Creeker's Past Week's Accomplishments

[Dennis Peacock]

2 Aug 2021

Greetings,
Welcome to August! Here where I live....it's the hottest and most humid time of the year. I'm so ready for fall and winter.
Customer picked up the twin-sized porch swing this past week. They really loved it. Started working on the cabinet project for the same customer to roll-around closet storage cubbies for their new home. I've moved some of the shop tasks to inside our house, at the kitchen table. Much better working in here than out in the shop right now!

Came off of oncall duty this morning. Glad that's over with!!

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

Best of weeks to you all.

[Derek Meyer]

I built a small section of picket fence to close in an area off my back porch so the dogs don't get out. I made it out of cedar with stainless fasteners. Two years ago, the materials would have cost me about $60 to $70. Now they cost me about $200. I couldn't believe the price of cedar - a 4x4 8ft post was $60. An 8ft 2x4 was almost $30. I'm sure glad I'm not building a house right now - I'd be double my budget or higher.

[Zachary Hoyt]

I sold an old Porter Cable circular saw and a Rockwell jointer, and an old PTO winch, all for asking price. I was glad to get some things cleaned out. I de-rusted the tables and fence on my new jointer, and set up an octave mandolin that I was pecking away at building for most of July, and got a good start on two left handed banjo necks.

[Paul F Franklin]

Mostly worked out in the yard last week, continuing to clear brush out near the road. Had to deal with hornets nesting behind the siding; it seems every year they find a new way/place to torment me. I bought a bee suit a few years ago and it comes in handy once or twice a year it seems. I filled in a good size pit our dog dug next to the house; she has plenty of places she could dig, but seem to like to inspect the foundation After filling and compacting I covered it with fabric and 3-4" "pebbles" to discourage her from digging there. Bought a new giant mailbox and post for it, and the materials to install it out by the road. I'll probably wait until the weekend to actually install the post; traffic on the road will be a lot less so it will be safer to be working out there then.

I've pretty much finalized the design for a console/bookcase for next to my desk and I'm starting to model it in sketchup. Anxious to get back into the shop at least a couple of days a week.

[Bruce Wrenn]

Back in the day, for hornets, or yellow jackets in the wall, I would use a can of Freon, after dark, and inject it into their hole. Forty below zero stops them dead in their tracks. Line men used to be issued cans for nests on transformers on poles. Quick shot, and they were frozen.

[Aaron Rosenthal]

I started on my "forever" project.
A few months ago I built my wife a box to hold the large roll of Plastic Wrap (ie: Saran) and she loved it so much she told the kids ...so now I've started building one for my daughter who's hosting me in late August (fingers crossed) in L.A. for a week - I'll be helping look after the kids, as both parents work crazy hours. I'll be building these boxes "forever".
Sold the table saw, and started reorganizing the garage space to compact my footprint and reorganize so I can order a new Sawstop. My goodness do I have a lot of accumulated stuff for sale/giveaway!
I expect to start insulating the outside wall tomorrow as I continue to clean and post stuff on Craigslist etc., and move stuff out of the way do I can put my bench against the wall.
Sigh. I thought I was retired from construction.

[Charles Taylor]

I started on my "forever" project...I'll be building these boxes "forever".

I'm beginning to think of my kitchen buffet/hutch project as my "forever" project. Seven months and counting. Although I had been prefinishing, or at least applying color as I went along, this past weekend I began applying the clear finish coats to the buffet/lower cabinet. A barrier coat of shellac followed by the coats of urethane to come.

Once I complete this step, hopefully within the week, I'll declare the lower cabinet complete. Then I can tackle the hutch.

[Jim Becker]

'Glad you're off on-call, Dennis! And good call with doing things in the house when you can at this time of the year.

This past week had a nice milestone to it...my "temporary shop" is now functional and actually got used for the first of many small projects, another walnut side table to match an existing one in our family/bird room. As noted in the associated thread in Woodworking Projects, i had to use some alternative methods for preparing the table components being without a table saw at the moment. While I was going to try and go the course without one, an opportunity for a "compact" cabinet saw came my way via another 'Creeker and as soon as I can work out the logistics, I will shoe-horn that into the space in place of the MFT.

I also embarked on getting the shed in the backyard renovated/restored since it will continue to "do what it does" going forward. I originally planned on incorporating a storage area in my proposed shop building for the ZTR and other lawn equipment/stuff, but due to zoning setbacks and my desire to not cut any live trees to make room for the shop, it was a better solution to keep the existing 10'x16' shed for that purpose and made the proposed shop building a more modest 24'x36'. So the shed gets new doors, reinforced structure above the doors to "fix" what a previous owner really screwed up, a small area of replaced siding (LP Smartside cutoffs from the doors did the deed and matched the pattern) and a fresh coat of paint to match the house. The roof is sound, albeit a little ugly...I may or may not put a layer of new shingles on that at some point, but not anytime soon.

New primary doors...

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Yesterday's structural fixes...

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This week is busy with outdoor stuff due to nice weather...low humidity and more moderate temperatures, but I'll get the table finished as time allows. I also need to do a full maintenance...cleaning and lubrication...of the CNC so I can put that back in service for projects.