Practice inlay piece


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The fit on the vines and stems was good, they just dropped in place with very slight pressure.  The lower vine dropped in with no pressure, not sure why that one did.  Maybe it was because the cut was across the grain of the Walnut.

But next time I won't leave the tabs, rather I'll cut to a skin of about 0.010" and let that hold the piece in place.  The tabs got in the way and those had to be trimmed - 2 tabs each on 16 stems and probably 15 tabs on the vines - lots of trimming.  The inlay pieces were 0.1875" thick and the pockets cut to 0.150" but I didn't think about the tabs being 0.0625" and those kept the inlay pieces from seating properly.  Since I cut the inlay pieces bottom side up that means the tabs were on the top side so I had to be delicate in cutting them off or it would have splintered the top side.

The leaves took a bit more work but that was by design.  I wanted some sharp points in places and as you know, it's easy to cut a sharp outside corner or point with a router bit but impossible to cut a sharp inside corner with a round bit.  If I had done this as a V-carve inlay I could have cut sharp corners but this is a traditional pocket and inlay piece.  So that meant hand fitting and cutting the sharp corners on each leaf. 

Ultimately it wasn't too bad, about what I expected.  If I look closely enough I can see a few thousandths gap in a few places but not really noticeable unless you're looking for it.

David

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