Project Updates

February 10, 2013 ~ Chuck ~ Leave a comment

WillsRoomUpdate1 — Wall replacement in progress in Will's room.

Today I finished (mostly) digging out from the 20+ inches of snow that dumped on us this weekend. The sun was out and the temperatures rose above freezing today. I have a couple of projects going on right now (the trick with ADHD is to finish projects before starting new ones – I’m not doing too bad so far this year):

Will’s room repair: All the insulation and drywall is installed. I repaired, repainted, and rehung the window. I am in the process of smoothing the joints with drywall joint compound. I have a couple of more evenings of drywall work left. I also need to reinstall the window trim and hood up the new outlets.

Woodworking Projects: I have two unfinished projects in the workshop. Today I worked for a while on the kitchen island. I finished milling the final 4 pieces of lumber for the aprons and stretchers. All the mortises are cut, and most of the tenons are fit to the appropriate mortise. I glued up one side of the base frame (two legs – one long apron and one long stretcher) tonight. I am drawbore pinning the tenons. Hopefully the drawbore pins will strengthen the frame. I should have the island frame completed by the end of next weekend. Then I’ll have to choose wood for the top (maybe ash or white oak or maple – not sure yet), mill, glue up, and finish the top.

Fig-164 — Drawbore Pinning from "Woodwork joints" by William Fairham

I am also have to finish making the drunken cutting boards. I have the pieces milled and ready to go, but am focusing on the kitchen island right now.

It has been a little cold to want to spend lots of time in the workshop. Hopefully we will start seeing some warmer days over the next couple of weeks.

I have lots of projects waiting to be started; the room repair and the kitchen island are starting to get a little boring, but I will feel much better when they are finished. So, no starting new projects for me yet…

Tomorrow both Susanna and the boys have the day off from school. Most of the towns are still digging out from the storm, so nearly all the schools in the area are closed tomorrow. Lots of my friends still don’t have power or just got it back today; we were lucky enough to only lose power for an hour or so last night.

Winter Storm Nemo

February 9, 2013February 9, 2013 ~ Chuck ~ Leave a comment

WillReadingWithDogs — Will taking a break from the winter storm (reading the final Harry Potter book)

Winter Storm Nemo plowed through here last night (I’m not sure when they started naming winter storms, but I’ll go with it), dumping 20+ inches (1/2 meter) of snow overnight. Surprisingly we didn’t lose power. However, I’m told that we will lose power shortly when they have to remove some trees from lines – I’ll see if I get this post done in time.

Will was supposed to have his birthday party today. That didn’t happen. But he got to go for a snowmobile ride with our neighbor; his daughter, Estelle invited him to go along. He was pretty cold when he got home from the ride, but according to him, “it was a blast.”

Ben has been fighting a cold, so I didn’t let him go for the ride. But he did get enough time outside to enjoy the deep snow.

The boys have both been alternating between playing outside, and taking it easy inside. Tucker spends most of his time outside in the garage, with short trips out into the deeper snow. It is even too deep for Targa to enjoy. Susanna and I worked on shoveling the driveway (though most of it was cleared by our neighbor and his snow blower – thanks Joel!). The sun even appeared for a little bit this afternoon.

Tonight we are going to sit down and enjoy a warm soup and bread. It is a vegetable soup, so the boys may starve tonight. Maybe we will even play some “Uno Attack” by candlelight later.

WillPlayingInSnow — Will playing in the 20 inches of snow that arrived last night

Dog stresses (gone again – this time for nearly 24 hours and counting)

February 3, 2013 ~ Chuck ~ Leave a comment

Targa and Tucker took off again yesterday morning. This time they got out of the yard. Tucker has gotten out of the yard before, but I think this is the first time Targa has run through the invisible fence. They have been gone overnight – this is the second time they have been gone overnight (the last time, they took off on a walk in the woods). I don’t usually worry if one of them is gone by himself – alone they don’t go far. But together they can go for hours.

I think it is a combination of Tucker being a beagle, and the invisible fence covering too much of the yard. For most of the yard, the invisible fence follows the property boundaries, even when there is no natural barrier for the dogs (e.g. a stone wall). It makes it difficult to train Tucker to the boundaries in the back of the yard – he is pretty good at not approaching the boundaries when someone is watching him.

Yesterday, Will and I rerouted the invisible fence. It now only will allow the dogs in about half of the yard. It now follows a stone wall (a natural boundary for the dogs) for about half of the boundary. Hopefully this eliminates the section of the yard that Tucker has been escaping from. We also will build a fenced (real fence, not just invisible fence) section of the yard to let the dogs run in when we can’t watch them outside.

Our friends, Rob and Anna are re-homing their dog, Dillon, because he isn’t getting along with their horses. Rob asked if I wanted Dillon (he offered free eggs along with the dog – I was heading over to pick up eggs from their farm yesterday). I told him (joking) that we would trade Tucker for Dillon. When he told Anna what I said, she thought for a second and then said that they would rather keep Dillon.

Blog Books (and a vacation from posting)

January 31, 2013January 31, 2013 ~ Chuck ~ Leave a comment

The boys’ blog books arrived today from Lulu.com. They are perfect – the boys immediately took them out and read them. And Will didn’t even complain about having to write in his blog tonight.

Now I feel obligated to write in my blog. I have taken a nice 10 day vacation between posts. I think it was a combination of the cold weather, maybe being a little burned out of writing, and the stress of worrying if (thanks to congress failing to do their job) there will be a furlough of federal employees starting this April.

Susanna has started school again – her last semester. That means that she won’t be free to work on house projects during the week. And probably not much during the weekends as homework starts to pile up.

We have made some progress on Will’s room. I have most of the drywall up, and the window repaired/repainted. I’ll try to get pictures up later this week. I hadn’t spent much time at all in the workshop – I’ve been waiting for the weekend temperatures to get above freezing. Working on the power tools when it is too cold outside sucks. Even after I get the workshop warmed up, the heavy tools are still bitter cold to the touch.

The weather today gives hope for warmer weather. I know by Sunday we will be back into winter, but hopefully not for that much longer.

An afternoon in the city

January 21, 2013 ~ Chuck ~ Leave a comment

Or, a visit to Madame Tussaud’s museum. Of course that isn’t all we did. But it is most of what we did. We were a bit slow getting out of the house (we couldn’t find Targa’s invisible fence collar that had been misplaced – but don’t worry the dogs found it while we were gone and chewed it up), but made it by lunch time. Will picked Mexican for lunch.

After lunch we walked through the museum. We then walked back to the train station, stopping at the New York Library for a short break (in the kids section). We were back in New Haven by dinner time (an exciting dinner at IKEA), and home before bed time.

BenandMeNYC — Having fun at lunch with Ben.

BenSquishedHand — Ben getting his hand stepped on by the Hulk

On our way to the city

January 19, 2013January 21, 2013 ~ Chuck ~ Leave a comment

Waiting for the train in New Haven

Sunday in the workshop (kitchen island progress and a new jig)

January 13, 2013 ~ Chuck ~ Leave a comment

PlaningStop — New planing stop/bench hook

I was finally able to get time in the workshop today. I have been a bit sidetracked with renovations to Will’s room over the past two weeks. One thing that has helped is trying to do two hours of work a day on the room. On the week nights, that gets progress done on the room. On the weekend, that allows me to find time to do other things without feeling guilty.

I was able to complete my two hours on the room by lunch today and take some time in the afternoon to head out to the shop. The weather has been crazy – it is mid-January and 50 degrees out.

I am making progress on the kitchen island. I have all the mortises done, and half of the tenons cut. Today I decided to build a planing stop. One of the frustrations with the workbench I have is holding the work while I hand plane. In the past I have put a board across the bench and clamped it on. That works fine if I am planing only in the direction of the grain. If I try to plane cross-grain, I need to fully clamp the work in the bench. It is a pain in the butt to always clamp and unclamp the work.

That leads me to the planning stop/bench hook I built today. I’m not sure if it is traditional, and time will tell how well it works. I took a 48-inch long 1×12 piece of pine and attached a board to the front (so it will register on the front of the workbench). I then took some thin stock (or rather made thin stock – about 1/2-inch thick) and attached it to the back and left side of the top of the board.

So far it seems to be working as planned. It makes cleaning up the long pieces of wood for the kitchen island much easier. It also gives me a nice board to chisel on and not worry about chopping up the top of the workbench. I suppose if I need to work on any pieces longer than about 44-inches I’ll need to build a new stop.

Day trip to New Bedford, MA

January 13, 2013 ~ Chuck ~ Leave a comment

NESalvage — Looking through doors at New England Demolition and Architectural Salvage

Yesterday, Susanna and I took a road trip to New Bedford, MA. We planned to visit the New England Demolition and Salvage company. The plan was to look at possibly getting a new door for the kitchen. In hindsight, I should have measured for a new bedroom door. Our bedroom door is the only really crappy replacement door in the house (hollow core, flat panel). There are tons of doors that match the style of our house, most for $50-$60. Exterior doors are closer to $150-$200.

We wound up not buying anything at the salvage store – but it is a great place to get ideas. They have an acre of claw-foot tubs. Thousands of doors and windows. And countless other treasures.

We made it a day trip, with lunch after the salvage store, and a visit to some more antique stores (and a flea market in Fall River that wasn’t worth stopping at). We aren’t really in the market for anything specific for the house, but it is nice to get out and explore. We were home in time for dinner and a movie.

Sharpening a vintage chisel

January 6, 2013 ~ Chuck ~ Leave a comment

Chisel1 — A $5 find at the local flea market

This morning the boys and I visited the local flea market. The boys were on a search for a new toy. I wasn’t looking for anything particular, but of course stopped by the tool vendors to see if anything caught my eye. For $5 I picked up a vintage 1/2-inch socket chisel. The blade was in very good shape, and the price was right. Tonight I decided to sharpen it. I figured I would document how I took an old flea market find and turned it into a sharp chisel. Not that I’m trying to tell anyone else how to do it, but I figured it would be interesting to look back in a few years and see if what I did still makes sense. But maybe by then I’ll only purchase new chisels. Just not from the box store. $5 (if one doesn’t count the cost of the sharpening stones) and 15 minutes on the water stones and I have a much better chisel than any crap one can pick up at a box store.

First thing I did was take a close look at the blade to see how much metal I needed to take off. In this case the blade was in good shape (no pitting or nicks):

Chisel2 — Chisel blade before any work is done

Next I get the waterstones ready. It is too cold to work out in the workshop this time of year, so I take over the kitchen:

Chisel3 — Set up to sharpen on the kitchen table. I'm guessing I'll have to find a new location once I build the island.

Next I flatten the back starting with the 220-grit and working my way to the 8000-grit stone. I use a thin ruler on the edge of the stone so I only have to flatten the back near the tip (it saves a lot of time flattening):

Chisel4 — Flattening the back on the coarse stone. I use two hands for this normally (but needed my other hand to hold the camera).

Next I put the chisel in my Veritas honing guide and work my way from the coarse to 8000 grit. I will periodically turn the chisel and flatten the back as I work (to get rid of the wire that forms when aggressively removing metal). For this chisel, the process took only 5 minutes to sharpen the bevel. I sharpened this with a 30-degree bevel angle:

Chisel5 — Sharpening the bevel. Only sharpen on the pull stroke. This is on the 220 grit stone. I have a 120 grit stone if I need to really remove metal.

When I get to the 8000 grit stone, I set the sharpening jig up to add a micro-bevel. On this chisel, I alternated with polishing the micro-bevel and the back (with the chisel in the jig) a couple of times on the 8000 grit stone. I did this until I was satisfied that the entire edge was sharp.

Chisel6 — The final results. Nice and sharp. Now to go try it on some wood.

Will’s room progress…

January 6, 2013 ~ Chuck ~ Leave a comment

Wall2 — Rigid insulation added between the rafters - allowing for ventilation space between the insulation and the roof.

The boys are here all weekend, so I didn’t entirely focus on working on the room. Susanna and I have agreed to each spend two hours on the room every day before we allow ourselves to sit down and watch TV. That should be incentive to make progress.

Yesterday we got most of the lath removed from the section of wall we are replacing. I also removed the trim from one side of the window and sealed and insulated the counter-weight cavity.

Today Susanna helped Will get settled into his new (temporary) bedroom. I made the trip to Home Depot to get insulation and drywall. I ran wires up to the attic to add outlets to the room. The trick will be to get a second 20 amp circuit to the attic so not all the bedrooms will share the same circuit. I installed the rigid insulation into the sloped part of the wall. Tomorrow the plan is to install the outlet boxes and add start installing drywall.