Thread: Meet the Gidgee family.....

I'll just wipe the drool from my chin.
Very nice.
Regards
John

Ian

Very cute tools and all the more so for being functional.

Regards
Paul

Now that's what I was talking about.
You my friend are inspirational. I very much enjoy looking at the tools you make. I enjoy how you openly share your thoughts and process. You share with all those who are willing to listen and learn and you openly credit those who have provided advice and perspective along the way.
You, along with many others I could name as the list is long, are an example of why this forum is a wonderful place to hang out from time to time.
Thanks to you, and the many like souls, for sharing so much.
Kevin

That's a very classy set of tools, Ian! We've pretty well run out of appropriate superlatives I think. I can't even see the damn bar you've set it so bloody high.

Tell us about your square. I see some grub screws that I'm presuming are to true the blade? That can't have been a piece of cake to make.

Matt

Beautiful yet functional "by the work one knows the workman".

cheers Rumnut

Originally Posted by Berlin

.......Tell us about your square. I see some grub screws that I'm presuming are to true the blade? That can't have been a piece of cake to make.

Matt

Hi Matt - Yes, the square works on the push-rod & fulcrum principle. The long story of how I made one for the first time is detailed here. They are really not all that difficult, just fiddly things to make, but one of the benefits of retirement is I now have a bit of time for fiddling! As detailedd in the orininal post, I had a deal of trouble drilling accurate holes through the stock on that original job, and there is some discussion in following posts on how it might be done easier/better. As it turns out, it's a LOT easier to do on a shorter stock, because a small error can't send the pushrod off centre so far, but it is still one of the trickier processes in the making, and requires care. The other tricky part is driling & tapping the brass dowels for the pusher screws, & keeping the hole & tap centred. I had to remake a couple of those when the hole or tap went askew.

I made several squares while I was doing the gidgee example (may as well do a 'run' when gearing up for these things!), so now I have the matching Bull-oak set I envisaged when I started on the big mutha a couple of years ago:

New squares.jpg


There's father bear (3oomm blade) mother bear (150mm) and baby bear (75mm).

When I made the first square, I didn't have a metal lathe, so I had to work with stock sizes of brass bar, which was ok, but this time I could go an extra mile & do things like size the push-rods and fulcrum dowel to match the size of the square they were fitted to. I also 'fixed' the one big mistake I made on the original. Because I was so nervous about drilling the long pushrod holes, I made them straight, instead of angling them out to get them to meet the blade as far from the fulcrum as possible. It means the square is a beast to adjust - you only have to think about turning one of the screws & the end of the blade moves a milimetre! I have considered re-making the stock & trying to drill angled holes, but it's a lot of work, for something that needs very rare attention. What I will try (& perhaps now is the time, while I'm in the mood ), is to replace the brass dowels and tap them for a 5mm metric thread, rather than the 3/16" NC screws that are in it currently. The finer thread will help a bit, though it will still be very touchy.

You'll notice I also removed the blueing from the blades, this time. The blueing looks good, but it is very fragile, & doesn't prevent corosion (just makes it harder to see, at first), so I decided to polish them instead. I'll do the same to the biggie if I replace the pusher screws, but I'm not going to dis-assemble it just for that...

Cheers,

PS added this evening: Dammit, after loking at the 3 squares, the big one looked so out of order, I decided to fix it today, so I dunnit. It took less time than I expected to make a couple of new dowel nuts and change the screws to M5, and it was well worth the effort. It's still a bit touchy, but infinitely better to adjust now. While I had it out, I took the trouble of correcting a very slight out-of-parallel error on the blade. It's now good to less than I can see with my magnifying loupe over the full blade, both inside & out. So I'm a very happy camper.

Ian they are amazing

I lurve Gidgee. Just wish i had some to play with and slobber on.

Originally Posted by artme

I lurve Gidgee. Just wish i had some to play with and slobber on.

Seeing as how Arthur has raised the issue (a bit like the lawyers introducing a subject. Then it's on) what are the sources of gidgee? I currently have contacted Loggerheads and am waiting for a quote on about a metre of ringed gidgee 100 x 75. Are there other sources? I am looking for the material to make some planes with the blades I obtained through the Forum's group buy. I have other suitable timber but nothing with high figure.

Regards
Paul

Makes me think of the game, "Happy Families". I should think it needs an updated version including Mr Gidgee the cabinet-maker.

Originally Posted by jimbur

Makes me think of the game, "Happy Families". I should think it needs an updated version including Mr Gidgee the cabinet-maker.

. I think that may have been Ian's intention.

I also remember my father saying that the man (before the days of PC ) who invented Happy Families should have been shot at birth.

Regards
Paul

Originally Posted by Bushmiller

.
I also remember my father saying that the man (before the days of PC ) who invented Happy Families should have been shot at birth. Regards
Paul

I can see his point. The game probably caused more arguments in family than anything else.

Originally Posted by Bushmiller

Seeing as how Arthur has raised the issue (a bit like the lawyers introducing a subject. Then it's on) what are the sources of gidgee? I currently have contacted Loggerheads and am waiting for a quote on about a metre of ringed gidgee 100 x 75. Are there other sources? I am looking for the material to make some planes with the blades I obtained through the Forum's group buy. I have other suitable timber but nothing with high figure.

Regards
Paul

Paul, I think it's a case of stumbling over it once per blue moon, & grabbing what you can when the oportunity arises. I saw the pieces I used here at Lazarides one day when I was buying some wood. I always take a look at the turning blanks he has, just to see if there is anything particularly interesting. There were two bits of RG; both had a couple of deep cracks & I wasn't sure I could get what I wanted out of either piece, so I solved that by buying them both! That's how I came to have ebough for a couple of extra gauges ...

Both RG and Lace She-oak only pop up in a very small percentage of trees, & I don't know if anyone can gaurantee a regular supply of it. Folks like Terry Gordon probably have a standing order for anything suitable for his stuff, & likewiswe the other tool makers who use RG in some of their products.

The wood I like most of all for tools & tool handles is Mulga - I reckon it's better to work with than Gidgee, and it has such a fine grain it will polish up like metal. I've seen some lovely dark colours in Mulga, but never anything like the fine fiddleback of RG. Most Acacias seem to throw a bit of fiddleback figure in at least a few trees, so I would be surprised if it never happened in Mulga. Does anyone out there know the answer??

Cheers,

I've seen some of Terry Gordon's tools in Ringed Mulga but they are few and far between. Almost never as even in the fiddleback as some of the ringed gidgee I've seen him use.
I've got some ringed Bendee tools that are similar to the Mulga. Not the same though.