Light Duties

I think this is the first time I’ve had the beginnings of boredom since I retired. What with the weather and the fact that I fell on the ice in the first week of snow and wrenched my left shoulder. Have now got full mobility back but still painful when lifting above head height.

In desperation I have had to resort to laying new flooring in the kitchen and repainting the bathroom.

The bench planer is still unserviceable but Lumaco say the circuit board is repairable but they are having to wait for an unusually small 240v relay which I presume is coming from China, so the skylight is still on hold.

In the meantime it’s back down to T-A to refit the radiator in the bedroom and bathroom towel rail. Looking at the wall brackets for the radiators I’m not too confident about the security, they are just held up by a No.8 screw and a square nut for a washer into just 12mm of ply. Another case of ‘You won’t see it once it’s in place’

To make me happier the screws have been replaced by insert nuts and bolts.

 

Looks like  the radiator in the lounge will have to come off as well because the fixings appear to be the same.

Back in the shed and it has just been timber cutting from stock. Length of 3”x4” of sapele cut from 3” board to form mast but I still need to plane it. Looked at hiring but it seems that the only items up for hire are hand planers and looking at prices if you hire for a week it costs the same as buying a cheap one so heaven knows how much to hire something larger.

Ah well! Better not complain too much or Karen is likely to find me plenty of jobs.J

Down Time

The bench planer packed up on Wednesday which was a pain. Just as I started to plane up the new timber the machine decided it was going to shut down. It started up OK but every time it reached operating speed it shut down again. A quick dismantling session showed that the circuit board for the soft start had fried.

Joined to Get Woodworking forum to try and find a solution and sure enough like all good forums a suggestion was soon forthcoming. So now the circuit board is in the hands of Lumaco in the hopes it can be repaired or replaced. If that is unsuccessful then I’ll try wiring the switch directly to the motor but I have doubts about being able to overcome the inertia of not only the motor but the drive rollers and cutting cylinder without continually blowing the fuse in the plug or doing other damage.

Two of the four shut frames have been made for the skylight but now I’m out of planed timber, so looking for other work to do routed out the bottom lip on the skylight frame to make a weather tight seal.

On Saturday went down with Karen to try the framework for size. Good job we did as it was fine for width but 3mm short for length. While we were in the Loughborough area Karen took me over to Screwfix to buy me an early birthday present – a nice new router to add to the collection on the grounds that I might as well have it now if I can use it.

Tried it out today trimming up the lip on the framework and it works just fine

Preparation and Maintenance

We went down to Kettering for a very pleasant evening to see the new year in with friends Tony and Les and since than have not done much at all.

Karen’s car was not fixed until Friday so all the week has been spent setting up the dovetail jig, routers and cutting timber for the skylight

Popped down to T-A on Saturday  to see if everything OK and pick up stainless steel screws and a few tools.

Started to assemble the skylight but didn’t get too far as more timber was needed

 

It is slightly larger than the old one so as not to have a lip running round the bottom which I believe to have been part of the problem

This time there are to be four opening lights to allow for extra drainage between and being smaller the shuts should be more rigid – apart from them being thicker and jointed using stile and rail joints reinforced with dowels

There will be a variety of joints – already we have dovetails on the corners, dowel and screw at the centre edges and biscuit joints on the centre ridge.

This is definitely the job for the next few days/weeks.

Yesterday it was down to Glenmere Timber at Market Harborough to get plenty more sapele and ash – I’m told we are having shutters to replace the curtains in the lounge- blimey I thought I was retired.

Today was just pottering about in the shed, firstly to sharpen the saw blades and then make a jig for the table saw to make it easier to do the tapered cuts need for the skylight. In the planning I decided on a 1 in 3 slope to allow rain to run off without making the skylight too tall – this works out at 18.4 degrees. To ensure all angles match I used bits from the off cuts from the end boards to mount a leftover piece of oak flooring with bolts through the rip fence on the table saw.

The next problem is that when making thin stock you run the risk of the leading edge dropping down the gap between saw blade and face plate. To this end I made a zero clearance face plate from some 6mm acrylic

Not sure as I like seeing the blade spinning around under your hands – think I may make another in some opaque material or spray the underside of this one.
This entry seems a bit disjointed but thats the way my head is spinning at the moment, trying to sort which joint would be best for each item and how best to overcome any possibility of error. The last skylight caused a great deal of problems with it leaking so badly that I am determined that this one will not be the same.