some sweet shop time

Paul Hubbman

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Messages
582
Location
St. Louis, MO
My shop was taken over with other projects on the house during the past 2 months. The biggest impact was having to replace the boiler - many machines got moved around, pipe cutting / threading meant oily metal chips to contend with, and the storage shelving had to be temporarily moved - boxes of stuff stacked around the shop. The work bench got taken over with pipe fittings and circulator pump parts. It took me a couple of days to put everything back and clean up the disaster - i was craving some wood shop time.
This weekend i got my fix. Saturday i had the planer and jointer running most of the day getting the rough cut stock flattened, sized, and planed. Sunday, i got 6 mortise/tennon single panel sides and 2 face frames made and dry fit for some built-ins i'm doing for the dining room. This week i'll get them fully assembled and sanded - maybe even get some of it installed.

About 3 weeks ago Yvette (my wife) informed me that she had invited her family for both Thanksgiving and Christmas and that she wanted the ground floor of the house completely done by then. 10 out of town house guests, plus another 26 for the big meals. We'll be "cozy" to say the least. There are a couple of projects that need to happen for this - i'm gonna have some fun this fall.

Paul Hubbman
 
I can't believe I almost missed this thread as I have been busy myself.

You will appreciate the new boiler even as the price of crude tumbles. You just got to love how speculation can drive the price up, but just as easily drive the price down. In either case you won't have to cringe when the boiler comes on and think "money out the exhaust stack."

Good for you anyway Paul! It took the passing of my sister in a Car Accident to appreciate family. Alyson helped too...children always do. Of course you might have too much of a good thing with that many guests, but at least you will get in some shop time as an excuse to "spruce things up" for the guests.

Me...I'm jealous. The only thing I got to look forward to making is some crude sheep feeders.
 
We were out of town for most of the weekend, but i did get to glue up the first of 4 tall skinny cabinets for the built-ins. It's the first time i've made cabinetry, and i'm doing it all with assembled framed panels - solid wood frames and plywood fill panels. The body of the casework will be painted, but the 3 piece stained base molding in the room will wrap around the bottom, and i'll have a stained top and molding to match the base. I'm really working so that i can get things painted outside before the weather gets foul. The shop is in the basement, and oil based paint stinks up the entire house.
I'll get some pics - you'll have to remember, though, that this is my first casework.
Hope you're all having some fun too.
paulh
 
I enjoy casework. You might like this Paul being an architect and all, yet you might not too. I know its hard for you to believe but for some reason my kitchen/house has a "country theme to it". Not sure why. Perhaps its the sheep out back, the hour long ride to the nearest Walmart and the 200 people in this town that make that look work. :)

Now I always loved the timber frame look, but lacked the skills to build an entire house that way. So I did the next best thing, I tried to pull the look into my kitchen by inverting the frames. I used 2x2's to mimic the look of 8x8 beams, and used cherry to "sheath" the inside of the frames. Ultimately because of the frame and sheathing arrangement, the cabinets are sturdy beyond belief.

Because of the way the kitchen is laid out, upper cabinets were not really possible,so they were left out. I dislike toe kicks because its hard to keep clean, so I cantilevered the top to give me a few inches of foot space and still work at the counter productively. You may note,I also cheated and used those pine panels pre-glued at HD or Lowes to make the panels inside the cabinet doors. All in all its Spruce 2x2's, black cherry boards and white pine panels...a contrast for sure.

I like it, and it works well for us, but I understand if people hate it. On the other hand I have had people admire them too.

Cabinets4-281x204.jpg
 
Travis,
Nice kitchen. I'm always amazed at how relatively spindly pieces of wood and relatively thin wood panels make incredibly stout furniture and boxes if you put them together in a good way.
The other side of the coin is, i'm amazed at how flimsey most cabinetry is - shoddy materials and poor connections. I consider that a waste of material and time. I also think it's taking advantage of people who don't know any better.
Keep up the good work.
paulh
 
Very nice Travis my only grievance is i can't click on the picture to get a better look at it. BEAUTIFUL none the less.:thumb:
Dawn
 
Travis,
Nice kitchen. I'm always amazed at how relatively spindly pieces of wood and relatively thin wood panels make incredibly stout furniture and boxes if you put them together in a good way.
The other side of the coin is, i'm amazed at how flimsey most cabinetry is - shoddy materials and poor connections. I consider that a waste of material and time. I also think it's taking advantage of people who don't know any better.
Keep up the good work.
paulh

Strong it is!. It stays all perfectly straight, square and plumb via the framing. Then the sheathing adds rigidity to racking, just as in a house. Then...and here is the part that really toughens it up...the shelves on the inside push against the sheathing from within, which is sandwiched against the outside frame. It's literally locked together.

Here is another interesting feature...its all free standing. You can slide it away from the wall if you need too. I don't know why you would want to do that, but weight, and its design keep it in place. But it does not HAVE to stay in place.

As for the counter top. I had originally planned to put a granite tile on top of it, but a lot of people liked the wood look. So its been that way ever since.
 
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