This thread is for anyone working on personal projects to share their progress, and hold themselves somewhat accountable to a group of peers.
Post your project, your progress from last week, and what you hope to accomplish this week.
If you want to be pinged with a reminder asking about your project, let me know, and I'll harass you each week until you cancel the service
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
When last I left you I had the cases made for my bookshelves out of birch plywood.
It's been a hectic two weeks, but I managed to mill the soft maple for the faces. A two, a three, four. Also drilled all the holes for the adjustable shelf pins. Using a jig and getting those done was the most economical method over trying to install six foot rails. I couldn't find a local supplier for them, and having them shipped incured freight charges on account of their size. Plus this saves me having to route out channels for them.
I am noticing more that almost none of the pieces I cut are perfectly square. Not massively so, and you really can't tell. There is maybe a 16th an inch of wobble that some shims will take out. The floor of my basement isn't exactly perfectly flat either. But in the future, if I ever redo the cabinets in my kitchen, I think I need to invest in a tracksaw to break down the sheet goods. Also the pocket screws, despite copious clamping and jigs, still walked on me when I drilled them in, pulling the whole box slightly out of square. Once again, maybe a 32nd of an inch, but it's every joint, and those errors compound. I think in the future I'm just going to suck it up and route rabbet joints. Should invest in some route bits that are perfectly sized for plywood thicknesses.
I did a test stain of the black, and I think I hate it. Tried out a black walnut stain I have, and I like the warmness of the brown tones a lot more. Think I'm going to go with that instead. Probably also worth doing a prestain treatment because the plywood was a pretty blotchy. Probably from the manufacturing process. I swear you can see where the rollers didn't apply preasure evenly across the sheet how the stain absorbs. I also got my last sheet of plywood mostly broken down into the widths I'll need for the shelves. The side cases get 4 shelves each, the top middle gets 2 and the bottom center gets 1.
The next week I aim to get sanding done, headers and footers, and if I'm lucky all the shelves and trim pieces. I doubt I will be lucky.
I recently did some "woodworking" this last week as well... putting up light-duty shelves in my garage for storing bulky items. The shelf itself was made of 1/2" OSB plywood, with a piece of 1x2 screwed down to make a reinforcing lip. Shelves were 18" deep, 16' long. I used some cheap shelving brackets bought off Amazon and screwed them into the studs. Overall it cost me about $60 and 8 hours, not too bad for an extra 24 square feet of storage in my cramped garage.
I'm curious - what drives you to build something elaborate like that from scratch? And how do you mentally draw the line between cost/effort/time and aesthetics? I find it interesting that two people can work with their hands in a similar manner, but come at it from completely different angles. My creation ended up being all function, zero form. Even the paint job on it was a single coat, as quickly as I could do it. I can hardly imagine staining a $100 piece of wood and having to live with any errors made.
A lot of my shop furniture isn't that different from your OSB shelving. Lots of stands thrown together with 2x4's and half-lap joints, glue and brad nails. A chest of drawers that are just 1/2" cheapo plywood, not even cabinet grade, with pocket screws, rabbet joints, glue and brad nails. All naked and unfinished. Quick and easy can be remarkably satisfying.
For the more labor intensive projects, I donno what to say. It's like when a Dwarf craftsman in Dwarf Fortress goes insane and simply has no choice but to build the masterpiece that's been plaguing his dreams. Often I get an idea that simply won't get out of my head, no matter what. The only way to get it out is to make the damned thing, no matter how extravagant and useless. That's what happened with my wooden 486. Although I think it went better than that with my walnut gaming table and dining chair set.
My daughter is a huge encouragement too. She's always so amazed every time I make something beautiful. And we've been making lots of memories sitting around the table I made, in the chairs I made, playing The Hobbit: There and Back Again which I got her for her birthday. And how do you put a price on making beautiful things to make memories around with your family?
Perhaps that's the key there. I find that the things I do or make for myself are very spartan, but for my family it has to be polished. I have a child that's too young to know the difference, but perhaps someday they'll be the reason why I put in the extra effort. We make things beautiful for other people I suppose.
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