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Kerf and veneers questions

Curly

Curly

PRO Member
Hi. I'm a new member and I'm still exploring both the site and the software. Please forgive me if my questions are answered elsewhere on the site. I'm doing my best to spend some time each day reading old posts and watching a few tutorials. I made a vase and used LaminationPro to design a very simple feature ring. I used the 'Southwest' button and a symmetrical lamination using maple on the sides and padauk in the middle. When I make Thunderbirds', I normally add strips of black veneer to the triangles to make a thin contrasting strip on the 'feather tips'. So ... I added a strip of black veneer to each side of the padauk in the lamination. The thinnest option for a lamination piece is 1/16 so that is what I selected for the veneer. I'm using a Freud crosscut blade that's stamped thin kerf with no measurement. I picked 3/32. After cutting the 1st Generation to form my southwest design I could see the small triangles for the top and bottom where much smaller than what LaminationPro depicts. Initially I thought maybe the culprit was choosing the 1/16 size for a veneer that's really only 1/42 thick but it still didn't add up. From there I measured the teeth on my saw blade with a micrometer. None of the teeth are as thin as 3/32. Cutting a short dado in a piece of MDF allows a 7/64 drill bit to fall in snugly. I can mentally make up for the veneer in a southwest design or leave it out, but wouldn't a discrepancy in blade width make a major difference in a 2nd or 3rd generation lamination? I was thinking I could buy a true 3/32 blade but what happens after I have it sharpened? Does it matter? Lastly, I noticed that after I save a .lam file and re-open it, some of the info doesn't save. The strip width, center strip, repeat units and # of strips as an example. Is this info I should enter in the 'notes' area? Is there anything I'm missing I would want to 'note'? Any help or thoughts on the veneer and the kerf size are greatly appreciated. Curly
 
You may want to visit Jim Roger's site

http://jlrodgers.com/index.shtml

Here is a direct link to building Tbirds.
http://jlrodgers.com/pdrm.shtml

Jim's method may be less complex in adding the detail veneer you want to the birds.

I have made few TBirds using this method and had good results.

When you save your file in Lamination Pro are you giving it a unique name?
If you do once you are in LP, just go to file open and select your file.
It does seem by default it is bring up a default setting when first started.
 
Last edited:
Thank you for the quick reply. I use Jim's method. I actually have the link bookmarked and refer to it every time I make a Thunderbird just in case he's updated his method. I do slip a piece of contrasting veneer between the triangle (in his case the purpleheart) and the maple. I have no issues whatsoever with veneer and T-birds.
I was adding veneer to a southwest 'blank' design in LaminationPro that gave me the issues. I'm thinking the veneer is overkill and will leave it out.

I save the files with unique names and open them just as you stated. I save them with the 'southwest' button on but they open without it 'on'. When I highlight the 'southwest' button, the items I stated in my original post all show the default settings. I noticed in the 'Samples' folder you have some files that open with the 'Disc' button highlighted. That made me assume a file saved with the 'Southwest' button highlighted would open that way too. There are no 'Southwest' files in the 'sample' folder to try.

I got an email from you stating I must have my authorization code because you received a copy. I didn't get an email and it's not in my spam folder. It's not on my 'Personal Details' page and I am not showing as a Pro member either. I'm in no hurry but I thought I'd let you know in case this is a bug with the new website. You may remember you had to register my account for me as the link in that email did not work. Curly
 
mfisher said:
You may want to visit Jim Roger's site

http://jlrodgers.com/index.shtml

Here is a direct link to building Tbirds.
http://jlrodgers.com/pdrm.shtml

Jim's method may be less complex in adding the detail veneer you want to the birds.

I have made few TBirds using this method and had good results.

When you save your file in Lamination Pro are you giving it a unique name?
If you do once you are in LP, just go to file open and select your file.
It does seem by default it is bring up a default setting when first started.
Click to expand...
Sorry mfisher. I got an email with the 'from' saying it was from Lloyd and clicked on the embedded link in the email. I assumed he had replied. The 'you' in my reply was to Lloyd. I will get the hang of this.
 
No problem.

Question. When your using the lamination wizard. and changing the width and type of wood for each strip. Are you using the save as default button? Refer to the help section in Lamination Pro.

The key is to save your lamination settings. Your correct that a file saved with a SW pattern button used, will not default to that pattern. However, if you lamination was saved, you can simple select the SW button to bring the pattern back up.

Hope this helps.
 
Curly,

I sent you an email with your authorization code. There was a hiccup at PayPal that failed to generate your code and update your account, but it is all done now. I hate it when something works flawlessly for days and then skips a beat. Oh well, welcome to my world.

With regards to Lamination PRO, all of the major information is saved in the file, but there are some ancillary fields that are not saved - not because they don't need to be saved but because I simply didn't have the bandwidth to do it all when I was doing my day job running a consulting company. Now that I've retired to work full-time on Woodturner PRO, I'll be tying up a lot of loose ends. All I can do now is apologize for rough edges. I'm currently working on an upgrade to Lamination PRO that will greatly simplify it for the user and greatly simplify it for me, the programmer. It won't lose any functionality, but it will allow me to eliminate some buttons that cause the code to be overly complex and difficult to maintain.

Lloyd
 
Thank you Lloyd, I'm all unlocked now. There's no need to apologize for rough edges. That's what makes life interesting. I've been 'full time retired' for about 18 months. I have so much to do, it makes me wonder how I got anything done when I had a full time job.

The software more than fits my own needs now. I was using Bill K's software and I feel like I'm cheating on him by switching but the LP software integration with the WTP software is something I felt I needed to try. Bill was always more than helpful.

Any thoughts on putting in a 1/42 or 1/32 size to add a veneer to a lamination? Is it overkill for any benefit it may yield? And lastly, any thoughts on the kerf size affecting a multi-generational lamination. Curly
 
Curly,
I'll gladly add a 1/32" width to the available strip widths as adding a very thin veneer strip is a common thing to do.
When I designed Lamination PRO, I could have gone a direction where you specify in decimal inches the width of the strips to use. This would have made the data entry considerable slower, though. By having you select from predetermined values, it meant that you could do the entire program with nothing more than clicking your mouse and the values would always be correct. The key is simply having enough predetermined values. I'm glad to add them because too few is a problem but too many simply slows you down.
The saw blade thickness is not the reason the design on the screen is different from your shop results as the difference in actual thickness is measured in thousandths of an inch. The issue is that the center strip that you remove from the 1st generation board has to be perfectly centered and be exactly the width you specify. If it is off by just 1/16", the strips above the centerline will be noticeably different than the strips below. It could be easily argued that making the design using the stacked wood approach would allow you to more easily achieve accuracy. I've made the identical design both from stacked wood and multi-generation laminations and the latter takes 1/3 the time. I have a few tricks that work well for me and will be making a video tutorial on this as soon as I can.
Also, I intend to add more to Lamination PRO to give you decimal instructions as to how to cut the center strip from the board.
The changes to Lamination PRO are part of the simplification upgrade I'm working on but it is a significant effort and I do not have a completion date in sight yet.

Lloyd
 
Lloyd Johnson said:
Curly,
I'll gladly add a 1/32" width to the available strip widths as adding a very thin veneer strip is a common thing to do.
When I designed Lamination PRO, I could have gone a direction where you specify in decimal inches the width of the strips to use. This would have made the data entry considerable slower, though. By having you select from predetermined values, it meant that you could do the entire program with nothing more than clicking your mouse and the values would always be correct. The key is simply having enough predetermined values. I'm glad to add them because too few is a problem but too many simply slows you down.
The saw blade thickness is not the reason the design on the screen is different from your shop results as the difference in actual thickness is measured in thousandths of an inch. The issue is that the center strip that you remove from the 1st generation board has to be perfectly centered and be exactly the width you specify. If it is off by just 1/16", the strips above the centerline will be noticeably different than the strips below. It could be easily argued that making the design using the stacked wood approach would allow you to more easily achieve accuracy. I've made the identical design both from stacked wood and multi-generation laminations and the latter takes 1/3 the time. I have a few tricks that work well for me and will be making a video tutorial on this as soon as I can.
Also, I intend to add more to Lamination PRO to give you decimal instructions as to how to cut the center strip from the board.
The changes to Lamination PRO are part of the simplification upgrade I'm working on but it is a significant effort and I do not have a completion date in sight yet.

Lloyd
Click to expand...
Thank you for the quick reply and explanation. I'm an old carpenter. Looks like I need to throw away the tape measure and start using the micrometer. :)
 
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