Completely different. Yep. Yeah.
Phil (05:51.43) So, cause you saw or you sent out a photo of the, I don't know, dry assembly of the doors a few days ago. So.
Logan Wittmer (05:57.897) Yeah, yeah, like I've had the yeah, I've had the doors together And I went on Sunday Once today Tuesday Yeah, I went Sunday to double check some sizes on the the opening because like I have this nightmare that I'm gonna build these stupid doors Based on the measurements I wrote down and you know me being a dummy. I measured something wrong, right? So I went and double-checked cuz I'm like, this is like
I can just imagine getting these all together and getting there and they're either too small or too big, right? Better too big because you can them down. Like it's harder to deal with too small a door. So I went and measured and then I was like, all right, got these measurements. I have the picture in my head, took pictures, stay in there. I'm gonna build the door jams right now that way. I just, now I'm building it into an opening into my shop. So because there is,
There's the size of the door. So there's the opening in the church. There's that size. Then there's the opening in the door jam. But within that opening, you have to house two doors, six hinges, an astragal strip that keeps the two doors together. And you have to have a room for everything to open and move freely, as well as have weather stripping blocks.
Phil (07:06.587) yeah.
Logan Wittmer (07:26.099) to hold weather stripping. So like there's a lot of moving parts. Like the doors are one part of it, but then getting everything lined up and fitting right is the other part. So jams are together, not done, but they're clamped together. So now I'm at the point where I have this morning got everything set up and started to mortise all of the parts because everything is held together with a coping stick basically, stub, tenon and groove for the most part.
But I want deeper mortises to hold everything. So what do I do? I decide the way to do this is to order the world's longest bit. So this is a six inch long end mill. It's a four inch cutting length designed for metal. So it's a four flute end cutting mill. So you can actually plunge this. Some mills you cannot plunge. This one you can plunge. And I'm like, I'm gonna
Waller out some four inch deep mortises on this bad boy We're have eight inch long loose tenons in there world's gonna be great This is far too grabby There was just a quarter inch pass there was a little pucker factor because you got this thing held in the router like this And it's all spinning and yeah, so Changed my tune a little bit
I was texting my buddy Brian at Atlanta, he does a lot of entry doors. He's like, yeah, try that on end grain because it'll be better. He said he uses a Felder slot mortiser. He's like, you know, even the Felder is really grabby on side grain or at face grain. He's like, end grain goes a whole lot easier. But I'm like, you know what? These doors are only 30 inches wide a piece. They're heavy, they're 125 pounds.
So they are heavy, but I think a five inch long floating mortise or floating tenon, so two and a half inch mortise on each part will be okay. So that's where I am at currently is I have a nice spiral up cut bit loaded up. I've done mortises in one of my styles already. They're four and a half inches wide, two and a half inches deep.
Logan Wittmer (09:51.537) I have 6 tenons in each style, so I think we'll be OK.
Phil (09:57.819) Okay.
Logan Wittmer (09:59.369) So my buddy that, my tree guy dropped off a load of logs. I don't think my wife listens to this podcast. She doesn't know that he dropped off a load of logs here yesterday, but he did. And he's the one that hooked me up with this church. He's a Serbian and he's like, why don't you just like glue it together as is and then just run super long screws in from the edge. I'm like, all right, first of all, this is why you do tree work and not woodworking.
John Doyle (10:26.076) Yeah, you use really long pocket screws, come on.
Logan Wittmer (10:31.753) Yeah, but I'm like, know, like, I was talking to Brian when I was down there doing a photo shoot with him and he's like, yeah, you know, lot of manufacturers, when they do doors, they use dowels.
And he said, even vintage doors, they used dowels. He's like, and I've rebuilt a lot of vintage doors. And he's like, my problem is they come apart real easily when you're rebuilding them. I'm like, okay, well, that makes me not want to dowel it. But like, I don't hate the idea of like.
I don't know how you'd have to do it, but like if you did like all thread through the top and bottom and a nut and then plug the holes. So at that point you're basically doing what they would do with like a guitar neck. You're putting like a tension rod in there, but that's a really long hold the bore and like.
Phil (11:15.729) Okay.
Logan Wittmer (11:26.471) We're gonna epoxy those loose tendons in, clamp the snot out of it, should be just fine.
Phil (11:36.994) You could peg the loose tenons too from the inside face.
Logan Wittmer (11:41.776) I could. That is true.
Phil (11:44.08) You know, because I mean, that's a legit technique and even has some historic precedent that I've seen in, you know, cause it's not like loose tendon joinery is brand new for a joinery technique. It's been around a while, but, you know, if you didn't want them showing on the backside, those doors are plenty thick enough that you could run pegs in and have a lot of security that way.
Logan Wittmer (11:50.556) Yeah, that is true.
Logan Wittmer (12:05.074) Yeah.
Logan Wittmer (12:09.255) Yeah, that is a good point. I could do that. And that actually makes clamping everything up a little bit easier, especially if I draw a little bit, you know.
Phil (12:17.074) Yeah, because you could glue up the, glue the loose tendons into the rails, the horizontal pieces, let that dry, peg them, and then draw a bore the other side and...
Logan Wittmer (12:25.541) Yep.
Logan Wittmer (12:31.301) Yeah.
Phil (12:33.938) Yeah, because
Logan Wittmer (12:33.946) I think I'm way over complicating this, but...
Phil (12:37.552) Yeah, but it's also outside doors just have this weird life because half of half of it is inside and half of its outside.
Logan Wittmer (12:44.027) They do, yeah.
Phil (12:49.574) So it's like getting dry roasted in the winter and air conditioned. And then on the outside is whatever sunshine, rain, snow, sleet.
Logan Wittmer (12:53.734) Mm-hmm.
Logan Wittmer (13:05.116) Yeah, I don't know. It's just one of those things. It's like, I know I am over-complicating it. At least the good part about these doors, the guys at the church built this porch, so there's a very large overhang over this door. Like 12 foot deep and 14 foot wide. It's a huge overhang.
Phil (13:21.872) that's excellent.
Logan Wittmer (13:31.183) Think they did that because their original doors that are other were not weathertight So like they were keeping a lot of the rain and stuff out doing that So so, you know, I have a lot going for me here where there's you know some protection but Yep, so I'm hoping I'm hoping that by Tomorrow afternoon, I'm gonna be gluing up these doors I would like to get some of these panels stained today so I can glue them to
Phil (14:02.364) Nice.
Logan Wittmer (14:03.409) So, yep, I'm gonna, the panels are a decently loose fit. Like I got like an eighth inch all the way around or eighth inch. So 16th all the way around. And I'm gonna use some latex caulk dabs inside of there to kind of not secure them, but to keep them from rattling. They're tight enough thickness wise that they don't rattle, but I don't want them shifting around at all if I can help it. So.
So, yep.
Phil (14:38.34) End is in sight then.
Logan Wittmer (14:40.036) Yep. Let's get in there.
Phil (14:41.852) So have you done, you're using the Panto router for this. Have you done extra deep, extra large mortises on the Panto router before?
Logan Wittmer (14:46.512) Mm-hmm.
Logan Wittmer (14:55.555) Not that big. These are half inch by four and a half wide by two and a half deep. Biggest I've done, or maybe two by inch and a half deep, two inches long by, or two inches wide by an inch deep by half inch. It handles it, I mean, absolutely no problem. like the hardest thing is,
Phil (14:56.978) Okay.
Phil (15:20.188) Okay.
Logan Wittmer (15:26.416) Hindsight I probably should have done these deep mortise and tenons or these deep mortises before I did the copan stick
Phil (15:36.881) Okay.
Logan Wittmer (15:37.644) because it would have been easier to line up because now that that edge is profiled, it's hard to line up my center line on my tenon mark to the center line on the table on the Panta router because there's no square reference edge. Yeah. So like, you know, I'm getting close. and I'll probably just undersize those tenants, width wise instead of being four and half, we'll probably go like four and three eight. So there's just a hair wiggle room there.
Phil (15:49.984) that way.
Logan Wittmer (16:07.865) But yeah, that's the hardest thing. like, I can't use, because of the bit protrusion and stuff, I can't use the dust collection shroud on the Pantorouter, so it is very messy. It's not a clean operation. And I will throw hands with John. Mahogany dust is worse than walnut dust. Like, yeah, like, because it is just, everything is red everywhere.
Phil (16:30.477) that's a bold statement.
John Doyle (16:31.063) to them.
Logan Wittmer (16:35.876) Like everything in the shop is red. I did this weekend order a, so I've talked about putting a like attic fan, whole house fan in the shop before and like turning that on and blowing dust to let it suck through the roof. I decided that was a little ridiculous. So instead I ordered a 36 inch drum fan that I'm gonna put in the doorway and then I'm gonna backpack leaf blower. So that's supposed to be here Thursday.
John Doyle (16:59.072) Mm-hmm.
Logan Wittmer (17:04.129) We're gonna blow everything out into the wilderness.
Phil (17:09.042) There we go.
John Doyle (17:09.154) Is that going towards the house though? Is it going to make it that far?
Logan Wittmer (17:11.653) It is completely, I don't think it's gonna make it that far. It is a 22,000 CFM fan. It's huge. So I'm pretty excited about it.
Phil (17:24.114) So if on the next shop notes podcast, we have a little story about the fact that Logan's pole barn shop building just kind of imploded, like just squished in, you'll know why.
Logan Wittmer (17:31.663) Yeah.
Phil (17:38.13) All right.
Logan Wittmer (17:38.565) Sorry, it is a 21,800 CFM. Man. Yeah, yeah. Probably won't upload at that point.
Phil (17:41.804) well, that makes a big difference.
Yeah. John, have you ever done a door that size?
John Doyle (17:52.216) No, I don't think I've done like entry type doors or I mean I've done big cabinet doors that are you know three quarter inches thick or one inch thick but nothing like that heavy or big so.
It's new territory for me too.
Phil (18:14.022) Now when you do, so not doors, but just large mortises in general, what do you use for a mortising technique?
John Doyle (18:22.424) I if I am taking the time to like do them the way I'd like to do them. I usually try to use like a router to get, you know, good clean sides and and everything size correctly. But most of the time when I'm in a hurry here is just drill them out at the drill press and kind of rough them out and chisel seems to go.
Faster than trying to find all the right bits and tools and set up and all that stuff. So That's the quick and dirty way, but if I want to do it right I would get use of some sort of router and edge guide jig and and do it that way
Phil (19:12.018) Okay, that's fair.
John Doyle (19:13.784) Yeah, seems like you just get a smoother surface for gluing and contact.
Phil (19:23.632) Right. I feel...
Phil (19:29.968) Mostly the Gen X part of me feels a little rebellious to the fact that when I started at Woodsmith, whenever we talked about mortising, it was always drill it out at the drill press and then clean it up along the edges with a chisel and chop it square. And there was just no consideration of other techniques.
And I get that it's pretty accessible if somebody has a drill press, because you can do that even with a small benchtop drill press. That approach works. I think you need the right technique for it. But my issue has always been consistency on mortises done that way. Because I'd like all of the mortises to be pretty close.
in their width and that's not easy to do at the drill press.
Phil (20:31.781) in my opinion.
John Doyle (20:33.746) When we were doing, I think it was the trestle table class, you had brought in your mortising jig and router and had it all set up for loose tenons. that was the first time that I really, I mean, I've done it before, but it might have just helped that you set it all up and it was just ready to go. That was like, this is pretty slick, you know, everything's uniform sized.
Logan Wittmer (21:02.179) you
John Doyle (21:03.062) So then ready to go. So yeah, this is pretty nice. I can get behind this.
Phil (21:13.916) No, I've spent a bunch of time on that jig and I do, I have, it's grown on me that I really like that technique. I do use the Jessum, what is it? Pocket Mill Pro, the like drill powered kind of slot mortiser thing. Craig Tool has a version of it now and those are really cool.
Logan Wittmer (21:31.926) Mm-hmm.
Logan Wittmer (21:41.772) made by Jessum, just to point that out. Don't be, get off Craig's back.
Phil (21:43.28) Made by Jessam. Yeah.
John Doyle (21:43.574) You
Phil (21:49.298) John Doyle (21:51.136) We were all getting worked up there.
Logan Wittmer (21:51.437) So I gotta come to the defense of my boys and my girls over at Craig. Everyone's like, Craig stole it, no!
Phil (21:57.958) Yeah, no, I'm saying I like them. I just yeah. Yeah. Right. No, Craig did not steal it. They work together.
Logan Wittmer (22:02.519) Yeah, yeah. No, I know, it's, I'm, yeah. No. Yes, they developed it together.
John Doyle (22:07.702) Team effort.
Phil (22:13.98) So anyway, but that method works really well too. And it's kind of shocking how smooth of a process that can be.
Logan Wittmer (22:26.017) Now, let me ask you guys something, just because, Abigail, related to the door thing, but in general, in your projects, because A, I have spent a lot of time looking at hardware, and I am currently looking at an ad for hardware, because I have done such, and everybody knows what we do now. When you guys are buying hardware for a project, how do you...
choose what quality of hardware you are getting. For example, the desk I'm sitting at, I had planned on ordering really nice, like hand-forged type hardware for this desk. Some high quality hardware. But I wasn't, the stuff I found that I liked was super expensive. The stuff that was a little bit less expensive,
didn't meet the aesthetic I wanted. So I actually ended up buying like super, super inexpensive hardware from Menards. But these entry door, these church doors, I told the guys at the church, like, hey, like these are gonna be pretty nice doors if I do say so myself. So like, let's not throw a Menards Master Force handle on them. Like, do me, do me a solid.
I'm not charging you for these doors. Like you're paying the materials, but do me a solid and like at least buy some decent hardware. And we got quotes. We got one quote from a hardware company here in town and for what they call ladder poles, which are basically those thick and the big vertical handles that are, you know, there's nothing on them. It's just a handle that you pull two ladder poles, two push plates for the inside.
six hinges, two bolts for the top and bottom of the door of the non-operating door and door closers. It was like $3,300, which seems extravagant. And that's me saying that. Like that seems excessive. I know that door hardware is expensive, but if you extrapolate this out to like something like a
Logan Wittmer (24:54.114) smaller project like a box, like a nice little jewelry box or something. You you can buy hinges at on Amazon for $2 for a pair, or you can buy a set of brusos that will be $200. Like, where do you guys, how do you guys get to the end point where you're ordering hardware and what, you know, how do you decide how much you're spending? John just goes through the drawers in the shop.
John Doyle (25:21.381) I, yeah, free. I'm trying to spend free. No, I go with the date, marry, kill method of purchasing hardware. How long am I going to have this project? Is this just for a little bit? Am I just dating this project? Am I going to marry this project? Is it going to be around forever? Am I going to have to replace this hardware if I don't get good enough stuff?
Logan Wittmer (25:31.285) Okay.
John Doyle (25:47.674) Or is this just a kill? Like I'm just building like a reader's tip. I'm going to take a photograph of it and then I'm going to throw it away. That the thing just get the cheapest thing. So it's like, how much am I going to have to deal with this hardware? How much is it going to get used? Am I going to have to keep adjusting this if it's around for a long time? So that's kind of my. My motto of hardware purchasing, because it seems like like we've built like
tiny boxes for the TV show. I've gone through the sources to buy the hinges for them. And it's like $150 hinges or something like that for a little tiny box. And it's like, it's not going to get that much use. You're not going to see, I have a hard time, like, you know, spending that much hard for the hardware on a small project. But like what you were talking about big heavy doors that are going to be around forever. You know, let's spend the money, get something nice, something that's going to last because I don't want to come back.
for to replace the hardware.
Phil (26:56.69) That's fair. I think I would.
I try to take like a middle of the road approach because I've been burned too many times on really cheap hardware that has a nice appearance. To me, it has to do like knobs and pulls. It's like, what does it feel like when you grab onto it? You know, does it feel like it's just metal? Which they can be, but did they do it in a way that makes it
comfortable to hold on to? You know, are there sharp edges on the backside? Or is the plate metal actually bent around and then closed off so that it forms us, you know, more like a tube construction that you can feel a little more secure in using?
Logan Wittmer (27:30.272) Mm-hmm.
Phil (27:50.81) One practical example is, we had Mike Peckovich in for doing a TV show episode and he was building one of his little tea chest boxes and left stunt parts here and I'm finishing that project up. And I was asking him about hardware that he used for the lid, because it's got two little hinges on the lid. And he sent me a link and this is not to disparage one maker over another.
But he sent me a link for brusso hinges that were
basically one inch by one inch when the hinge is open, butt hinges when they're open. And it was $50 for a pair.
Phil (28:42.672) which I've seen Bruso Hardware, we use their stuff on a bunch of our projects here. It's amazing to have a butt hinge like that work the way that it should. And it's super cool, but I couldn't spend that. I don't know. I just couldn't justify that for hinges that were that small. And like you said, John,
It's not like this thing's open 60 times a day. I ended up finding similar hinges from Horton Brasses, which still pricey, but those were $20 a pair, and that felt better to me. So those are the ones that I ordered. You know, everybody's going to draw their line in a different place.
for the, I think it also depends on the level of the project. You know, is it an everyday?
Phil (29:48.74) entertainment center, TV cabinet kind of a thing, then it's going to get more middling hardware, in my opinion, than something that's meant to be like a, you know, 25th anniversary jewelry box or something like that, where you might splurge on some stuff.
Logan Wittmer (30:09.341) Yeah. Well, that's kind of like, I'm trying to help the church figure out like.
Now, where do they get saved money? Because that's not, obviously not what we're trying to, I'm not trying to get them cheap hardware, the cheapest hardware. I'm trying to get them a good value hardware that isn't going to take away from the doors because they want these doors to be nice. So I'm looking at some of the hardware available on Amazon and it's like, man, it just doesn't. Some of it's okay. Some of it appears to be okay. Like obviously you can't touch it and feel it so I don't.
know, but then there's some things on them like, you could tell it, that's kind of a cheap handle. Like, you know, most of these ladder pole style, you know, you had the handle and then you have two studs coming off of it that bolt through the door to those studs. Some of the ones on Amazon it's like, well, this stud actually slips over a piece you screw onto the front of the door, like a toilet paper holder. And then there's a set screw on the bottom. And I'm like,
Yeah, and that's kind of where I'm like, this just is not right. Like this, it's better than putting, you know, black pipe flanges with black pipe on the door, but not by much. Not by much. So, but you know what you shouldn't do is you should never use those vinyl, white vinyl drawer slides from the big box store. That's what you should never do. Ever.
John Doyle (31:43.569) Yes. Never. Never ever.
I mean, if you're a serious woodworker.
Logan Wittmer (31:52.018) Yeah
John Doyle (31:52.931) You
Logan Wittmer (31:58.12) So.
Phil (32:02.319) story.
Yeah, picking hardware is not easy to do. I don't think there's.
because it's a choose your own adventure every time you do it.
John Doyle (32:15.664) And most of it's online, like you said, and you can't feel it. So it's kind of just a guessing game.
Phil (32:15.846) I mean, there's something to be si- Yeah.
Phil (32:24.838) Yeah, you're like gonna have to be okay with being wrong and or returning stuff or just kind of eating a few of them to figure out who's
whose stuff actually matches the quality that the pictures appear to show.
if that if that's a thing.
Logan Wittmer (32:51.783) Yeah. Now, the one thing I will say is like going through a nice
High, let's look at, let's say a high quality company for hardware and just like browsing their site, the amount of different things that they have makes me want to build stuff that I would have never wanted to build before. Just seeing some of the cool hardware that they have. Like right now I'm on the Horton Brasses site because Bruce, for some reason, is the website's down. But like there is a tip top
John Doyle (33:22.8) Mm-hmm.
Logan Wittmer (33:29.818) table catch that just looks super sweet. It's 210 dollars. I've never had a desire to build a tip-top table, but I want to use that hardware for something because it looks sweet. Yeah, so some of it is just super cool.
Phil (33:34.226) Yeah.
Phil (33:42.524) something.
Phil (33:55.6) Right, yeah, hardware catalogs are very dangerous. And even their sites, when you start cruising around on it, it's like, kind of want to build kitchen cabinets so that I can use all these pulls and really nice brass hinges on them.
Phil (34:14.648) or build things that have locks, like drawer locks or little chest locks and put those on. Would you ever use them? No. Like 90 % of chest locks that go on boxes or tool chests or something like that never get used.
Logan Wittmer (34:17.756) Yeah.
Logan Wittmer (34:30.032) unless you're hiding your Girl Scout cookies from your spouse.
Logan Wittmer (34:37.212) Like this, come on. A Sheraton knob. It's just this really cool floral topped knob from Horton Brasses, but it is $114. Oh God.
So, I don't know. Like I will say, several years ago when I did this dovetailed tool chest for Popwood, that was one of my first like full build projects for the magazine. I did buy really nice hinges from a company in Ireland maybe. And I mean, they were kind of knife hinges a little bit. And...
Phil (35:05.384) yeah.
Logan Wittmer (35:22.136) I love them. They were, they weren't a hundred dollars for the pair, but they were, they were up there. Like they were close. But they are, if for some reason that chest ever goes away, that's the one you take the hinges off of, you know?
Phil (35:44.21) All right, that's fair.
You know, I think small boxes.
you know, where you're, where you have a much closer interaction with it, if that makes sense. Quality, quality hinges make more of a difference because on a small box, crappy hinges that have a lot of side to side play, you really notice that a lot more than you do on a, on a bigger project.
Logan Wittmer (35:58.661) Yeah. Well.
Logan Wittmer (36:10.971) You do.
Logan Wittmer (36:15.257) I will say, it seems to be that some of the hinges available on Amazon really seem to be pretty decent for the price. And I was first told that and I didn't believe it. don't remember if it was, I know it was either Shay or Shay Alexander or Albert Klein when we were there working on projects in Shay Shop. One of them had mentioned it.
Like, oh, these are from Amazon. They're actually super, like super nice. And I was like, okay, whatever. And I started playing with them during the photo shoot. Like, oh yeah, these actually are kind of nice. So those are the hinges we ordered for the little mantle box class I did. I taught and they are like pretty good budget hinges for what they are. But again, as you said, you kind of have to weed through them and be okay ordering stuff and then just shoving it in the hardware drawer for.
later use if it's not what you want.
Phil (37:22.962) All right, somewhat related to that, question that I had came up as a project that I'm working on for myself here is,
what you could sometimes call, I don't know, flaws or blemishes, personality in your lumber and how you would either cut around it or avoid it or incorporate it into a project. And my specific example here is I'm making a small box or a tote to store some of my carving gouges in and
This should come as no surprise to people. making it out of white pine. But the piece that I have has the blue stain along the edge, like kind of where the sapwood is. And it's the result of beetles and fungus working together if I'm understanding the science behind that. Though I am no wood scientist like John is.
Sometimes they call it, you know, like turn a problem into a friend, like denim pine, because it has that color of kind of a medium toned denim look to it. And I'm, since it's a shop project, I am going to try and incorporate it into it, because I think it would have a cool look. But would like to know from you guys, what are some of the
of some materials that you've used and incorporated into a project.
Logan Wittmer (39:10.03) Hold on, I'm gonna mute my mic so that my daughter doesn't squeal.
Phil (39:18.374) We'll wait. Yeah. One Mississippi, two Mississippi.
John Doyle (39:18.541) We'll time them. Yeah.
John Doyle (39:26.231) Yeah, I'm trying to think of like wood defects that I've incorporated. Doesn't necessarily come to mind, but there are like woodworking screw ups that I've had to turn into some sort of feature where it's like, I'll just put some sort of walnut inlay into this rabbit that I cut on the wrong edge of this tabletop or something like that. like turned, yeah.
Phil (39:53.852) Well, what about, what about say like if you're working with oak or even cherry, you can get small pin knots where it doesn't look like knotty pine, you know, but they, are smaller knots, like where, at what level do you just roll with that and rock it? And then where, where, where are you like, Nope, the board has to be pretty, pretty flawless.
John Doyle (40:02.336) Mm-hmm.
John Doyle (40:14.54) Right.
John Doyle (40:22.24) Yeah, no, I just the game table that we built recently for Woodsooth. And I'm not going to say where we got the lumber from, but you know, we had we had to work with it.
Logan Wittmer (40:32.137) It was budget clearance. Okay, yes.
John Doyle (40:38.602) Yeah, the price was right. You know, and the budget, it worked with the budget. But no, there were some, there were some knots in there that we kind of featured and put, you know, black super glue into to kind of tighten them up and they look good and some streaks of sapwood. I mean, by the time we got all done, it looks, it looks great. I mean, it looks like, you know,
Phil (40:40.977) Yeah.
John Doyle (41:08.638) natural wood and so I mean there were some defects and some some wormholes that we filled in that but covered them up or you know filled them and What else did we do we put some coffee grounds and superglue and some stuff and filled it and so I think it looks great
Logan Wittmer (41:27.798) Yeah? Yeah.
Yeah. So yeah, I mean...
Phil (41:33.83) You know, because some of the some of the mahogany that you had for the church doors, Logan had some significant wormholes in it. Yeah, man, there you go.
Logan Wittmer (41:44.118) Yep, I don't know how all those show up. So there's one there and there's one there and they protrude through on the backside there. You can really see them.
Phil (41:53.596) Yeah.
Logan Wittmer (41:55.064) So like I I fall under the mentality of like wood is a natural product, right? It's never perfect. You can I mean you can get clean and clear stuff. But that. In my mind, sometimes takes away from what it is right? Like if you want to build a.
desk out of Coruscant White Oak and you do it all out of perfectly Coruscant, beautiful flake White Oak, it almost looks like a veneered piece because you went through that trouble. Now, I'm not saying you shouldn't pick out good clean stuff because I think you should, but there's a point where I think you have to roll with what the material is and pay homage to
it being a natural material. know, the desk I'm sitting at, the craftsman desk, had kind of a calico-y section of the tree, so my top has some dark mineral stained spots on it. Like, it's kind of cool. It's a quirk about it. Now, there's a point where wormholes in an entry door, that is a problem. Like, you don't want that. So these...
in this panel happened to pop up after I routed the the og for this panel and They're packed with mahogany dust like I don't know what type of Worm this was Because they're huge some of them. I could actually stick my pinky through the holes
I'm going to try to stain this and see what those wormholes look like. might have to... What I really probably ought to do is seal around these with shellac, soak them with super glue to harden up this sawdust. It's actually really hard. It's hard to pick out. It's so dense. And then see if I can use this piece.
Logan Wittmer (44:15.36) Like there's points where it's structural that you want to avoid it, right? Like if a wood is so punky that it's kind of crumbling and falling apart, maybe that's not the right thing to use for your table legs.
But if you use it, if you're deliberate on how you use it, and you know what it is, you know, to me it's part of the charm. It's part of the story of that tree and how you used it. You know, I used the calico white oak for the top on this desk. There is some nasty parts of this white oak, but they're in the back because I wanted those in the back.
you know, that walnut, like, I mean, so that walnut that we used for the game table, as John said.
It ended up being a lot worse than I thought it was. Like hindsight, and I told you guys this as we were working on it, hindsight, it took us a lot of work to use that. The better use of that walnut, in my opinion, would have been cutting it up into much smaller pieces for some like chair parts and stuff like that where you need small pieces. And some of the grain was a little squirrely and that would work fine for like curved backs of chairs and stuff like that.
We made it work and you know at the end of the day it looks really looks really cool. You know, would it have looked just as cool out of straight quarter riffs on walnut? Maybe, but it would lose a little bit of charm.
Phil (45:53.446) Yeah, I think it also depends on how you use it too. Like if you had like if you were gluing up your desktop, say it's a four, let's just say it's a four board glue up. Three of them are fantastic. And then the fourth one is the Calico. Then that stands out in all the wrong ways.
Logan Wittmer (46:12.565) Yes, exactly. Yeah. Whereas I was trying to be deliberate with it. So two of them are, I'm looking at them, two of them are bookmatched. And then the other two are bookmatched on the opposite end. So you kind of have this houndstooth type thing going on. You know, so actually the one on this end kind of has faded out after it sat in the sun for a while.
So, you know, like there's, you're deliberate on how you use it, I think it'd be very cool. There was a project right after I started, and I don't remember what it was. Maybe it was Dylan's arched stretcher sofa table that I remember sitting in a meeting and there was a strip of sapwood in it. And it was used pretty deliberately. Like I think they were like,
Phil (47:00.145) Okay.
Logan Wittmer (47:11.95) almost book match so kind of looked like a of a wavy trail through the center of the the top. But Todd was like we don't use sapwood. I'm like what not man? Like what? And he was he was very like I think it was Todd it was kind of like don't want that.
John Doyle (47:22.214) Yeah.
John Doyle (47:33.576) That was just the woodsmith way for the longest time. It all had to be very sterile, like evenly colored, know, cherry or maple and had to be this stain and had to be this color to photograph it and no personality. So Dylan came along and just shook up the woodworking world.
Logan Wittmer (47:36.831) It was, yeah.
Logan Wittmer (47:42.559) Yep.
John Doyle (47:58.6) Thank
Logan Wittmer (47:58.74) Now I do think that there are...
instances also where you need to have consistency. I have two orders of mahogany here for these doors and we noticed this out there. Liberty Harwood must have got a shipment of albino mahogany because my first order was this beautiful like kind of mahogany color that you think of like it's that rich
John Doyle (48:21.564) Yep.
Logan Wittmer (48:32.617) warm brown, right? The second order I went and picked up a couple days ago was the same pale stuff that we got for the bar top.
John Doyle (48:39.538) Mm-hmm.
Logan Wittmer (48:41.765) So I'm kind of like, it's okay for the door frame, I think. But part of what this mahogany has to make is the trim that gets applied to the front of the door. And it is a, it's significantly lighter. I think it's gonna be okay because I am staining.
Phil (48:55.439) yeah.
Logan Wittmer (49:04.917) and all of that trim will be the same lighter mahogany. So, you know, it might look deliberate, but because I am staining it, I think it's gonna be okay. But like, that's an instance where if I was doing it just a straight clear coat, I'd have an issue with it.
So.
Phil (49:27.729) Okay.
Logan Wittmer (49:28.851) Yeah, so this is the, my, yep. I was just saying, this is like one of the first projects in a long time that I have stained. So.
Phil (49:30.002) So there we go, that's, go ahead.
Phil (49:44.85) Can't wait to see how turns out.
Logan Wittmer (49:47.796) Me either.
Phil (49:54.258) All right, there's our discussion questions for this episode of the shop notes podcast. How do you choose hardware for your projects? What's your good, better, best quality flow chart decision tree that you go through in picking hardware? And then how do you use wood and lumber in your projects in terms of its personality quirks? it sapwood?
knots, color variations, know, wormholes, staining due to either mineral or spalting or other kind of, I don't know, fungal diseases or whatever that's going on in materials. How do you pick that out? What do you do to work that in? Send us your thoughts and comments on that. You can put that on the comment section on our YouTube channel. That's the shop notes podcast on YouTube. You could send us an email woodsmith at woodsmith.com. Otherwise we will see you next week everybody. Enjoy your sauna. Bye.
