Is There An Endgrain In Particleboard?

[Ed Clarke]

The problem is that these designers don't have a factory behind them. With no factory, they can never ever get into a "furniture store". Therefore, for most Americans, they do not exist.

I'm tired of spending thousands of dollars (Henredon and others) on stuff that is destined to end up at the curb on bulk trash day. From what I can see as I pass through furniture stores, everything (mass market oriented) is designed to be "temporary" and discarded as fashions change next year.

Changed my sig...

[Patriarch]

Tom Watson wrote in news: [e-mail]:

Just for my education, any idea of the screw holding capabilities of some of the hardwoods you regularly use, measured in a similar manner?

Patriarch

[Larry Jaques]

On Thu, 10 Feb 2005 14:01:38 +0000, the inscrutable Andy Dingley spake:

I saw quite a few Stickley and Ellis/Stickley repros in Anchorage, AK when I was there a couple years ago. I just love Ellis' stuff!

Yes, indeed. Harvey was Stickley's premier designer. Robert Lang just put out a book on his inlay work. I hope to be doing some of that in the near future, along with a few other projects.

[Larry Jaques]

On Thu, 10 Feb 2005 09:22:55 -0500, the inscrutable "Mike Marlow" spake:

Answer to original question: Any given rectangular piece of particleboard has a total of -6- planes of endgrain. Feh!

[Highland Pairos]

You have got to be kidding. I drove one of those in high school.

SteveP.

[Will]

Where some are less equal than others. :-)

[Ed Clarke]

Just found this site:

when I was searching for info on another bookcase ( Charles Limbert ). I've started digging up lots of names because I bought a complete CD-ROM copy of "The Craftsman" from 1901 through 1916 on eBay. This is the guy I bought it from:

discovered (much to my amazement) that William Morris the chair designer also wrote a book that I enjoyed very much.

[Rick Cook]

Morris wrote a lot more than one book! He was a 19th Century polymath who designed everything from furniture to fabrics and wrote books from fiction to poetry to books on design.

Find some more of his stuff. You're likely to be astonished at his range and inspired by his thoughts on design.

--RC

[Larry Jaques]

On 10 Feb 2005 23:53:33 GMT, the inscrutable Ed Clarke spake:

very nice A&C books now, including 2 of Lang's Craftsman furniture books and the latest, "Shop Drawings for Craftsman Inlays & Hardware : Original Designs by Gustav Stickley and Harvey Ellis" (Shop Drawings series)

He was a prolific author. His fabric designs are still being reproduced by Sanderson in GB. Lovely stuff going for a mere $40 to $60/yd.

[Rob Mitchell]

Any problem with moisture absorption? Was the oak just decorative, or ? That would make a cheap floor covering.

[Fly-by-Night CC]

Of the mass market manufacturers of the time, I think many of Limbert's designs are outstanding and set themselves apart from the Stickley's. The cutouts and gothic arches, I find very appealing. I would agree with Ellis' designs too - especially the beautiful inlay pieces.

The Roycrofters is a puzzler to me - they branded almost all of their furniture with a big ol' Roycroft logo right on the very front. Signing one's work is one thing, but sheesh.

Of course, as I'm sure you know, the A&C movement was all about honoring the individual artisan and craftsman and rejecting the factory clones brought about by industrialization of the late Victorian era. It was about purposeful design and not merely because the technology to stamp out thousands of copies of an intricate design by machine was now possible. (Just because one can do something doesn't mean it adds value to the end product.) The irony is that the very movement that honored the skill of the individual was appropriated by mass production factories wherein the worker was just an operator of a machine.

[Andy Dingley]

Limbert ?! I find their stuff indeed distinctive, but the random arches and mad cutouts have more in common with '60s sub-Tolkien than with the Gothic period.

Is there any truth in the rumour that the Seven Dwarves' house in Disney's Snow White was furnished in Limbert designs ?

[Robatoy]

He had to finish the edges where the sheets were going to join in order to control possible moisture. It was at that point he decided to cut the sheets into smaller 'tiles' (making scribing and fitting a lot easier) and the oak became decorative as well. The floor is above grade. I called him and he told me that he put a thick coat of Fabulon on the bottom of the tiles as well, then put it down with construction adhesive. He said he got the idea from an article (which he thinks) he saw in Fine Homebuilding some 10 years ago. The floor looked great 2 years after he did the job, other than the usual 'knockabout' scuffing.

Maybe a search at Taunton's site?

0?0

Rob--->who thinks that the moisture issue would be about the same as an edgebanded bookshelf as the floor is installed above grade.

[Robatoy]

Kidding about what? That some clown paid 150K or that it was a bad car?

*G*

The Barrett Jackson auction site will have more to say about it. May have been a special engine/transmission combo...limited production? Who knows?.... but 150 grand?? Hell, that's more money than all the tools in the Festool catalogue!!!

150 grand?? That's an upgrade to my home theatre set-up...like a NEW HOME!

[Ed Clarke]

What you get is eight CD-ROMs with pdf files of each issue of "The Craftsman". The files are searchable and printable with one exception. The "Index" file is a modern compilation that includes the table of contents of every issue and that is not printable except through some contortions to defeat the no-print security flag.

This is not simply a bunch of plans; it includes things like an essay by a stained glass worker complaining about how the customer screws up the "art" and cheapens the product. "12th century stained glass lasts 700 years exposed to the elements; modern stained glass needs to be kept behind outer glass due to flimsyness of construction."

I notice a significant number of woman authors in the contents. I'd been under the impression that women were kitchen dwellers or household managers at that time (1901-1916). Guess I was wrong, at least in the A&C community.

All in all, I'm glad that I spent the $50. I'm learning a lot, and not just about woodworking.

[Bob G.]

.

============================ .

I also watched in amusement for what these cars sold for...

I am an older lifelong "Car Freak" and have a 68 SS 396 Chevelle and

5 older Corvettes resting until spring in my garages right now...

But the fact remains that the value of some cars when fully documented and equipped the right way .....and ... stripped models that were ordered from the factory with very high performance engines under their hoods...etc... were equipped the right way... .

No I would not pay 150 big ones for the Satellite nor would I have paid 350 big ones for the Chevelle that sold at the same auction.. these were very exceptional and rare cars that were offered for sale at the right time to the right crowd...

I only wish that I could now Infer or say my Chevelle is worth 175 Big ones because it is very similar to the one that sold for 350K.... heck 20K is much more like its true value...and even at that price it would not sell in a day or two...

Bob Griffiths

[Larry Jaques]

On 11 Feb 2005 15:36:13 GMT, the inscrutable Ed Clarke spake:

That's good! There have always been a few women artists, and Elizabeth Eaton Burton has always been my favorite of those. Look for her lamps and leather + hammered copper book covers. Outstanding!

I wish they'd put out a paper version. I'd much rather read things like that in their original format.

Thanks for the review, Ed.

-- Vidi, Vici, Veni ---

Comprehensive Website Development

[Robatoy]

Ohh, don't get me wrong, I love a nice car as much as the next guy, maybe even more. I'd drop 300 big ones on the right Bentley. TWO problems though...the right Bentley would cost 5 times that and I don't have 300 grand.

...

[Fly-by-Night CC]

Well I find both of these tables very attractive:

I'm planning on building a couple of the smaller ones (#34 jpg).

Funny you should say that! The last couple times I've seen the movie (I have a young daughter who plays her movies over and over and over), I thought, "It would be so cool to have a house like that. The carved door, owl stairs and everything."

[Fly-by-Night CC]

I'm always a bit surprised at the number of women who influenced history. We've been taught that men did everything and women stayed home to raise kids and run the house but it just wasn't true. There were many women involved outside the home in the A&C movement and history in general- not just laborers, but real innovators and influential. Names escape me at the moment, but I know I've read at least a few instances of women running companies plus taking over ownership when their husbands died. Just fer instance, Charles R. Makintosh's wife was a designer in her own right and they partnered with another husband and wife couple in Glasgow. I don't remember her name because the sexism, at that time and since, has generated more recognition for her husband. Sad really.