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This project was very interesting, as it is a rare occasion to be asked to repair an ancient Buddha statue.
The wooden sculpture of a Serving Buddha was made from the single piece of the very old extreme hard exotic wood, which is Merbau.
The Buddha statue had the left foot missing.
I decided to use the half blind sliding dovetail, to ensure the new foot would never separate from the body.
The steps I took in the process:
1. Sand the broken / missing foot surface on the belt sander, to allow good joinery with the new piece.
2. Make the recess with the router, and freehand the walls of the recess into the half blind sliding dovetail.
3. Mill and glue 2 pieces of the same species wooden blanks, to achiever desired thickness.
4. Cut male part of the sliding dovetail using the miter saw and the table saw, and sneak to fit.
5. Shape the new foot on the bandsaw
6. Fine tune the new foot with the hand files, and later with the orbital palm sander.
7. Slide the foot into the sliding dovetail and glue it up.
I believe my solution is permanent as the chances of the new foot separation from the statue are very low.
I truly enjoyed the project, and got some new experience from it as well.
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At Tiger Carpenter, I use both hand tools as well as power tools to make furniture and wood working jigs.
I put a lot of thought into the design and optimization of the furniture and jigs I make. I like to come up with the improvements of the tools or jigs that are already out there, and share my ideas or findings with the community so that we all can benefit from the new upgraded versions or iterations of each invention.
I also implement the principle of aiming for perfection, even though I make a lot or mistakes and errors like all humans do. I learn from the mistakes I made, and I raise the bar for every next project.