Australian Wood Review – June 2017

40 Australian Wood Review

PROJECT

Which wood to use?

Any dimensionally stable wood can be used, and my choice

was tigerwood – scrap wood from a previous hardwood

flooring project. For contrast, I used maple, purpleheart

and walnut scraps to make the inlay strips.

Cutting the tongues

I planed and cut the stock to final sizes, removing the

grooves and tongues in the process. The quickest way to

cut the rebates on both sides of the sticks is to cut them

at the same time, that is, as tongues. I installed a tongue

cutter in my plough plane (photo 1) and started from the

far end, working backwards (photo 2). I found it more

precise to set the plough fence with a hammer.

You can cut tongues with a shoulder plane, but it’s a lot

slower. Clamp a batten in place on the workpiece and cut

the rebate – one at a time on each face – to depth with the

shoulder plane.

Cutting the inlay strips

Many woodworkers tend to approach the ripping of thin

strips with a measure of uneasiness. One simple and safe

option is to rip the strips so they fall to the waste side of the

blade. If you prefer to rip strips in such a manner without

resetting the fence, you can use a shopmade notched

pushblock that is designed to be cut into (see fig.1).

I have a Grrr-ipper pushpad which combines a blade guard

and pushblock to handle challenging cuts, like angled

ripping, resawing or strip ripping. I used it to cut out the

inlays (photo 3).

4

5

F i g .1 Notched pushblock (mm)

(add handle on top, if desired)

30-40

100

20

240-280 notch slightly less than

thickness of workpiece