While I'm working on the remaining wheels, I thought I'd share a few things I learned about how Grandpa made his pieces. Grandpa was meticulous and he must have been VERY patient. But he did make mistakes. In taking apart one of the wheels, I noticed that he must have repositioned the spokes at times as he assembled it. A couple of the spokes have two tiny holes instead of one to accept the pins that hold the bamboo rim onto the spoke. I've had to be careful to reuse the right hole! The holes are so small (<1/16th in diameter) and the spokes are so thin that he had to have drilled the holes by hand. Otherwise, a powertool would have split the pieces instantly.
Early in my parents marriage, my grandfather was already making his wagons, sleighs, and houses. My mother recalls that he originally did everything with hand tools....no power tools, even for cutting. It wasn't until my father bought a band saw that Grandpa started using it for cutting strips of wood. The hubs of the wheels are shaped. At first glance, it looks like they were cut on a lathe, but I do not recall there being a lathe in the house when I was growing up. What I do recall is Grandpa whittling a lot. I looked more closely at the wheel hubs and I suspect that he made or bought the round stock and whittled the patterns into the hubs. There is just the hint of irregularity in the shape to suggest this. It is possible that he had a hand powered lathe or made a jig to cut the design into the round stock.
Speaking of whittling, each spoke is unique. The shape and irregular roundness again suggests he whittled these pieces. I do recall as a young child, Grandpa whittling on the front porch. He kept making these things that looked like large toothpicks. I wonder if they weren't spokes? Grandpa made many pocket knives too, and he used them for his whittling. Many of these pocket knives are housed in brass or aluminum cases, and only the blade is steel. So his talent extended from wood to metal, but clearly, his medium was wood. My Dad was a tool and die maker, and his skills with metal were extrordinary. But Dad's woodworking skills extended to "it's good enough, and you can use putty." Metal working is beyond me, but I did inherit some of Grandpa's woodworking skills. Maybe it skips generations, because our son is taking up welding and metal fabrication, but wood is not his thing.
Because his pieces are hand tooled, not everything fits snugly. I can see small gaps where the seat meets the slanted sides of the wagon. I have decided that I will not try to rework these pieces for a better fit unless absolutely necessary. First, it's a "keeping it original" thing. Seconly, I don't want to risk damaging it or screwing it up.
Well, that's all for now. I have one wheel soaking and one being glued together to attend to.
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