Chairs No Time Like The Present

My daughter has played the violin for several years and recently decided to learn to play the cello. After finding a reasonable used instrument (Thanks Greg!), I noticed one of our dining chairs missing from our table, and unsurprisingly found it in her room. Despite the normal backlog of projects, I decided she needed a task specific seat for practice (and my OCD nature needed all the chairs at the table). There are some selfish reasons for this as well, besides that it allows me to procrastinate more on the second phase of the "Epic Kitchen Project" leftovers, it also allows an entry point into chair making.

For the last few years I've hungered to build chairs, but have been largely unable to begin in earnest. While I did make the shop stool in the SSBO a while back. many of the chair designs I want to build have been waiting patiently, generally building in complexity & nuance with each napkin sketch revision. Add to this the inspiration peer pressure from chair makers like Jeff Miller, Chris Schwarz, Peter Galbert, Paul Lemiski, and non-chair makers like Konrad Sauer Throw on top that, positive wworking community peer pressure in the forms of June chair builds and Extravaganzas and you can understand my pent up creative need.

If you also follow me on Instagram you've probably seen my other obsession is scorched & waxed finish (Shou-sugi-ban) especially on red oak. I love this finish (full stop) It has lots of rich texture and a luster like a vintage motorcycle jacket; and since I have a decent pile of red oak (a wood I am otherwise not too fond of) many of my project sketches lean this direction. BUT the scorching process is at times violent and does unpleasant things to glue (your mileage may vary) so I was hesitant to burn (and ruin) a project I had invested significant effort into. I've also been curious as to how this finish would hold up and patina when applied to a chair.

Enter the Perch

This little stool which I was late to Peter's blog for, (I think I was first introduced to by #toolmakersretreat) would be the perfect test bed for me to try out several important skills from saddling seats and "staked" joinery to the process sequence requirements Shou-sugi-ban would introduce. The instruction and videos on Peter's site are more than enough instruction to build a perch, though it's a disservice to not get his book Chairmaker's Notebook. While Peter's design sense is spot on, functionally it needed some tweaks to work for my application

Design 

First off, the legs needed to be shortened as a consequence of its function as a cello chair this meant I needed to tweak the rake & splay a bit to maintain the same ground contact patch and avoid it getting tippy, this required a bit of trig to get in the ballpark, then rounding to a convenient angle. The forward lean and stance is good because of the desired posture for cellists. Second, I wanted to avoid turned legs; I have just a short midi-lathe and I prefer the simple (looking) chunky square legs on welsh stick chairs.

I also decided I wanted to try to play with the shape and see if I could bring in some design queues from the violin family. I introduced the C-bout into the back which doubles as a nice grab handle (and casts an interesting shadow). The concave saddling of the seat adds a bit of an optical illusion mimicking the convex arching of a violin top. Finally the tapered legs with a gentle crowning on their faces hopefully give a subtle nod to the fingerboard of a violin.

Process

Galbert works with green wood and hand tools. I love hand tools as much as the next galoot, but I was working with dried oak and not all of the necessary tools, so I did much of the work (saddling, leg tapering) with power tools (kutzall, table saw). Surprisingly, the seemingly obvious thing to do with power tools (contouring the seat with a bandsaw), I did with my bow saw after my only blade broke at the weld with a bang. Still it didn't take long at all. I got lots of hand tool use in the project from drilling the leg holes to bevel cleanup with spokeshaves so I don't worry I've switched to CNC just yet.

Lessons Learned (After Action Report) 

• Don't trim legs until after assembly, it prevents straight line pounding of the leg during the seating process.
• Don't think you can predict and pre-finish the tenon stick out (and leave contrasting unfinished wedges), you will be wrong once the pounding begins.
• I chose flat sawn oak for the seat, since I think it's less likely to split self-rive than quarter sawn oak with racking forces in the seat from the legs.
• Don't drill 3/4" holes if you plan on using 1" tenons (It makes for a lot more reaming.)
• A cabinet scraper makes quick work of the scratch pattern left from a coarse kutzall wheel, way better than sandpaper.
• Kutzall wheels cut excellently, but make a ton of dust.
• Kutzall really do "cut all", including a nice abrasion on your fingertip if you forget.
• Surface checking. The scorching process opened up some checks I thought were gone during shaping. Nothing catastophic but likely a consequence of the flat sawn seat material (that started with some checking) and the risk inherent in the process.
• Crowning the leg faces really makes them richer both in looks and in feel.
• The seat position on the perch is very similar to what I did on the SSBO tilted and saddled, encouraging an upright riding posture without putting edge pressure under the thighs. My Shop stool is very comfortable, even if it's a bit ungainly from a design perspective. Pete's Perch is attractive and way simpler construction, I wish I had used this as the starting point for the SSBO.
• I will would make a version for myself about 6-7" taller for my general use. I think this is the kind of seat that is very personal and tweaking it to fit perfectly is well worth the customization.
• I have a feeling I will be making more of these. Chair building fever is only intensified, not abated. 

SSBO Wrap Up

Last weekend was a great experience. First off, I want to thank Chris Wong for initiating this event; without doing so, undoubtedly I would have trudged on with my meh shop stool for many more years. Having participated, there were many positives.

• I have gained clarity on what makes a mo' betta' task seat by really looking at the various functional features of even the "simple" backless stool.
• I gained confidence and practice cutting odd chair angles. Chairs are pretty close to the top of the woodworking pyramid and can now see having one or more chairs in my normal project list (vs. a bucket list)
• In seeing how successful others were in going the eyeballing angles, round/octagon legs route, I feel like giving that a shot too.
• Having a deadline forced me to press on. Often on a project, I get stuck either daydreaming about what it will look like, or over analyzing what is next when really the next step is inevitable and I'm just stalling. Prior to the build, I wrote up a coarse process map, that helped eliminate "what's next?" hang ups.
• Be careful what you consider scrap. The walnut I had was short, narrow, punky and had other defects. I could not have made a chest with it, but a chair or stool doesn't take much material, and I could work around the defects with some effort. I ended up with nice air dried material with consistent coloring for a great price, nothing. At the same time I used a piece of wood that several people had hung on to for a number of years. That feels good to put something to rest, once and for all.
• It's OK to make scrap. I had to work hard to highlight great figure in the seat. In the middle of this log was a small amount of burl grain, it took quite a bit of finagling to get it into a place that would put it on display. My juvenile sense of humor also enjoys the word play of "crotch".
• "All time greatest tool of all time this week" (FWW STL) Hands-down my plastic handled Veritas striking knife. This thing really punched above its weight. I've had it for a while and have used it a bit, but this was my first major layout project replacing an old reground kitchen knife. This little guy was inexpensive, yet it fit everywhere and never failed to leave a perfect line. 
• Subtle differences make a big difference with chairs. This has been fit to my bum like a custom saw tote, and I like it that way since it is purpose built. However, my petite wife didn't think it very comfortable due to the width at the top relative to the cutaways. While it was only 2-3" taller (prior to final height adjustment) I thought it felt a bit odd too.

The obligatory things I'd consider doing differently... I probably shouldn't, but it is compulsive, so here goes. Also, if you are a judge, please skip along, nothing to see here.

• Don't forget about vector clamping. With weird angles, it can be near impossible to  pull surfaces together. I found this out about midnight Saturday when I needed to glue the saddles to the top. Ideally, I should have hide glued on some blocks to allow the joint to be clamped normal to the joint. I hadn't time or lucidity required at that point and glued it together with tape (yellow glue) Because of this, I have some gaps that I will need to fill next time I get a chance. Not a huge deal but... it happened.
• The "wings" on the seat come forward a bit much aesthetically IMO, but it "sits" perfectly for my tastes. My prototype seat was shorter, and I found it caused a minor pressure point on the thigh. I will give this a fair chance,  but I may end up altering this shape in the future and feather the lower edge,
• I think I could have simplified the structure with joinery akin to a Morovian stool and combined with hexagon legs and had a faster constructed stool.

All in all this was a great experience. Based on the response this year, Chris will surely organize another, and can't wait to sign up sight unseen, hmmm that's an idea... Sealed orders build-off.