a custom stair rail

just before christmas we installed the final sections of 

this custom stair rail a local clients house. 

we have been working with this client for, literally, years ... 

we made seme nice cherry shelves when my brother in law was

redoing the masonry of the fireplaces, and then a few years back we made

a nice cherry bar ... here's a link to that project

and after that we made four new vanities, also in cherry ...

 

we talked about replacing the existing stair rail for 

quite a while, and i made several sketches and drawings, 

finally settling on the tapered 3/8th steel spindles we had 

cut by wayne jones metal shop and his cnc plasma cutter.

from the cad drawing we made some full size mdf templates 

that we checked and adjusted (slightly), on site

since they were to be finished with a custom powder coat by

r&b powder coat in poultney, vt

we test fitted them before the powder coat, which

turned out to be a good plan in one case ... 

anyway, the finish was beautiful.

it was a 'translucent' powder finish which meant the

fabrication marks were still somewhat visible giving the 

railing more of a 'handmade' look.

we made the handrails in the wood shop and installed the last sections the day
before the clients arrived for the holidays .. nip and tuck ...

Progress on the Cockatoo Chairs

The cocatoo chair prototype from my blog post of 6/5

7/1/09 ... Frames welded and arms on ... more tomorrow

Sam is underway on the cockatoo chairs ... It's going well for him. He made a new jig to make the seats all the same and then we had to figure out how to make all the chairs the same. Once he had the main parts made, we took the prototype and built a frame under it, marking the locations of the various parts and correcting the asymmetries of the prototype by averaging distances of parts from vertical and from center. It seems like it worked well as they all look the same to me ... click the photos to enlarge them ...

the main parts

jig from the back

jig from the front ...

And this from our client ... check it out; it's a hoot
http://birdloversonly.blogspot.com/2007/09/may-i-have-this-dance.html

Update on the Cockatoo Chairs

All welded up now ... We kind of like the weld 'buttons' on the top of the bow ...

Believe it or not, we are still working on the prototype parrot/now cockatoo chairs. (Original Post) Our client has been extremely patient but now we're on the home stretch ... Primer tomorrow. Click the photos to enlarge them ... And I thought designing a wood chair from scratch was hard .... The cockatoo is still not perfect but after talking with our client, we modified the one we had by cutting his neck, 'cocking' his head and rewelding it. We'll make it right for the real ones. The rest of the chair is all welded now and it looks good and seems comfortable for most folks. The size and proportions of the new chair are much better and we changed the scale of a couple of the elements, especially the 'cage' bars. It'll look a lot different once it's all painted ..... almost done !

The full size drawings

side view

Clamped up and ready for 'the cage'

reworked and rewelded cockatoo

Took it out in the garden yesterday to have a beer with it's friends....It was happy to be out ...
Paint tomorrow ...

The Parrot Chairs ... Sketching in Metal

Inspiration Photo

Via a referral from a friend in Massachusetts, we were contacted by a client who had an interest in having Sam fabricate some 'parrot chairs'. The client had saved a picture from a magazine, but had no other details like measurements, what the front legs looked like, a close up of the parrott detail, etc. We agreed to make a mockup for a small fee and the results and their proposed changes are shown below. It took us a while to get to it as there were some 'thought problems' to work through such as how to bend the back legs/hoop piece with even a small amount of repeatable control. I'm sure these things are pressed out cold by the thousands in factories around the world, but unfortunately, we're not one of them. We ended up making a pretty elaborate jig that, with a few modifications, will work fine. The jig was essentially based on the one we use to steam bend backs for Windsor chairs, something we've been doing since the late 70's. Creating a new chair design is tough in any medium, as what you are really creating is a functional sculpture, something viewed from all four sides with small complications like comfort, durability, and repeatable production thrown in. Tough in wood, not much easier in metal ... We'll see if we get to build them .... It will be a challenge for sure if we do ....

The 'sketch'

Proposed changes to the 'sketch' ... click to enlarge

Back view

Test drive ...The seat needs to be wider in the front and the back needs to be tipped back a little more .... other than that, not bad for comfort ...