Old Mallet Restoration

This old wooden mallet may have been hand-made, or it may have been purchased. I didn't see any maker's marks on it, I think it was hand-made. Its got a nice size and weight to it, maybe 50% bigger than the wood mallet I made for myself a few years ago, so I think it will be handy to have around the shop. The handle fits into the head in a tapered hole, so the harder you swing it, the tighter the head gets, yet and easy tap is all it takes to loosen the head up. Between the two parts, the handles is probably slightly more complicated, so making a new head would have been pretty easy, but i wanted ti try and keep as much of it as I could.

So I planed off the big break at the top of the head, and matched it to a piece of white oak I had in the shop. After the glue set up I trimmed it on the band saw, and then took it down to rough shape in the vise with a hand plane. I finished up the shaping on the power sander, and then went over it with files and sandpaper to get the shape right. I didn't want to try and chuck this up in the lathe, so doing it this way was a little fussy, but the results were good.

After I got it shaped up I scribed the detail lines in with a marking knife, and then deepened them by running a thin wire in the slot. The final step was to clean the wood with grain alcohol and a utility knife blade, and then coat the wood with raw linseed oil.

You can see a video I made of this build on YouTube.

Scratch Stock

I have an old fireplace surround I'm working on for my sister and her husband. They've bought a gas fireplace that they'd like to install in their living room. The shape of the gas fireplace doesn't match the opening in the surround they found so I'll modify it to suit, and add some shelving along with some other elements to tie it into their living room (see below.) *

 

My son and I used a heat gun to strip most of the paint off the most complex parts we're reusing, the small columns. They have appliques on them but that section of the column will be removed to lower the height, leaving the lower fluted section, and there is still paint in the flutes. That's why I need a scraper. I could just round off the end of a piece of tool steel and use it like a paint scraper, but holding it firmly, and close to the wood surface will give me more control. At least that is my hope, so I'm working on making a simple scratch stock.

I found some great sites that really helped with the design and build of this tool. This article from Woodsmith Magazine is a great introduction to the basics and includes plans. For more of a deep dive into the types and styles of scratch stocks and their history, check out the Valley Woodworker blog. Fine Woodworking has a helpful article with an embedded video which is also helpful. Thanks to  these sources for the great information. 

Click to enlarge

 

I made a video of this tool build and posted it on my YouTube channel, check out the video here. I'll save the scratch stockfence for a later date, as I don't need it for this project. The cutter head is half-round and its designed to get into the flutes on the columns without damaging the wood. The cutter blade is made from a used utility knife blade, so between the scrap wood and the used blade, this project has basically no cost for materials. And the cutter head can be shaped on both sides, but I haven't done that yet.

The completed scratch stock

Leave a comment if you think the Sketchup model would be useful and I'll post it.

Here's the surround I'm building*

* Hopefully I'll get a chance to record some of that work and post it here and on my YouTube channel.