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My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

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Re: My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

#211

Post by mauvehaus »

greedo wrote: post #166
war1025 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (GOOD) clamps Any advice on what to look for or what brands you might recommend? I bought a couple furniture clamps a few years ago and they are complete garbage.

Bessey is very good and worth every penny. I also have some Bora clamps that are good. Parallel clamps are generally the best since the clamping force is even.

Parallel clamps are the result of hundreds of years of research into developing a clamp even less intuitive than handscrews. I love 'em, but man are they a hassle when the head doesn't engage the bar.

Pipe clamps are comparatively cheaper with the bonus that if you need longer clamps, you can go to the plumbing supply for a longer bit of pipe. They aren't as nice as parallel clamps for gluing up thin panels though.

For handscrews, I highly recommend Miro Moose. The Besseys are surprisingly subpar. Lie-Nielsen makes them as well for a reasonable price, but they galvanize the screws, and I don't like the action as much.

Re: My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

#212

Post by dr_orpheus »

lsiunsuex wrote: post #20
pen2l wrote: post #5

It seems so fulfilling, being able to make such beautiful things. But also a bit expensive eh... to get the woodworking skills (presumably by taking classes at a technical college?), the equipment, and the time involved. If any folks here are capable of doing this stuff, would you please share details of your journey, I feel inspired to learn some of this myself. Did you feel it was all worth it, what would you do di…

Not wood working, but I remodeled almost my entire last house. 1 kitchen, 1 bathroom, 2 bedrooms, a hallway and minor work to the dining room and family room. These were complete guts down to the studs with new windows, doors, electrical, plumbing, insulation. Expense wise, you need quite a few tools and obviously materials. Doors I always went with solid core doors (vs hollow) and double pane windows. We used fiber…

> Took time to get good at mudding the joints to get them smooth

I can attest that drywall work and mudding is definitely an acquired skill. No matter how many youtube videos you watch it takes practice.

Re: My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

#213

Post by dr_orpheus »

war1025 wrote: post #148
wegs wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's less expensive than pre-made furniture. A good place to get started is construction lumber -- just 2x4s. They're not bad once you clean them up with a sander and potentially planer and finish them, and they have a certain industrial aesthetic raw. They're cheap enough that if you mess up or change your mind, you can throw them away and try again. And if you want to redo a piece of furniture, you can do that too.…

> (GOOD) clamps Any advice on what to look for or what brands you might recommend? I bought a couple furniture clamps a few years ago and they are complete garbage.

I absolutely love pipe clamps. They still provide a lot of clamping pressure but are significantly cheaper than parallel bar clamps. And if you need a longer clamp all you need to do is go buy a longer piece of pipe

Re: My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

#214

Post by mauvehaus »

pawelk wrote: post #71
pen2l wrote: post #5

It seems so fulfilling, being able to make such beautiful things. But also a bit expensive eh... to get the woodworking skills (presumably by taking classes at a technical college?), the equipment, and the time involved. If any folks here are capable of doing this stuff, would you please share details of your journey, I feel inspired to learn some of this myself. Did you feel it was all worth it, what would you do di…

I started when we bought our first house and there wasn't much money left for kitchen furniture. But we needed a kitchen, so I decided to get some big box store pine, hinges, drawer slides etc to build some temporary cabinets. I didn't know much and I made many mistakes, but the kitchen I built lasted us... 7 years, and is gone now mainly because we're renovating the whole house. All the tools I had back then were a…

Paul Sellers' book is worth a buy as well. It's a good reference on not only the use, but also the care and feeding of pretty much all of the core hand tools, with pictures.

Re: My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

#215

Post by dr_orpheus »

wegs wrote: post #12
pen2l wrote: post #5

It seems so fulfilling, being able to make such beautiful things. But also a bit expensive eh... to get the woodworking skills (presumably by taking classes at a technical college?), the equipment, and the time involved. If any folks here are capable of doing this stuff, would you please share details of your journey, I feel inspired to learn some of this myself. Did you feel it was all worth it, what would you do di…

It's less expensive than pre-made furniture. A good place to get started is construction lumber -- just 2x4s. They're not bad once you clean them up with a sander and potentially planer and finish them, and they have a certain industrial aesthetic raw. They're cheap enough that if you mess up or change your mind, you can throw them away and try again. And if you want to redo a piece of furniture, you can do that too.…

2x4s can go a long ways. I know that this is a professional furniture maker but Hal Taylor made a beautiful rocking chair out of 2x4s from Lowes. That said, this does not make it cheaper because it still a professionally made chair with very intricate details, but it is a testament that you don't need expensive tropical hardwood to make something beautiful.

http://www.haltaylor.com/for-sale.html

Re: My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

#216

Post by etothet »

eindiran wrote: post #200
randycupertino wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, this is a stupid question, but do you mind explaining what are the benefits of using planter boxes vs just planting directly in the ground? We're getting into gardening a bit during the pandemic as well and I'm trying to understand why planter boxes have become so popular. Thank you!

There are probably other reasons people use them, but a few reasons why planter boxes can be the right choice: (1) If you live in an area with very poor soil conditions, it may take years and lots of hard work to get your soil usable for the things you want to plant. Or you can grab planting soil that meets your requirements upfront and dump it into some planter boxes. (2) They look nice, and some people are going fo…

I'll add to this:

4) Not having to actually dig to plant. The work involved in buying soil and dumping in a planter box usually pales in comparison to digging a hole a couple-to-few feet deep, wide, and long.

Re: My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

#217

Post by cpwright »

Arainach wrote: post #113
gummydog wrote: post #47

My woodworking journey started when I was quoted $2500 to fix my porch railings. $1000 in materials, $1000 in tools mix in youtube tutorials and patience and now I'm hooked. The sliding compound mitre saw was the life changing tool for me. It was what was holding me back all these years from doing my own projects. I was always outsourcing this type of work for simply the cutting of lumber and thought I could do bette…

I enjoy woodworking quite a bit, but before anyone gets any misconceptions, cost savings is NOT a reason to get into it. Unless you need very specific custom dimensions, IKEA can sell a piece of furniture significantly cheaper than I can get raw materials (even if my time is valued at zero).

You are totally right about furniture, though if you enjoy it; it can certainly be worth while. With practice you can save money over higher end places like Crate and Barrel or Pottery Barn that might have more interesting design than Ikea. Any furniture you build should be because you enjoy the process, saving money can be elusive.

For things like the railing the original poster mentioned, that really falls under home improvement. For those things which are generally site built by a carpenter, you can absolutely save money even factoring in a few tools.

Re: My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

#218

Post by cpwright »

dr_orpheus wrote: post #206
saalweachter wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also one of those frustrating life lessons about putting in the work. Like, sanding. When you first start out you're very tempted to just give it a very cursory sand to get any splinters off the edges or whatever, but once you sand something butter-smooth once, you have the frustrating realization that you're going to have to keep investing that much time and effort on every project you make going forward.

Sanding well is huge. It can be the difference between "yep, you nailed some 2x4s together" and "oh my god, that is so beautiful"

I took Jory Brigham's TWW guild Hank Chair class, he said something like 30% of his shop time is spent sanding.

For me, finishing is not as fun as joinery; but patience during the sanding and finishing is absolutely essential to a good result.

Re: My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

#219

Post by lemonberry »

elboru wrote: post #160
dekhn wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Miter saw (even without sliding) was transformative for me as well. A cheap table saw complements it nicely (I then splurged and got a CNC router, too, which opens up a wide range of techniques). AFter that I ended up playing with chisels, which I always thought were very primitive, but you can do a surprising amount of nice work with just a chisel and a hand saw. I'm a computer programmer but I expect that more and…

That’s the exact reason I (as a programmer) want to start doing some wood work, there’s something about creating tangible stuff that web programming just doesn’t fulfill. You talk about the table saw as a complement. I thought it was a must have, legit question, how do you make precise long cuts without a table saw?

If you're interested in making furniture you should check out Lost Art Press' Anarchist's Design Book. It describes making "vernacular" furniture, i.e., not fancy but sturdy and durable furniture.

Re: My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

#220

Post by cercatrova »

quicklyfrozen wrote: post #180
ticmasta wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ha! I was the only one taking AP-level everything and electronics and power mechanics as my electives! The shop teacher was so grateful that he finally had someone super-interested in more advanced topics that I got to do extra projects he'd had on his wish list for years. One of my favorite high school memories and experiences.

Unfortunately I think a lot of kids would shy away from doing this today as it can hurt your GPA -- because of weighting, an A in an AP class is worth more then an A in a shop class. So if a school is mostly focused on college-bound students, it's kind of natural that these programs have fallen away. I'm old enough that I did basic shop stuff in middle school -- soldering, bandsaw, even a table saw. No way that would…

Colleges don't care about weighted GPAs, only unweighted. Of course, they'd prefer if you take more advanced courses but they'd rather see that you perform well in the courses that you do take rather than struggle in courses that are too hard for you.
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