27
Oct 19

Done

So during the week I had to work from home for a day, so while doing that I took my lunch break to pull the shelves out of the shed and put a second coat of Polyx on them. They didn’t look too bad.

 

And after they’d cured for a few days in the shed, I went out again and glued on some leather pads on the contact points between the shelves and the wall so that they wouldn’t rub against the wall and destroy the paint. Awkward to clamp though.

And then today while Calum was out at a birthday party, I snuck out to the shed, took off the tape and trimmed the leather pads, drilled the first inch or so of the wiring channel out so the barrel socket would fit and then brought the shelves indoors.

It looks very very empty now 😀

Some manhandling of the shelves later and I got them into the lab and soldered the socket to the LEDs and then finished fitting the LED lights; then more manhandling of the shelves to get them into Calum’s room and a quick coat of beeswax which looked about a shiny as sand. Guess I need to rub harder.

And that’s it. Done.

Yikes, that only took a year and four months. To the day.

Okay, granted some other stuff happened in the middle of all that, like making a carved oak box, getting a promotion at work and embedding a mug in resin, but still. Yikes. And I can’t help but think it’d have gone faster with a larger shed…

Still though, end result is nice.

At least he hasn’t grown enough to not fit it anymore. According to the growth charts and the various furniture design books, it’ll last him about two more years before his knees won’t fit under the desk; at that point, I’ll make a pair of feet to go under the uprights and raise the whole thing up by a few inches and we’ll get another few years out of it. 

Stocking the shelves.

And of course, there’s the LED lighting. Need to tidy that cable away a bit yet. 

Didn’t even need glue, the slot was just the right size and the aluminium extrusion had small ridges to act as barbs to hold it in place.

And finally all the books have a place to live.

(Nobody tell him, but this is going to be covered in homework in a few years 😀 )

Yes, that’s the model of the titanic that Calum made. Why do you think he had me build a sea in the middle of the racetrack on the desk? 😀

I even remembered to sign it. Though my blowtorch ran out of propane at the worst possible moment so it could be darker. Oh well. 

So, what’s next?

Tidying up, that’s what’s next! The shed is a serious mess and there are a dozen five-minute jobs that have piled up. So, that should only take six months to sort out…


16
Oct 19

Lights, corners, more oil…

Got the LED strip during the week, cut a length off, soldered on the wire, tested it in the lab and it all lit up well, so I pulled off the paper on the back (the strip is self-adhesive) and stuck it in place inside the aluminium extrusion with some heatshrink around the cable end for strain relief and put the diffuser and endcaps in place…

The cable fits in the hole that I drilled for it, so that’s grand, but the connector for the 12V power supply on the other hand, is just a little too big so I’ll have to expand that hole, then cut the wire to length, solder the connector on and then install it. That’s going to be a bit fiddly and I might even wait till it’s indoors before doing that. 

So with that checked, I went round the joints with a chisel and a plastic razor and cleaned up the excess glue. The joints under the desk I couldn’t reach, so that might be for the weekend when I can take it out of the shed in the daylight.

Next job was to shape the dovetail joints at the top, which is a damn sight easier when the workpiece is small enough to be able to walk around it. When it’s taking up the entire floor space of the shed and you’re literally climbing on stuff to reach the tools on the wall behind it, not so much. Still, an hour of cursing and swearing and the #04 and two chisels and some 120 grit sandpaper later, and another application of danish oil…

I don’t think I’m completely done with sanding for that shelf and those joints though. But I can’t reach them to work on them properly so I may need to take the desk out of the shed to work on it with the sander, give it another dose of danish oil, let that cure up then do another coat or two of polyx until it looks done. Then I’ll take it indoors, fit the light and that’ll be it done. I hope.


12
Oct 19

Drilling and Glue-up

So routed down another 8-9mm in the groove for the LED at one end to give a target zone to aim for.

Now to drill in from the back of the shelf to meet that point. None of my drill bits are really long enough bar some of my auger bits, but I’m not hugely confident of my ability to drill straight-on with the bit and brace when I can’t drill downwards which I thought would be awkward here, so I went off and bought a long drill bit from FAMAG (who got recommended by Crimson Guitars a while back, and I thought for long drill bits, well, they’d know). 

Ever feel like you’ve over-spec’d a tool for a job? Oh well. A few minutes of very careful drilling later, and…

And that’s the last bit to do before the glue-up. I’d fit the LED, but, well, the LEDs didn’t arrive (or rather, the wrong ones did – but I’ll take a look later and see if I couldn’t modify them. Might not do so though because the socket meant to go in that countersunk hole in the back of the shelf has not arrived either.

So, I can’t glue-up in the shed, it’s not big enough. There’s a small deck outside the shed I use for this sort of thing.

That reminds me, there’s a rather large cleanup due once this is finished. But for now, out with the hide glue, the clamps, the cauls, and the hammers. 20 minutes of cursing, belting, giving up and getting more clamps and sticky tape and a lot of confused staring at joints that were no longer as snug as they used to be later and…

It’s not… terrible. Though that was one of the more annoying glue-ups I’ve ever done.

I mean, I knew before day one of this project that this clamping setup would be terrible, but still, this was painful. Also, I really need to spend some time reviving those clamps, they’re fantastic things but they’ve been in the elements unprotected for too long and they’ve rusted.

Having six hands would have been useful too…

Somehow those dovetails are now less well-fitting than when last fettled. It has been some time, there would have been some wood movement but it’s still surprising. Oh well.

This one’s the worse of the two, but even at that, it looks worse than it really is because of the shadowlines – I need to spend a while rounding this corner off and fettling the flow from upright to shelf. Glue should be cured by tomorrow, I can take a stab at it then.

Six or seven hours in the clamps later, I removed the clamps and let the shelf sit in the shed to cure fully. It doesn’t look terrible yet.

Looks even enough…

Definitely too big for my shed though. Yikes.
So, still needs to cure off overnight, then shape the top corners, glue some leather to the contact points where it leans against the wall, add another coat or two of polyx (the one coat on it so far is actually quite nice-looking), polish the resin a bit, fit the LED lights… but those are mostly small jobs compared to this. We’re easily more 95% of the way there. Of course, that last 5% can ruin everything still…