It came out well — serving as his instrument for a high school Battle of the Bands – and he still owns and is proud of it, but it’s also fair to say that Josh’s guitar making has come a long way since then.

These days, he runs Oak Creek Guitars as a part-time business in addition to working full-time as a carpenter for a construction company, and regularly enters (and wins) in the themed competition for the Design in Wood show at the San Diego County Fair. Most recently, his 2018 entry won the Theme award for a “Willy Wonka Jumbo Body Guitar.”

There was a gap between Josh’s first guitar and his next efforts, which came about while he was on a military base in Germany. Having read books on guitar building and theory, he built a semi-hollow body guitar with bent sides and carved neck in the base woodshop. “That one came out leaps and bounds better than the first one,” Josh said. And, with all of the comings and goings as people moved in and out of the military community, “a lot of broken musical instruments wind up coming there, so I kind of found a little niche market in doing guitar repairs,” Josh said.

He still also does restoration work in addition to building custom and themed guitars, noting that he really enjoys restoration. “I take on the ones that most people won’t touch, because either the guitar is too far gone or they don’t want to risk ruining a historic instrument. Those are the things I really excel on. I will take that and do my thing and bring back a guitar that probably would never have played again.”

Most recently, he restored a Kamaka ukulele that his best friend’s father had purchased in Hawaii in the 1950s. “The hide glue was crystallized; the wood was very dry; it had wear from being played so much so the top was starting to separate from the sides.” Working with Kamaka Ukulele and the United States Military Academy at West Point, Josh both repaired the instrument and adorned it with the West Point crest on the back, the father’s retired rank of colonel on the fretboard and Hawaii’s Diamond Head on the headstock for presentation at the funeral at Arlington National Cemetery.

“I absolutely love doing inlay,” Josh said. “I basically make a guitar so I can inlay them.” He doesn’t limit himself when it comes to inlay material, having used mother-of-pearl, abalone, metal and resin, either tinted or clear to simulate water. Resin pen turning blanks in different colors and materials are a favorite option. He also uses wood for inlay: “I will use any type of wood, keeping in mind that they do react differently when they are paired together – but usually the inlays are so thin that flexing and warping is not an issue, especially when you get a clear coat on it.”

His first step in creating a guitar is to sketch out his designs, with the back, the top and the headstock being the three major areas he focuses on for inlay. Then he’ll research, and eventually fine-tune his drawings to exactly what he wants. “Then I just use copies of that, full-scale to cut out my inlay pieces, and then I rout and glue everything down from that master drawing.”

Josh has graduated from laundry room building to a dedicated shop, with, as he said, “thousands of tools that go into building a guitar.” He’s also built a couple of jigs and fixtures himself to speed along the process: a fret-slot cutting jig that gives him accurate depth and spacing of the frets for the fretboard and a side bending machine for the guitar sides.

The latter is the latest iteration in his bending technique. At first, “I used to use a spray bottle full of water and a pipe that I heated with a torch.” He then graduated to an electronically bending iron with temperature control and a teardrop shape to allow the creation of sweeping sides or sharp radii. His latest upgrade is to the side bending machine: “It incorporates a form in the shape of one half of the guitar side, and I lay the wood on there with an electronically heated blanket, and then use a screwed auger to push down in the waist of the guitar and then clamps to hold the sides into place. So it’s a form that utilizes heat and moisture to hold the sides. I can get very specific, accurate and consistent sides with that machine in a matter of minutes, where it would take me hours to hand bend one side.”

Some of the most recent guitars he’s built with his apparatus include one he’s working on, made from black walnut from his grandparent’s San Diego property that was harvested after the tree was damaged in one of the recent wildfires. Plus, he also recently made a replica of country singer Willie Nelson’s 1963 Sitka spruce Martin guitar, “Trigger.”

“His guitar is very famous for looking the way it does. He’s actually worn a hole in the front of it. I’ve always been a fan of his guitar, so I made a replica and took it to have him sign it.” While Josh didn’t get to meet Willie himself, he did meet Willie’s son, Lukas Nelson, who was impressed by the guitar’s similarity to the original – and, by contacting the person who repairs those guitars, he was able to acquire pieces of the original Trigger that he incorporated into the replica: “Some tuners and a couple pieces of guitar string that were on the original and a couple chips of wood, so it was pretty neat.”

Josh is also working on his entry for the 2019 Design in Wood show. The theme was recently announced as “Oz-some,” inspired by The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. “Sometimes it comes down to the wire; I joke that I’m often holding the guitar outside the window to try to let the finish dry on my way to the Fair,” Josh said.

In total, he has so far made 13 complete guitars, eight of which have been for the San Diego County Fair. “I have a book of all my original drawings for each guitar. It’s something that’s pretty special to me,” he said.

The post Josh Stotler: Making Guitars and Custom Inlays appeared first on Woodworking | Blog | Videos | Plans | How To.

Here in California and across the western United States, the mountain pine beetle (above) has been detrimental to pine trees. I have heard estimates that there are 100 million dead pine trees in Western forests. These dead trees pose a severe fire hazard and detract from the natural green beauty of the forests. My question is: What can the wood of beetle-killed pine trees be used for? And, if the answer is “anything and everything,” why are these trees not harvested and used? – Blair Tonkin 

Tim Inman: Why are the trees not harvested? My best guess would be the simple economics of it. Dead trees rot quickly. Getting them out of the forest selectively would be prohibitively expensive. Pine stands are typically not select cut. They are cleared wholesale and then the area replanted.

Chris Marshall: To learn more about the mountain pine beetle epidemic, here’s an overview provided by the National Park Service (click here).

The post Can Infected Pine Trees Be Harvested? appeared first on Woodworking | Blog | Videos | Plans | How To.

The saw’s rail and motor carriage tilts left up to 48 degrees for making bevel cuts. Its table rotates 47 degrees left or right, and it can be positioned at nine common miter detents for quick set-ups. Or lock the table’s front handle to any other miter angle you need to cut. An LED cut line indicator helps you align the blade to your layout line more easily, and an electric brake stops the blade quickly when the trigger is released.

Part of Craftsman’s V20 cordless system, this 21.8-lb. miter saw is powered by a 20V MAX 4Ah high capacity lithium-ion battery. Craftsman reports that on a full charge, the saw will make up to 585 cuts through 3-1/4-in. MDF baseboard before the battery needs recharging. When that time comes, an included fast charger replenishes it in 60 minutes or less.

The saw kit includes one battery and charger, a carbide-tipped blade, material clamp, blade wrench and dust bag. The tool is warrantied for three years.

Craftsman’s 7-1/4-in. V20 Single Bevel Sliding Miter Saw (model CMCS714M1) is available now through Lowes.com and sells for $199.

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– Ed Smail
Wilson, Wyoming

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Its slippery smooth white coating provides a bright, clean, hardened surface for protecting MDF or plywood tabletops in the shop. It cuts, routs and drills easily. I mount mine with double-sided tape and replace it every so often when the white coating wears through.

– Pat Keefer
Manning, South Carolina

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While admitting that, in his younger years, he might have been among that number, Rob noted that, with age comes wisdom, and he now uses the guard for its intended purpose. His query about whether such wisdom was limited to his personal path or reflected a broader experience among woodworkers brought so much response that it overflowed the print issue … and ended up here. – Editor

“A few years ago, I was remodeling my basement after a flood. It was late Sunday afternoon. I was tired but wanted to just finish one more piece … After spending four hours in the emergency room with two very badly cut and one broken finger, I now have guards on both my table saws and, boy, am I careful. I learned a couple of good lessons:

“The saw that did the damage is gone and replaced with a new one with a nice guard. The other saw now has a guard on it, too. And pay attention to what you are doing. If you’re tired, quit for the day. It’s not worth the pain and suffering.” – Bill Miller

“I do know where my table saw guard is, but I don’t use it. I always felt it was more of an obstruction and hindrance to what I was doing. At 66, I am very much more aware of safety using eye and hearing protection and double-checking where my extremities are, even my body as a whole, after falling off an incline after losing my balance and breaking two ribs. You are right, as we get older and more experienced, we recognize our immortality! In fact, experience is the driver of knowledge and wisdom. We can read and be told about safety all day long, but until we have that close call, whether it be in a relationship, job choice or shop accident, we will never heed the advice! Living and doing is the only road I know that works!” – Merle Riesgaard

“I enjoyed your note on starting to use guards. A few years back, that was me. Guards were cumbersome and hard to use, so they sat on the shelf, not to be used. One day, after nicking a finger on the table saw, I decided that was stupid. I still hated the guards and still found them hard to use.

“Instead of just living with it, I thought I could do better. I spent a year designing and building what I thought was the ultimate saw and shaper guards. The saw guard could handle a stationary and some movable saws from 8 inches to about 14 inches, almost any normal extension width and capable of floor mounting, ceiling mounting or rail mounting. It could be used crosscutting, ripping or dadoing and was easy to ‘get out of the way’ when those conditions happened. I built it, refined it and thought I’d come up with the better mousetrap.

“I approached over a dozen companies about making and selling my design. You’d have thought I had beaten their dog; not one expressed any interest. It wasn’t because of the design, because several indicated they liked the design, function and the wide range of applications it could cover. The most honest answer I got from one company was they felt if they made something like a saw guard it would put a bull’s-eye on their back to be sued by every person that would misuse it then would run to a lawyer.

“As it stands, I have the original on my cabinet saw. It worked very well for many years now, and it’s not let me down. It’s too bad that any attempt to make things safer just opens up more opportunities to be sued. With that mentality, everyone loses.” – Paul Hauschildt

“Given an hour, I could probably find my table saw guard. But that is not what this is about. The question, or rather questions, are: How did you acquire your first table saw and then, how did you learn how to use your table saw?

“The answers are possibly:
• I just got a table saw and started using it.
• I got a table saw and an experienced friend /relative taught me how to use it.
• I had safe table saw techniques beat into my head at school before I was even allowed to stand within an arm’s length of the table saw.

“I was a 60-year-old before I encountered the last at a cabinet building class in community college.

“The first safety-related issue that I encountered was, at school the Delta Unisaw felt uncomfortable after using my Unisaw at home and, at home, the Unisaw felt uncomfortable after using the Unisaw at school. Illogical, but my Unisaw at home was five-eights of an inch higher because it is mounted to a piece of Baltic birch and the ones at school are mounted directly to the floor. The solution is to make three or four ‘cuts’ with the blade below the table to get my muscle memory back. Yes, five-eighths does make a difference.

“It would be kind of interesting to know what your introduction to table saw safety was. Looking back, mine was scary until school at age 60 —and about 45 years later than it should have been.” – Rich Flynn

“My grandfather was a carpenter and, by today’s standard, he was a master. Even though he did not have all the power tools I have, he made furniture and other things that were outstanding with fits that are holding today after 70 years. He preached safety to me in all we did together. He had a 1947 SS 10ER which I wanted bad, but he said, ‘No, it does not have guards on it and you really could get hurt if not careful.’ He only used it for the lathe.

“I use all the guards on all my tools, plus hearing and eye protection is a must after being in ‘Nam and a GM factory for five years. I have a SS MarkV plus several other power tools, and all guards are in place, and will stay there except when using the dado blade.” – David H Garner

“Your letter resonated with me this month. I haven’t been a woodworker very long (three or four years), but recently switched over to hand tools exclusively. I do know where all my guards are: they’re buried under dust with the table saw and router table in a corner of my shop.  For a strict hobbyist, I highly recommended hand tools only!” – Jason Zvokel

“After over 40 years of woodworking, I am thrilled to say that I have all my fingers! Some serious scars, but all 10. I can empathize with a renewed safety awareness these days.

“Ever since I worked in small furniture manufacturing factories, I have made it a habit to leave my safety glasses on all day in the shop. On the other hand, blade guards gathered dust against a wall until I finally
threw them away. Then, age began to set in, and I felt like sooner or later was, well, sooner than later. We all know that good technique, a clean work area, push blocks and push sticks keep us safe. The wisdom to
actually work safely came years later for me when the thought of mutilating myself or worse overrode my complacency.

“Anyone who has ever replaced old bench tools soon realizes that modern tools are far more efficient, lighter and easier to use. As I began replacing old drills, routers and sanders, it dawned on me that
replacing 30-year-old band saw and table saw made sense. Just like a new car offers safety features that weren’t around 10 years prior, I thought new machines would be inherently safer. My SawStop table saw
doesn’t make me feel any safer, but it makes me realize just how foolishly dangerous it would be to keep up the same old habits. My new Laguna band saw has so much more power than my old Inca that I am
intimidated if I don¹t use a padded push lock when I resaw. The broken spring on the jointer blade guard still needs replacing, but I wouldn¹t dare run the face of a board across it without using a push lock these
days.

“With all the emphasis on safety at the machines, let’s not forget hand tool safety at the workbench! Who hasn’t learned a hard lesson with achisel pointed the wrong direction or slipped with a screwdriver or
utility knife? Am I the only genius who ran a drill bit into his hand on the backside of a board? These mishaps at the bench have been huge lessons for me, especially since a finger or palm injury can take weeks
to heal.

“So, these days I use a lot more forethought, a vise, and a few clamps to keep my hands out of the thrust vector of a sharp hand tool. Here is to finishing with all 10!” – Andy Ratliff

“I was thinking of your question about table saw guards after a friend of mine cut his finger the other day on his old (hand-me-down from his Dad) table saw with the guards long lost. Luckily, his was a minor cut and his wife is a nurse, so not even an emergency visit required. I’ve had other friends that were not so lucky. I ALWAYS have the guard on my saw unless it is a dado cut. I can see the cut just fine with the guard in place, so I don’t buy that common excuse.” – Tim Callahan

“I have replaced or reinstalled the guards on all of my machines. I have also installed a red light on all of the bladed machines. I have a hearing loss of 80 to 90 percent in both ears which, when coupled with hearing protection, makes it such that I cannot tell, by sound, if the machine is running. I still have to install lights on the non-bladed tools. I will get around to that this summer. I have not been cut by any of the tools in my primary wood shop or my smaller shop. I also have a stained glass shop in my basement. I have only been cut there when showing how to cut glass, never when working by myself.  Now, if I could figure a way to put a safety guard on hammers, screwdrivers, wrenches, etc. …” – Steve Tracey

The post Saw Guard Safety appeared first on Woodworking | Blog | Videos | Plans | How To.

If you are interested in building a knife block, the steps and Drawings we show here will teach you how to make it, but you will need to adjust the slot measurements and placements to accommodate the knives and accessories you own.

This unit is made of four pieces of solid wood. Cut them to length and width and get ready to cut some slots, using a standard full-kerf saw blade. This will leave you with openings that will fit the vast majority of knife blades. As you can see in the Drawings, by matching up the slots cut into piece 1 with the slots cut into the thicker piece 2, you can adjust the size of the knife openings. Align the openings by laying out and cutting all of the slots in piece 1 first and then using that piece to set up the rip fence for each matching cut in piece 2. The small 3/8″ square opening for the honing steel was formed with multiple cuts from the saw blade, versus switching over to a dado head or moving to the router table.

Totally Table Saw

Point of fact: I made all the cuts for this project on my table saw. Piece 3 was made in the same manner as piece 1. This section was made to hold a set of steak knives and is an optional feature. You can include it or not, depending on your collection of knives. Piece 4 (which is glued together to make the final roughly triangular “chunk” that forms the base) is made from three pieces of 1-3/4″-thick lumber. To be safe, I used a small sled with fences attached on my table saw to secure them as I cut.

Once I had glued these three pieces together, I added a notch (see Drawings) to hold a scissors — of course, if you don’t have a scissors, don’t make the opening. It would look silly.

Now it’s time to glue the knife-holding pieces together. Careful application of your glue is important; you don’t want globs of it getting into your knife slots. Alignment is important as well. As you can see in the photo (bottom right), I used small slats of 1/8″-thick plywood, well oiled so glue would not stick to them, to help me keep pieces 1 and 2 properly aligned during the glue-up.

Once the clamps are tight, pull the strips out. (Be careful; even when they’re oiled, they might want to stay stuck!) Now, once again step to the table saw and cut the 45° angle onto the bottoms of the knife-holding pieces. The glued-up subassembly of pieces 1 and 2 will need to be cut in a two-step process on the table saw because a 10″ table saw blade will not slice through the whole piece on a 45° cut. Cut halfway through it, then flip it to the opposite face to finish the cut. With the blade still set at 45°, cut the chamfers onto the edges of the knife-holding pieces as shown on the Drawings. Then, sand your parts smooth, but be careful not to burn the end grain as you are doing so.

With that done, glue piece 3 to the subassembly (pieces 1 and 2) with their mitered ends aligned. Be sure it’s centered. Once the glue dries, do the same thing with piece 4. Scrape off any excess glue and then apply an oil finish. I used Watco® Natural — three coats and that is it — you’ve got yourself a knife block, and you didn’t resort to buying it retail!

Click Here to Download the Drawings.

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Drying vs. Non-drying

There are two types of oils — drying oils and non-drying oils. In my mind, drying oils are the only valid finishing oils. They start out as liquids, but they cure to a solid film. To me, that’s the definition of a finish.

Typically, nut oils are drying oils, and the most common ones we use are linseed, tung and walnut. These drying oils cure by taking oxygen from the air and crosslinking the oil molecules into much larger molecules. Once the new molecules get big enough, the resulting matrix they form becomes a solid instead of a liquid, forming a film either in the wood or on the wood.

The most common is boiled linseed oil (BLO), which, in spite of its name, is neither boiled nor heated. Instead, it contains metallic drier that speeds up the cure time. A coat of raw linseed oil will take over a week to dry; one of BLO will often dry overnight. Tung oil dries quickly by itself, so it generally does not need driers added to it. Unmodified walnut oil dries even more slowly than raw linseed oil, which is why I avoid it.

Non-drying oils are usually vegetable (peanut, olive, corn, coconut, rapeseed) or mineral oil, which is extracted from petroleum. Orange and lemon oil, typically mineral oil with citrus scent added, are also in this group.

These do not form a film but stay wet indefinitely. They can come off onto whatever comes in contact with the oiled wood, and they will soon wash off with soap and water.

Thus, putting vegetable or mineral oil on wood is not a finish, but a wood treatment, and a temporary one at that.

Important Safety Note!

Drying oils are spontaneously combustible. Take all rags and wipes containing drying oils and lay them out one layer thick until they are dry and crusty, at which point they can be safely added to your household trash.

VOCs vs. Solids

Concerned about VOCs? Those are the finish solvents, restricted by the EPA, that can cause dangerous ozone buildup in the presence of sunlight. Pure oil has none whatsoever, because it has no solvent in it. Thus, it is a 100% solids finish. Solids are whatever stays on the wood, after the solvent, to become the film. Clearly, this is a very eco-friendly finish; it comes from plants and contains no solvents, harmful or otherwise.

Where’s the Film?

In many woods, the first coat of oil penetrates and is almost entirely absorbed by the wood, so it does not look like a film was formed. It’s there, but it is in the wood, not atop it. The oil cures in the outer layers of wood fibers. But even if you add no more than one coat, cured oil will still help the wood shed water, oils, dirt and some, but not all, of the things that stain wood. Add more and you get more protection. Multiple coats can eventually build up a gloss film.

Applying Oil

Do not add solvent to pure oil. It will not, as some believe, increase absorption, and will only reduce the amount of protective film per coat while contributing to environmental problems.

Flood oil onto the wood liberally, keeping it wet for at least 10 minutes. If areas of the wood absorb all the oil in under 10 minutes, add more, keeping the whole surface fully wet. When it stops absorbing oil, wipe all the oil off the surface. You’ll have a uniform, dustfree coat with almost no effort.

Want more build? Do the same thing the next day, and the next, adding one flooded on/wiped off coat per day until you get the look you want. One coat will look woody and natural, while 12 coats (over 12 days) will look like traditional varnish.

To speed the process, or create a slurry to help fill open pores, sand the oil into the wood with fine wet/dry paper.

Oil Varnish

Where oil has only one ingredient, varnish contains resin and solvent. Traditional spar varnish, for instance, contains tung oil, phenolic resin and mineral spirits or naphtha. The most common varnish resins, alkyd and polyurethane, can be made by chemically modifying linseed oil.

In spite of their names, Danish oil and teak oil are not oils, but thin varnishes. Manufacturers call them “oil” because they are designed to be applied just like oil. The truth is that you can apply any oil varnish the same way you apply pure oil: flood it on, wipe it all off, and repeat with one coat per day until you get the build you want.

Forget the Solvent

Whether it’s Danish oil or polyurethane varnish, there’s no need to thin it for this type of application: any solvent only acts as a diluent and does not effect how well the finish penetrates the wood.

With thicker varnish, a nylon pad (such as ScotchBrite®) works best to scrub the varnish on before wiping it off. Of course, should you prefer to spray or brush thick varnish, you’ll likely have to thin it for workability.

Exceptions

There are a few woods over which oils will not cure properly. Notable among them are most Dalbergias (rosewoods) and some aromatic cedars.

Remember how oil and oil varnish cure by using oxygen from the air to crosslink the molecules? Such “problem” woods contain antioxidants that prevent oxygen cure.

The solution? Seal them first with a thin coat of dewaxed shellac, after which you can switch to oil varnish.

But What About Nut Allergies?

Once they cure, drying oils, which are usually nut oils, form a solid, inert matrix that will not come off on your hands or in your mouth. Thus, the odds of a negative reaction should be substantially less than with wet oil.

Anything can happen, but in more than 45 years in this field, I’ve never seen an allergic reaction to a cured film of linseed oil.

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