where I will be working for the next few weeks

[robin wood]

Personally I hate chainsaw mills. having run a woodmizer for a few years it makes them feel very, very inefficient. They work your saw very hard and the thickness of the cut feels like a waste if you are cutting anything thinner than 2" boards. The noise and vibes are not pleasant. Having said that they are portable into areas where a portable bandsaw can't get, and cheap and do a reasonable job at 2'+ so this is the perfect use for them.

It would be great to work in there entirely with hand tools, pitsaw, axes, drawknives but it would take longer and the customers are already paying a premium over buying a tanalised softwood bridge which is what most folk use.

 

[Dave Budd]

Don't get me wrong, I agree. They are noisey, inefficent, unplesant to use, thick cut and really only any use for thicker planks in inaccessable places. But for me I'm afraid that they are a couple of hundred quid rather than the thousands that a woodmizer costs If only...

Likewise with the use of traditional tools. I like the idea of using handtools for my work, but sometimes the appliance of power is the only way to make it a doable financially (and for my own sanity and daily longevity). I've taken to cutting with the chainsaw and then finishing with an adze if I want a nicer surface (benches and the like). cheating maybe, but easier than doing the whole lot with axes and handsaws!

 

[mr dazzler]

No its not cheating, unless your trying to con someone that an item partly made by machine was done entirely by hand. I expect craftsmen who used flint thought it was cheating to use a bronze axe, or an iron one.....
The only thing is that nowadays we are unused to physical labour (12 or 14 hours as they often did before labour saving devices arrived), we assume that because our use of non machine methods is sometimes clumsy and slow it must have been lack that 200 or 400 years ago. When I was about 14 I worked on the same farm for 3 or 4 hay time's. We ran a lister conveyor to get the bales up into the barn after theyd been led in from the field's. One day the engine gave out. Right said Stan (the boss and absolutely the best, fairest, most honest and decent bloke I've ever had the privelidge to work for-you worked bloody hard, he treated you like royalty and paid top wages of any farm around) said to one of the older lads get off to boothmans and get a new briggs engine. We thought oh this'll be quiet for a while. Right said Stan I'll show you how we heaved sheafs when I was younger, uh oh...no rest for the wicked. So 2 of us stood on the ground below the top doors with a pitch fork each, a bale on the floor between us. Stab the **** and hoy it up, stab the **** and hoy it up I can hear him now he was bawdy and colourful as anything yet gentle as a lamb. We had to stick the fork in near to either end then swing the bale up in unison using the leverage of the fork handle, it literally flew up, 12 or 15 foot, once you got the impetus it would fly off the fork ends, another lad caught it and pulled it in and it got added to the stack. It was actually quickker than the conveyor, but more energetic, (and almost killed you if there was a damp bale from near a shaded hedgerow, if you had been wearing a truss it would of had a test ) Needless to say when the new engine arrived we reverted to using the conveyor, but that episode gave me a little glimpse into how things were once done, and that old ways werent necessarily stupid or inefficient as we are often led to believe

 

[robin wood]

old ways werent necessarily stupid or inefficient as we are often led to believe

I could not agree more with that. I get so frustrated when I see folk demonstrating crafts these days, very few folk do it enough to get up to full production speed, they earn a living from demonstrating and teaching not producing, that can give the impression that as you say the old folk were stupid or inefficient. I really enjoy challenging that prejudice, I turn wooden bowls faster on my pole lathe than any power turner..but then pole lathes were used all the time that people were using wooden bowls every day to eat from so they had to be quick and efficient.

Do you know George Sturt's "the Wheelright's Shop" a gorgeous record of the end of an era, I think you would like it.

 

[Dave Budd]

I would be the last to say that the old ways are obsolete, I try and earn some of my living by teaching them! When I teach people with the Iron Age forges they don't expect it to get hot enough, but it does the same teperatures in a faster time than my coke forge with a 1HP motor. That's one of the reasons that I ONLY demonsrate smithing using 3000 technology, it also means I have less kit to drag around

Modern labour saving devices are exactly that: they save labour. I've got some lovely 2 man saws, but I've never been able to use them because I work on my own. So I have no option but to fire up a chainsaw, even if the cutting would take less time (when putting on ppe, refueling, etc are taken into concideration) and the end result would be nicer.

 

[John Fenna]

Modern technology cannot be relied upon!
I was reading this thread and the awful weather we are having (light drizzle and gentle breeze at the moment) was enough to cause our electric to fail for a couple of minutes....this after days of gales and lashing rain without problems!
I dispair!

 

[mr dazzler]

So I have no option but to fire up a chainsaw, even if the cutting would take less time (when putting on ppe, refueling, etc are taken into concideration) and the end result would be nicer.

I recently got a chainsaw, the ppe trouesers are so boody HOT to wear, I wonder if I could manage in summer with them

Its the same with carpentery basic's like cutting mortices and tennons, too often now people get obsessed with jigs and other router or machinery devices to do the job, it can take ages to set everything up, plus HSE hassles with noise, dust, guard's etc. When the traditional method of face edge/face side, mortice guage, chop mortices, rip and crosscut tennons, can be just as fast (with practise) especially where your doing a small job rather than a run of identical item's, no fannying about setting machinery up, just the mortice guage thats it. I think it all comes down to well developed manual skil and efficient job organisation. You can use a mafell chain morticer to cut a big framing mortice, they are more or less standard kit now. But traditionally, german timber framers were expected to be able to hand chop a BIG mortice by hand from start to finish (including setting out) in less than 8 minutes by the time they finished there aprenticeship (and as far as I know they didnt pre drill out any of the waste with a boring machine or auger or similar)
If there was 2 skilled pit sawyers with a well set and tuned sharp saw, it would be interesting to have a contest VS a chainsaw slabbing mill (like your contest VS the power lathe Rob ) It could actually be a close run thing.

PS Rob I did read Sturt's book many years ago, also walter roses one village carpenter. Good neighbours another one by Rose is an interseting read as are any of c henry Warren's books such as england is a Village or the land is yours

 

[robin wood]

Well its been a while but here are a few more pictures.

Cutting the curved handrails.

Digging the new abutments in.

The main timbers in place.

Linking the main timbers with steel bar and oak cross pieces.

Fitting the uprights, slightly splayed.

Fitting treads and first handrail.

Most of the way there, just a couple of days left sculpting and sanding.

 

[JonnyP]

Looks lovely Robin, well done...
Will those upright have to be tightened periodically..?

 

[redneck]

you're a talented man, very well done, great pictures I enjoyed that

 

[redneck]

edit ...sorry double post!....

 

[korvin karbon]

im jealous. Your work is to big to take home with you LOL

Nice work

 

[robin wood]

Looks lovely Robin, well done...
Will those upright have to be tightened periodically..?

In theory perhaps, in practice I have not found they need it. The theory says the oak uprights are about 75mm thick and could shrink up to 10% or 7mm which would be enough to let the uprights wobble. In practice I have not found that they do, perhaps because I crank them up very tight with a huge 2 foot long 1/2" drive socket to begin with or perhaps because the uprights had already done some of their shrinking before final assembly. I do check them after a few months but have yet to find they take much adjustment.

 

[UselessSurvivor]

That's amazing work, it's rare to see such beautiful wood working these days, every one's use to IKEA and the likes these days.

I'd love to learn about wood working and other useful skills but I'm stuck in an office writing computer programs all day. I'd probably lose a finger using a chain saw knowing my luck, probably safest to keep me locked up in an office.

 

[drewdunnrespect]

my god your a master bridge builder its =#£ing ausome