November Meeting: String inlay with Chuck Bender

Chuck Bender, from the Acanthus Workshop, was our featured speaker.  He gave an excellent demonstration on string inlay techniques.  He showed how to prepare wood strings for inlay, how to make patterned inlay strips such as herringbone patterns, and effective techniques for cutting the grooves for the inlay.  He finished up his demonstration by using molten sulfur as an inlay material.  This was a technique used by Pennsylvania German furnituremakers as a means to add decoration to furniture pieces.  As you can see in the picture, he was quickly able to do a sulfur inlay of our club’s initials with some basic carving tools and a hot plate.  Thanks to Chuck for an excellent presentation, and for most likely supplying additional atmosphere for services at the church the following Sunday.

In other business, we had five new visitors to our November meeting.  Frank Vucolo gave an update on his progress in planning for our booth at the upcoming Woodworking Show in Somerset the weekend of Feb. 19-21.  Currently, the plans are to have projects for convention-goers to look at, as well as a schedule of hands on demos throughout the weekend.  Thanks to Frank for taking this on, and for the great start to the planning! 

Log Power was kind enough to bring a number of samples of wood from their store for a wood species identification contest, and generously donated a $100 certificate as a prize.  John Aniano was the winner by correctly identifying more species than anyone else.  Congratulations, John!

Speaker topic survey results

Here are the results from the speaker topic survey that was taken at the last meeting.  This list is in order of popularity, with the topics that got the most votes at the top.

• Advanced router techniques
• Sketchup demonstration
• Decorative carving
• Joinery
• Field trip to local woodworking business
• Glues and their applications
• Marquetry demo
• Using dyes
• Japanese woodworking tools
• Veneering
• Cabinet building and selecting cabinet hardware
• Design approaches to projects
• Hands on project
• Power tool maintenance
• Portable Sawmill demonstration
• Green finishes
• New tool survey
• Tool Swap

We will certainly keep this list in mind when selecting speakers for upcoming meetings.  Thanks for your input!

As always, suggestions are welcome on the Contact CJWA page.

November meeting: Chuck Bender on string inlay

Our next meeting will be at 7 PM on November 11. We are very lucky to have Chuck Bender from Charles Bender & Company and The Acanthus Workshop as our speaker.  He will demonstrate string inlay using wood and other materials.  What other materials, you may ask?  You’ll have to come to the meeting to find out.

October Meeting: plans for the upcoming year, and WIA report

We had one new member at the October meeting.  The first part of the meeting was given to discussing plans for the club’s activities for the upcoming year.  Committees were formed for the birdhouse project (thanks, Dave White!) and for the CJWA booth at the Woodworking Show in Somerset (thanks, Frank Vucolo!) on February 19-21, 2010.  Our new website (you’re looking at it now) and our email list were reviewed.

Wilbur Pan reported on the goings on at the Woodworking in America Hand Tools Conference in Valley Forge, PA the weekend of Oct. 3.  Many CJWA members were at the conference throughout the 3 days.  There were many seminars and hands on sessions designed to teach hand tool techniques, a busy marketplace area where hand tool makers had their products to try out, and the Hand Tool Olympics, where participants could test their speed and skill with hand tools.

Birdhouse and bird feeders at the Jackson Township Fall Forestry Festival

On Saturday, October 3, CJWA again participated in the annual New Jersey Fall Forestry Festival in Jackson Township, where we sold birdhouse and bird feeder kits, and helped kids build the kits at the site. CJWA sold and helped kids build over 60 birdhouse and bird feeder kits, and clearly everyone had a lot of fun doing so, even if the day was cut a little short by a heavy late afternoon rain shower.

Thanks to Jeff Brown for spearheading this effort, and to all the members that participated! The birdhouse project certainly has been a successful CJWA event for the past few years running.