Dewald Swanepoel Posted September 11, 2014 Report Share Posted September 11, 2014 A few months ago, as my son turned 1 and I thought it'd be nice to make him something as opposed to all the store bought toys he would receive. I decided on a little wooden biplane. Here are some pics of the design, the process and the final product. Bear in mind though that this was done with only the most rudimentary tools (I didn't even have proper hand tools, let alone power tools). My original idea was to make it from a light hard wood like beech but in the end I decided that I'd rather just use MDF which is cheap and see how it goes. Maybe for his second birthday I'll attempt something in a better wood and hopefully by then I'll have more appropriate tools as well. The only tools I had at my disposal were a jigsaw, orbital sander and paint brushes. So this was largely a jigsaw job. The wings and tail find were fairly simple to cut but the compound cuts on the fuselage (4 layers of laminated MDF) would be a bit of a challenge. My solution (and I'm not sure it can be called a solution as it's actually just stupid) was to clamp the jigsaw upside down and run the wood through it like a mini table saw of sorts. It got the job done, although nothing as neat (or safe) as one would've been able to achieve with a band saw. I did impress on my wife how stupid this was and now she's much more susceptible to me buying proper power tools. Already got me a sliding mitre saw and I've got my eye on a table saw The rest of the components weren't too difficult to cut Some of the joins have rather small surface areas and I'm pretty sure that wood glue would not have held up over time so I opted to fix everything together with an epoxy. Some coats of lead free acrylic paint later, an action figure with his lower body surgically removed and we had ourselves a toy. Design -> Product 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wtnhighlander Posted September 11, 2014 Report Share Posted September 11, 2014 Can't say anything negative about the result. I'd say you did an excellent job of improvisation with the tools at hand, as well. There are actually a couple of commercially made versions of the inverted jigsaw on the market now. Maybe you were just ahead of the trend! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dewald Swanepoel Posted September 11, 2014 Author Report Share Posted September 11, 2014 There are actually a couple of commercially made versions of the inverted jigsaw on the market now. Maybe you were just ahead of the trend! I'm guessing they're not precariously held together with clamps Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wdwerker Posted September 11, 2014 Report Share Posted September 11, 2014 I have mounted my jigsaw upside down like that on job sites before. I used several large washers and short screws to hold the saw to the board. This gave me more open space to cut. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
..Kev Posted September 11, 2014 Report Share Posted September 11, 2014 I'm the oddball who hasn't done that with the jig saw Nice work on the plane! The action figure was a nice touch! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChetlovesMer Posted September 11, 2014 Report Share Posted September 11, 2014 I've done the jigsaw trick a few times myself. But enough of that. Love the biplane. I especially like the pilot. That was a great idea to add him. What did he look like with his legs? Great job! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coop Posted September 11, 2014 Report Share Posted September 11, 2014 That is just too cool. Great job Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NTexRob Posted September 11, 2014 Report Share Posted September 11, 2014 Good Job! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikem Posted September 11, 2014 Report Share Posted September 11, 2014 Very well done!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dewald Swanepoel Posted September 12, 2014 Author Report Share Posted September 12, 2014 Thanks folks. It was a fun little project and really not something requiring a lot of skill. I especially like the pilot. That was a great idea to add him. What did he look like with his legs? Like this: Some scraping with a blade and a few touch ups with a sharpie marker got rid of the S.W.A.T signage and I slightly modified the helmet with a blade to make it look a little more like a pilot and less like a police man. To be honest though, I was actually hoping to find something a little more cartoonish, for want of a better word. Something in the style of Noddy or Dora the Explorer or something like that. But in the end it proved quite a challenge to find an action figure that was the correct size and looked something like a pilot so I had to settle for this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wfd55 Posted September 12, 2014 Report Share Posted September 12, 2014 Nothing wrong with using MDF a lot of the toys you buy today are MDF awesome job on the plane. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mzdadoc Posted September 15, 2014 Report Share Posted September 15, 2014 Looks great!!!!! I'm mean it's great!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wouldwurker Posted September 16, 2014 Report Share Posted September 16, 2014 Looks great, and it'll be an 'heirloom toy'! Tough part about the inverted jigsaw (I'm in that club) is that the blade isn't pulling the piece downwards, so you have to place a lot of downward pressure on the piece. Let it get away from you, and it'll start punching holes into the bottom of your piece....ask me how I know 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Byrdie Posted September 20, 2014 Report Share Posted September 20, 2014 Very nicely done! I haven't done the jig saw trick but actually had a commercially made table to do a similar trick with a circ saw to make a small table saw. Now THAT was scary! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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