It’s Monday…let’s make something! ~ Week 29
Week 29! It’s wild to think that I’ve been taking you all up to the barn with me for this long! Fun times! This week I made something that I actually have in my kitchen and use all the time!
<—— Check out today’s video!
I’ve made a few of these mallets over the years. The last one was made by request by another woodworker that I know. So I purchased a baseball bat blank from Woodcraft. Since it’s a hard maple, it’ll be great for this project! I started off by measuring and cutting the blank to size. Then I used my center finder to punch an indentation into each end. One more punch with the end that will go onto the lathe and we are ready to get started!
This is a pretty straight forward project…but nevertheless it’s a fun one. These can be customizable with some burned in lines or a textured handle even. But I decided to not go fancy with this one! I made a few passes to make sure it was completely round then started to shape the handle. Once that was to my liking I turned off the bottom to make the mallet the length I was wanting. Then it was time to sand and oil.
Once that was done, I turned almost all of the bottom piece, sanded it and then used my new saw to finish the cut! Then it was time to head to the Grizzly bandsaw to cut off the part of above the handle! Then you guessed it…more sanding! I seem to do more sanding than anything else! But once that was done I was able to oil both the ends and that was all she wrote!
Like I said, this was a pretty simple project, but honestly it’s something I use weekly in my home. My kids love chicken piccata, so I use the mallet to make sure the chicken is all one thickness! But this can also be used in the garage or shop as an actual mallet!
What do you all think? Need one of these in your kitchen?
See you all back up in the barn next Monday!
