Making the tracklight base: Pt2
Continuing the project started with Making the tracklight base: Pt1, I began work on the edge moldings. The first step was to cut the rabbets. I did this by first mking 3/4″ deep and 1/4″ in from the edge of the walnut pieces.
This left me with a rabbet and some long strips of walnut that are just under 1/4″ thick. Wonderful fodder for a future miniatures project (grin).
Unfortunately, I don’t own many molding planes and in this case I wanted an Astragal-like edging. I had to resort to a router for this function. I suppose one cannot deny that using a router on wood can be referred to as creating things with wood but in my opinion it is not “woodworking” any more than a toothpick factory is woodworking. Routing with a bit spinning 25 thousand rpm, is a brutal, process that I won’t promote with photographs of the process. I long for the day when I can own molding planes to allow me to do this process without the expense, noise and brutality of a router. And so here we skip ahead a bit to what I managed with the router.
I found that I had to maintain a flat on to of this process as I had to pass the stock through the router on each side while retaining a flat surface in contact with the table. This flat, however, was easily removed using a block plane. I was back to enjoying the project at this step.
With that accomplished, and a bit of rough sanding, the cross-sections on the moldings was finished and I was ready to cut miters. Those were cut and then test fit on the bench.
It was time to heat up the glue pot and so I did. A few clamps, some hide glue and a bit of time and the frame was glued together.
I glued the center plate into place, being careful to glue it only on the ends. In this way, the oak would be free to expand/contract across the grain. This approach would be less than optimal for a trampoline but as this piece will be hanging from the ceiling, with the panel weight resting in the rabbets, I think it will be fine.
I applied a couple coats of oil, let it dry, and then applied a couple coats of General Finishes Armo-R-Seal, which is an oil-based, wipe-on polyurethane that I really like when I turn to a polyurethane. I’ll need to drill a couple holes for mounting and to get the lighting wires through it but otherwise the base is ready for installation.
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