Sixth Class

Time flies.  I cannot believe it has already been six weeks, but here we are.  Last week I didn't feel like I did much in class, and in this class, even more so.  I attached muslin to the seat and tacked it to the back, I didn't have time to staple it.  First it is tacked every couple of inches on all 4 sides, only tapping the tacks halfway in.  Then you staple the front starting in the middle and working one way for a couple of inches, then from the middle toward the other side, the staples have to be end-to-end to ensure the most secure attachment.  Then you staple the back, same method.  The muslin is pulled hand tight and its purpose is to smooth out the foam (particularly on the edges).  The sides are stapled starting at the front of the chair and go toward the back.  Since the chair is wider in the front, this is particularly important as you are tightening the muslin as you go and eliminating wrinkles.  I did this wrong; I stapled in the middle and continued to the front then the back as I had done on the front and back faces of the chair.  He explained that the fabric's threads aren't parallel to the staple line due to the fact that the seat isn't square.  Thus if you staple toward the back of the chair where the seat is narrower, and you are trying to tighten and smooth out the muslin toward the front, you're stapling above the thread line of what you already stapled and it doesn't help.  If you start at the front, you're always stapling on or below the thread line and can eliminate the wrinkles.  It is hard to explain but if you see it up close, it makes sense.  The good thing was that I didn't have to pull out the staples.  The front of the muslin at the corners has to have a pleat in order to finish it, there is no way around it.  You won't feel it in the muslin, but the same thing happens with the finish fabric but every chair is similar (I will be inspecting other chairs to verify this!).  Pictures below, and hopefully next week you'll see some fabric!



Muslin stapled to 2" from the corners, still tacked at the corners.





Muslin stapled at the sides.




Muslin tacked to the back.



Fifth Class

Hi!  Sorry I haven't posted like I said I would...I will work on that.  In this class, it doesn't seem like I did much at all!  I added cotton to the back of the chair over the burlap then stapled the foam over it.  I worked on scuffing up the frame and filling gouges with wood putty so I could stain and polyurethane it before fabric is attached.  I brought the chair home to do the staining had poly as I am running out of classes.  Pics below!

Cotton and foam cut for the back.

Final foam.

Fourth Class

In the fourth class I made burlap flaps for all 4 edges of the seat in which cotton was rolled to make an edge at the same height as the wood blocks at the back corners.  Then cotton is placed in the wedge area inside the rolls, and more pieces of cotton are placed in holes in the surface of the seat until it feels even all over.  Then, 2 full layers of cotton are placed over the top and trimmed even with the seat edges.  Finally, a layer of 1" foam is placed on top and stapled down along the edge as shown in the last picture.  It is looking like a chair again!

Rolls with cotton inside.



Close-up of roll with cotton (before trimming).



Cotton fill.




Cotton fill complete.



Final foam layer (forgot the picture of full cotton layers).

Third Class

Hi!  Sorry for the late posting.  This class was all about springs.  It turns out the spring heights are generally the same, it is the diameter of the wire that varies, creating more or less compression.  The following photos show the stages of string tying; it is quite complicated.  After initial tying is complete, I stuffed some cotton below the last round of each spring so that when you sit on the seat, the springs don't hit the webbing which sounds like a drum each time.  Then, they are covered with burlap.


Initial ties and cotton.



Tying is complete.



Ties viewed from above.



Burlap covering springs.

Second Class

Hello!  Now the fun part - attaching new materials to the chair.  Tonight's class was all about webbing and springs, but the springs he gave me to use were for couches and he decided they were too tall so we removed them and he is bringing me springs for a chair that are shorter.  You still have to tie them down and tighten them to compress the springs, but we couldn't compress the tall springs enough.

The webbing is attached in one direction, and depending on the item, spaced apart to fit full widths of webbing.  You can't cut them lengthwise, the strength is lost as the edges are sewn to tie in the crosswise stitching in the webbing material.  Then the webbing is woven between in the other direction, see pictures below.  When I had downtime, I roughed up the wood with steel wool to prepare for finishing over the course of the next few weeks.  The idea is to finish the wood before final fabric is applied.  Check back next week!


Bottom webbing.



Back webbing.



The expert teacher - Paul Sr.



Completed webbing.



Back burlap - to contain the cotton.



These springs would be good for an ejection seat!