Creekers Weekend Accomplishments....

[Dennis Peacock]

30 June 2008

Good Morning,

Wow, what a day yesterday was with the cooler temps after the storms and rain moved through and then this morning being so nice out. Very unusual for this time of year, but I'm not going to complain one bit.

I have been cleaning up in the shop and trying to get things better so I can have the room necessary to work on this kitchen table project. I know y'all think that I'm never going to get around to this thing, but life has dealt our family some pretty hard times this year and my woodworking has had to take a back seat for a bit. However, that is coming to an end and things are greatly improving and I'm slowly getting time to get back in the shop and plan what's next.

I have a cutting board on the bench in the shop that I've gotten glued up and ready to take off the dried glue, sand down, and put on the rubber feet. It is already sold and I just need to finish it up and deliver it to the owner.

Well, that's it for me. So what did YOU do this weekend?

Best of weeks to you all.!!!

[Ken Fitzgerald]

I got in from DFW late Friday night and only got 2 hours sleep. Saturday, I emptied and restocked the refrigerator. (Did you know veggies go bad in the refrigerator EVEN if you aren't here? I did have the forethought to throw out the milk BEFORE I left).

Napped and picked up the LOML and MIL at the airport.

Sunday, family time.

I am hoping to take this week off to spend with my wife, MIL and family. If so, finish painting the cabinet doors and shelves and maybe start turning again.

[alex grams]

Well, it was the most eventful and frustrating weekend I have had in a while.

Started remodeling the second bathroom:
- Tore out the tile floor and the tile around the shower, found severe damage to the wall behind the toilet, so tore out lots of dry wall.
- Basically tore EVERYTHING but the tub and sheetrock out of the bathroom, and redid the plumbing on the shower (the 4 way valve for the shower was leaking about 5 gals every 2 days for the last couple of months....) They obviously can't make it easy to tear out the valve, you have to remove all 4 branches to get the thing out and reset a new one in there)
- Lots of chipping on the floor to get the tile out, then there was lots of loose thinset under it with what also looked like some leveler they put in, so a knucklebuster hammer and a chisel and about 4 hours of chipping and I have a good slab to start the new tile.
- Decided to rebuild the vanity also, with walnut, which will look nice. Interesting contrast with the reused white mother of pearl 1 piece countertop/sink, but it will look good.


We did make about an hour trip to M&G Sawmill in Huntsville, TX. Neat place, father and son operation. They didn't have a lot of walnut, but what they did have was a very nice price and some BEAUTIFUL wood. Their kiln/air dried walnut had SO much more color than steam dried, and they had some gorgeous 4/4 pieces about 10' long and 15-18" wide. These will be great to use for panels on the doors on the new cabinet. They mainly do cedar and mesquite and custom built slab mesquite mantels. Their price and selection makes me want to try and find a project to use some mesquite on.

Oh yea, the A/C system on the home crapped out, so getting estimates on a new system this week (that will be a nice 4-5 grand chunk of change).

I need a beer....:(

[Charles Seehuetter Panama City]

Char and I got started on the cleanup of the Delta 37-315 jointer that we picked up in our Craiglist tool deal a few months back. It's interesting and we still have a ways to go. You can see pictures of the progress here if interested.

http://picasaweb.google.com/chuckinpc/ToolGloat/photo#5217659612062233202

There are a lot more pics there if you are interested.

Hope everyone else had a good weekend too.

Chuck

[Joe Mioux]

worked Sat.

Sunday, after the obligatory things. (trip to the airport for a pick up and church)

Applied some polyurethane to a Walnut Easel I am building and nothing else productive.

No yard work and no woodwork.

Joe

[Nancy Laird]

Finally got the new flooring installation finished in the living and dining rooms and hall, got all the furniture put back in place and things put away, new closet doors on the coat closet, and general clean-up. Hardwood flooring is sooooo much nicer than carpet--

[Michael Schumacher]

Well - I didn't accomplish a single thing that I hoped to. After getting home Friday evening, I opened my package that will help me tune my jointer - went downstairs and gave it a quick test. After that, I went back upstairs and talked to my wife for a bit, went outside to empty the rain gauge since I knew that a cloud was coming. Right as I was emptying it, the tornado sirens sounded off. My wife holding my son was in the doorway, I said, well, lets go down to the basement. She grabbed the stuff for my Son, I grabbed on cat, put her in the kitty carrier, went back upstairs (wind wasn't blowing yet) and got the other cat and went downstairs with her. Yes, I know, not the smartest thing, but the wind wasn't blowing and the storm hadn't reached us yet. So we sat downstairs and watched the wind blow and blow, then it let up. When the radar showed that most of the storm had pasted us, we went upstairs to see what damage happened - we saw this in our front lawn.

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/picture.php?albumid=28&pictureid=194

Amazingly, it fell away from the house and only went into the neighbor's tree a bit and took a few of it's limbs. Although the leader of his tree broke out, so I don't know if that tree will look very well if not trim by someone that knows what they are doing.

So, since I think we have a fireplace that can burn wood or have it as a gas fireplace, I saved as much as I could and this is the results of it.

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/picture.php?albumid=28&pictureid=195

Took all weekend and I didn't get a SINGLE thing done that I hoped to get done. Now to question the insurance company if they will pay for the loss of the tree.

Michael

[Chris Kennedy]

Well, my weekend plans were relatively simple. I recently convinced my wife that buying a Excalibur blade guard was worth the money and this weekend, I was going to install it. It shouldn't take long, right?

So, all the parts come out of the box, and being a little bit of a wuss, I actually read the instructions. I need at least 39.75" of extension table to the right of the blade. I have 35". The apron should be 3 inches deep. Mine is 1.5"-2". So, my extension is wholly incompatible with the guard.

Nuts.

Okay -- so I'll just make a new extension. Need some melamine for the top. Go to the borg, and the smallest piece of melamine they have is a 4 by 8 sheet. I don't have a 4 by 8 car, so this is a small problem. So, I give it a little thought (what can I make with the remaining pieces, what dimensions etc.) and come up with a good cutting plan for the pieces of the extension, and with the remainder to build an extension for my workbench. Now all I need is to find somebody and have them do a couple of cuts on the panel saw so it will fit in the car.

Panel saw is out of order.

Nuts.

New plan. Bought a small piece of plywood and some thin masonite. I'll make the extension out of the plywood and top it with the masonite so it will be smooth on top.

Get everything home and out into the shop and start cutting. Go to do the glue-up, and I don't quite know what has happened, but apparently my Titebond doesn't like 95 degrees and 95% humidity. It sets in seconds. All the same, thankfully manage to get everything glued and nailed together before my 18 month old decides that he wants to help.

"No, you can't play with the brad nailer. That's daddy's toy. How about the blow gun at 10PSI?"

Next morning, go out and dry fit the new extension. Perfect. At this point, I accidentally knocked a hex wrench through the throat plate into the saw. At that point, I found out why my old extension had shallower than three inch aprons. I can't open the access panel to the saw cabinet.

Nuts.

Pull out the extension, grab the jigsaw and relieve the inner apron so the panel will open. Put it back, get it lined up and drill the mounting holes. Put in the bolts, no problem. Go to put the washers and nuts on -- small problem. Apparently, the 3/4 ply with the 1/8 masonite lowered the top just enough so that the washer and nut won't fit on one bolt.

Nuts.

Pull the extension back out, relieve the top with a chisel until the washer and nut will go on. Great. Put it back, line it up, and secure the table.

And now to the blade guard. Mount the mounting channel -- well, one bolt lines up perfectly with a screw holding a leg onto the extension. Okay, so I'll use 5 instead of 6 bolts. That's fine. Put the braces on and they should be screwed into the extension. The extension is too short or the braces are too long, and if used as the currently are, they will have to be bolted into the cast iron table.

Nuts.

Need another idea and a beer. Beer is easier, so have a beer while sitting underneath my saw contemplating what to do. The bolts mounting the fence brackets to the saw are plenty long enough. Extend the eyebolts for the braces, and they should loop over those just nicely. Hah -- idea, probably courtesy of Red Hook Brewery.

Next morning, off to the borg we go. Family outing, wife and child in tow. One day I will understand how the hardware is organized at the borg, but not anytime soon. Takes a good half hour to find everything that is needed (especially since the size eyebolt I needed was hiding in the wrong sized box), and it comes to a total of $1.07. Open my wallet -- I have a dollar.

Nuts.

So, I pay for 1.07 of hardware with a credit card.

Get back to shop, get the hardware on the front bracket, and everything is fine. Go to line up the back bracket, and discover that the bolts in the back are actually shorter than the ones in front -- apparently, one beer gives you beer goggles when looking at bolts on the underside of a tablesaw.

Nuts.

Back to the hardware store. Probably spent $1 in gas for an 8 cent bolt.

Get back to the shop, and finally, I get the bracket on. And after that, things actually run smoothly. The boom and guard go on, get them squared up, hook up the dust collector, and then my 18 month old wants to help.

"Daddy needs that wrench. No, please don't walk away with the screwdriver. Can you please play with the other drill? I need that one right now.

"Dear, Aidan's helping!"

LOML comes to the rescue.

So, the Excalibur is on. I still need to finish reassembling the Biesemeyer (I had to take some of it off to remove and install extensions) and then some calibration, but it is all good. Maybe next weekend I'll get to try it out.

Cheers,

Chris

[Douglas Brummett]

Reclaimed TS base for a mobile stand, setup the new planer, built a drill press table, went to the hardwood dealer 30mi away, started on an entry/hall table, sharpened a couple chisels. Drank a case of PBR for good measure, not while operating sharp tools fwiw :D

[John Sanford]

Hmmm....
Continued with the seemingly unending process of setting shop up, and went to the Great Western Truck Show. Saw some mighty fine looking rigs, including some incredible paint jobs, and won a $25 gas card, good for a full tank for me! Picked up one of those InterMetro style wire shelving unit's from Craigslist and put it together, along with a set of casters.

I actually cut some wood last night, putting up a 1x4 for clamp storage. If this week's evenings proceed roughly according to plan, the shop will finally be in operation for this weekend. Its been more than 4 years since I've had my own shop, so I'm really looking forward to this.

Oh, and I settled my bandsaw conundrum. Put the Jet on layaway.

[Rob Hough]

I cleaned up my jointer, bandsaw and tablesaw over the weekend. Also spent some time working on the jointer in order to get a little better at using it.

oh yeah, and I didn't kill my girlfriends 13yr girl.

[Greg Hines, MD]

I took the Scout Troop out Geocaching for the first time, and everyone seemed to really enjoy it. My shop time was limited, but am working on trying to rejuvenate my cordless tool batteries.

Doc

[Fred Voorhees]

My younger brother came up from Cape May this weekend in preparation for signing up for apprenticeship in the union that I belong to this Tuesday and to get some fishing in this past weekend. We hung out on Friday night and on Saturday, we had a huge high school graduation party for a freinds daughter to attend in the afternoon. After that, my brother and I hit the local stretch of the Delaware River to try out his boat and "new" motor with some fishing. Sunday morning, it was up at a little after 4AM for the hours trip North to put in in Phillipsburg, NJ for a six or seven hour float on the Delaware River for our first bass float of the season. Two boats this time with myself and a racing buddy in my boat and my brothers boat with another buddy in that one. We totaled around sixty bass with a few walleyes mixed in as well as some sunfish and rock bass. Got home in time to take in the days NASCAR event from New Hampshire and after that just veg'ed for the rest of the evening.

[Michael Liechty]

Got a drywall patch done and 1st coast of mud on where I pushed pops through the wall while trying to move the safe into position.

Shot some squirrels out in the desert in 110* heat on Saturday.

Got inside the kitchen cabinets painted ready to rent the townhouse.

ML

[Jim Becker]

Vell...I tell you...

It was a weekend. We had a family event (Professor Dr. SWMBO's older sister's birthday party) in Woodbridge VA, so we drove down there on Saturday morning, arrived at our hotel mid-afternoon, spent some time in the pool and then at the party until about 10pm. Sunday we drove home after breakfast, a swim and Starbucks. The girls were surprisingly well behaved for a change, so the ride was not unpleasant. And...I was driving Professor Dr. SWMBO's 2008 Prius and managed 51 mpg...at 65 mph. Can't complain about that.

Now, we got home late in the afternoon and I then spent a couple hours on the big orange power tool moving around some very large piles of dirt and rock. Therapy. My best friend got laid off from her job on Friday...a new single mom. :( And that really bit me (and her) in a not nice way. Did I happen to mention that moving dirt around is good therapy?

[Larry Browning]

Hey Dennis,
When ya going to start that workbench?? Mine is almost done... Maybe another year or so:rolleyes:

[George Bregar]

Had some broken glass (damn birds) so re-glazed some old windows. Sexy! Did a damn fine job though. My neighbor thinks I'm a wizard...or maybe just weird.

[Matt Meiser]

I helped my brother move on Saturday which took the better part of the day. Then I ran back out to pick up the plywood to build a new cabinet which, with the microwave we bought Friday night, will reside in place of our current range hood. Sunday I started to mow until rain hit, then worked on reassembling my jointer for a couple hours. I have the beds mounted and the adjustment mechanisms for both in place.

Basically I didn't get anything done, but at least made some progress on a few different things.