Creeker's Past Week's Accomplishments

[Dennis Peacock]

23 Apr 2018

Greetings,
I didn't get anything posted last night because The LOML and I decided to watch a movie and by the time the movie was over, we were both exhausted and went to bed. I'm still trying to figure out how to get the wobble out of one of my CBN wheels on my slow speed grinder. I'm off work today and maybe I'll piddle with it a bit more to see if I can get the left side to run true. The right side runs well and no issues there. I swapped the wheels around to see if it was the wheel and I get the same wobble. Shaft runout is practically zero on both sides. I checked that with my dial indicator.
I am forever amazed at how many people want you to do things for them in your shop...for free...just because we work together or I know you and you know me. Funny, I was a nobody until people spread the word about me being a woodworker and having good tools with a good shop.
Today, it's punch on the honey-do list since I'm off work. Came off of oncall duty at 08:00 this morning. The way things have been going, I'm just glad to still be employed.

That's it for me, so what did YOU do this past week?

Best of weeks to you all.

[Jim Becker]

Sad you're still having issue with that wheel, Dennis. Can you get the vendor to replace it...it sounds like it may simply be defective?

Busy week for me...and a very happy one, at that. The most important part of my past week was getting to unpack this big box...

IMG_0649.jpg

After a 9+ week wait, my "freshly built" CNC machine arrived and by Saturday afternoon, I was able to start the learning process after getting it into the shop and setup the way I wanted it to be.

IMG_0697.jpg

Now I just have to figure out a good name for her...Professor Dr. SWMBO doesn't think that "yellow monster" is appropriate for some reason.

Other activities included the normal food shopping excursion, planting another tree out front, mowing the front lawn for the first time, breaking up the big crate and storing away the very useful lumber and OSB, cleaning up some wayward wild grapevines, cleaning up Professor Dr SWMBO's Outback and cooking a delicious NY steak dinner via sous vide on Saturday night.

[Matt Schrum]

I got a lot crossed of my list this weekend, but probably the biggest thing was that I installed a radon mitigation system. I punched a 6" hole in my slab, dug out about 10-15 gallons through that hole, then piped up some PVC to a radon fan and poked that through the roof. It was a bit of work, but not technically challenging-- and my total costs will be under $300 at the end of the day while still being able to route/hide the system just how I wanted.

The only fun part was figuring out how to put the 4" PVC pipe for the radon in the furnace/water heater closet room while still being able to squeeze out the water heater when it needs to be replaced. I ended up putting a PVC coupling in flush with the floor, then had a rubber coupling (with two hose clamps) at about ceiling height. Since I only caulked the floor coupling to the pipe, I should be able to remove that section of the system pretty easily and scoot the water heater out when the time comes. Anywho, I have a digital radon meter and the reading has dropped by half in 24 hours (to below 4 piC/l already), so I'll be curious to see where it stabilizes after a week or two.

[Jay Larson]

Dennis -- Does the 'honey do' list count as someone asking you to do things for free? (just kidding, I cleared up a task from that list myself)

Jim -- The only way I could mow my front lawn would be with the snowblower... Still have about a foot of snow in some sections of the back yard.

Anyway, my weekend was filled with fun and work. We went to see Delbert McClinton on Friday night. Good show, but only an hour and 45 minutes. Then, since it was at a casino, we parleyed $40 of match play money into $20 of real money playing three card poker. Woo hoo.

Saturday, I was doing some cleanup in the shop when I noticed a small spot of corrosion on the table saw. So I cleaned that up. Then 'as long as I have the wax out', I waxed the whole top. Then I adjusted the wings and I adjusted the inserts. Then I broke out the shop vac, and vacuumed out the gears and trunions. Then I adjusted the 90 and 45* stops. Phew, two and a half hours later, I finished up. Not bad for a spot about the size of a quarter...

Yesterday, I got started on a shelf for out laundry room. All built, stained up and ready for a couple of coats of poly. Then it was time to get outside. During a couple of the winter storms, the wind blew over two arbor vitaes that we had transplanted. They were not going to come back, so I started to dig them up. Got one out, cut up and hauled over to the firepit. Went to dig out the second one, and the ground was still frozen. So I cut the branches off and hauled them to the firepit. BTW, I had to shovel out the firepit first...

After that, I went down into the basement and cleaned up in preparation for the plumber coming out for an estimate on the bathroom, bar sink, and an outside spigot for conditioned water.

[Jim Becker]

Jay, clearly no snow here and while it wasn't "long", the amount of rain we've had would make it a challenge to mow two weeks from now. Since I have some travel planned, I felt it prudent to "cut their little heads off" to avoid a future problem. I used to wait until May. No longer.

[Ron Magliocco]

Almost finished with a screened in garden arbor to protect my "crops" from squirrels, deer and chipmunks.

[Terry Kelly]

I built a table for my planer.....it just out of 2x4’s.....did trim them all down to have square edges it was fun.....next is to mount the planer and build in and out feed tables and make a one piece top to go end to end.....383B62AC-2C81-43A8-AA06-F473D0CEC99F.jpg

[John Sanford]

On Saturday, I went forth to get some tools. First stop was the welding store, where I picked up a 2.75" knotted cup brush and some info regarding adjusting my hood. Next stop was BladeHQ to get a Mora 106, i.e. a sloyd knife. I would have gotten one from Blue Spruce, but for some odd reason he's using a very unsloydlike blade shape, so I decided to go old school. Unfortunately, even though BladeHQ is a Utah company (I used to work across the freeway from them), almost all of their Mora knives are stocked at their warehouse in WV, not here. So I gave 'em my money and will pick it up next weekend. Don't see any point in paying for tax AND shipping. Last tool stop, Home Depot (Saturday in spring - i.e. packed with people) to get the Makita cordless tracksaw kit, promo coming complete with 55" guide rail and two additional batteries, was $499, reduced to $399. Grab everything, go to checkout, and the free batteries don't want to ring up free. Look more closely, they are 3.0ah, not the 5.0ah batteries of the promotion. Look for 5.0ah pair, no find. Get employee to look. No find. 'Puter says they have 8. Tell them son is waiting to go eat, I'll be back tomorrow to pick up the saw, unless they can find the batteries sooner. Head back Sunday, they weren't able to find 'em, manager said 'puter was lying about inventory. What to do, what to do? Here's the arrangement I have with the manager. Buy kit, order batteries online, have them shipped to store, pick 'em up at the store, "return" them getting my money back, walk out with batteries. Sigh... lotta complication because 'tis likely some mook responsible for stocking put the promo batteries (2 x 5.0ah @ $159) up next to the normal for-sale (2x 3.0ah @ $159) batteries. Guess which ones sold??

Anyway, those were the annoying semi-accomplishments for the weekend. In the realm of actual accomplishments, I had an "ahh ha!" moment. I had picked up another angle grinder (Metabo) weekend before last, and was trying to decide where to keep it. I have a small herd of empty DeWalt Toughboxes, which I'm using for some other angle grinders. I decided to put the new AG, along with a die grinder (also Metabo) into one of the small Toughboxes. Opening up the small TB, I find a bunch of wee containers. A light bulb goes on. Will 4.5" grinding discs fit into these wee containers? It turns out that yes, yes they will. I gather the scattered discs and wire wheels and get them all organized into one of the small TBs. Put the two Metabos into the other small TB, and build myself a Toughbox stack on a Harbor Freight mover's dolly. I had planned on making some small wooden boxes to organize the grinding consumables, but that's unnecessary now. The Organization Elves have a party!!

Grinders all situated, I get to what I meant to get accomplished when I headed out to the garage. I get the "welding" bench put back together, i.e. get the welding blanket curtains back up. Pull out the welder and set to making more progress on the cart for my cyclone build. Made good progress on that, and the "how am I going to attach the DC to this thing" plan finally came together in my head. If everything goes well, by the end of this coming weekend I should have a cyclone in action.

[Rod Sheridan]

Completed.jpgI grouted the tiles on the electric fireplace cabinet, the project is now complete.

The center top tile I found at Roycroft in New York a few years ago after looking for suitable tiles. Looked at the back of the tile and found out that it was made by Verdant Tile near where I live.

Contacted the artist and she made me the square tiles to match.

The style , wood and colour match a couple of floor to ceiling bookcases I built 20 years ago, the fireplace will go in between them.

The red oak is from 3 logs I milled that were heading to the municipal shredder.