Stools for friends

On Saturday I made stools for a friend and her friends. The stools are 9 inches wide by one foot long. The stools are aproximately 7 inches tall. My friend is a beautician in a beauty parlor. On day a customer stood up on the rung that customer set their feet on when the chair is raised or lowered. Well this is a modern parlor and the chairs are not bolted down. Since this was a customer of some bulk the chair tipped over. The result of that, is the rungs that you rest your feet on were all removed. It leaves the customers feet dangling. I made a stool for my friends feet to rest on and all the other beauticians wanted one. That is why there are three. It has been too wet here to remove the wood filler by sanding so they are in the stage before staining and putting the varnish on.

Now I will explain how to make them. The first thing is to get a couple of 2 by 4 scraps together. I ripped the two by fours into 2 by 2's. Then I set my chop saw to a compound 10 degree cut that is ten degrees accros the board and a ten degree slant at the same time. I then cut the legs all 7 inches long. When you look at the pictures you can see the legs butted so it forms a kind of slanted rectangle. I ripped some 2 by 4's to a 2 inch width. Then I cut two 7 inch and two 3 inch boards for each stool. These I cut at a 10 degree angle on each end in a v shape. After the wood was cut, I presanded it with a 120 grit finish. Then I put the wood pieces together with screws and glue. On most corners there was room for two screws on each joint. On tip is, the legs go so the peak of the cut is on the inside corner of the leg. That leaves a level surface to put the top of the stool on. After I had assembled the stool leg systems I made the tops. This was a three foot pine board recovered from a packing crate that had mirrors in it. I ripped the board to a 9 inch width and then cut it into three 12 inch pieces. Then I spent a couple of minutes cleaning the rough wood with a grinder with a sanding disc on it. Then I used a random orbital sander with 36 grit to clean it up a little more. The corners of the 9 by 12's I had knocked of with the chop saw set at 45 degrees just so I did not have to do so much grinding. Now the wood has dried for a couple of days, I will sand the wood filler off with 36 grit and finish sand with a random orbital sander and 120 grit. Then I will stain to taste and put on spar varnish.

These stools are fast, easy and very strong. They are not fancy, but very popular and fun to make.

This is my fun thing. It helps my friend, gives me something fun to do, and with that, it has a few twists.