(upbeat music) - There's a chair-maker in all of us.

Today we're going to make this classic and make it a bit more contemporary.

It's a hoop back American Windsor.

So stay with us.

(scrapes wood) - [Narrator] The American wood shop with Scott Phillips is brought to you by, - [Narrator] Woodcraft since 1928, providing traditional and modern woodworking tools and supplies to generations of craftsmen, Woodcraft, helping you, make wood work.

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- You talk about comfort.

This Windsor inspired chair is absolutely as comfortable as can be except, it's a sewing Windsor elbows free to sew needs to be a bit bigger, but I love the form made by a famous maker and painted to hide the fact that there are multiple species of woods in this chair, which is a beautiful thing for me to celebrate.

So, we're going to make a bigger contemporary version of that, and it starts with the hoop.

Then we'll go to the seat, then we'll do the legs, then the spindles for the back.

But look at this because this is cool.

This is when you take thin strips of wood that are just a little less than an eighth of an inch thick.

And earlier, I set up my band saw with a three quarter inch blade and I put a rip fence on it and I cut down all these thin strips, of course, using all the proper safety gear.

Whatever you do, be sure to read understand and follow, all the instructions that come with the tools and products you use in your wood shop.

Work safely, safety glasses, hearing protection, always a must.

Now watch what happens.

You see these strips already have a good bead of glue laid out on each one and I stack it up.

There's a Walnut strip.

Okay.

And, I just bring it on out like this, like so, and there are eight individual strips and this adds up to just about an inch of banding.

So I'll stack this all up.

This has been air drying for about five minutes.

And you get a stronger bond that way.

And the glue has a tendency to stay where you want it to.

Now I'm going to flip that around, now that I've got this side fanned out.

That's good on the inside to help tack it in place.

Now this is a key step.

Going to use packing tape, ordinary packing tape, to tape it in the middle, roughly in the middle.

And that helps to keep those bands together when we bend this into the form, (tape tears) I'll do it one more place right here.

And this is neat.

This is where you need jigs and fixtures, when you're doing things like this.

Because if you tried to clamp this up individually, without this jig, which is cut out of the band saw out of scrap plywood.

Now watch what happens.

I take that banding.

I bend it.

Into this form.

Gently.

And they're cut overlong, over length.

And, there you go.

And it is key that all of these pieces are pressed down to the bottom of the form.

And you go, that's easy enough, right?

You bet.

And so, the trick to this is, you take these pieces, right here.

And again, three quarter inch thick plywood.

And you want this loop all the way up against top of that.

And now you line up the bottom of these plywood pieces and do not put your fingers in that seam.

And you press that down and you go, "oh!"

well, you're taking all the fun out of it.

That's easy.

(opens clamp) Well, I'm still going to put a clamp on this to draw it tight to the top of this crest right here, like that.

And I'll tell ya, that makes it so easy.

And it's nice and tight all the way around.

I'll just let that cure out.

Just like that.

So one clamp to do all those strips.

Just so happens to save time, I've already glued one up.

Now let's head outside and we'll trim this up with a power hand planer.

And then, it'll be inside to do the seat.

Now, watch what happens.

(planer whirring) Got to keep it flat (planer whirring) There's one pass.

One more will do it.

(planer whirring) (wood falling) So there's the hoop that's going into the back of the seat.

And this is a plank of wood.

That's been glued up with five different planks of wood here.

It's gonna have a cool grain pattern.

This is the bottom, and this is a template.

And on this template, it says bottom here.

And I bring it up, and line it up, and use a Sharpie to lay in the line, permanent marker.

And then, wherever, I have a leg hole on the bottom, I mark that.

I have holes drilled through this and this template has every dimension on it.

And you'll find this on Facebook.

And this is for the top.

And that gives me how to drill the hole for, the spindles in the hoop.

But now I need to cut this out.

Once this is cut out on the band saw, using a half inch blade, then I also need to make some turning squares and I'll get to that.

This is a Silicon steel blade that cuts like a dream, (blade starting) like a hot knife through butter.

(bandsaw whirring) (wood sliding) Now you won't believe the grain that's in that seat.

And we'll get outside and sculpt that in a second.

But while we're at the bandsaw cut the spindles and the leg work pieces.

So these are the bamboo shaped legs.

Turn those, right there, the bamboo form, and then the stretchers we'll cut those out and we'll need the back work pieces as well, slightly different technique on that.

And so, I just cross cut on the band saw to the finished lengths.

Those are the stretchers and the legs that I need.

And then once I do the cross cuts, I bring the fence up and I rip it to the turning squares or billets, and then we can head outside, sculpt the seat, and then, we'll be back inside to turn.

(bandsaw whirring) (cutting through wood) (cutter revving) I'm using a special Arbor tech cutter and this thing's amazing.

It's just the fastest, easiest way to saddle a seat.

And that's what this is called.

Whenever you scallop out wood to make it fit your derriére to make it comfortable.

That's what makes Windsor chairs special.

If it was a flat board, it'd be uncomfortable.

I can use this tungsten carbide cutter next to profile the outside edge.

Then I go to a 40 grit sanding disk to smooth it all out.

I'll get that worked out and we'll take a look at it.

There's no better way to do it.

Imagine my surprise.

When I was with Sam Maloof, he used a very similar technique.

He didn't.

Simone, his son, did.

(grinder revving) It's shaping up very nicely indeed.

And that four and a half inch grinder is absolutely the best way to go.

It takes a light touch.

Use it safely, always have two hands on the grinder.

Never one handed.

Look at that.

I mean that's lovely.

And, that just is designed to make you sit down, enjoy that drink or read that book.

And that's what makes this Windsor chair so comfortable.

Now on to turning all the rest of the parts.

(wood falling) So things are coming together nicely.

You know, we have the hoop, we have the plank seat now, and it's time to turn the three other key parts of the chair.

That'd be the spindle backs, that'd be the stretchers and that would be the legs.

But if you look at those legs, that's called a bamboo form because it looks, even though it's wood, like bamboo.

That's the style, but that's a little bit spooky to me.

I still like the bamboo shape.

So we're going to turn the stretcher, the front stretcher on the leg into a bamboo form.

And it just so happens I have an antique one that was painted, and by the way, most Windsor chairs were painted for one reason.

And that was because they had different species of woods for different parts.

And it's what the market wanted.

So I'm using a four jaw chuck to hold the billet that we cut at the band saw, and I have enough of those to make four stretchers.

Only the front stretcher will end up looking like the bamboo form and then the leg, unh-uh, we're going to make it a square leg, but I'll show you how to turn the tenon that will go into the plank seat.

And then, for the back pieces, we're going to make these graceful forms out of an oak dowel.

So to do that, shield down.

And the first order of business is to turn this into a round form, using a roughing gauge.

And I want the cutting edge of that gauge right at or slightly above center line.

And that looks good right there.

And that's lock lock, lock, lock, lock.

That's good.

We'll bring it up to speed.

What speed do you want when you turn this?

Depends on your skill level, but I'm gonna take this up even though it's square to around a thousand RPM.

And lay that chisel on there (chisel grinding on wood) and, just take nibbling cuts.

And I'll turn that into a round form and, work that right on down, on both ends, first, I'm not worried about turning it into the bamboo form yet.

(machine revving) I just need to make it round.

We'll get that done left and right.

And then we'll taper it on each end.

And once we have it tapered on each end, I'll use a diamond shape cutter, carbide cutter to lay in the two knuckles that we're going to use to create the bamboo form for the stretcher.

And then from there a little bit more sizing on the end using a square cutter to make the tenons on each end.

That's a very simple process.

You just have to check the diameter with a caliper and then a little bit of sanding, a little bit of finish.

You have a beautiful spalted maple, Ambrosia maple stretcher, bamboo form.

And then it's on to making the tenons on the legs.

(wood clashing) And that is how the stretcher for the front legs comes together.

Ambrosia maple.

Beautiful.

Okay.

Now, to cut the tenons.

Four tenons for four legs that need be 15/16ths.

That's our sizing caliper, right there.

A big old wrench.

And what I'm going to do now is use the bowl gauge to sculpt this down an inch and three quarters down from the top.

We'll turn that on.

That's secured by the chuck and the live ball bearing center here.

So we'll turn it up.

Turn it up!

And then when I make this initial cut, that bevel right there needs to be square to that shoulder.

Otherwise it will skate out, so square to the shoulder.

(scraping wood) It's not about speed.

It's just about the confidence to know that you're doing everything safely and you go, how do you know when you're to size?

Now, this is an advanced technique right here, where you take the round carbide cutter.

You go in, keep it right at or slightly below center line.

And you just make it 15/16ths of an inch in diameter.

How do you know when you're there?

You bring the wrench up, and you don't wanna do that with it running, and you size it that way.

I'll take that down just a bit more and I'll do four of those.

I'll sand it, finish it here.

And I'm using Arm-R-Seal for that.

So I'll get that sized to perfection, sanded and finished.

And then, it's onto the delicate four back work pieces that poke into the hoop.

(wood sliding) And, that is how the graceful leg tenons are cut.

Set that out of the way.

And next we're on to the four back spindles.

Starts out in this form right here.

That's just a hair over three quarters of an inch in diameter.

And it's six and a half inches up from the 5/8ths tenon.

that goes into the seat.

And this comes down, to 5/16ths right there and nice and graceful.

And the way that is made, there are a bunch of different ways to make it.

You can use a drawknife and a spoke shave, and work this on out by hand with a shaving horse.

I like to turn them, but to turn them, I have to have the four jaw chuck with these delicate fingers that hold on to the tenon like that.

And it expands out big enough that it held the leg work piece that I put in between those gaps.

But for that, I just backed this off.

Look at that.

It's graceful.

And you want this down low and tapered up ever so slightly.

So I'm going to start out with a 7/8ths dowel rod right here.

That's nice and long.

I need to net out 21 inches.

I'll put that right on center.

Need to move the tail stock back just a hair and bring that up.

Find that center point right there.

Make sure it's just gently held in place.

Now I can close the jaws down here on that.

And it needs to grip it in a uniform way, which means I have to swing it around to the other key hole and tighten it down there and rotate it back, that way it centers up this work piece, like so, and we'll see how good I was on eyeballing that.

That looks good right there.

And we'll bring that up to speed.

Bring up the tool rest.

And, you work from this end down here first and take real light cuts to create the swell right there.

And then I'll gently work it down here to create the spindle.

And I won't turn on the dust collector until I sand.

But that's how things look.

It's secure.

Make sure that, check all your locks on the lathe and that's good.

Let's see what we've got.

Lovely.

Okay.

So, now gently, we're going to go in with this, size the tenon down here to 5/8ths and create the form.

And once we get this shaped up, (machine whirring) Then I do a bit of sanding on it.

Then a spot of finishing and then it's over to the drill press, so we can drill the mortises or the holes in the seat first so that we have a place for all these beautiful turnings to go.

It's really important when you make chairs to make templates that have all the key angles and dimensions on that.

This is for the bottom and the bottom is clamped to this jig right now.

And I'm just going to drill a hole and show you what I've done.

Let's do that first.

This is a stop right here.

I'll go all the way to the stop.

That way it won't drill all the way through, now watch.

(drilling wood) And that gives me a nice, seven degree splay.

Now, what that means is, it's going to kick out to the side for a splay and a rake would be front and back.

And different compound angles, using, this jig are done in order to make everything fit together perfectly.

So now I'm just going to get this set up to drill all the rest of the holes based upon the template I showed you earlier.

And then once the holes are drilled, I'll put a finish on it and then we can fit all the rest of the parts together.

It's coming together beautifully.

(machine drilling) Now, when you see the hat on, it means I'm doing something that I want a little bit of luck with.

This is my lucky hat.

(machine revving) And what I'm doing is using a tenon cutter to size tenons so that when it goes into the back of the seat, we have a perfect fit like that.

Now, as we bring the hoop around left and right, have an angle jig here, that's 13 degrees and that's designed to show me exactly the angle that the back rest need to camp back at.

So if you look at this, I have the hoop now up and I'm going to switch it out to a seven, well, actually 15/16ths inch diameter cutter and cut tenons here and here.

And I'm sighting down this shank.

I'll just go ahead and do it.

You bring it up to speed.

(machine whirring) And you can cut the tenon to size it to the holes that you want, but it has to be nice and solid.

So I'll get the tenons cut this sized to perfection, and then we'll see how these join the hoop.

(wood falling) These are sized to perfection.

These holes are back 13 and out seven to accommodate the curve of the hoop.

And then on the inside, you can see I've drilled the holes to match up to the equal spacing of the back spindles.

And this is a bit tricky to line up everything because it's all been cut to do a perfect size, cause that's what's required and the holes are drilled into the band.

Meaning that black Walnut, when you hit that, you're done.

So let me line this up.

It looks good.

Draw in the hoop and take a look at that.

Think one holding up, oh, perfect.

And that is perfect.

So now take this apart.

That's a dry fit.

Flip it over, clamp it down.

I'll show you how to drill the legs.

(wood sliding) Well, imagine my surprise.

We're running out of time.

So we have to speed through the rest of this.

So we're popping the leg tenons into the bottom of the seat holes, lining up the pre drilled holes into the legs and then tapping all of this home with a hammer that has escaped.

Yay team.

Here we go.

Now, when I do this, (hammers the wood) It's walking the dog and you go, wait a minute, Scott, you skipped the key step.

And that key step is how did you drill these holes?

Before I put the stretchers in, the way I drilled these holes is, I put the legs in, without the stretchers.

I lined the legs up the way I wanted to.

And I learned this trick from Michael Dunbar.

I get an extension on a 5/8ths inch auger bit.

And I drill the hole through blue painter's tape, wherever I need them.

And that way you can sight like a rifle on a gun.

Trust me, that is so much easier than trying to figure out what compound angles these are, on your own.

So, now I'm going to seize these home, flip it over and fit all the parts together before I glue it.

And we'll get to take a look at this contemporary hooped back Windsor chair with a bamboo accent.

(wood clacking) Well, did I pull it off?

Does it have a nice contemporary, look to it?

I believe so.

Now I've brushed out Arm-R-Seal and I want you to look at the seat.

Look at that.

I mean, that's why I work with wood.

It's the grain, it's the wood.

It's just, intoxicating and look at that beautiful form.

I'd sit in it, but it's wet and it's rock, rock solid.

Cause it's built kind of like a suspension bridge.

These stretchers are all designed to spread the legs and lock it into the hole in the bottom of the plank.

Now that's it for this week on the American wood shop.

You know, all the highlights on how to make a Windsor chair.

Now, once this dries, I'll pull it all apart and I'll glue it so that it will be there for the ages and be sure to sign your work, whatever you do.

We'll see you next week.

Stay well and get busy in your wood shop.

See ya.

(upbeat music) - Woodcraft since 1928, providing traditional and modern woodworking tools and supplies to generations of craftsmen.

Woodcraft, helping you, make wood work.

(upbeat music) - Pro tools, for tool pros.

(upbeat music) Rikon tools.

- [Narrator] Woodcraft magazine projects, plans, and web links.

Designed to help you make wood work.

PSwood, home of Timber Wolf, Swedish silicon steel, bandsaw blades, and super sharp scroll saw blades.

A bed to sleep on.

A table to share meals.

A house that feels like a home.

The Furniture Bank of Central Ohio, providing furniture to neighbors in need.

- For more information on tips behind the American Woodshop and watch free episodes, 24-7, check us out online and like us on Facebook.

(upbeat music)