More wheels - for evangelical cars and mountain bikes

On Saturday, several more of the boys at the farm got their turn to make wheels for the cars for Haiti.  Neither Alex Mora or Fabian Perdomo had chucked up a bit in the drill press before, so I should have started with a more in-depth training before they started the project.  After one of them let the hole saw fall onto the shop floor while removing it from the chuck, I finally realized it was time for more remedial instructions.

That covered, they did their best to align the hole saw cuts from both sides of the workpiece, but about a third of the wheels were coming out uneven across the "tread" area.  So my son, Keegan suggested that we just cut them from one side - which doesn't produce as clean a cut (ie. more tear-out), but at least the tread area is even straight across the wheel.  In practice this change lead to better looking wheels, because the sanding required for the significant tear-out was easier and faster than that required to rectify the uneven tread.

So the boys cut 10 wheels apiece and sanded them off.  That left about 60 wheels to go to meet our goal of assembling 50 cars.

Fabian with his 10 completed wheels.

Alex Mora with the product of his efforts.

Then Keegan and Arley Rocha worked together and cut out another 40 wheels between them.  They also cut up all the axles for the rest of the cars.  So at the end of the day, we're only lacking another 20 wheels before we can assemble the rest of the cars.

I've been looking for linseed oil here, which is the material specified to finish the cars in the instructions for these cars that I received from the folks in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, who gave me the idea for these cars.  Here in Colombia linseed oil would be called "aceite de linaza", but so far no joy in finding a source.  At the wood-working stores and paint stores that I've checked so far, they all look at me like I'm a crazy gringo when I ask if they sell the oil here.  I read on Wikipedia that linseed oil doesn't prevent mildew, so perhaps that is why it's not popular in this humid climate.  So I've bought some Tung oil and some clear wood preservative to test as potential alternative finishes.

Aside from the work on the car parts, Einer continued stringing up the spokes on the new wheels for his bicycle.  He did the front wheel about a week ago, and on Saturday had the chance to work on the back wheel.  Only problem was getting the gear cassette off the hub.  Since the cassette was so firmly attached (rusted on), we had trouble with the hub slipping in the vice while reefing on the freewheel remover.  In the end, the hub was damaged because of the high force we put on it to keep it from turning with the cassette, so I gave Einer a new one to replace it.  Then he could finally remove the old spokes and start installing the spokes, as shown in the photo below:

Einer stringing the spokes while Arley helps steady the wheel.

Other misc tasks we completed during the day were repair of the firewood storage rack by Arley and another coat of epoxy paint applied to the chemical pump support by me. 

Not a day of big wins, rather of determination to keep moving ahead.

Cutting big wheels for the dragster cars

On April 7th, Anderson Mora cut out 28 two-inch diameter wheels for the dragster version of the wooden cars we are preparing to take with us on a two-week work team trip to Haiti.

 Anderson holding the remnant of the scrap hardwood board he used to cut out the wheels, shown in the foreground..

Anderson is only 11-years old, but he did a very careful and precise job making the wheels.  At the moment, he is the most eager student in the workshop at Granja Peniel.  He is anxious to learn and is happy getting experience in the workshop.

During the two hours he was working, Anderson learned how to use the hole saw on the drill press.  We found that it works best to first cut all the holes about 2/3 of the depth of the board (enough that the pilot bit goes all the way through), then make a pass with the spade bit to form the "hubcap", and finally turn the board over and finish cutting the wheel using the hole saw.  Alignment using the pilot bit hole on the last cut is particularly critical to the wheel being true.

After cutting all the wheels out, Anderson spent a half an hour trueing them up using the disk sander attachment on the lathe:

We still lack cutting out 80 of the smaller wheels to equip the full fleet of 50 cars that we plan to take to Haiti.  The boards are prepared and sanded.  Next week, Lord willing...

Evangelistic Cars for Haiti

Last week, during the school break for Semana Santa, we started making 50 wooden cars that my son, Keegan, and I plan to take to Haiti later in April. We plan to give the cars as evangelical gifts to kids that we meet there.  Each car will have a Bible verse printed on it.

Starting March 29th, the group of five young men cut out the bodies for all the cars and assembled about half of them. We hit some obstacles along the way. But with patience and God's grace, we found ways around them.


The picture below shows the crew that worked on the cars, l to r, Ruben Ruiz, Einer Posada, Keegan Bye, Luis Meza, and William Gomez.  They are seated on a few of the eucalyptus blocks that we unloaded from a big truck on Day 2 of the trip.

The first problem came up right after we'd prepared the wood to cut up into car bodies, when we discovered that the scrolling saw had a problem. It made a terrible racket when we turned it on, similar to the noise it makes when you break a blade. But the blade was new and properly adjusted. After disassembling the machine (with no instruction manual or previous experience) we found out that an internal spring was broken. Fortunately it wasn't hard to bend a new end attachment on the spring, but it took three tries to get the machine re-assembled correctly and working properly. We probably spent half of the first day fixing the scrolling saw, but without it we wouldn't have finished any cars this trip, we'd still be cutting out car bodies...

So, Einer Posada and William Gomez took over the scrolling saw and made the sawdust fly! Einer is shown in the picture above, here he's running the cars over a 1/8" roundover bit in the router, but the scrolling saw is shown in the background.

Meanwhile, Keegan and Luis Meza smoothed the bodies with a sanding drum mounted in the drill press and drilled the holes for axles and simulated windows. They made a whole lot more sawdust fly! In the process, we encountered our second problem - the drill bit for the axle holes was dull. So I got the Drill Doctor out and sharpened that bit and many more that were dull in the set. Sure is a blessing to have nice tools!

Einer (nearer) and Ruben (operating press) drilling holes for axles.

Luis and Ruben Ruiz cut the 8mm dowels to the appropriate length, using a Japanese back-saw and a homemade miter box. They quickly cut up all the dowels that we had, which was enough for about 25 cars.

Then we set up the router and roundover bit so that Einer could run them all through, rounding off the sharp edges on the car bodies. Quick - and saves a lot of sanding to make them look so much more finished!

We saved one of the harder and more time-consuming jobs until Day 2, which was cutting out the wheels from 3/4" hardwood. Keegan was the specialist at this job, while Luis sanded off the tearout using the disk sander. It takes 200 wheels to make 50 cars!

Then there is the hand sanding and assembly step. Not as easy as it sounds, because you often have to take it back to a previous step to correct defects. William Gomez and I are the fussy detail-oriented types on the team, so we did most of this job. Hard work!

At lunchtime on March 31st, they had cut out and assembled 25 cars, with another 25 car bodies waiting for wheels, axles, and assembly. We needed more materials and our support staff was itching to get back home, so we called it good for this trip.

Welcome to this blog

This workshop has been operating since 2005 but this is our first attempt at communicating what we are doing to a wider audience.  We have been greatly blessed to have this workshop and many wonderful tools to help the boys discover what they can do with their hands and minds.  We hope that you'll enjoy seeing what they are up to!