JohnM42

The last Norm show I watched, very briefly, showed him doing a resaw on a band-saw with a 3 inch blade. I simply got up and left at that point.

The local comm college has a very nice Laguna that we use for resaw. It has a 1.5 inch blade; ditto for the machine room at the local Woodcraft. Both are saws that run into the multi-thousand dollar range.

Norm and his tools were simply ridiculous. That issue has come up in threads on so many sites, and it never seemed to make a difference. So, I concluded that whatever he was doing, it didn't relate to woodworking for most of the rest of us.

I'm willing to be reasonable with the industry regarding its shameful display of irresponsibility. I'll settle out-of-court for a new Unisaw. I'm really going to go after them for the dust collection on those old Delta bandsaws. Now that design is a real crime.

Since I've spent most of the year repairing and refinishing Danish dining room sets, I agree sorta. What I see is that earlier Dansk stuff used Teak heavily. Don't know if you've priced Teak lately, but that characteristic ain't gonna continue long. Even veneer makes you breath hard before you reach for your wallet.

But, compared to earlier styles, the 20th century was all about simplicity. Art Deco (1925) is much less ornamental than Art Nouveau, throw in Arts-Crafts, Prairie School, etc. Formalism is out, and if they try it, we lop off their heads. Within that constraint, feel free to create all the simple, stark, unvarnished, natural finished, un-ornamented styles that you can come up with. I don't get the sense that tastes are going to run to ostentatious and elaborate any time soon.

I love good box work. It forces you to do everything: marquetry, veneering, joinery, design, finishing, but on a scale that allows you to see your results sooner. I really enjoy the subtlety in the design, and am going to steal the curved bottom that ends in the flat feet at the corners. You have certainly mastered a variety of techniques that I still struggle with. Congrats on a very nice result.

I've been doing both hand cut and template dovetails for several years. Mechanically, I find no difference between the two, and the time required to do a hand cut is seldom worth the additional effort.

I find little ornamental value in either, but routinely use template dovetails in most of the drawers I build, particularly in heavy use situations like kitchens. With a router and a good jig, they take less than ten minutes per drawer.

I'm with the flakey Shellac guys, I even grind mine in an old coffee bean grinder. Fresh shellac done that way takes maybe 15 minutes to create, in whatever quantity and cut that you desire. Grind it, mix it, set it in a sunny spot for a couple minutes. If you have any left over use it to coat something in your shop. I use www.shellacshack.com and end up paying pennies to shellac something. I also store mine in ziplocks in the freezer - driest container you'll ever find.