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Sunday 18th 72F. Cloudy start, becoming clearer with some sunshine. Breezy from the north west.I have set up the router with a new support layout for the trammel [radius bar] and plywood arc. Having one accurate arc is all I need now to replicate it repeatedly. Using a trimming router bit with a ball race on the tip.
It is a bit fiddly to get the ends of the arc equally distant from the 2 meters distant, pivot point. It pays to take light cuts to avoid the router bit digging in or causing vibration. Both potentially leading to vicious chatter. Which will really ruin a nice, smooth arc.
The seeing was absolute mush again today! Worst ever! Impossible to focus.
So I went back to finishing the routing of an accurate pattern for the base ring arcs. I need at least another ten arcs to make one more layer of base ring. 2.15m outer radius to fit the dome's inside curvature. 15cm wide, so I made the inside 2m radius. The arcs are cut from sheets of 12mm birch ply 1.5m x 1.5m. I mark them out with the pattern and cut outside the line with a jigsaw. Then trim them accurately to size using the pattern and the router with a trimming bit.
The compact, little Makita router is a delight to use compared with the hefty standard routers. They do a rechargeable model now but I bought the mains model to avoid frequent battery changing. That said, the cable is often a nuisance when sweeping over 5' long, plywood arcs. When near the workshop I arrange a "sky hook" to support the cable from above. This can be as simple as a projecting, overhead batten or large, shelf bracket.
A batten can be thrust through the hedge for a quick method of cable support. A short length of cord fixes the cable to the batten. It is easier and cleaner to work out of doors when making lots of sawdust. An arc takes only seconds to trim. So hardly registers on the DB scale compares with the neighbours' decades of chainsawing for firewood.
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