In my past post I talked about making a Template for my wooden legs. The idea was that I’d rough cut the patterns, and then use the template to finish the pieces on my router table. Well, as Adam Savage says, “No plan survives first contact with implementation”. I’ll get back to this later. I am using Baltic Birch Plywood for these legs, in 12mm and 18mm thickness. Note: Yes, I may speak in the sensible measurement scale (metric) sometimes… I’ll go back and forth between fractional inches and metric on a whim. This is a byproduct of growing up during the metrification of Canada in the early 70s. If you’re lucky (or not) you may even catch me measuring by Smoot… but I digress…
The final legs are to be laminated layers of the plywood, stacked to achieve the finished look. I laid the patterns out on my plywood using the Template which is marked for the various parts of it for each piece. Only one 12mm layer is the full size of the template, the rest are various lengths to make up the final contour. I began by cutting my plywood into manageable sized blanks, then tracing the full size piece. I cut this on my Bandsaw, leaving just a bit of material at the line to be taken off with the router. This is the point where my plan went awry… as it turns out, the bandsaw work was more than accurate enough to skip the template-router-table act altogether, and for the remaining pieces I cut to the line instead of proud.
You will notice that I cut a slot in the 18mm layer; this is to provide a conduit for the wires that will be running down the legs to the drive motors I plan to install in the feet. I did have to go back and cut the recesses into the outer layers to create the pockets for the Shoulder Stabilizers. I was able to cut these areas on the 18mm layer with the bandsaw, then transfer the pattern to the 12mm layers to finish with a router.
The three main layers were then carefully glued and clamped overnight, using just about every small bar clamp I have… I used a PV wood glue from Gorilla Glue which I have had great luck with in the past. The last layers, which finish off the lower leg, needed to be planed down by a couple mm so that the final thickness matched the Club Specs and they were glued and clamped as well.