Descending Ashtray

This is a site specific table that I am making for our neighbor, hence the unusual shape. The spindle legs are perhaps a little more traditional of a style then what I would normally make but it was a fun project to work on and figure out. The spindles themselves are not square stock at the top and bottom. They are more of an arrowhead like diamond shape which made it tricky finding the center point for turning them. I also learned early on not to use a wide gouge on the transition between the square and the round part of the spindle. The first attempt splintered out really bad and made it unusable. The second attempt went much smoother. I wrapped masking tape around the part I wanted to stay square and used my narrowest scraper to cut into the spindle at angle that moved the knife away from the grain instead of into it. Anyway the rest of the legs turned out pretty good. Then I Kreg jigged everything together from the bottom.

I probably should have taken more pictures to illustrate the process, oh well, maybe next time.

(I realized after posting the picture that it is kind of hard to see that the top is a trapezoid shape. In the picture it looks like a long table that is foreshortened. It is kind of an optical illusion.)