Flight Light Fixture - Ohia, Kamani and Sitka Spruce

This is my attempt to make a 1960's light fixture for my kitchen

I've been locked out of my jeweler's studio - So, I have been doing woodworking in my garage.  

Dang old Covid 19

Here is the photo from my Artist Registry Page at Gallery One.

The pictures aren't very good, but I will eventually install it and get better pictures.

The woods are Ohia and Kammani that I brought back from Hawaii and Sitka Spruce that I brought back from Alaska.  You know, the 49th and 50th states.

CalDawg Helped me with pictures and I was goofing off taking pictures of him.  Jodi liked it.

Construction Photos:

Wood!  These are Ohia and Kamanni from Hawaii and Sitka Spruce from Alaska.

None of the boards were long enough, because I brought them back from vacations in Hawaii and Alaska, so I had to piece them all together.  This is after cutting the basic shapes out.

This was figuring out spacing for the LED light bulbs.

This is the Kamanni and figuring out how to get a sweep shape.

MORE AFTER THE "SEE MORE" LINK BELOW

 

Cutting for a shim/splice to hold it together.

You can't really glue end grain to end grain very well, so this piece works to provide some strength.

I'm trying to get a sort of bird wing shape here.

Like this, sort of a wing shape.  That means a different pitch as they move away from the center.

These will be the splines to hold the but joints where the wings come together.

This will make the notch for the spline.

Like this you see.

Getting ready to cut each apart to add a stripe of color.  I also cut a notch on the top of each.

These are the contrasting pieces glued in.

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Checking spacing

These notches will accept the wings.  Each is slightly deeper going away from the center.

Ceramic Fixtures from ebay.  Taping them up to paint brown.  Don't want any paint down in the electrical contacts.

Stop and check everything.

Paint

You can get a sense of the change in pitch here.

Adding in some feathers or beaks or whatever.  I'm really going for something just kind of 'bird like'.

Drilled out and dowled for the eyes or spots or whatever.

I Drilled holes behind where each fixture attaches and cut a channel in the top to tuck all of the wires into.

All glued and screwed together.  This time the now painted fixtures are taped because I will be applying the danish oil.

This is the first coat of oil.

The spruce, the lighter colored wood, is 'spalted'  That means that the wood was just beginning to decay right as it was kiln dried.  That is where all of the stripes of darker brown come from.