day two! 3-4-08

Hello again, this was our second day in my inter-session! Today our wood for the gaga pit arrived! The first thing we did today was (in our crews) we distributed the wood evenly to each group. We measured out how big each piece of wood was exactly. This was important because if we didn't know how big each piece of wood was exactly our cuts would be off which would mess up the whole project. We found out that all of our 2" x 4" x 10' were the same size except for one. If we just would have measured a couple and skipped the one that was odd sized our whole project would be messed up. One thing about carpentry is everything has to be perfect, even 1/16 of an inch could do a lot of damage to your final project! Later on in the day we practiced cutting on cheap pieces of wood. I got to tell all of you... cutting with a handsaw is no walk in the park, the hardest part is starting it. So if I was going to teach someone how to use an American handsaw I would first make sure they are wearing all the required equipment like goggles, something sturdy to hold the wood down, supervision, wood and of course a saw. Now that they are ready to cut I would next teach them how to start cutting. NOTE: Make sure your measurements are check twice before you start cutting. To start cutting with an american saw, pull the saw back easy a couple times to make a nice smooth rift. Now that you have your rift, try and get a constant motion of pulling and pushing the saw. This process is tiring but in no time if you do all the steps you will have a nice cut. Today we had to memorize a "magic number" by saying it 10 times in a row. The "magic number" is 67.5. Our gaga pit will be in the shape of a octagon, each corner will be 135˚. Half of that is 67.5 which is the "magic number. ooOOoOOoooOooooOOOo. 

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