Kevin Deal Fine Woodworking

What a wonderful gift I received today! Volume 2 of the American Period Furniture. It is the annual journal of the Society of American Period Furniture Make...rs. With woodworking being my vocation and definately one of my loves I am thrilled and honored to be a member of SAPFM. The annual journal of our Society is always a great learning tool that can be read and referred to over and over! This journal is a gift from a fellow woodworker, George Pauls of Pipersville, Pennsylvania. I can say that in knowing George he has helped me be a better woodworker and that I'm sure he has the same effect to those around him. George is a creative, knowledgable artist that always seems to try to help those he can. This journal will be bringing me years of enjoyment!. Thank you, George. See more

Just took care of a 1913 Montgomery Wards sewing cabinet and machine. I believe one of the pictures will show some of the marks that was on the top. The entir...e cabinet was dried out and dingy. The machine, a Windsor, put out by Montgomery Wards was dirty and needed a cleaning. It belonged to the gentleman's grandmother. I cleaned the machine and foot treadle then restored all the woodwork. Easy, breezy and fun! Included a picture of one online with a Damascus machine which is another Montgomery Wards. Enjoy the pics. See more

Here is a family heirloom coffee table I took care of for a customer. A nice shape and made out of pine. Had to be careful I didnt let it get to dark. I had ...to refinish it once. I had stained it and the color look kind of right but was way to dark in the curved areas, etc. I wasnt happy so I stripped it . Sanding it was harder than the first time! After resanding I used a new minwax color stain, fruitwood and then followed that with various toners between clear coats to give it a little character. Steel wool 0000 and wax at the end to get a warm, beautiful sheen. Enjoy See more

It's been a long time since I posted anything. Though its later on Friday here is a book review that might be enjoyed. I have one problem with this book an...d like my Pierre Gole book this one is also in French. It will probably take the rest of my life to read it. For now it is like a picture book for me. But what beautiful pictures! One drawback is that unlike my book on Pierre Gole this book does not give measurements and wood types with the pictures. My book today is Jean-Francois Oeben by Rosemarie Stratmann-Dohler. A semi rare book that I had been looking for for probably 5 years. There were books around but they were far out of my budget! I believe this book from 2002 was put out in conjunction with a museum/antiques showing. Oeben was born in 1721 in Germany but by the mid 1740's he had moved to Paris to become an ebeniste. By the mid 1750's he had been given a royal workshop and became the ebeniste to the king. Oeben died at 42 yr old. One of his assistants was Riesener who would take his place as the Master of the shop four years after Oeben's death when he married Oeben's widow. Enjoy the pictures, this is just a small amount of them. See more

I received a nice treat in the mail today. The American Period Furniture vol 3 from 2003. Really looking forward to the great articles and if they are as wond...erful as the cover picture this will be a classic. On the cover is one of my favorite Presidents, Jimmy Carter who is also an avid woodworker and great humanitarian! With Carter is Eugene Landon, a dedicated period furniture maker and I believe the 3rd Cartouche recipient. The picture of him standing in his shop with the hundreds of hand planes is famous. Carter is seen holding a Philadelphia bible box built with wood I believe from the last liberty tree. A gift from Landon it is a design he used to build in his shop. Regrettably he passed away in 2011. As most woodworkers know President Jimmy Carter is still setting an example of a life well lived each day. Even though I have only been with the Society of American Period Furniture Makers -SAPFM since 2014 restoring antiques and dealing with period furnitures is much of my livelihood. I have been trying to acquire all the issues of our top-notch woodworking journal that is dedicated to the building and study of American period furniture. #2 is the last one I need to get. When going through these annual journals and our quarterly Pins and Tails newsletter I feel like a kid in the candy store! Reach out, join SAPFM and enjoy the beauty of period furniture. See more

Recently finished

Way to much white work lately! Had a desk adjustment job from a company in Texas. Business out here bought new furniture. Doors needed adjustment on a creden...za and a desk needed the drawers to stop rolling out on their own. Hard to stop them when the desk is so out of plumb! It take 40 yrs of experience to know when to remove back feet on a desk! For some reason the concrete floor had been ground but they didn't get near the wall. Also delivered 5 kitchen door parts that needed refinishing. The finish was cracked up and just called for sanding, priming and respraying. Being about 35-40 yrs old the cabinets weren't white anymore. Everything was very yellowed. After priming I switched off with Mohawk Yellow toner and Mohawk semigloss white precatilized lacquer. Top coated with a clear to give it a little depth and the right yellow cast. Still not done with white in my shop. Got to spray a cabinet door for one customer and I still have 3 bedroom pieces sitting on the bench. Let me stain something!! See more

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Another hand tied cane chair! Straight forward 7 step caning. Also a few other chairs that has gone through the shop in the last couple of weeks! Enjoy!

Fixed up a German Shepherd destroyed mid-century type of bench. Not a big deal. Lots of three inch dowels in the corners. Lots of touch up.

Was asked to make and install a shelf above a tv in an entertainment center. The customer told me it was made with alder. Was going by the lumber yard so I bo...ught a sheet of alder plywood. When the customer brought me the sample I could see it wasn't alder. Oh well, had already spent $100 buying the sheet. I figured I could make it match good enough. It would be dark in a dark entertainment center. It will look OK. It looked fine when I installed it. Not a big, custom job just more of the usual! Enjoy. See more

Some cool work I did. Out of the ordinary! https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=3773139539371239&id=100000256918788

Haven't posted my work in a while. Not many wonderful pieces lately but they all add up! The first piece on the agenda is a 1966 walnut office credenza. Sup...posedly he bought a warehouse full of office furniture. It had been sun burned on half of the top at one time. It still could have been made a beautiful walnut color but the customer wanted a dark charcoal color. I stained with a dark walnut/ebony mixed penetrating oil stain. After sealing that in lightly I mixed up a charcoal colored wood filler to fill the grain and color the piece overall. This piece weighed a couple of hundred pounds. Customer used a moving company to take it away! I was glad to see this behemoth gone! See more

Selling my tablesaw set up! I have dual, connected craftsman table saws. Matching 2hp, direct flex drive table saws. Full length Jet Xacta fence, miter gauge, zero clearance throat plate along with regular and dado plates. Dust bags for both saws. Instant on, smooth strong motors. Total charge for complete set up, $800. Thank you, Kevin Deal

A lot of small jobs have been going on. Took care of two rockers from one customer. They had loose arms and stretchers. Needed sanding and refinishing. H...ad to respray the tops on a house full of Ashley furniture. This new stuff was just chipping everywhere! Not like their old Ashley furniture they left in Ohio! Took care of two mexican rockers. The customer was sanding and repainting but he needed someone to install slats to hold cushions. I went with hickory! A customer brought me a drum top from a 1930's table.the top and bottom of the drum was separating and areas of the side veneer was bad and crumbling. Did some gluing, bondo work and then some new mahogany veneer around the side. She loved it! Let's not forget some IKEA cabinet part redoing! Utilizing old drawer parts I made a 47 inch window seat and a pullout drawer area. I think I forgot pics for the window seat but have included pics of the 3 level pullout drawers. I really need to start building better pieces of furniture. Spent a few hours yesterday organizing a big chunk of my wood pile. I have almost 50 genuine mahogany boards and my Cuban mahogany is turning a beautiful dark reddish brown! See more

Last week I took care of some older furniture. There were three squeaky, loose chairs. Repairs there consisted of reglueing joints and adding some hidden scre...ws. They turned out nice. There was a round coffee table with the usual water/heat damaged spots. That just took the usual restoration. The same with restoring an oak barrister style bookcase with a bad top. Fish tanks and furniture dont mix! A fun piece was a sofa table that the customer had made when she was in Africa. It is made out of Paduak which is a reddish wood. It browns with age. As you can see the whole table was sun damaged and the finish had turned whitish. It also had a mean, blotchy red area on the top that had a pot on it for years. We were able to get by with restoring the side and the top. This job shows my new helper Jeff tackling the finesse scraping. He's been helping with some jobs and picking up the repair work quickly. The sofa table turned out wonderful. We touched up and resprayed the dining table. The oak always looks beautiful! The main piece is a 1920ish white oak veneered buffet. With quartersawn white oak had heavy flake/medullary rays. New veneer was a little had to locate. The pieces I used here came from Edensaw Lumber from Washington st. One problem that presented itself was that the old veneer, which had been replaced at some point was glued with contact cement. Much of the underlayment plywood skin failed and where it didnt the glue wanted to stay there. Working on location in the dining room I didn't want to make much of a mess. With some bondo and wood dough filling and following that with a course toothing plane the surface came out smooth enough. The new veneer I had helped. It had a good thickness. I used the heat sensitive glue from Veneer Supplies that I like. I glued together 3 sheets for the front half and then connected a two piece sheet. It turned out great and the finishing eventually matched better than the old veneer. Everything was done on location in Coronado, Calif. Enjoy the pictures. I included one of new paduak from my shop! See more

Just recently wrapped up a staircase restoration. The sprayed on color and finish had gotten destroyed over the years. After spending the first day doing my ...usual thorough masking I was grateful much of the cap was only going to need slight touch up. Masking and unmasking balusters is very difficult and time consuming. Because of windows shining on the upper face of the wood I planned to strip the top edge and touch up the sides. Sometimes I just touch up the top but it's hard to hide repairs in the sunshine. The staircase had a slightly raw umber color to it. The customer had gotten a reddish wood floor so I figured I would tweak the color a little, make the rail and floor complement each other. A pull scraper and hand sanding made short work of the prepping. The staining consisted of van dyke brown UTC and paint thinner for stain. I did some light touch up coloring with Mohawk Finishing Products blendal powders. I wrapped up the second day with custom spray toning with Mohawk colors, Deft clear wood finish and blending it all together. Moisture in the air from a Marine layer and the numerous coats kept me from finishing. I had completed almost all the coats I was going to do with much sanding between coats to achieve depth to the finish. Putting color between coats of clear helps with that. I figured I would come back the next day to finish it off. That would give the lacquer time to shrink and harden. The next day I gave everything a light sanding with 320 grit sandpaper. The customer had marked spots where something needed to be addressed. Usually an edge with light color or a little roughness. I had expected to take care of all of that in the better light. By noon I was done with my prep and applied at least 2 more coats of deft nitrocellulose lacquer and the finishing was complete. A couple of hours of demasking and the house was back to normal. Before leaving I hard rubbed everything with a clean cloth to remove lint etc plus to give the finish a burnish. Left the customers with a beautiful staircase! Enjoy the pictures. See more

Delivered 4 cane back chairs today! Second job from the same customer. The tubular frame was dirty, slightly corroded and definately in need of polishing a...nd re-lacquering. What brought the work to me was the need to recane all 4 chairs. Of course the wood needs to be restored and prepped for the new cane. Splines caning which is easier than doing the hand woven variety. A little tinting and lacquer gives the new cane an appropriate patina. Enjoy See more

Been slow on my posting lately. Got a pile of jobs but some are small. Here is a couple of the recent ones I liked. A redwood mailbox for a new customer and ...a desktop restoration for a repeat! It's hard to find thick, 1" redwood. That's what I wanted for most of this mailbox. I was looking for a robust box compared to what they had. I wasn't thinking, I started with 1 1/2" and planed it down. I should have resawed and left myself with some thin stock. I have a bunch of 1" redwood but its 60+ years old. Old growth and it wasn't getting cut up for a mailbox! The desk was just a regular 1985 type red oak small office desk. How often do you get to break out the Minwax Gunstock stain. A one day refinish with a follow up the next day for rubout and wax. Customer is going to put glass on it. Enjoy the pictures. See more