Hello from sunny Nuneaton

[throbscottle]

Pretty much the middle of the Midlands here...
Just moved house. Collecting wood to make a bench in the garage, cabinets for tools and stuff. Looking forward to having the space and tooling to make accurate joints! Also, being able to keep wood, metal, and electronics away from each other (unless they're part of the same thing, obviously) which was quite an issue when I only had a shed to knackle in.
After that, well my muse doesn't seem to be working very well - I want to make stuff that isn't just because I need *thing", but just for the joy of it, but can't get past the mental barrier of "well, after I've made that, what do I do with it?" and the other mental barrier of "my imagination's broken!"
Also, some of the wood I've collected is nearly rotten - it gets quite interesting doesn't it? Has anyone used bad wood to decorative effect?

 

[Bingy man]

Hi from just up the road in Wolverhampton- greetings and welcome, just crack on and make what comes to mind , start with what you will need for your workshop bench , storage and take it from there. As for rotten wood I can’t help you there as most of my work involves cutting it out and replacing it with new . As for other items you make you’ll probably find that your friends and family will help you out . Good luck in your woodwork.

 

[throbscottle]

Thank you Bingy man! Yes, see what happens would be the way...

 

[Sirenity]

And welcome from Coventry, down the road! As for what to do with it once it's made... if your creative juices have flowed, there's always a market to sell it. I've got the skills to sell, just not the skills to make ... yet!

 

[Lorenzl]

You could check out this thread for ideas, only 365 pages at the moment: https://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/threads/post-a-photo-of-the-last-thing-you-made.81798/

 

[throbscottle]

Yay! I posted the last thing I made - my upstairs "lab bench"
The garage bench is being made out of pallet wood, which isn't easy when I haven't really got anything to flatten it! Enjoying the challenge, though.

 

[Bingy man]

Pallet wood is no easy to work with , not sure what tools you have to “flatten it with but a planer would take the grunt out of it . My choices based on cost starting with the cheapest would be a good quality belt sander - triton make a large one but not sure of model number- portable planer -makita nb2012,, or a full sized planer thickneser -with either choice my main concern would be nails and grit etc in the pallet wood. Also of course a decent dust collection system . Nice looking bench tho

 

[throbscottle]

The plan is to glue the boards together so the narrow edges form the bench top and it's nice and thick. I don't have anything fancy like a thicknesser. I do have a table saw though. So I thought I would try using it to skim the wide-face surface of some of the crappiest bits, as an experiment, and glue them together. It sort of worked, but the ratio of waste to useable wood is too high and the cuts are still too uneven. So I'm just going to choose the flattest pieces and sand them. Orbital sander is available but I've a feeling I'm going to resort to a sanding block and some very coarse paper...
Then when it's done I can flatten the top of the whole thing with the big plane I don't have yet...

 

[Alexam]

Welcome to anew world. Overall y years, this sight helped me when starting woodwork with ideas and advice. Now I'm 81 and just starting to find out what all my equipment will sell for. My main interest has been in making bandsaw boxes and there is a huge amount of variety in that, including all the different woods that work best. MyRecord BS 400 bandsaw has been a really great foundation and together with the CarterStabilizer to hold 1/8 inch blades it makes very tight turns. Something like that or smaller would work well for you.

As for rotten wood, the best way to avoid this is the way you store it. Ideally onracks where the air can circulate around. Don't forget to wear a dust mask to avoid chest problems that may occur unless you are carefully. Most of all, enjoy what you do. Good luck.