New Contest: Best Use of Scrap Wood (closed)

KaLea Thoits

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Best use of your scraps:
Scrounge through your scrap pile and come up with an idea from the materials you have available.... only scraps may be used (other than fasteners).

Take a picture of your pile of materials (the scrap you have chosen to use)
begin the construction and take another photo of the piece in process.
Finish up and take a pic of the end product.

All construction methods are welcome. You must use at least 80% of the original pile you selected and can only add an additional 20% of stuff you realized would work better but wasn't included in the picture.... still has to be scrap though.

Turn around time is 3 weeks. You don't need to tell me if you are in, though you are welcome to post here if you like. Just be sure I have your pics by the deadline, February 26th, if you are interested in playing!

Email all photos to me, I will put them together and post them on February 27th (without names attached) in a thread with a poll for people to vote which they think is best.

Shipping or purchasing of materials will not be necessary for this contest.

There will be no limit on the number of entrants for this contest. The winner gets the satisfaction of their entry being voted best by their peers.
 
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I wish you would have had this idea about a week and a half ago. I have had some walnut laying around that came out of a furniture shop years ago and decided to finally make some use of it. I am building essentially a library card file to hold all my nails, screws, nuts and bolts, etc, so I can get rid of the plastic bins. My dad thinks it is a travisty to use walnut for the shop though.
Don
 
I wish you would have had this idea about a week and a half ago. I have had some walnut laying around that came out of a furniture shop years ago and decided to finally make some use of it. I am building essentially a library card file to hold all my nails, screws, nuts and bolts, etc, so I can get rid of the plastic bins. My dad thinks it is a travisty to use walnut for the shop though.
Don

Better using it for the shop than tossing it in the wood stove?
 
Are you going to have a category for turners and non-turners? Seems like those spinny folks are always doing things with "scrap" firewood... ;)
Aww, he saw thorough our thinly-veiled ploy. :D Or is that a touch of envy I'm sensing? :p

For your information, we're forced to turn scrap, since we spent all the lumber money on turning tools. :rofl:
 
Are you going to have a category for turners and non-turners? Seems like those spinny folks are always doing things with "scrap" firewood... ;)

i agree art those spinny guys are doing just that, i think they should be made to use the scrap from the bowl and platers and make something,, ow they can use alot of glue though to hold the chips together.:rofl:
 
Scrap..... left over bits from some other project... usually to small to consider using on their own... but when leftovers from various projects are combined you might have enough to do something with ;)

I was considering having different categories, but that will depend on how many entries I get... 5 entries means only one category..... 25 entries... likely to be at least 2 possibly 3 groups.

I would love to see many different skill sets used on this one.... turners, flat workers, carvers, hand tool users... and anyone else I am forgetting!

...and yes... turners have a tendency to use smaller sizes of wood... but the goal here is to use actual scrap wood.... if you can't tell the piece started out as scraps then who is going to vote for it to be best? As far as I am concerned turners are going to have a harder time of it because they will have to use that much more creativity to come up with a vote winning entry ;)
 
Im going to skip the scraps contest since I dont have much warm time in the shop now, and I want to finish the "shot shack", which ofcourse I didnt buy any wood for, just using whats laying around the floor taking up space. I did buy a 1 and 1/8th forstner bit, but I dont own many bits, so I have to start collecting some where.

I sort through my junk pile every now and then and must make choices as to what has to go to keep some kind of space since Im limited.I save everything, and shove it into any space available. I will always find a use for it.wood stuff 135 (Medium).jpg

all that warping plywood that I used for the shed, the odd pieces was about to throw it all out, just warped horribly, and all those short 4x4 pieces from cuttoffs from all the outdoor builds, cedar, redwood, (knotty stuff), PT, put it together, slapped some leftover stain on it, voila, plantersTiki 218 (Medium).jpgTiki 225 (Medium).jpg
and any cutoff of hardwood, no matter 2 inches, or 8 inches, always can route an edge, forstner bit a hole, and I always make people smile with tealight holders, big scrap user, better than using it for kindling. use any old stain I have, outdoor poly, indoor poly, whatever is old and must go first

made that eisel from scrap,well, nothing Id be able to plan on cutting up for any real project, cut up all my leftover redwood, red cedar into thin slices and all those long pieces of leftover 2 inch or less IPe, cause what on earth could ya use strips of Ipe for, nothing. Problem was, once I made that outdoor chest, I didnt have any scraps for the top, so I ended up buying some 2 pieces of cedar decking, had a ton of messemers finish I used for the ipe furniture, so I just schmeared a bunch on the chest, (had to buy a piano hinge, didnt want to use one I had pulled off furniture, it was too crappy looking)

and my best use of old stained up little pieces of plywood, pulled the nails and sanded out most of the stains, got that beer can to "float" in that little box....gets a good laugh.(I dont even want to mention all those little dollar pictures people get over the years, with those cheap frames, and that paper thin glass or plastic, when my wife throws them out, I pull the glass or plastic out and save it all. Makes a good box front.

that little parts inventory sign, didnt even bother to clean the ply after I took it out of the garbage pail, didnt sand it or anything, left the stains on it, and just used the best side. lazy I guess.
 

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for the record, I had those plastic inserts for those planters rotting away waiting to be thrown out eventually, old cracked, but I find uses.

that circular stand, cut apart the 3 old bars stools I had made for the outdoor tiki bar, all those slats on the seats, recut them, took some old pieces of ply, and some caster wheels I took off a thrown out dolly I found.
Im a bit of a scavenger, not because of money, just because Im cheap when it comes to things I need or dont see why they are in the trash, Ive embarrassed my wife many, many times, opening the back of the car and shoving someones gargage into my car.
I use that rolling cart for my huge ice/beverage container I bought at Dicks sporting goods a while back. It holds at least 100 cans. Makes it easy to handle cause filled with ice and water and cans, it cant be lifted so the wheels make it simple to move.

I have so much scraps cause I used to build so much outdoor furniture.
Get alot of PT leftovers, and alot of old sheet goods, some given to me, some odd cuts.
just showing my scraps and what I do with them. wish I had some time to get in on this one.

and if I see galvanized lag screws or bolts going into the garbage, I take them out if possible, and I dont care about the stares I get from people, seeing some guy in a nice sports car taking apart someones trash, I always make sure I pile it up neater than when I found it, noone has complained. Or shot at me yet.
yep, I believe someone's trash is someone else's treasure.
I never found a piece of old nail filled dirty wood I didnt think was usuable.
 

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the redwood colored Pt adirondack set was the first set I made after 2 months of trying chairs. It now rests on the backyard lawn of a Pratt University professor. the small bench and child sized table on the right, I gave to a local nabe to use with his small kids.
It was all experimental, just wanted to see if I could create anything I like.
I now have 4 sets of chairs and tables, countless adirondack chairs, a couple lounges, bbq carts, swings, and Im going to give most of it away this summer after I shine them all up. I only want to keep my ipe set and my red cedar table.
 
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