Veneer & Cabinetwork, our brand new third-level advanced course, launches it's very first run in November and we have been prepping like mad men (and woman)!
Using walnut that was cut and dried by yours truly, the Lohr Woodworking team, we have been hard at work to turn rough boards into pre-milled packs that students will to turn into beautiful cabinets. In order for our students to get the project complete in just 6 days, we take on some of the dirty work of milling and squaring up the basic parts ahead of time so students can focus their attentions on the finer details. In this case, they'll need their class days to construct cabinet carcase joinery, make doors and drawers, and veneer!The cabinet is a complex project with many parts of similar dimensions so, Rob crafted a clever color-coding system to help us maintain some degree of organization throughout the process. With stiles, rails, and drawer parts galore, it would be all too easy to lose track of our count so the system worked well.
Our process starts with lots of rough walnut boards which are cut to rough lengths (an inch oversize) which are then working-faced on the jointer and milled to thickness via a [no exaggeration] 4 hour planer run. From there, we rip the pieces to their varied widths and, the last stage is to cut them to exact length. The ripping and cutting-to-length parts of the process are where my anxiety sets in because we have everything down to it's nearly finished size and the last thing an apprentice wants to do is cut 44 pieces of milled wood to the wrong length; Trust me when I say, it wouldn't have been the first time.
But, we made it through and the student packs are compiled and awaiting student hands! As we spend the coming weeks fine tuning the course structure and lessons, we are excited to embark on this new class adventure with a group of stellar Lohr Woodworking School alumni. Next week, we will be moving the Allen's Frontier live edge dining table onto some carts we've made so it can travel to it's new home in California. Look forward to a blog post documenting our surely-entertaining days moving and packing the massive slab for it's journey! Until next time kids, practice shop safety and enjoy the onset of the fall!
