First stacked frames

Post examples...
Of framing styles or techniques that rocked your boat, and also of those that didn't
Post Reply
User avatar
Orde02
Posts: 147
Joined: Wed 04 Sep, 2019 9:31 pm
Location: East Lothian
Organisation: Northwood Framing
Interests: Painting, flying, cycling

First stacked frames

Post by Orde02 »

Hello everyone

I recently decided to buy a small cheap band saw and after a lot of research, I had one of these arrive on my doorstep last weekend.

55938FC7-FE5A-47C8-96E9-D37B4D961D64.jpeg

After some watching of YouTube videos and some tweaking and tinkering, got it set up and working quite nicely.
It’s really opened up what I’m capable of doing in my tiny little work space and I’m constantly thinking of new ways in which I can use it. Sorry, I’ve never used a piece of machinery like this so I’m quietly excited!

Here’s a couple of frames I’ve made since getting the band saw.
A tabernacle frame, been wanting to make one of these since way before I started making frames and a wide stacked frame that was a bit of a head scratcher. Got there in the end though. The second frame isn't as accurate as I'd like but it was really just a practice piece. I did however learn a lot.

tab.jpg

stack.jpg


Regards

Matt
Not your average framer
Posts: 11013
Joined: Sat 25 Mar, 2006 8:40 pm
Location: Devon, U.K.
Organisation: The Dartmoor Gallery
Interests: Lost causes, saving and restoring old things, learning something every day
Location: Glorious Devon

Re: First stacked frames

Post by Not your average framer »

Hi Matt,

I like the frames very much, such classic looking frames and I'm really pleased for you to have got the band saw. It will take you a little while to fully appreciate just how much potential a band saw can give you to be really creative with wood. In time you will develop your own ideas and ways of using a band saw and they may very different to how other band saw users are thinking and doing things. A band saw is not like many other power saws, in that it enables tremendous possibilities for creative expression that you don't necessarily have with other power saws. At first, you may well feel that a small band saw is a big under powered, but there is a learning curve about cutting through thicker pieces of would at a speed, which is working within the comfort zone for that particular saw.

When you learn to take the saw blade through the wood at the natural speed where the saw is in it's comfort zone, such great possibities will open up for you. Like you, I have a small bench top band saw and I find this particularly good to use with obeche and pine. It's much more difficult, when cutting through harder woods like ash, or oak when you are dealing with more than a certain degree of wood thickness, but it can still be done at a more leisurely pace. Have you tried cutting veneers yet? I can easily cut veneers of Imm thickness with my band saw, when cutting against the fence, but you will need to get the band saw perfectly set up to be able to do that. Not that is particularly useful to most band saw users to be able to do that, but it's just a way of verifying that the saw is really well set up.

Do not forget all the useful ways in which you can reuse, so many of those left over bits of wood, by cutting bits of moulding to new profiles to make spacers, slips and the like. You may find, if you think like me that the various bits of scrap wood in the scrap bin, suddenly will become so incredibly useful now that you have got a band saw, to reshape and make seemingly unuseable bits of wood into something useful.
Mark Lacey

“Life is short. Art long. Opportunity is fleeting. Experience treacherous. Judgement difficult.”
― Geoffrey Chaucer
Not your average framer
Posts: 11013
Joined: Sat 25 Mar, 2006 8:40 pm
Location: Devon, U.K.
Organisation: The Dartmoor Gallery
Interests: Lost causes, saving and restoring old things, learning something every day
Location: Glorious Devon

Re: First stacked frames

Post by Not your average framer »

For me buying a band saw was a great decision and it has proved to be amazingly useful. I would encourage anyone thinking of buying a band saw also, to go ahead and get one. If like me you do stacked frames, you won't look back. They give you so many creative possibilities and once you have got used to using a band saw, you will find so intuitive to use. With practice, you will be amazed at the level of control with which it can be used. If you are like me and have a natural urge to made and create things, you will love what you are able to do with it. You can not only cut with it, but you can even do a little bit of carving things to shape against the cutting edge of the blade.

Doing normal cutting with it can produce a very clean cut finish, which hardly needs much cleaning up, before applying a painted finish. Athough it is mainly meant for cutting wood, there are other materials, which it is also suitable for cutting, inclding plastics, cutting the waste of of compo moulded ornaments and trimming moulded plaster of paris. I ocassionally make mould impressions using plasticine, from compo ornament of frames and cast replacement ornaments to replace those which are broken, or missing. Sometimes, these need cutting to fit into position and a band saw is ideal for doing this.

I also have a scroll saw, which is a kind of powered alternative to a fret saw and uses short blades which travel both up and down, it is particularly useful for cutting stencils, where bits of stencil material can be stuck to a thin piece of backing board to support the stencil material while being cut. I use the modified geometry blade which have a small section of reversed teeth at the bottom of the blade as these do not leave a burr when they cut. You can obtain various thicknesses of small bits of plastic sheeting from modelling shops and can easily stencil raised detail onto flat surfaces of frames. Different thicknesses of stencil material will allow differences in the depth of feature that you what to stencil on the the frame.

It is even possible to scoop of the surplus level with the top surface of the stencil matterial using a small off cut of glass, if you consider making stencils, don't forget to leave enough stencil material around the cut out, to allow for tapping the stencil in place while you are using it. My local hardware store has a kitchen department and has thin kitchen chopping boards made out of about 2mm thick plastic. These are not expensive and quite useful for creating raised features on wood either under, or over the painted finish on the frame. I hope that this will encourage some forum member to see some of the advantages of investing in a few small power tools to extend their range of creative options.
Mark Lacey

“Life is short. Art long. Opportunity is fleeting. Experience treacherous. Judgement difficult.”
― Geoffrey Chaucer
Post Reply