Base preparation
While the seat assembly is drying, begin work on the base. It’s made of beefy 1 3/4" square legs, joined together at the top with horizontal rails. As an added challenge, the rails situated at the front and back of the bench are curved to match the shape of the seat that sits on top.
Cutting lumber
Begin by cutting oversized blanks for the legs from rough 8⁄4 lumber. After making two adjoining faces flat and square using a jointer, use a thickness planer to mill opposing sides until you reach a final thickness of 1 3/4". This technique leaves you with four square corners and avoids the need for tedious sanding to remove saw marks. Trim the legs to length, then tilt your saw blade 45° to chamfer the edges on the bottom end. This bevel helps prevent the legs from splintering when the bench is dragged across rough surfaces.
Straight and curved rails
Next, tackle the rails that connect the legs together at the top. The straight rails are easy—all you need to do is cut them to size from 3/4"-thick material. Creating the curved rails, on the other hand, is a little more complicated. These parts are too wide for template routing. One alternative is to laminate thin material around a curved form, but this technique takes a lot of time and there is a possibility that exposure to the weather will cause the layers to separate. An easier method is to start with thicker wood and cut out the curved shapes freehand at the bandsaw. Start by preparing blanks from 1 1/2"-thick stock, then mitre the ends at an 82 1/2° angle, just like the ends of the benchtop slats. Now grab your trammel stick and lay out full-sized cardboard patterns. Cut out the patterns and trace the shape onto the top of the blanks. When you do this, make sure the ends of the pattern align with the bevelled ends of the blanks. Head over to the bandsaw and cut along the outside of the layout lines carefully.
0 Comment