Creeker's Past Week's Accomplishments

[Dennis Peacock]

24 Feb 2020

Greetings,
I'm tired, I'm exhausted and I'm ready to be done with oncall for the day job. It's been 6 weeks now and I wished I was an hourly employee for these past 6 weeks. If I was? I'd be a money making fool!!! Being on salary in the I.T. world is not what I expected it to be, but it still pays the bills. I'm going to bed and get some much needed sleep. All I did was work and get a bit of sleep this past week.

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

Best of weeks to you all.

[Charles Taylor]

I made modest progress on my armchair project over the weekend. Upholstered the seat, cut tenons on the upper ends of the front legs where the arms will attach, and glued the left and right pairs of legs together with the side stretchers. I thought I'd get to take the curved back rails out of their setting forms and begin making the mortises and tenons they require, but...not yet.

[Jim Becker]

I feel for you, Dennis...

This past week, aside from a good shop cleaning, I got the Lane cedar chest I brought from my mother's old apartment cleaned up and finished. The original exterior finish was deteriorated enough that rather than try and preserve it, I chose to take it black which will be a good look for our master bedroom. GF Lamp Black "milk paint" plus a matte clear did the job. I cleaned up the hardware without totally removing the, um...patina...from all the years since 1954 when my mother got it as a wedding gift. It was her very first piece of furniture and I'm glad it's staying in the family.

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I also got my shipment of "unicorn pine"... 5/4 clear...for a client project that involves 12 locker doors for an equestrian facility's new lounge. I unfortunately had to buy a lot that's twice what I needed simply to get the required material, but it really is nice stuff. My shop current smells like pine cleaner after initial milling of stock needed for the project. I'll be back to working on that today. I have a few other smaller things to work on this week, too.

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This weekend, we also bought a new ride for Professor Dr. SWMBO. That wasn't originally in our "immediate" plans, but it was still part of "the" plan. We had taking the 2011 Outback Limited that our daughter drives in for service on Friday because she has a planned trip to western PA to visit her boyfriend this coming weekend. There were a number of things identified that really needed remediation, as can sometimes be expected on a 9 year old car with 114K miles on it. (the last half of them "hard" miles because of how darling daughter drives) They were "little things" parts wise, but labor intensive and expensive as a result. So rather than putting out a bunch of money now on the older vehicle, we accelerated our intended plan to give DD our 2016 Outback Limited with Eyesight (only 36K miles) to our daughter as an early graduation from PSU present (title will pass after the deed is actually done a little more than a year from now) and bought a 2020 Forester Limited for Professor Dr. SWMBO to use for commuting to the train station and general driving. I have to chuckle because it's literally a "mini-me" of my Ascent in almost every way. The only downside was just how long the process takes to buy a vehicle...still. Despite all the computer driven things, etc., and even walking in there knowing exactly what we wanted, how much we were going to pay for it, etc., it still takes 5 hours to get out the door. The sales manager, whom we've known for years (our original sales person for the 2011), and I had a fun conversation about that as we are of similar age and dealt with similar auto organizations over the years. We both just can't get over how "nothing has changed" with respect to the time to complete the deal and how it's worse than closing on a house. At any rate, we're happy and the dealer is happy. They will turn around and sell the 2011 for well more than twice what they gave us after they replace a few parts and put on some new tires.

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[mike stenson]

I finally have all the walls of my shop taken care of (the previous owner had walled the building off into 5 distinct partitions). The former rat-shed is where my bench will go, now moving major tools around to see where they want to live before I undo it all to insulate and add a new electrical service entrance. I might have a fully usable shop this year. Oh, and I still need to replace a door, and completely replace an external wall due to damage. edit, yes that step up is weird

[Jim Becker]

That's going to be a very nice space, Mike!

[Paul F Franklin]

Sending restful thoughts your way Dennis!

Jim, the chest came out beautifully! Did you paint the entire drawers, or just mask off and paint the fronts? Congrats on the forester; my wife drives one and loves it.

Mike, gorgeous shop space!

I had a mixed bag last week. Made progress on the design work for the office redo. One long wall, which has the double entry door in the middle, will have cabinet built-ins on both sides. A tall closet style cabinet in each corner, and then 4' of drawer over door base cabinets with work surface tops, and then open bookcase shelves above. So two full height closets, four 2' wide base cabinets, and four 2' wide bookcase uppers with adjustable shelves. Haven't decided whether I will build them as double 2' wide or single 4' wide, but probably the former just for ease of handling and installation. The rest of the office furniture will be stand alone pieces, not built-in: two desks and a few lateral file cabinets, maybe a printer stand. All will be cherry and shaker-ish.

When I needed a break from that mental work, I started refurbishing the Stanley Bailey 5 1/2 I picked up last fall. Stripped the jappaning as it was in bad shape and de-rusted everything. That's as far as I got with that.

Then I hit the Harville tool sale and picked up a King 12" jointer/planer. Bit of a job to get it into the basement shop, and then to get it on the mobile base, get all the slime cleaned off, etc. But it's in place now and hooked up to power and dust collection. All I've jointed so far is one piece of figured cherry as a test; so far I'm very happy. I'll probably be listing my old 6" delta jointer and lunchbox planer in the classifieds. They are modest tools but they are in good shape and I've made a lot of decent furniture with them over the years. I hope to find a good home for them.

[Jim Becker]

Jim, the chest came out beautifully! Did you paint the entire drawers, or just mask off and paint the fronts? Congrats on the forester; my wife drives one and loves it.

Thanks, Paul. There is only one drawer on the cedar chest...the lowest position...and yes, only the front and front edges were sprayed which mirrors the original finish.

We're all Subaru here...three of them. There were actually four in the driveway on Saturday afternoon as I still had the loaner for the one we traded that was in for service...LOL

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[Lisa Starr]

Dennis...enjoy your well deserved sleep. Jim nice job on the Cedar Chest. I'm also a Subaru fan (drive a 2016 Legacy), but DH drives a Chevy truck since he has the commercial roofing business.

Basically no time in the shop, as we spent another weekend in our son's basement. Finished up the demo Saturday. Sunday we set up the Laser Transit and made a batch of reference marks to help with the straightening of the basement ceiling/1st floor floor joists. The main beam is structurally deficient and needs to be lifted prior to being reinforced per the Structural Engineer's plans. We got the jacks and lifting beams in place and made the first 1/8" lift. We'll do another 1/8" lift later this week, but it will take a while since the beam is down 7/8" in the center.

[Steve Fish]

Hopefully you get some rest Dennis. Congrats to everyone ‘s accomplishments this week!
Finally made it to the top. We finished the form work for my concrete ring beam. It’s been a long project but this is a good milestone to reach once it’s poured. Two trucks and a pump will get barged over the first week of March. Fingers crossed for no blowouts.
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I will never ever get the pictures right side up. Anyway, enjoy the rest of your weekends

[Mike Wilkins]

Get some well-deserved rest Dennis; I don't miss work at all since retirement a little over a year ago. Especially don't miss the politics.
Jim-great job on the chest resto. How did you apply the finish; spray or brush. I am in the middle of a project which will be finished with GF milk paint in a white color. I am hoping to spray with a HVLP sprayer and need to know if thinning will be needed. Thanks.

[Rod Sheridan]

Mike, you suck!

I'm really envious of your new shop, it looks great, I hope you really enjoy working in it........Rod.

[Rod Sheridan]

Haha, automobiles..............Nothing changes in the purchasing process, still the worst.

Jim, what is "unicorn pine"? I don't see any horns................Rod.

[Jim Becker]

Get some well-deserved rest Dennis; I don't miss work at all since retirement a little over a year ago. Especially don't miss the politics.
Jim-great job on the chest resto. How did you apply the finish; spray or brush. I am in the middle of a project which will be finished with GF milk paint in a white color. I am hoping to spray with a HVLP sprayer and need to know if thinning will be needed. Thanks.

Spray, Mike. Whether or not it needs thinned depends upon your gun. I use a larger needle setup for it than I do for clears...and my gun is pressure assist.

Haha, automobiles..............Nothing changes in the purchasing process, still the worst.

Jim, what is "unicorn pine"? I don't see any horns................Rod.

It was fortunately "horn free" "unicorn wood". Just hard to source and expensive. I can buy cherry or walnut for the same or less. But the specific project required pine and I required pine that was actually dry and flat. (which it mostly is, but I'm still taking it down in baby steps with acclimation in between)

[Derek Cohen]

...

Looks just like my half of a double garage!

Regards from Perth

Derek

[Derek Cohen]

Jim, did you say that you built the top drawers?

Regards from Perth

Derek