What can a 5-axis CNC router really do?

Our 5-axis CNC router has state-of-the-art technology that allows us to machine wood (and other soft materials such as acrylic) from all angles in a variety of ways.

Here are 2 videos of a machine like ours in action. My apologies for the cheesy music in the first video!

The carving of the leg in the following video (starts at min 2:40) uses the same technique we used to create the custom corbels in our previous post.

Our machine.

Another Custom Production Project

Here are some images of two custom corbels we CNC machined for a client. They are made from laminated (glued together) strips of solid black walnut. The pieces were finish sanded, but left raw for the client to incorporate into a large kitchen island in someone's home.

Natural beauty and a little bit of bling!

We recently completed an interesting and unique project - custom jewelry boxes in solid walnut. 

One of the prototypes gets a test-drive with 
a diamond engagement ring.

The intriguing containers were designed by award-winning design firm Johnson Chou Design, for !Xam Diamonds. This Toronto boutique creates beautiful jewelry with ethically sourced South African diamonds, including intriguing rough stones. You can see images of their custom designs on their Facebook page. 

The unique designs definitely deserve a unique jewelry box to house them and we were happy to assist in their production. Here are some images of the process involved.

The boxes are produced in multiples on our CNC router 
to maximize production efficiency.

Stacks of the milled boxes awaiting separation 
and finish sanding.

Another view of the milled boxes. There were 500 in total.

One of the prototypes with its natural hand-rubbed oil finish. 
You can see the leather hinge and magnets that are used to keep 
the two halves closed securely. In the end, the leather hinge 
was chosen over the metal hinge for its more 
natural organic aesthetic.

Bruce gives each box a final buffing before shipping.

The finished box, open.

The finished box, closed.

The boxes had the !Xam logo embossed on the wood in silver foil. This tricky task was expertly done by Toronto printing house The Press Connection.

Sheridan students come for a visit

We are happy to partner with Sheridan College, which has a great Furniture program in their Craft and Design Faculty. This is our second year setting a project with the Year 2 Commercial Furniture Class, taught by industrial designer Kirsten White. The course focuses on furniture design for production and introduces students to the concepts of designing product for a client, producing designs in multiples, designing for efficiency in production, cost considerations, etc.

We particularly enjoy the partnership because it gives us a chance to interact with the students and re-connect with the energy of student minds. We also offer the students the possibility of producing and adding their designs to our collection if they create a particularly successful project.

Having been design students ourselves, we remember the incredible importance of industry exposure and the valuable critiques of design professionals that helped to hone our design skills. We hope to pass on a bit of our experience and knowledge of the industry. In the end, everyone benefits.

The students recently joined us for a "grand tour" of the workshop.  

The students watch as Chad demonstrates machining on the CNC router.

Here Chad demonstrates our edgebander. 

For anyone who has edge-banded panels by hand (a time-consuming process), an edge-bander holds a certain special appeal!

The students join us in our office for a question and answer session after the tour of the workshop.

Happy Birthday to Us!

January 2012 marks Speke Klein's 13th birthday! 

We have weathered some pretty serious storms (literally) and are happy to reach this milestone.

Thank you to all our customers, colleagues, friends and family who have helped us throughout the past 13 years. We could not have done it without you!

With best wishes for the year ahead,

Robin & Thomas
Speke Klein

Happy Holidays!

Putting the Mo in Movember

So all of our employees did their part for Movember, sporting a little facial hair for a good cause. Here are a couple of pics to prove it.

A Shout Out for MimiTENS (and a visual plug for Speke Klein)

Lovely entrepreneurial mom, Anna-Marie of MimiTENS, got a huge boost to her business when celebrity style guru Gwyneth Paltrow raved about the fabulous children's mittens in her popular lifestyle newsletter GOOP. 

Here, Anna-Maria is interviewed about the brush with celebrity. Why is Speke Klein interested? Not only do we like MimiTENS, but the walnut table she displays her wares on is one of our Quinn tables! Check it out!

Our New Bedroom Furniture Collection Launches in Halifax

We were delighted to travel out to the East Coast as our new Bedroom Collection was launched this weekend at our retail partner Statement in Halifax. Roger and his team hosted a wonderful couple of days for us in honour of the new collection.

The new Highland Half Dresser in natural beech in the showcase window. 

Two of the new bed designs (the Stirling and Argyll) on the showroom floor. 

On Friday, I had the pleasure of speaking to aspiring design students from the Nova Scotia College of Arts and Design (NSCAD). I spoke about our company's creation and the evolution of our design language over time.

On Saturday there was a lovely launch party. Peach and Champagne Mimosas and tasty organic treats tempted all the visitors who browsed the collection and Statement's beautiful showroom space.

Guests chat in the showroom. Our Touch coffee table  serves as a cocktail table for refreshments.

Another image of the showroom. Our Rowlands coffee table acts as a play table for a young guest.

Our solid wood Rowlands Bed on display. 

Speke Klein and the Statement Team - from l to r - Ray (Design Director), Robin, Mark (Store Manager), Roger (Owner and host extraordinaire), and Thomas (holding our daughter who joined us for the trip). 

Week 46: The machine is up and running!

Our CNC router installation continues. We have been joined by technicians from Homag Canada who are fine-tuning everything, training us in the machine's operation and making sure things run smoothly. Here is the crew posing in front of the machine. From left to right: Ian (Homag), Bruce, Chad, Thomas and Nelio (Homag), with Kai (Homag) perched on top.

Here are images of the machine running its first test programs.

Thomas and Chad discuss the set-up of a part on the machine bed. You can see the computer console that runs the programming in the forefront of the image. The black mat at the front of the machine is a safety feature and contains sensors that will stop the machine immediately if someone steps on the mat (on the side where the part is being machined) when the router is in operation.

Chad positions a test part on the machine bed.

Here is the test part (the side of a drawer box), positioned and ready to go. It is placed on "pods" and is held down by vacuum suction.

Here is the same part getting machined. You will notice the router bit on the right side of the wood piece notching its side. The large hood over the router head deals with dust extraction.

Everyone watches as the machine runs the program to mill the part. From left to right: Kai  and Nelio (Homag), Chad, Ian (Homag), and Bruce. You will note that Chad is holding a control console as he watches the operation. This allows him to stop the machine if he has a concern about the program running correctly.

Week 44: Special Delivery!

After much anticipation, we finally took delivery this week of our brand new 5-axis CNC (computer numerically controlled) router. The beautiful BMG 511 from Homag, Germany is the very first of its kind in North America.  We cannot wait to explore all that it will do for us!

Here are some images of its delivery to the workshop.

The rigging company needed 2 trucks - one for the machine itself and one for the special heavy duty forklifts and equipment needed to offload it.

The machine bed gets off-loaded from the truck...

...and manouevred through the workshop to its final position.

Kai, the technician who is going to install the machine for us, oversees the final positioning. When the workshop floor was poured, we had to create a special area with extra thick concrete to support the machine, so the accuracy of the positioning was crucial.

The machine gantry is readied for off-loading.

Preparing for "the marriage": the gantry gets positioned over the machine bed with only 1mm of space between the components so there is no room for error.

More images of the installation to come!

Week 36: Still Settling In

It has been a while since an update, and we just wanted to say that we will be posting more infrequently now as our re-start is nearing completion. We are focusing on ironing out the wrinkles as production returns to normal and then we will be setting our sites on designing and introducing new products to add to the collection.

Please check back in the coming weeks as more details emerge.

Week 28: Back in production!!

Finally, after 28 long (and somehow very fast) weeks, we are starting to build furniture in our new workshop!!  The road to get here has definitely been up and down, but we are so excited and very much relieved to be finally producing furniture again.

Here is our first large load of wood, delivered and ready to go.

John doing some panel dimensioning on the new table saw.

Some walnut panels that are in the process of being finger-jointed.

Here are a number of prepared finger-jointed panels that are awaiting glue-up to become a batch of our very popular Touch benches.

And here are Thomas and John putting parts for our Petits Fours Bed through the sander.