My Golden Mallets

In woodworking, mallets and hammers are basic tools, as basic as pick up trucks and bulldozers in road construction.

I've made as many wooden mallets as I could possibly and reasonably make. Hammers, I bought - new or at flea markets. Wooden mallets to have heft are typically humongous to  be able to enforce the function that they were made for. Both steel hammers and wooden mallets are enforcers but lack subtlety for delicate and fine work, unless in their miniaturized versions. Japanese hammers with their narrow and skinny look come close to combining heft and accuracy. One slight flaw is that  solid steel hammers vibrate at every strike.

My solution is a hybrid of wood and strips of brass rods embedded with epoxy in grooves I created along slender wooden heads.  The finished projects allow for accuracy with just the proper heft with no vibration and better control.  I dubbed them the sports cars next to the pick up trucks and bulldozers of full size hammers and bulky wooden mallets for fine and delicate work.

 

With my hand close to the mallet head gives me better control and accuracy for delicate work.  By the way, even though I am typically right handed in most everything I do (writing and eating, for example), but I use tools left handed, including the use of kitchen knives. I customized  these mallets to my left handed grip. For one mallet the grip is close to the head, which makes for an accurate and delicate strike.

 

Below is one example of delicate work where accuracy is critical.

The next two photos below show the weight of the grooved mallet head without the brass, weighing at a mere 31 grams. It became ten times heavier when the brass bars were added.

What follows in the next photos are for the woodworking readers eager to make their own versions from the steps I laid out. A solid background in woodworking is a must to follow the self explanatory steps.

Extra Beds for Extra Guests, No Problem

My wife's two brothers and two sisters and their spouses wanted to visit with us all at the same time, flying in from two different states. We have enough rooms in our home except for one without a bed (it's the home office/library).  Fortunately, I had enough lead time to build an extra bed (a king size one that is a joined two twin beds.  Two separate twin beds are easier to carry and maneuver individually when there is only one person - namely me - to do it.  I've built beds, several of them actually, in the past, from the time we had our first home. That was when I started my woodworking hobby.  It meant that we - my wife and two sons - had to sleep on the carpet on mattresses which we purchased when we moved in while I started learning and finally started building the bed frames.  That was forty three three years ago.  Since then I've made several versions as my skills improved overtime, along with an accumulation of tools that improved my techniques and efficiency. In other words, this latest one was  going to be a piece of cake, right?  You, the reader, will be the judge.

I started with good quality (kiln dried and smooth-finished) 3 X 3/4  pine lumber.  Using short connecting pieces in between two long boards produced 7- 1/2 wide boards like so in the photo below. Weight is obviously less than had I opted to join three boards all the way.

I used pocket hole joinery and only one-size (1-1/4) pocket screws all throughout.

Below shows the completed four long sides of the two twin beds

Later the four short end pieces - two per bed - and middle rails  with feet attached to the long sides completed the parts for assembly (below).

Assembly is done with the same pocket screws

Note below the short support bar attached below each rail to help with load bearing at the joint.  Notice the pocket holes

This design has all the pieces oriented vertically (perpendicular to the floor when laid out flat) for maximum load carrying capacity.  The parts will resist bending stresses because they are "on edge" relative to the floor.

1/4 inch peg boards provide the flat platform for the mattress to rest on.

I ordered two memory foam mattresses from Siena. 

Once released from its binding the bed will slowly expand until it reaches its full dimension. The manufacturer recommends a full 24 hours before use.

Earlier, a while back, I knew this was a good mattress from an earlier bed for one of the grand kids to sleep on in one of the bedrooms.

The two twin beds join to make a king size bed.

Within the day after our guests left I dis-assembled the two twin beds and packed the parts together.  They will be re-assembled next year when the same guests plan to come back for another visit. It was fun having them as this was the first time we all got together since my wife was first diagnosed with Parkinson's.  They want this visit to be a yearly event.

Once packed, the whole package is neatly stored in one of the closets in one of the bedrooms (see below). This is ideally the place to store them as opposed to the garage where frequent and irregular changes in temperature and humidity can adversely affect the joined pieces, not the least to be expected is warping of the wood from changes in the weather.

ULU - Unique Kitchen Knife, "Magic" Knife Stand

"Derived from the Eskimo-Aleut term “ooloo”, the ulu knife was a device used by indigenous Alaskan tribes for thousands of years. Originally, it was named uuluurag, which meant a woman's knife. It has been traditionally used to clean the skins of different types of meat to make clothing and cut meat for different preparations".  ---https://dalstrong.com/blogs/news/ulu-knife

That is about the best summary I could find about this knife which led me to continue with the latest theme in "woodworking projects for the kitchen".

There are two projects involved here.  As in most of our kitchen knives that were from "blank" blades, I recently ordered an ulu (blade only) so I can fashion the handle (known as scale) and made a "magical" knife stand.   As in most magic tricks the allure is lost once the trick is exposed. Or, as in this case, perhaps you will find it still interesting even if you find out how the magic works.  More importantly, which I will get to later in the blog, this knife has one distinct cutting advantage in "kitchen works".

The knife

 

Knife stand

1. Fashioning the handle (scale):

A drawn to scale sketch 

From the stash of leftover hard woods, I picked marble wood for the scale and maple for the stand. Marble wood is not just known as such because of its grain pattern but that for its hardness (as a rock, metaphorically).

I ripped a section of marble wood close to the required dimension

My shop-made jig saw did quick work of the scales roughly close to dimension

I used a double sided tape to temporarily attach the scales to the blade 

Shaping the edge of the scale flush with the blade handle's edge 

2-part industrial epoxy, rivets and clamps completed the glue-up of the scales to the blade handle.  Took 24 hours to cure.

Oscillating drum sander did the final shaping of the scale's edge

Final sanding and shaping of the scales 

2. Making the knife stand:

Dimensioning the parts from scrap maple

By the way, I actually made the stand before the scales; thus showing the blade in the photo (below) without the scales yet, positioned over the block.

I ripped a very thin veneer of the maple (below) from the block

Drilled two shallow sockets to accept two rare earth magnets

CA glue secured the two magnets

The veneer is glued back to the block 

The test

This knife, predating the medieval look by a few thousand years, has one advantage.  Since the handle is directly above and over the blade, it requires very little amount of pressure to make cutting and slicing with minimum effort over the same traditional blade of comparable sharpness. No wonder the indigenous Inuit and Eskimo women favored the knife.

This knife allows  rolling/rocking motions that are not possible with traditional knives for cutting fish fins and fish center bones easily.  Slicing meat and vegetables go naturally. As in all cutlery tools, sharpening and honing are a must.  Mastering the use of an ulu knife will take a bit of getting used but clearly not difficult to learn; however, once mastered it is a joy to use.

Notes:  

1. The knife can be used bi-directionally; that is, traditionally the wide blade is pointed forward but one may use, reversing it, with the sharp point forward as in getting into the crevices of the meat or even veggies (for example I used that configuration of cutting into the gills of the fish above, or into the narrow corners of a pepper or tomato)

2.  Finished (complete and ready to use) ulu knives are commercially available at prices no more expensive than medium-priced and high end cutlery.  They are worth a look.