Curly Maloof Rocker

[Chet]

1 hour ago, Bmac said:

I was so stressed doing this

Lol. I can spend the whole day in the shop avoiding a nerve racking step like this.  It usually gets ends up getting done by the fact that it has to be done to move on with the project.  These steps are magnified by the fact that they are usually toward the end were mistakes are more costly.

[Mark J]

9 minutes ago, Chet said:

These steps are magnified by the fact that they are usually toward the end were mistakes are more costly.

And where get done-itis also makes them more likely.

[Bmac]

Getting ready to wrap this build up! I've got the whole rocker assembled and I'm finalizing the last bit of shaping. I'll walk you through the final steps of construction and shaping. 

Where I left off last time I was finalizing the headrest joints and the horns. Here is a few pics of the horns, it takes quite a bit of work to get them to this point, esp since I'm dealing with all different grain directions in the horn. This is a view from the rear, key point here is showing the flow and the continuous line developed from the front edge of the horn down to the top edge of the headrest;

Looking down the horn from the top, you can see how the cove of the horn continues down the back to a cove along the headrest to back leg joint;

Front view of the horn detail, again highlighting the continuous flow of the lines from the backrest to the horn;

Next up was shaping the rockers. Basically rounding over the top and bottom edges and adding some detail to the rear part of the rocker. I did just about all the initial shaping with the rasps, then on to small sander and interface pad to 180;

Rocker glue up! Final glue up for this project, a big step. Epoxy was used, need to drive a 3.5" long dowel through the rocker and into the back leg. Using TB is a disaster waiting to happen in my opinion. Any swelling of the dowels and you are sunk. 

We now have a complete rocker;

Back leg interface prior to any shaping;

Back leg with initial shaping, mainly using rasps;

Front leg pre shaping;

Drawing some guidelines for reduction;

Initial shaping with the RAS;

Shaping roughed out, mainly using rasps;

What's left is the final sanding of the rockers and the legs at the rocker leg interface. After that I'll wet the whole chair down to raise the grain, resand everything and then apply the dye. Not looking forward to that step.

Time it took for these operations;

Horns and shaping rockers- 1.5 hrs

Sanding rockers, glue up- 1 hr

Shaping back leg to rocker interface- 1 hr

Shaping front leg to rocker interface- 1 hr

This takes me to a total time of 59.5 hrs. I'm really quite surprised at the time, I thought it would be higher. 

Thanks for looking.

[pkinneb]

Looks great Bmac! I have another question is there a reason you didn’t use a one piece block for the riser between the rocker and the leg?

[Chet]

Did you give any thought to doing some of the shaping on things like the rockers using a spoke shave?

[Tom King]

Maybe the best build thread ever!!

[Bmac]

1 hour ago, pkinneb said:

Looks great Bmac! I have another question is there a reason you didn’t use a one piece block for the riser between the rocker and the leg?

Well the reason for the laminates is you are gluing the riser onto a surface that is not flat, but rather has a curve. So the strips that make up the riser become part of the curved lamination that is the rocker.

45 minutes ago, Chet said:

Did you give any thought to doing some of the shaping on things like the rockers using a spoke shave?

Absolutely a spoke shave works on shaping a lot of these areas. I've really gravitated toward the rasps because of their versatility and the fact you don't need to pay attention to grain direction and etc like you do with a spoke shave.

19 minutes ago, Tom King said:

Maybe the best build thread ever!!

That's pretty high praise and I've humbled you would even think that. Thanks for the kind words.

[drzaius]

38 minutes ago, Bmac said:

Well the reason for the laminates is you are gluing the riser onto a surface that is not flat, but rather has a curve. So the strips that make up the riser become part of the curved lamination that is the rocker.

That's a nice piece of attention to detail there.

[pkinneb]

22 hours ago, Bmac said:

Well the reason for the laminates is you are gluing the riser onto a surface that is not flat, but rather has a curve. So the strips that make up the riser become part of the curved lamination that is the rocker.

ahh makes sense now thanks!

[Spanky]

Bmac, I keep looking for pics of the finished rocker? 

[Bmac]

1 hour ago, Spanky said:

Bmac, I keep looking for pics of the finished rocker? 

Any day now, maybe even later today. I put the last coat of oil/wax on it last night. Took the long road with the finish, 3 coats of oil/poly and 2 coats of oil/wax. 

[Bmac]

Ok, @Spanky got me going to finish up this post. I had put my last coat of finish on the Rocker yesterday and so I went home at lunch to move it into the house and grab some pics. 

When I left off here I had to do the final sanding of the rockers and lower legs. Then it was wet down the whole rocker to raise the grain and then resand the whole rocker. Dye was applied next and again I had to resand the whole rocker! Once those very joyless tasks were completed I got to apply the finish and then for the first time see what this wood had to offer. Well it didn't disappoint, God made some beautiful wood here and Rickey was the man to find it! The wood is really the big star of this piece and the dye I used really made the figure POP. I hope @treeslayer approves.

For the finish it was 3 coats of the Maloof oil/poly then 2 coats of Maloof oil/wax. Each coat was applied with a rag, let to sit and then rubbed down vigorously to remove all the excess. Last night as I was applying the last coat, I couldn't resist to snap a few pics of the figure. It really pops with the oil still wet;

So finishing this was a complete joy. Here are a few pics of the chair;

Some details. I love the horn detail, it seems so organic to me how it flows. Here's a shot of the headrest and the horns;

Top of headrest flows into the front line or edge of the horn;

Again you can see that flowing line and see how the cove of the horn flows into the concave area of the headrest;

The contours of the bottom of the headrest;

Inside of the arm detail;

Great figure in the seat;

Front leg detail;

Leg to seat joints;

Rocker to leg interface;

And to wrap it up, here are the 3 rockers I've made this year, one from walnut, one out of cherry, and the last from some great Spanky curly maple;

Thanks for following. Hopefully I was helpful with posting this build. I can't say enough how much I enjoy this build. I will likely not make another one of these until I get some white oak dried sufficiently. White oak is a slow drying wood, I need to be patient, most of it was milled last year.

Total time was surprising to me, it went quicker than I thought it would. I was at 59.5 last post. This post added 3 hrs for all the sanding/wetting/resanding/staining/resanding. Applying the finish of all 5 coats was time consuming also, another 2 hrs.

So my total time start to finish was 64.9 hrs, time well spent in my book!!!!

 

[JohnG]

Absolutely gorgeous! Now that you have made one in walnut, cherry, and maple, which did you like working with the most for the rocker?

Which one is the least comfortable? I'll take it off your hands for you

[RIW]

Bmac:  Great job !!  That tiger is unbelievable.   

[pkinneb]

Great looking family  

Awesome job and thanks for taking the time to journal it, this will be one of my go to resources when I do mine.

[Chet]

1 hour ago, Bmac said:

When I left off here I had to do the final sanding of the rockers and lower legs. Then it was wet down the whole rocker to raise the grain and then resand the whole rocker. Dye was applied next and again I had to resand the whole rocker!

I think you should have done a "real time" video of all of this so we could have enjoyed the joyless task with you. 

Normally a persons most recent project is there favorite but of the three rockers do you gravitate towards one?

You most certainly did a great job on this one.

[treeslayer]

 Beautiful, beautiful work @Bmac and that dye really did it’s job on making that grain pop, that’s some of the finest work I’ve seen on here and an awesome trio that will last several lifetimes. Well done sir!

[Bmac]

1 hour ago, JohnG said:

Absolutely gorgeous! Now that you have made one in walnut, cherry, and maple, which did you like working with the most for the rocker?

Which one is the least comfortable? I'll take it off your hands for you

 

24 minutes ago, Chet said:

I think you should have done a "real time" video of all of this so we could have enjoyed the joyless task with you. 

Normally a persons most recent project is there favorite but of the three rockers do you gravitate towards one?

You most certainly did a great job on this one.

First, all 3 woods, cherry, walnut and maple, were ideal for this project. The tiger maple with all its figure really turned up the wow factor and was very easy to work with. I've made 2 of these rockers before these 3, and those first two were cherry. Can't really say I have a favorite wood, I think all the woods worked similarly and all took just as long to sand. This chair is a real labor of love, by the time I'm done I've felt every surface, edge, joint, corner and roundover hundreds of times. The hand sanding is tiresome, but at least at that point you can see the chair and it's nice form and shape, that's enough to encourage one forward through the repetitive parts. 

In the end the tiger maple is by far the prettiest one I've built. That figure just popped! So I guess @Chet the tiger maple is my favorite.

@JohnG Unfortunately for you they are all very comfortable! Actually the cherry rocker is a Christmas gift for my father. I'll keep the walnut and curly maple ones with me. I hope to make a few white oak ones for the porch in the future.

 

[RichardA]

Absof***lutly beautiful job. And you have three?  I'd go crazy trying to wear them out evenly. Top notch craftsmanship.

[Spanky]

Bmac, that rocker needs to come back to the mtns of Tennessee . Hey, you done a great job on that rocker! I was hoping that you wouldn’t be disappoint with the wood.

[Coop]

Some may consider this sac religious but, with all due respect, I don’t think Mr. Maloof could have done or, did any better! Well done Bmac on the chair and the journal. 

[Bmac]

2 hours ago, Spanky said:

Bmac, that rocker needs to come back to the mtns of Tennessee . Hey, you done a great job on that rocker! I was hoping that you wouldn’t be disappoint with the wood.

Rickey, that wood was a real pleasure to work, now I hope you can find some more this winter!!!!!

1 hour ago, K Cooper said:

Some may consider this sac religious but, with all due respect, I don’t think Mr. Maloof could have done or, did any better! Well done Bmac on the chair and the journal. 

Coop you are way to kind. I think it is sacrilegious to say that. I'm just trying to copy the original. Glad you liked the journal, I find doing a journal helps me to do my best. Now I want to see what you make out of Rickey's awesome curly maple!!!

[Coop]

As soon as Christmas is over and my wife gets her decorations off the mantel, I plan to make a bracket for the slab to mount on. Kind of like an old cherished muzzleloader. 

[Spanky]

29 minutes ago, Bmac said:

Rickey, that wood was a real pleasure to work, now I hope you can find some more this winter!!!!!

 

Bmac it will need to be springtime to find anymore. I looked for that log three years, It may take three more years to get one that good.

[Coop]

Can you imagine the price in three years? Time to take options!