Once I finished the basics of the frame I turned my attention to the side legs. The basic structure of the legs has five layers made out of various thicknesses of plywood. The shape of each layer is the same, the only difference being the length of the part. Here you can see the five parts for one leg and there corresponding thicknesses.
A good way to make multiple parts of the same shape is you a router with a pattern cutting bit. A pattern cutting bit is a straight cutting bit with bearing on the end. To use it you attach a wood template to the piece you want to cut so that the bearing runs along the template and the bit cuts the piece to the exact same shape as the template.
It’s easiest to do pattern cuts on a router table, but what if you don’t have one? First option is to build a simple one. For the purpose of pattern cutting you will really only need a smooth piece of plywood or MDF that you can mount the router to. You can then set that up on a couple saw horses. For pattern cutting you will not need fence, but you will need some sort of starting pin which I will talk about later. Here is an article that explains how to build a simple table, and I am sure there are others.
Another option is to use a handheld router. In this case you will want a pattern cutting bit that has the bearing on the bottom, not the top., You will need to clamp the piece to the edge of a workbench so you will need to unclamp and move it a couple times to complete the cut.
No comments:
Post a Comment