Coolmeadow Creations Shop Construction

Well, last weekend was a total bust for working in the shop. But I got good and rested for a change. This weekend was much better. Still a little cold yesterday morning to paint in the shop, so I went and got the vents for the eaves. Man, I HATE sawing with a circular saw above my head. The first cut I made I got saw dust in my left eye. And I was wearing a full face shield!!! Ended up wearing my earmuffs with the built in eye protector AND the face shield. Had to build a contraption to clamp to the saw to work as an edge guide to keep a semi straight line going. Installed the vent in the east and north walls. Still need to do the west wall, but I've got an obstacle with my box bay window not allowing me to get the circular saw up there for that part of the cut. About 4' or so. I'll have to devise a plan to cut that part. I don't think my jig saw will fit either, but it might be close.
Got the eaves caulked and primed this morning as soon as the temp allowed, then took a lunch break. After that it was warm enough in the shop to start. I already had one coat on the walls, so I started with the ceiling, then did a second coat on the walls, and back to the ceiling for it's second coat. This is the Kilz 2 latex primer. It is white enough for me for now. If I get a burr in my get-a-long, I can still top coat it later.
Now I can get the tarp put away, and start that built in bench next Thursday. Oops, I still need to paint the eaves the final coat. That won't take too long.
Thanks for reading. Hope you had a good weekend! Jim.

I thought I'd put pictures here of the work bench I'm building...I see I put them in the thread about questions on the work bench. That's fine. I'll get back to that in a moment.
Today started out with tackling the remaining 24' wall with eave vents. I wanted to do this while it was still cool because of all the sawdust that flies. Didn't finish until it was warm and I was sweaty. The main part went very smooth and quick. It was the spot above the box bay window that gave me fits for 3 hours. The circular saw wouldn't fit under there, and neither would the jig saw. A barrel grip might have had better luck. I got most of it (roughly 4' wide at the shingles) with the PC Tigersaw. Had to cut through, or should I say burn through, about 8 to 10 " with the angle grinder. It would have been a smoother cut if I had had a saw wheel for it, if they make one, but didn't want to make a 35 mile round trip to find out. So the cut wasn't smooth nor straight, but it will vent. I need to get some caulk in the morning and and seal it off so that I can paint. I may prime it first then caulk, so I can get one painting step done before I have to wait for the caulk to dry.
I ate lunch (LOML was gone to judge a music competition for a neighboring Music Teachers Association.) then went to the shop to do some more on the bench. First I finished the masonite top. I left the bench in the other thread with the entire front open. Well, that wasn't what I decided I wanted, so I framed in a spot on each side for drawers. I should be able to put 2 deep ones, or 3 medium ones on each side. Not sure how I'll proceed yet. So the legs aren't real pretty, but I needed the 4X4 surface to mount the adjustable feet. The piece of dark plywood on the wall is my mounting surface for the Snap On boxes. I'll have room under them for a couple gadget boxes with pull out trays, and for my battery chargers. The way the cabinet door will interfere with the slat wall on the left side, I may pull it out and patch in with some OSB. I may leave it and see if it is usable for some shallow stuff, maybe hang the cheap chisels there or something. Well, I'm bushed. Time to give the dogs their pills and go to bed. Have a good second half of the weekend!! Jim.

I got the remainder of the eaves primed this morning, went to HD to get some long screws to mount the tool box mounting plate, ate lunch, mowed the yard, the moved the tool boxes to the wall where they are now mounted!! And cleaned out and organized. It's been a long time since I had these up and usable. They've been on top of some 2X4s to keep them off the concrete in the garage for almost 3 years. It's been soooo hard to keep tools organized. I found all but 2 drill bits, and one of them is one of the bigger ones, so I know it's not one that got broken. But the smaller of the 2 probably got used in one of the counter sink bits and broken. Wouldn't be the first time.
Well, now I can get the eaves painted next Sat. after my half day of work. We are supposed to have a chance of rain Mon through Wed, so maybe I can see if I'm going to have to put in some ground drainage, or if I can start building a little pump shed for the sprinkler pump to keep it off the ground, the bugs out of it, and the rain off of it to see if the new one will last more than a year. I'm thinking about disconecting it next winter and bringing it in the shop to see if that won't help too.
Well, the weekend is all but over. The steak's on the grill, and the veggies are in the skillet. Life is grand! OH! And we got a contract in the mail saying that they are going to drill for gas near us, and we get some money! Now, if the lottery tickets we bought at work will just win, I'll be in great shape!! Jim.

Good progress, Jim (sure better than mine). I spent 2 1/2 days looking everywhere for a large assortment of "T" nuts I had put up about a year ago, (finally found them Sunday afternoon), but it started raining here Sat. night and continued almost all day Sunday. I didn't want to chance running the extension cord in the rain and across the wet yard to the shop, so I gave up on any shop work. I did do some work on one new plane blade and one old blade til my wrists said ENOUGH!!! Bad news... it's supposed to rain more for the next three days. We need the rain, but it is sure messing up my progress in the shop.

Built-in bench is looking good Jim

I like the upper boxes also.

Norman, I went for close to 2 1/2 years with basically an electrical cord. Actually I was lucky that there was a spot light mounted on the corner of the shop that had power fed from the house. I commandeered that line to give me 2 outlets in the shop to work off of. I still had to run an extension cord at times to get enough amps to run the stereo, TS and some lights.
I think we have your rain today and for the rest of the week. Not much so far, but it is going to get heavier later today.
Thanks Steve, yeah I like the boxes too, especially since they were free! I was trained for car stereo installations from the tools in those boxes, plus some air tools I didn't get to take. There is a lot of sentimental value is some of those tools. Jim.

Short note. I finished painting the rest of the eaves first thing this am. Well, not first thing, it was about 10:30 before I finished breakfast and helped get the dogs fed and then everything cleaned up after LOML left for a music rehersal with two music teams. Glad to get that finished up. Cut up the sheet of Baltic Birch I bought on the way home last night for the drawers for the bench. Stopped for lunch about 1:30, then mowed the yard. That took a little over an hour and half. Then started the daddo cuts and rabbit cuts for the pieces. Finished around 6:50 with the 4 shorter drawers glued up and drying. The 2 lower drawers are a little deeper, but I need some more material for the bottoms. Couldn't get all 6 made from 1 sheet, but don't want to spend another sheets worth of money just for the little I need, so I'll probably get a 1/4 sheet of 1/2" ply tomorrow on the way back from the dog show up in Denton. (No, it has nothing to do with Mother's Day )
I'll take some pictures tomorrow on how this changes the appearance of the bench. At least if I get as far as I hope to. Happy Mother's Day to all out there. You're all very special! Jim.

Hi Jim,
You are really coming along and it is all good. Glad you finally got the tool boxes up. Keep on while you can and thanks for posting of your progress.
Building drawers can only mean one thing, you are close! (that is if we are ever close). Enjoy the weekend, good luck in Denton!
Shaz

Shorter note today. Tried Lowes for a quarter sheet of birch for the 2 remaining drawer bottoms. 17.84!!! The full sheet at HD was only 26.00. Didn't want a full sheet, but guess I'll go ahead and get one unless HD's cheap ply looks better that Lowes. I could use it for other shelves I have in the back of my mind for the TS extension table storage. Was just going to be further down the road. Or maybe I'll just use the old ply I have, and leave the drawer where I can pull the back off of it and replace the bottom. Guess I could use a scrap piece of OSB too. We'll see. Jim.

Really coming along...

Jim,

The shop is really coming along nicely. Looking real good!!

Go ahead and buy the whole sheet of Baltic Birch. I'm sure you'll find another use for it along the way. We've used small scraps of Baltic Birch for various little things along the way. It won't go to waste.

Again the shop is looking real great!

-Denise-

Thanks for the comments!
Well, I spent about 2 1/4 hours in the shop after work both yesterday and today. Did one bank of drawers yesterday, and the other tonight, plus had to adjust the doors for the left side. Now I can cover up the ugly bottoms where the adjustable feet are for the bench. Just make the lower doors longer at the bottom to hide the mess!
For those that have read my PayPal rant thread, LOML told me she got e-mail confirmation that the pump was shipped...yesterday. Guess that one slipped the memory last night. So Friday I can get the wood to make my little pump house and see how much I can get done this weekend.
The weeks almost over! Jim.

Hi all! Well, I worked all day yesterday getting as far as I dared on the sprinkler pump house. It rained off and on all day, and most of the night. A shower or 2 today, but the ground is too wet to try to get things mounted. Supposed to rain most of the week too! Hopefully next weekend will dry out enough to set the poles in concrete, and do the plumbing and wiring.
So, today I worked on the first side of the multipurpose station cabinets. I have 4 of the 6 panels dry fitted to make sure they are close to the same dimensions, and have one more cut out that was my first one. I'm using it as the master, taking measurements from it as I cut the others. Sure helps to set up and cut all like cuts and daddos at the same time before moving on to another cut. Saves so much set up time. I was a little short on 2 x 4s to get all 6 done. Forgot that the bottom gets doubled 2 X 4s so the adjustable feet have something to mount to. I do have some pictures to show the panels, and the parts that make them up.
Picture 1 shows the parts cut and ready to assemble. It's hard to tell but the plywood panel is at the top of the 2Xs.
The next 3 pictures show the panel being assembled.
And the final picture of course shows it all together. Each panel sits on 2 of the adjustable feet like my built in work bench does. I will have a 2 X 4 stretcher at the bottom and top, front and back to stabilize the panels. I decided to go ahead and build the top as a torsion box that will sit on this unit. I can shim it if need be, then level everything with the feet, and or other shims. I will have some more daddo work to do on some of these parts so that the stretchers fit flush, so I won't glue and screw them together until I get that done. And if I did all my measurements right, the finished top will be the same height as the table saw! Time will tell!!!
Thanks for looking in. Jim.

Well, here is where I got to today. Shows a little more detail. This one shows the whole enchilada. Ok, half an enchilada, since there will be another one of these on the other side of the box bay window. Note, the upper rear brace, and the upper front brace will be replaced. I cut all the wood I had and got going on the cuts for the bottom two that had wider daddos and forgot to stop! So those will be the lower ones on the other side, and I'll cut two replacements for this side.
Even though I checked each panel against the master as a reference when building them to make sure they were all the same size, (after gluing and screwing together) There is still one that is off somehow. May be the floor interfering with it, and making it off, I don't know. But as I told Glenna (LOML), it's a bench, it's not fine furniture. But it IS sturdy!!!
Well, it's only 6:20, there's nothing on TV to watch, I've had my quart of gatorade and did my post, so I may go back out and cut some more 2X4s to get ready for the next 6 panels.
Hey, are you guys in west Texas sending storms our way again???? Jim.

Jim,

Just read through your thread. It was fun to follow your progress from the beginning to now.

Great work and a very impressive shop!

Darrin

Well, I'm baaack!! Spent all of last weekend and evenings this week on the sprinkler pump project. I got it wrapped up yesterday afternoon after work and a haircut, but it's too wet and muddy to go try it out. But that means that I don't need to water, so that's ok.
Finished up what I can do on the multistation benches earlier. I'm waiting for my friend to get the remainder of the adjusters I need. Not sure how long it will take him. He knew of 8, and I need 11 more. Need one more 8' 2X4 for the last four top braces, and some more screws, but that's a 10 minute job, and not worth the gas to go to town to get it. Easy evening job for this week. Now I need money to get the material for the tops. But that will have to wait for a few weeks. I'm sure next weekend will be major cleaning getting ready for company the following week for the local dog shows. We'll show 3 of the 4 days, so probably no shop time. Hope everyone had a good Father's Day. And you got rested up for the coming week. Jim

Jim O'Dell said:

Well, I'm baaack!! Spent all of last weekend and evenings this week on the sprinkler pump project. I got it wrapped up yesterday afternoon after work and a haircut, but it's too wet and muddy to go try it out. But that means that I don't need to water, so that's ok.
Finished up what I can do on the multistation benches earlier. View attachment 9862 I'm waiting for my friend to get the remainder of the adjusters I need. Not sure how long it will take him. He knew of 8, and I need 11 more. Need one more 8' 2X4 for the last four top braces, and some more screws, but that's a 10 minute job, and not worth the gas to go to town to get it. Easy evening job for this week. Now I need money to get the material for the tops. But that will have to wait for a few weeks. I'm sure next weekend will be major cleaning getting ready for company the following week for the local dog shows. We'll show 3 of the 4 days, so probably no shop time. Hope everyone had a good Father's Day. And you got rested up for the coming week. Jim

Click to expand...

Jim,

Your picture is a little blury.

Sean Wright said:

Jim,

Your picture is a little blury.

Click to expand...

Yeah, the batteries need to be recharged. It's always a good sign to charge them. Looks great on the screen, but something in the saving process? Maybe it's me not being braced when I take the shot. Jim.

My friend Bob came through once again. I make a big score, and never left the house!!! Top left is a box of 13 of the adjustable levelling feet for the bench. I needed 11 more for the second half of the multistation bench. Top right are 4 long sleeve high quality t-shirts. Perfect for winter shop attire! And the bottom left is a Shark vacuum cleaner, brand new!!! This is the one built in the little carry case that copier repair people use on site for clean up. The box to the right is an extra filter module. I was really surprised with this. It was not being used as Xerox is closing down their Informart location in Dallas, so he snagged it for me. I'm speechless!! (But I can still type ) He even drove 25 miles to deliver this prize. Thanks Bob!! Jim.

Well, it's been a while since I updated this thread. The thread I started on torsion boxes kept me busy for the interim. Time to bring it back and integrate it in to the shop thread.
Yesterday found me installing the leveling bolts, leveling the torsion boxes to be on the same plane as the TS, and then contemplating how to attach the torsion boxes to the benches. I went to Lowes and bought some L brackets to do this, (and go see if they had a Beis fence for cheap) and by the time I got home, I thought of a better way to secure it. I took some 2X4 scraps and countersunk screws into them and screwed into the bottom of the boxes from underneath. It eliminates the side to side movement, and keeps the boxes from coming forward. The uprights that the "fence" mounts to keeps them from going toward the wall.
Then it was on to making the "fence" part of the benches. I cut the MDF to fit, both benches were actually the same!!! Then I cut a 1" lip and glued and bradded it on for the top. This butts up against the T-track I bought 2 years ago for this project. Still need 4' more of it, 2' on each bench. Then I struggled with how to attach the "fence" part to the structure. I knew I wanted it to be able to be disassembled if need be, so it had to be detachable. I found some 5/16" tee nuts from my old HO train set up (levelling the platforms with carriage bolts on the bottoms of the legs) and counter sunk those into the face of the "fence" and drilled throught the 2X4 that is in the structure of the bench. Works perfect! Then I (bondoed, bondo'd, bondo-ed,...) slapped on some bondo, and sanded it down. Finished the laminate up about 7:00 this evening. Sorry, I didn't take pictures along the way. But I don't think there was anything earth shattering here to show.
I thought I might be able to do one of the tops this weekend, but it wasn't to be. I have enough laminate to do one side. Would have had enough for both except a bonehead move cutting the material for the "fence". Oh well, I want some more for the router table and outfeed table before they sell out anyway.
I need to build a spacer for the T-track so it will sit at the same level as the top boards. 2 thicknesses of laminate is perfect! Yes, I'll use scrap to do it!
That's it! Sorry I was so long winded. Jim.

Well, I didn't quite get finished what I wanted to, but I got real close. I got the tops built and laminated for the benches I've been working on. Got the ducting figured out and cut and dry fitted yesterday, and the new laminate sheet cut ready to put on the tops. Did that and cut the hole in the one piece for said pipe to go through. I pulled the fence sections off and put 2 coats of clear poly on the backs of them and the tops...well, most of the tops anyway. I forgot about the 2 short sections because they were not on my work table. So after dryfitting everything, I took them off and got the first coat on, then went out and figured what I will need in the way of roofing materials to start with Tuesday. I'll go get them on the way home Monday night. I figure I will work on the roof in the mornings and die in the afternoons. I'll finish the second coat on the short pieces and put them together one afternoon where I can at least have the comfort of the fan blowing on me.
Hope everyone had a good weekend! Jim.