Popular Post Tom King Posted February 25, 2017 Popular Post Report Share Posted February 25, 2017 I had this Chinese Chippendale balustrade to build for an 1850 museum house. After looking at all sorts of variations of 18th and 19th Century Chinese Chippendale balustrades, I figured out what I thought looked good, and what some problems were with other designs that didn't quite look right. Some will say that this is carpentry rather than woodworking, and you would be right, but it uses some of the same tools and techniques, so I don't care what you call it. I call it getting the job done. This house was known to have Chinese Chippendale balustrades when it was built, but they had been replaced in the 1980's with a modern, bastardized version. Anyway, after making a full sized drawing on a sheet of pink Styrofoam, I saw what the angles were, and thought about getting everything to fit perfectly. There are several different angles to cut, as you can see. I carried two miter saws, my old Langdon-Acme, and made four shooting boards. The first day, with all that stuff set up in the yard, it was pretty quickly obvious that I had WAY over-complicated it. I loaded all that stuff up, carried it back to the shop, and sharpened up a couple of backsaws. One is a 10" crosscut 13 pt., and the other a 12" 12 pt. rip. I sharpened the crosscut with a bit more upright rake than for a straight crosscut, since even the least angled crosscut still had a lot of rip in it. The ripper was sharpened with a bit more rake than I normally put on a simple rip saw, since all the sharp angles still had some crossgrain angle. It couldn't have worked any better. I screwed a strip of wood on the top of a sawhorse to hold each piece being cut by hand easier. The other tools used were a combination square, a sliding bevel, a couple of strips of plywood the width of the opening to mark by, and a sharp no. 4 Mirado pencil. It was quite an exercise in sawing by hand, but I'm convinced it went faster, simpler, and easier than using the other, complicated setup. I just held each piece where it went, marked it, and sawed it. Sometimes I needed both helpers to hold the long, starter pieces. Each piece was had all its edges sanded to round them over a bit (paint doesn't stick to sharp corners), the ends were painted, the place where the ends mounted to were painted, and each was stuck in place with a couple of stainless steel 23 ga. pins. Then holes were drilled for the nails, and each end was nailed with hand forged nails that we had saved from the old Cypress shingles we took off the roof, so they were nailed together with nails original to the house. I'll have a page in a week or two going over the design points, and comparing it to others on my website, along with how I built it, but it's not high on the to-do list. In the picture, to the left on the porch you can see the 20th Century version of Chinese Chippendale railing. It's made from 2x2's, with each part in each quadrant going the same direction. My "19th Century" version is built more in keeping with other 18th/19th Century existing versions, with 15/16" x 2" Cypress parts. The handrails are the pieces I needed to get straight out of the pile of 12/4 stuff that I bought which had enough bd. ft. to get the shutter stiles and rails out of. Mods, feel free to move this to another Forum if you see fit. 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wdwerker Posted February 25, 2017 Report Share Posted February 25, 2017 So old growth cypress ? I've had new growth cypress feel more like sponge cake. Back to original or as close as possible , Kudos ! Cutting by eye & a pencil mark , great, bringing 2 helpers and 40 + years of experience, smart, mixing 23 gauge stainless nails and historically correct hand forged nails, priceless !!!!!! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mat60 Posted February 25, 2017 Report Share Posted February 25, 2017 Always like to see your work and that had to take some time. Nice Tom. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coop Posted February 25, 2017 Report Share Posted February 25, 2017 Tom, just out of curiosity, there are two pieces in each section that go from corner to corner. Why did you just miter one side of each end and nail it to the sides as opposed to mitering each side of each end where it would fit in the corner and be centered in the corners, touching two sides? I think the way you did it looks much cooler than the way I would have! Great job. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unknown craftsman Posted February 25, 2017 Report Share Posted February 25, 2017 It looks like it's falling apart already I see pieces on the ground. Just kidding nice work Tom. I need to work on my handsaw sharpening. Aj Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom King Posted February 25, 2017 Author Report Share Posted February 25, 2017 K Cooper, the design is more complicated than it looks, when trying to avoid problems I found in every old one I saw. It was most important to have the middle two elements of each section meet with their outside lines forming a right angle on the same side of the vertical dividers. In order to do that, one of the main cross members doesn't quite even get to one corner. There is one piece in the whole assembly that does bisect one of the angles between a vertical, and the handrail. The stringers were old, and too good to replace, but one side longer than the other, as well as out of parallel a little. It needed to be built so as you look through, from one side to the other, the the angles of the balustrade were the same on both sides. Spacing with open space relative to member width appeared most pleasing when 4:1. Pieces need to be a little less than an inch to look like other old ones, and current code calls for a 4" ball not passing through anywhere. Not that code needed to apply, but why not? 3-3/4":15/16". After the first cross was placed, each of the next set of pieces was 4 in each of the 10 sections, so 40 pieces in each run. The crosscut saw needed sharpening again before I was finished, but I made do. Yes. Old growth heart. Air dried for over 40 years. Out of some of the leftover boards from making shingles, that are on this house. White pieces on the ground were from the 20th Century section I knocked out on the porch front. The picture was taken before it was finished all the way. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Janello Posted February 25, 2017 Report Share Posted February 25, 2017 Looks great Tom. You get to do some really interesting projects, this one being no exception. I call that woodworking Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eric. Posted February 25, 2017 Report Share Posted February 25, 2017 15 hours ago, Tom King said: Chinese Chippendale That's a style I was not aware of. Looks great, Tom. I love it. Looks like a total PITA to build. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sheperd80 Posted February 25, 2017 Report Share Posted February 25, 2017 Dont shame yourself with dirty words like hobbyist! That is beautiful carpentry. Nicely done. Id never heard of chinese chippendale either. Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using Tapatalk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom King Posted February 25, 2017 Author Report Share Posted February 25, 2017 Chippendale had three "Periods" of his work. The third was called his Chinese period. All things Chinese were very much in vogue then-one of the reasons we call dinnerware "China" today. George Washington received an order of 300 pieces of Chinese Blue and White dinnerware that came on a ship carrying something like 30 tons of it (might have been 60 tons-memory not the best on that sort of thing). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Chippendale_(architecture) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bulldog Posted February 28, 2017 Report Share Posted February 28, 2017 Your work, as usual, is impeccable. Thanks for sharing Tom! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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