First flight is in

The first flight of stairs is installed, complete with 11 drawers.  I've made a mental note that next time (next time?) that making such a unit in three sections would be better than two.  It nearly killed us moving it from the workshop onto the trailer and then into the house. 

Total time to build this flight of stairs....drum roll....59 hours including making the 12 "secret" drawers.  (They're not really a secret now I've told you!).  I should charge by the hour.

Next steps (excuse the pun): build the second flight; make the very first step, clad the landing wall and make a door for entry into the Harry Potter suite.

An unlikely marriage

When I was in Scotland at the Chippendale International School of Furniture in 1996 the principal, Anselm, introduced me to the Black and Decker powerfile.  This tool can best be described as an unlikely marriage between a belt sander and an angle grinder.  It’s been on my list of “tools to buy” ever since I’ve returned and last Saturday my patience was rewarded when Nette gave me one for my birthday.

 

I have high hopes for the powerfile when it comes to fitting the drawers, tidying up some of the ratty edges on the beams and generally “making things fit”.  I’ll report back in a few weeks on how it’s performing. 

Meanwhile in the workshop I've finished the first flight of stairs, including using the powerfile to fine tune the fit of the drawers.  All going well I'll be installing the stair unit this weekend.

TIMBERCRETE - love it

We chose to build our house with a product called Timbercrete.  Their website is amazingly useful and, based on our experience, true to its word.  I really can’t praise the product or the company enough. 

For example, when I was drafting up the house plans (which I did in Microsoft Word - but that’s another post perhaps)  I emailed a copy to Timbercrete for their input.  They came back with some ideas which greatly simplified the brick laying and reduced waste.  Based on my plans they also estimated how many bricks we’d need, including bricks with power points already installed, bricks for lintels, bricks with horizontal and vertical service channels and even half bricks.  The wastage was incredibly small and their estimate very accurate. 

As for how it looks….love it.

Sanders aren't just for sanding

After a great week with my new DeWalt quarter sheet sander I got to thinking about why I liked it so much. I've written a bit more about it on Pemberley-Estate's sister blog, The Worship Woodworker.  You can check it out here.

Four clear winners

The two story open plan design of our house meant that we had a span of 9 metres to cover.  Not astronomical, but a bit of a challenge all the same.  The company that sold us the LVLs (Laminated Veneer Lumber – which is basically really hefty “plywood” with a funky name) came up with an engineered solution using 395mm x 55mm LVLs at 450mm centres. 

We had planned to leave these deep beams exposed, contributing to the pioneering, hand made texture of the house.  What we hadn’t banked on however, was that every beam would come with the date and manufacturer printed on it in wide black lettering.

We could have opted to paint the beams, but we felt that would look at odds with the warm oiled timber finishes on the Tassie oak windows, cedar doors and tallow wood stairs.  So, that left just one option – sanding.

Between us, Nette and I have spent around 60 hours sanding the blessed ink off the beams.  It’s been impossible to remove 100% of it, but it now looks aged and a lot less obtrusive.

A plus side of all this sanding is that it has enabled me to draw four conclusions:

The Dust-Bee-Gone works.

My highly scientific “blow my nose on the clean hanky test” has confirmed in my mind that the DBG filters out 95% more dust than the el cheapo dust masks. It’s that simple.  Here's some more info about them.

Electric sanders are consumables.

I kill at least one electric sander a year, usually just after the warrantee runs out (how do they know?). The upside is that I have worn out a lot of sanders over the last two decades and feel somewhat of an expert on the subject. I have tried cheap ones and expensive ones. My first observation has been that price is not a reflection of longevity.  To replace my last dead sander ($60-Ryobi, good sander, but only lasted 13 months) I lashed out and bought a DeWalt for $130. After 14 hours of solid sanding this weekend – I love it.

Compared to any other sander I’ve used: it captures more dust, runs markedly cooler, is significantly lighter (granted, it is the smaller quarter sheet size) and has the longest cord. If it lasts more than 12 months it will be a bonus.

The best sand paper is white aluminium oxide.

It keeps sanding for longer than anything else I’ve used. The best brand I’ve encountered is Carborundum. The worst performer I have experienced is the yellow painters’ sandpaper. As far as sandpaper goes, the yellow stuff makes a good non-slip drink coaster.

And the forth ….

God is good…but I already knew that.