Build Your Own Arcade Controls Forum
Main => Woodworking => Topic started by: SukkaFoo2 on August 25, 2007, 03:24:43 pm
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I'm trying to get a piece of wood that looks like my illustration at the bottom. How do I get a tapered angle that looks good, besides sanding it down?
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If you are good at geometry, build a jig and use the table saw.
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I've seen people making cuts off the front of speakers where they used two straight edges and a hand saw. Doesn't look like you have the thickness to be able to put a straightedge on the sides though
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Assuming you're using wood, not plywood or MDF or another engineered product, you'd use a high quality hand plane sharpened to perfection. Hint: if you bought your hand plane at Home Depot, Lowe's, or Sears it's a piece crap; throw it in the garbage so you won't be tempted to use it! If you've got a nice Lie-Nielsen, Lee Valley/Veritas, or vintage Stanley you're good to go! A block plane would probably be ideal, but you might be able to make do with one of the smaller bench planes (e.g. #1 or #2).
Mark layout lines on both edges of the piece. Set the plane to take a shallow cut. Start near the corner where you'll need to remove the most material and take a short cut. Do this 2-4 times, then move back a bit and take another cut. The idea is to gradually move the plane back toward the shallowest area to be cut. A good plane should be capable of taking paper-thin shavings off the wood at each cut. Pare down to the point where you just touch the layout lines. If you've held the plane steady, you should have a flat cut from one line to the other. if the cut isn't quite flat, you can clean it up with sand paper or a well-sharpened chisel.
If the cuts aren't wide, you might be able to do the entire thing with a chisel. You'd, essentially, use it just like the hand plane: take light, paring cuts until you'd trimmed the wood down to your layout lines.
That said, a belt sander isn't a terrible way to go. My Bosch 1274DVS has a flat top, so you can lay it upside-down on a bench bring the work down to it from above. Of course, the sander needs to be clamped in place and you need to be very careful when holding the piece!
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hand plane ftw
a nice record or stanly one
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hand plane ftw
a nice record or stanly one
Current production Stanley planes are junk for the most part. The ones being produced in England are supposed to be better, but you'll pay a lot to get one to the U.S. I've heard that current Record planes are a bit better, but still not great. They might be a step up from Groz or Anant, but from what I've read they still need some tuning before they're ready to go.
Older hand planes from both Record and Stanley are excellent, however! You can often buy them cheaply on eBay and provided you know how to tune and sharpen them, they can be a great value. The old 1940's Stanley #5 that I bought on eBay for $20 is one of my best-working hand tools....
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well i've got this record plane -
http://www.tooled-up.com/Product.asp?PID=7978&MAN=Record-04-Smoothing-Plane-2in
seems good enough to me, i use it a fair bit a work
tbh i prefer it to my power plane when shooting in doors
although obviously it will vary for you guys in america
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why wont you sand it? it seems the easiest way
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If you have a table saw, you could do it too.
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I think I would go with a belt sander. Just lay everything out and let'r eat.
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Use a radial arm saw, no two ways about it. Cut yourself a wedge that matches the angle of the line between the face and the removed section, set your blade just off of horizontal to match the angle of cut, use that wedge to angle your piece and feed her through! People make raised panels for cabinets and doors like this all the time (without the wedge though), or at least used to before radial arm saws fell out of favor. My biggest advice is twofold: 1) don't use a newer Craftsman unless this is the only piece you are going to use it for, or unless the angles don't have to be perfect. 2) I was going to say #2 would be to use a ripping blade specifically for radial arm saws (0 degree blade angle if you can find it) and not a table saw ripping blade (something like a 30 degree angle blade) because table saw blades on a radial arm saw pick the piece up and throw it. Now I'm thinking maybe a table saw blade would be good in this one instance because the blade will be coming from below, but only by a few degrees. On third thought though you should probably use a finer toothed blade instead of a ripping blade. Oh hell, I don't know what I'm talking about here anyway. Forget advice #2. You can probably forget advice #1 as well, but I wouldn't buy one. Have fun and good luck!
Brian Z
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I think I would go with a belt sander. Just lay everything out and let'r eat.
Would he be able to make it exact that way, if necessary?
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I wonder if SukkaFoo2 is actually still reading this thread.
Hope he didn't hurt himself trying to make these cuts, but then he seems to have been logged on recently so he must have been ok :P
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Would he be able to make it exact that way, if necessary?
Sure. You just mark both sides of the cut and then carefully sand down to the line. There's some amount of skill required, but it's fairly easy to do if you're careful...
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Are you building a cab..... or a coffin??? ;)