2 out of 2 ghost agree: there's no such thing as too many clamps

Yesterday my good friend Kevin was at my place, and he was nice enough to help me glue some more thickness onto my workbench top. More hands make it easier to finish while the glue is wet, so thanks a bunch Kevin! We are both interested in photography and silliness, so this was the result:

We piled on weight, and then used typical clamps to get the front glueline as tight as possible.

Bonus tip: spreading shavings around the floor is a good way to catch glue drips. Just sweep when dry(ish).

hanging bikes and reclaimed mahogany

This weekend I helped a friend make some hangers for french cleats we recently put up in his garage.

French cleats holding bikes and garden implements.

By the way, one big hook at the right height makes a pretty effective way to store a bike.

Sawing plywood on ikea sawhorses, as part of an effort to suss out any big gaps in my friend's small tool collection.

I also scored some mahogany (I think) from a shoddy hutch type thing sitting in his garage from the previous owner. Thanks Kevin!

...at least I think it's mahogany. Whatever it is, it's nice medium hardness with roey grain.

I stripped some of the ugly brown stain of the reclaimed boards, just enough to preview it's beauty. It will be fun to see what I can turn it into.

Quick tip: clamps help transport lumber

I discovered that if you have a roof-rack, you can affix boards to it very quickly using a [quick] clamp. This saves time fooling with straps & rope. Just make sure it's tight and won't wiggle.

Taking a couple of french cleats over to a friend's house for installation (on his car). We just saved 5 minutes we can use to decipher concrete anchors at the local home center.

You might still want to use one strap as a safety. Make your own decision on this. I'm not guaranteeing it's safe in every case and you must take responsibility for your own decisions--but this has worked well for me on a half dozen occasions.

Proof that woodworking does not have to be solitary

I love working on projects with friends. It is really nice to have company in the shop, and skate the sense of satisfaction from accomplishing something.

Yesterday Abby, Charlotte, and Frank joined me for a glowing epoxy job, but we also got some mortises and tenons knocked out--my idea of a good day.

I'll just let the pictures do the talking:

Abby is mortising while Frank saws out haunched tenons.

Charlotte saws tenon edges with intense focus.

Somebody had the bright idea to use sugar to figure out how much epoxy we needed to mix up.

The payoff. Phosphorescent powder and epoxy have landed in our rout.

I think this was a first for Abby and her dog.

Thanks to everyone who came today, plus my wife, D, and Patty for all the good work and positivity you are bringing to this project.

Visiting the lumberyard is more fun with a friend

Today I took my friend Frank on an exploratory mission to figure out what type of wood we might want to build a rather odd portable bar. We ended up finding a nice purpleheart board 12" wide and 17' long at Anderson Mcquaid (no affiliation) in Cambridge, MA. I had no idea those kind of sizes were even available, but we found it reasonably affordable. I always like my trips to lumberyards enough to prolong them, but even more so with a friend along.

Scott: "We must look like a couple of yahoos right now."
Frank: "Scott, we're using this lumber to build a purple and yellow glow-in-the-dark bar-top to bring to [...]. We *are* yahoos."

OK, readers, I'm heading back down to the workshop. Don't forget to smile.

Matt's Adjustable desk - finished!

The completed desk, at standing height. (Please ignore the other white desk below it)

Hi all! It's been a while since I last posted, but I haven't been idle. Anyway, low volume is one of the main benefits to subscribing to this blog. I'll be posting some of the things I've been working on lately in the near future. Let's start with this very odd adjustable desk that I built with and for my friend Matt (also Aaron helped).

Matt's design requirements were simple, but ambitious. The goal was to make an adjustable computer desk that could easily be adjusted for use at a wide range of heights, from standing to sitting cross-legged on the floor. It also had to be easy to disassemble and move. The basic idea was to have all table surfaces, keyboard trays, monitor mounts, and computers move vertically together, with computers and wires hidden from sight on the back. Matt and I discussed many design ideas, including some with pulleys and springs, but ultimately landed on this more simple and solid design that requires a few minutes of aerobic excercise and a wrench to adjust.

Rather than write a whole lot more, here's a bunch of pictures to show you some of what we went through:

I look over our Ash that we had cut to size.

Aaron and Matt with the frame that will form the basis of the monitor mounting area. Made with table-saw dadoes/rebates, glue, and screws. The vertical pieces extent down so they can bolt on to the tabletop portion.

This single bolt attaches a tabletop support to one vertical side of the monitor-mounting frame. We have checked it for square one last time and clamped it in place before drilling the other holes.

There are two tees now. The nuts are inset flush into the wood and epoxied in place. Bolts are trimmed to match. All this so they don't interfere with our adjustment system.

This is the mounting hardware for the trestle legs, (which you haven't seen yet). The horizontal parts on the floor are at least 5' long and the verticals are more like 6'. Three large bolts connect two overlapping boards. You'll get a better look at this later.

Getting ready for the adjustment system, which requires extremely accurate measurements. Step 1 was to make sure we don't use this inaccurate yardstick by accident.

We drilled holes every 3.5" inches. For accurate positioning, we are using this hastily improvised guide fence and a bolt to index on the previous hole.

These holes will be used with another set of holes on the trestle legs that are spaced every 3". Using the same principles as a vernier calliper, we can adjust the desk height in 0.5" increments even though the holes are more widely spaced.

A second row of holes to match the first. We planned this so that the monitor-mounting box will have four bolts attaching it to the trestle legs. They will stay in the vicinity of each of the four corners, no matter the height. This took a lot of time poring over graph paper to get right.

Jumping ahead a bit. A strip of ash gets dowelled and glued onto the front of the main work surface.

While the glue dries, we prepare to dowel it onto its supports.

Dowelling the back work surface on to supports, which will hold a computer and any other necessary objects with less visual appeal than whatever is on the monitors.

From the back, you can see the handy little storage area inside the monitor-mounting box. We have set some blue tape and other handy items in there while working. The vertical plywood is where the monitors will be mounted.

The front/main work surface has some finish on it and is starting to look the part.

Here is a dicey repair in progress. We accidentally sanded through the plywood's veneer right near a dowel. We then alvaged more veneer off a scrap of the same plywood, then glued and sanded it until the dowel wasn't covered. When this photo was taken, there was still a little more sanding to do. Next time it might be better to be more careful in the first place.

These adjustable metal arms will hold monitors. The nearby holes are for cables.

Here the desk is in place, but missing the work-surface sub-assembly.

From the side, you can see how the vernier-adjusters work. This is a good standing height. Note the white desk at a more typical height for comparison.

The desk surface gets bolted on from the inside out. A computer and 2 monitors have been added. A 4' power strip is even nestled in there right between the back work surface and the vertical parts.

Here it is, ready to do its job. The white desk in the picture just got replaced.