The Hank Chair

[Bmac]

Well this project was just released and it's right up my alley. First it's a chair, one of my favorite things to build. It's also a little funky looking, a cool style I'd like to delve into. I do think it needs some curves and softening, so I'm going to experiment with it and see if i can develop some curves. Finally it is made with an unique template system that I'm very interested in seeing how it's done. This technique could be used with a lot of projects and it is different approach. This might be a neat technique to have experience with.

As with the other Guild projects I've purchased, I think this one is one I'll be referring back to quite often if I like the technique. I can't tell you how many times I've used the other Guild projects I've purchased. The Sculptured Rocker series has been used a ton by me and it introduced me to a type of construction I absolutely love. That series changed my woodworking more than anything I've purchased. The Krenov Cabinet has also been an awesome purchase as it's my go to tutorial for hand cut dovetails. I've done about 3 projects since that one that I referred back to the video series for dovetail tips. That one also introduced me to drawers with a center guide, love them now.

So, I hope to get started on this build soon, I'm in the middle of a double Maloof Rocker build (2 individual rockers, not the actual 2 seat rocker), but I'm going to start the templates on this series soon and I'll post as I go along.

Are others are as intrigued as I am? 

https://thewoodwhispererguild.com/product/hank-chair/

[Chet]

The look of the Hank Chair doesn't intrigue me at all but I have heard things about Jory himself and his techniques that has me thinking about buying the guild project.

[pkinneb]

1 hour ago, Chet said:

The look of the Hank Chair doesn't intrigue me at all but I have heard things about Jory himself and his techniques that has me thinking about buying the guild project.

Not sure I'm a fan either but I bought it to see how all the joinery is done should be some good info in there.

[Coop]

I almost bought this instead of the low back but was turned away due the bulky look as it will be for my daughter. I agree that I have yet to buy a guild build that I didn’t use some of the ideas and methods on other builds. Bmac, like you, the Knenov Cabinet was the one I had the most fun with and I too refer back to the dove tail cutting method that Marc used. Looking forward to following you on this. 

[legenddc]

I watched some from the live watch party that Marc did and it seemed really interesting. I'm sure there's a lot of good stuff in there on templates and joinery if nothing else.

[JohnG]

I went back and forth on this project. I like the funky look of it, but it's not something that I'd have a spot for in my house. I'll probably pick it up at some point, after I've worked through my project to-do list a bit.

[wtnhighlander]

Not my cup o' tea. In my eyes, that thing looks singularly uncomfortable to sit in. Any of you that build one, please share your experience.

[Bmac]

I agree with most here that the look of this chair is a little harsh, but I see more to this that the harsh angles. My eye has already started to soften it. Here's a few altered sketches I developed from the PDF plan. 

Here is one that was developed by making the arm rest thicker/wider, giving a better sweep to the arm and a pronounced area where your hand rests. 

Same outline traced from the above sketch;

Here's a sketch staying within the confines of the original plan, meaning I don't need to alter the size of the parts the plan calls for, less of a pronounced sweep in the arm and no pronounced area for hand rest;

I think both of these alterations of the sides are going to be simple. I like the first alteration better.

Also I think rounding over the leg profile is a simple way to soften the look and shouldn't weaken the chair.

As for the rest of the chair, I think the seat won't need to be altered but I'd like to soften the back rest. Perhaps for the back rest try to use thicker stock and develop a more pronounced curve. 

As I stated earlier I plan to post this build. I really intrigued by this construction approach.

 

[wtnhighlander]

@Bmacthat certainly looks like an improvement in comfort! O prefer the more organic look, too. The original has a crystalline feel, that just doesn't jive with wood.

[Bmac]

9 hours ago, wtnhighlander said:

@Bmacthat certainly looks like an improvement in comfort! O prefer the more organic look, too. The original has a crystalline feel, that just doesn't jive with wood.

Yes, the original does have a crystalline look, totally agree. Jory was talking about this piece on the first video of the build series and referred to it's sleek and crisp lines that appeals to him. He also leans heavily toward the Mid-Century Modern style we are starting to really see crop up more and more. I think Jory is more inclined to build this way based on his construction style. He needs straight edges to make his sleds that cut the correct angles for the joints. 

Now what I've learned from the sculptured furniture I've made is that you often need these straight edges to help make your joints, but by oversizing everything you then can sculpt the piece after it's put together. That's my very simple alteration to this plan. Excited to give it a shot as soon as I finish my current projects.

[Chestnut]

I'd love to see the front leg and arm rest be done as a bent lamination that gets further sculpting similar to the rockers on a maloof rocker. It may end of falling flat but i'd try it.

The nice part is maloof and nakashima both built within the MCM style but it was just sculpted instead of hard lines. Modifying this to a sculpted chair doesn't really remove it from that style though it makes it considerably different. I'm excited to see where you go with this.

 

[Bmac]

1 hour ago, Chestnut said:

I'd love to see the front leg and arm rest be done as a bent lamination that gets further sculpting similar to the rockers on a maloof rocker. It may end of falling flat but i'd try it.

The nice part is maloof and nakashima both built within the MCM style but it was just sculpted instead of hard lines. Modifying this to a sculpted chair doesn't really remove it from that style though it makes it considerably different. I'm excited to see where you go with this.

 

Exactly, when I said the curves should work well with this piece I could have said that they work well within the MCM style. Glad you clarified that for me because I was thinking along those lines.

 

[Bmac]

Been kept busy by an always fun project, Maloof Rockers, 2 of them. One for my house and one for a Christmas present. Always good to do chair projects in twos, at least in my in my opinion. Since you do special cuts/joints, once you are set up for those it makes things go much faster. I started these the last week in April, but with my HS baseball team making the State playoffs, two kids graduating ( one each from HS and college), and general life they have taken alittle longer. These are my third and fourth Mallof Rockers I've built and I think I have it down to about 1 month. I really should show a build of one of these rockers as I've developed a few shortcuts and time saving techniques.

Now that I'm wrapping those up, I'm moving to the Hank chair, or at least getting prep work done. Finished the templates for the 2 sides. Made some changes to the original template, added some width to the arm and drew in my curves. Then I made 2 copies of that before cutting out the curves;

Here's the cut out curvy one overlaying my full size template;

I'll use the full sized curved template to rough shape the side piece once assembled and then use a pattern router bit to get both identical to the final curved template. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Here's the stock I plan to use. Jory loves to use the cheaper stock with knots, sapwood and other imperfections, I plan to do the same;

That wood has been air dried 3 years and has been stickered in the shop for the past 6 months. I run a dehumidifier in my shop and that stock is sitting at 8-9%. Here are my pieces to construct the sides, oversized and jointed on the surfaces that go against the fence of the homemade sleds I need to make;

Before I make the sleds I think I'm going to make this a double build so next on tap next I need to get pieces for that second chair roughed out. I'm going to go with a different species for the other chair, thinking maple. Need to pull my stock of maple to see what I have. Cherry is another option for the second chair. I do have some hickory and white oak but that needs some more time to season. What is nice with this build is you can use up scraps since the pieces aren't that large, I've got a ton of 8/4 scraps. Of course with my luck the pieces are always an inch too short or an inch too narrow to use!

 

[Chestnut]

Oooo it's starting to show some shape!!!!

I'm really excited to see where this goes.

[pkinneb]

You do some awesome work BMAC!! And yes to a rocker  journal  I hope to do one some day LOL

[Coop]

The rockers look amazing. I too am looking forward to the Hank chair. You’re beginning to sound a lot like Kev, “ I’ll be be using some scrap 8/4 that just happened to be laying around”! 

[Bmac]

1 hour ago, pkinneb said:

You do some awesome work BMAC!! And yes to a rocker  journal  I hope to do one some day LOL

Will do. I was wondering if I should since there has been quite a few rocker builds on here over the years. Next Rocker will likely be this winter or late fall, plan to use the curly maple I got from Spanky! Not sure where I'll put that one though, running out of space in my house. 

1 hour ago, K Cooper said:

The rockers look amazing. I too am looking forward to the Hank chair. You’re beginning to sound a lot like Kev, “ I’ll be be using some scrap 8/4 that just happened to be laying around”! 

I wonder if Kev has the same problem as me, scraps always being an inch too small in one dimension. When making these sculptured chairs you definitely end up with 8/4 scrap. I think I have a hoarding problem with scraps. I should sell it to pen turners.

1 hour ago, Chestnut said:

Oooo it's starting to show some shape!!!!

I'm really excited to see where this goes.

Yup, trying to make a pointy harsh look into one with some sexy curves. Well sort of sexy, I guess that depends on who you are talking to. Did run into a little bit of a problem I'm sure I can work around. Making the arm wider for the curve meant the stock I needed was slightly over 8" wide. That doesn't work well for my 8" jointer, so I'll be alittle short on the top of the arm by the back rest, but I think I still have enough stock to fall in line with that curve, meaning I was going to round off that corner anyway. If I don't have enough stock I'll just alter that back curve. 

[Chestnut]

14 hours ago, Bmac said:

Yup, trying to make a pointy harsh look into one with some sexy curves. Well sort of sexy, I guess that depends on who you are talking to. Did run into a little bit of a problem I'm sure I can work around. Making the arm wider for the curve meant the stock I needed was slightly over 8" wide. That doesn't work well for my 8" jointer, so I'll be alittle short on the top of the arm by the back rest, but I think I still have enough stock to fall in line with that curve, meaning I was going to round off that corner anyway. If I don't have enough stock I'll just alter that back curve.

Gotta figure out those jointer tricks. I was using some 10-11" lumber the other day just fine on my 8" jointer. I draw the line at 12" material, it gets hard to fit through my 13" planer with the hook sled at that point.

I don't mind the look of the chair originally but it's going to look better with curves. I assume you are goign to do a sculpted seat?

[Bmac]

56 minutes ago, Chestnut said:

Gotta figure out those jointer tricks. I was using some 10-11" lumber the other day just fine on my 8" jointer. I draw the line at 12" material, it gets hard to fit through my 13" planer with the hook sled at that point.

I don't mind the look of the chair originally but it's going to look better with curves. I assume you are goign to do a sculpted seat?

I know there are tricks dealing with getting more width from a jointer, point taken. 

I'm actually going to see how the cushion seat is done and will likely go with that. It's more out of my comfort zone and I'm excited to try it.

[Bmac]

This chair has taken awhile to get into with a busy schedule and trying to finish up the 2 rockers. My walnut rocker is done and I'll post a few photos of that. For the Hank chairs, this has been sort of a "soft" start. I got the pieces cut for the sides of 2 chairs. My second chair was going to be another species but I ended up defaulting back to walnut, as I had some perfect stock for this. Once the 3 pieces that make up the sides were rough cut to size, I moved on to creating clean joint surfaces. To do this we start with our template. I made extra templates and cut one in 3 pieces. The cut line were you cut the template in pieces is the joint line and the angle you cut is not critical, it just needs to be consistent. Here's a picture again of the templates;

The 3 smaller pieces were cut roughly along the lines shown on the full size template. These were just cut on the bandsaw and don't need to match the original identically, but the key is the pieces match up. 

You take those pieces to the table saw and Jory make sleds to do the cutting. Start with a piece of plywood with parallel sides and position your template on the plywood;

The cut line needs to line up perfectly with the edge of the sled;

Next screw on a straight edge to for a fence;

Now you have a sled to cut consistent angles. 

That works well and is so easy. That sled was made for the arm part of the chair. Next moved on the the legs and I decided to try the incra miter gauge. The angle for the arm was too harsh to use this method;

Once positioned perfectly against the blade I locked in the angle on the miter gauge;

Instant reproducible cut, like I said we aren't worried about measuring the angle, we just need to match the template. Simple enough and all cuts completed in no time;

Next mark your domino placement;

So my next step will be to bore my domino holes, dry fit and make some clamping culls to pull the pieces together along the long axis of the joint, then glue up. But I'll need to save that job for another day.

The template/sled concept is interesting. The imagination is about the only thing that limits you in your design.

Thanks for looking.

 

 

[Bmac]

Ok, getting back to the Hank after a detour with a surfboard. This post is picture heavy, covering the glue up of the chair sides,  pattern routing of sides, 42 degree cuts for the backrest  joint, fitting sides to back, cutting out contour of back and putting scallop in backrest. 

Dominos join the sides, culls cut out of the pieces to help with the clamping of awkward pieces, titebond 3 used;

Here's what the weird shaped sides look like after glueup.

Next I drew the outline of the pattern on the sides and cut the chair sides close to the line on the bandsaw and routed the pieces using the template. Cleaned up the template then routed;

Next it's cutting the 42 degree joint for the backrest. It's a hairy operation putting the front leg against the aux fence on the table saw;

To cut the opposite side you need to reposition the aux fence forward and start the cut between the back leg and the backrest, hard to explain so I'll let the picture do the explaining, here's the setup;

Final cut joint surfaces, two sides put together to confirm correct angle and symmetry;

Sides ready for dominos;

Backrests were also cut at a 42 degree cut, much more simple operation and just used the miter gauge on the table saw. Here's one joint dry fit;

Next it was back to the bandsaw to cut out the backrest profile;

Outline for a scalloped/dished out area at the top of the backrest;

Completed this operation using the Festool RAS 115, my favorite gross shaping tool. These two pics are after shaping one of the backrests. There was absolutely no cleanup of dust needed, the vac picked up almost all of it. This is not doctored, literally finished shaping and then took pic. This is why I love this tool, rapid stock removal and minimal dust;

There will be dust if you are shaping smaller pieces, but with a large flat area like this dust is negligible. 

Next job is to glue up the seat frame, I already have those pieces roughed out.

Thanks for looking. 

 

 

[pkinneb]

I've been watching the guild video's and I might have to make one of these just for the challenge. They look pretty straight forward but its kind of deceiving there is a lot that goes into one of these. As usual your execution is top notch thanks for sharing.

[Bmac]

30 minutes ago, pkinneb said:

I've been watching the guild video's and I might have to make one of these just for the challenge. They look pretty straight forward but its kind of deceiving there is a lot that goes into one of these. As usual your execution is top notch thanks for sharing.

Yes, it is a different kind of build. Using the dominos makes the joinery easy, but I think it takes some of the fun out of it. Nevertheless, this style lends itself to many different designs. Looking at Jory's website, if I had to pick something he made that I would really want to make, it probably would be one of his couches. They have a really nice look to them and you could probably figure it out on your own after doing this chair. Looks better to me than this chair.

[lewisc]

Looking good. I might have to buy this one as well. 

 

What’s the final thickness of the timber once it has been milled?

[Bmac]

The sides are around 6/4-7/4, seat frame will be around 5/4 and the back rest starts as a 12/4 board but is shaped to around a 6/4 thickness.