Projects of Mike Brown

Mike Brown, from London, Ontario, Canada, mike@hugibear.com made these projects.

"This large covered bowl has 113 pieces of wood. The types of wood in it are Purpleheart, Padauk, Walnut, Maple and Oak. 

"This is a bowl made from glued up material. The base is solid purpleheart and the upper part of the bowl is made up of alternating pieces of maple & purpleheart. It was then of course turbed on a lathe. This smaller bowl has 49 pieces of Oak, Maple, Walnut and Padauk."

"Here's a wooden turned vase similar to the one already on this page below. It was done using the glue up method I described for the other one."

"This project is for a "Keepsake Box", the plans for which came from Wood-on-Line Plans.  It is constructed of red oak and purpleheart woods. It measurers 5" x 8" and is 5-1/4" high. It is finished in 5 coats of a gloss water base clear urethane."

"This project is two sets of rocking doll cradles for our granddaughters. The design is my own and the smaller set (pink bows) has a bed size of 4" x 6" and would fit a doll of about 5" tall. The second set has a bed size of 6" x 10" and would take a doll up to 9" tall. It is finished in white acrylic gloss with appliques glued on."

"Here's a couple of change tables I made a while ago for our two daughters."

This is a two drawer filing cabinet made of 3/4" birch plycore plywood and clear pine. It is finished in a natural colour with three coats of satin polyurethane. The drawer sides and ends are 1/2" x 6" clear pine with painted 1/8" masonite bottoms and the fronts are 3/4" clear pine. It also has full extension drawer slides.

Overall height is 30" and top measures 19"wide x 25" deep.  It is for letter size files and has hanging folder frames as well. To make it a legal size cabinet it only requires 3" added to all the width measurements.

Free Plan for this filing cabinet.
Dimensioned drawings are available for this file cabinet at Mike's site.
Here's the URL for his easy to follow plans.
www.hugibear.com/fcplans.html

"The first is a desk caddie that I got the idea for from Canadian Home Workshop and I have included pics of some of the various steps."

"The second is a wooden bowl that I glued up and turned on my lathe.  I forgot to take pictures of it as work progressed, as it was a last minute thingy. The fruit that it holds, I was able to get from an auction on eBay and supposedly it came from Hawaii in the 50's."  

"These two pictures show the front and back of a toolchest I built to put in the cab of my carhauler. In the back (right) view, a steering wheel desk can be seen hanging in it's rack. This is simply a piece of hardboard and a curved bracket that sits on the steering wheel to enable paper work to be done."

"You can see that there is a 6" deep well under the top tray which is hinged for access to the well. This area is for holding map books and all my licensing for the truck and the three drawers and the bottom storage area can also be seen. These are for tools and storage of miscelaneous small repair parts that are needed in the everyday operation of a big rig! The drawers and hinged front for the storage are held closed by a unique lock that will be shown in pictures below."

"The black area on the left side of the chest is sheet metal for magnetic clips that will hold paper work for the current load being transported and a cup holder in place for those early morning coffee's that start the day."

"These two pictures show the locking mechanism, which is simply a rod that goes down through holes
that are lined up in the all the front pieces.
This rod is hidden and held in place by the tray when it is lowered in place."

"The materials used in the construction are for the main carcass--3/4" fir plywood, for the fronts--3/4" whitewood(poplar) and for the top tray--3/4" birch plywood framed by whitewood. The inside of the top well and lower storage area has been painted a battleship grey while all other surfaces are done with clear polyurethane."

"Here are a couple of views of a cedar chest that I made for our daughter for her nineteenth birthday.  It is about 24" high by 48" long and 24" wide. It is made of clear white pine and finished with an Early American gel stain with three coats of urethane semigloss finish. 

It is also lined with aromatic cedar and has a lockable push button closure.  The front and two ends are made of raised panels as used in door construction".

This is his sofa table.

"This sofa table is made of red oak with early American stain and polyurethane finish".

His second project is this unique wooden vase. Personally, I had never made a wooden vase, nor did I know someone who had. So when this project came in, I just had to get more details! Mike kindly obliged with "in-progress" photos for all of us rookies to see. A few of his words accompany the extra shots at my request.

These 4 photos show the piece as it progresses towards completion. They are not meant to line up with the descriptions shown below, which are describing the means of glue up of the piece.

PREPARATORY GLUE-UP METHOD FOR THIS ULTIMATELY LATHE TURNED PIECE

1. made up two blocks consisting of: 2 pcs 3/4 x 1-1/2 walnut and 1pc 1/4 x 1-1/2 maple (about 6")

2. made up two blocks consisting of: 2pcs 1-1/2 x 1-1/2 maple(about 6") and the above glue up and a third block consisting of: 2pcs 1-1/2 x 1-1/2 walnut (about 6") and 1pc 1-1/2 x 1-1/2 maple that was 14" long (the center piece)

3. glued the 3 blocks resulting from step 2 to form a glue up of nine blocks with the colours alternating and the 14" pc in the middle of everything

4. glued a band of walnut around the lower (nine block) area and one around the top (single block). I think if you compare the notes to the pics you can figure out what I am talking about. I neglected to take pics before I started the lathe work so the first stage photo already has been turned slightly

This project is a sewing/craft cabiinet that I made for my wife.  It has fourteen drawers (6-2"deep and 8-3" deep) that are 9" X 12" and a 2" deep bin under the lid.

It is made of just about clear pine (a few solid knots), the drawer fronts are poplar, and everything is finished with antique stain and polyurethane.  The handles are solid polished brass. 

The drawer sides/slides are aluminum extrusions that incorporate the slides making it unnecessary to make or use extra hardware.  All that is needed is a 1/8" saw kerf in the side of the cabinet.  They really work slick and are available through Lee Valley Tools.

This is a Toddler Town Car (kiddie car) that I built for my grandaughter, Sarah, for her first birthday.  It is made of red oak and finished with Minwax satin polyurethane and no stain.  There is a lazy susan bearing between the front forks and seat for ease of steering. Overall length is about 24", seat height is7-1/2" and handlebar is 13" high. 

The wheels (drums) are 5-1/2" disks with 13 dowels (3/8") and have pingpong balls inside them. 

The Town Car was made from plans purchased from Wood Magazine's plan service.

Mike has his own site located at www.hugibear.com and by visiting you can see some of his other projects and other interests.

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