Steve's workshop - Painting the outside walls

[wcndave]

Personally I can't wait to finish all the things I _have_ to make, so i can start on all the things I want to make, other than workbench and arcade machine it's been all need rather than desire.

 

[lurker]

I'm very flattered by you all! I fear my skills are not in that league.

S

I have seen your stuff in the flesh
It is good enough to sell, you might not make a living out of it but I assume that's not the goal
You just need to find the market

 

[Steve Maskery]

I have seen your stuff in the flesh
It is good enough to sell, you might not make a living out of it but I assume that's not the goal

You just need to find the market

You just need to find the market

<Brucie> And that's all there is to it </Brucie>

Ha-ha. Thank you Jim, thank you very much. I just wish I had your optimism, I really do.

But how many furniture makers do you know who pay their way? Ones who are not married to a doctor, dentist, management consultant, teacher, lawyer...

Most have a safety net, as I used to have. Perhaps there are some. I hope there are, I'd love to be proved wrong.

I've been self-employed for nearly 25 years and so I do know how difficult it is. I think it is difficult if you are a genius, and I am no genius. There are a few things I'm good at, and presenting stuff is one of them. I have had one brilliant idea in my entire life and you could count the interested parties on the legs of a centipede.

Selling my work would not be difficult. It is, as you say, good enough.

I once asked someone who admired my (rather magnificently wonderfully comfortable) dining chairs and said they were good enough to sell, what he thought they would fetch.

"Why, you'd pay £150, maybe even more for those in IKEA".

When I pointed out that a set of 8 had taken up 3 months of my life, virtually full-time, from concept to design, through mock-up, prototype to one-off set to upholstery, and asked him if he would work for 3 months for £1200 minus the several hundred pounds worth of outlay, he said "Oh".

This is an intelligent, educated, professional bloke. A scientist in a pharma company. That is what we are up against.

Selling it at a profit, now that's the challenge.

 

[Woodmonkey]

Looking great Steve, if all else fails I reckon that would make a great little holiday let!

Joking aside, I reckon teaching is the way to go, looks like a perfect space to learn some woodworking

 

[riclepp]

Looking great Steve, if all else fails I reckon that would make a great little holiday let!

Joking aside, I reckon teaching is the way to go, looks like a perfect space to learn some woodworking

And that lies the pandoras box. For teaching, Steve would require some forms of teacher training (ketals, petels, cert ed etc), a higher level of cover on his insurance, risk assessment, method statements policy, procedures, fire risk assessments, fire warning and detection systems, welfare facilities for the student/s, teaching syllabus etc and this would be before getting a student. I have no doubt Steve would make a fine teacher, but as he indicated that the cost for making video is highly underestimated and that goes for teaching too. There is also the cost for ppm's and maintenance for the tools.

So it is not just a case of "I'm now going to teach and make a tidy packet of cash". Steve would also be a sole trader and if a student is injured, it would be Steve who could be prosecuted and he would be a sole trader on his own. Not that I am saying that is going to happen. But as in everything there are the numerous hidden cost to be considered.

Nice workshop and have been enjoying the thread.

 

[Steve Maskery]

Late start again today but once I did get going everything went quite well.

First I primed the window trim inside. I forgot to take a pic of me doing it, but this is what it looks like now

I thought of painting the white trim outside as well, but white is dazzling and I'm photosensitive, so I'd rather do that on an overcast day.

Instead I turned my attention to the soffit supports. The soffit is the outside ceiling, covering the trusses. This would often be flat horizontal, but I can't do that because of the lights. The alternative option would be to nail directly onto the trusses, but there would be a problem right at the top where the electric cables are, and I've already trimmed the trusses at the bottom end. If I hadn't, I would have needed a very deep fascia. So I'm going to do a bit of both, a sort of zig-zag.

So I notched some short lengths of scrap. Some are 3x2, some are 4x2

And in writing this post and editing the pictures, I've found the ring magnet I've been looking for. I knew I had it, but I have no idea why I stuck it to the bandsaw.

Then I nailed them up one at each end. Unfortunately the Paslode was dead, so I had to use a hammer. I don't mind, but it doesn't half exacerbate my tennis elbow. I've cropped the picture to spare you the sight of a very fat belly exposed.

A string between the two gives me a nice straight line

Fortunately the Paslode charged up fairly quickly, so by the time I'd faffed about with one or two other things it was charged up and ready to use

The Community Workshop is closed for a couple of weeks, so I think Ray might be coming tomorrow.

 

[Steve Maskery]

Ray wanted to get the holes filled in before we did anything else, so we did.

Hole, what hole?

The is also the bit down the side

With that done, we turned outr attention to getting the cladding off. You will have figured out by now, I am sure, that I cocked up here. Having wooden cladding on the front is fine and the BCO is happy with that, but he is not happy with it on the sides and back because of the proximity of the building to the boundary. I have only myself to blame, but it's a mistake that is going to cost me dearly.

I'd levered one board off, but done some damage in the process. Ray suggested that, as we were going to have nail holes anyway, why not "just" punch the nails all the way through. He'd brought along a drift punch and I had a DW nail set. and we hammered away. It was noisy and Ray was concerned that we would upset the neighbours I was concerned that my tennis elbow would explode.

Fortunately, Ray's pin punch bent under the strain so we had only one. I very kindly lent mine to Ray so he could carry on.

It worked well and the boards came off with little damage bar the nail holes.

It's not very often I catch Ray sitting down on the job. Lazy beggar.

So whilst Ray was doing that, I was filling the nail holes with caulk and painting the boards white. I'm going to use them for the soffit. I would have used V T&G, but as I have all this shiplap, it seems daft not to use it.

I didn't paint all of it white, some is going to be used at the top of the front. This bit took us ages.

First we cleared the mess from the front. Well, we moved the mess from one place to another, to be more accurate.

But I'm glad we did it, I've come close to doing myself a mischief on more than one occasion.

The problem is that, working from the bottom up, it is very difficult to maintain level between the areas to the left of the big door, between the doors and to the right of the man-door. And although they were close, there was no cigar on offer. So we had to trim a few tongues and rework them to lose about 16mm in total. Some of the boards on the left are now narrower than they were originally. But TBH, you would never know. Even I think it's unnoticeable, and I know it's there. In fact, now that we have a course over the complete length, the line is good.

 

[Steve Maskery]

And of course, we had to take the lights off and then replace them. Only whereas they were straight before, they are now a bit wonky, so we are going to have to sort that out, but not today.

So as the sun descends over the yardarm it looks like this. It was a lot of work to put right a cockup, but it's looking good, I reckon.

And from the landing it looks virtually finished

Ray's back next week, but we have also moved (what's left of) my router table down to the workshop. It looks very forlorn indeed. I could weep, I really could, but I'm going to try to resurrect it, so I'm not short of tasks to do before he comes again.

 

[Brentingby]

Looking nice there, Steve.

Do you need to get out the grey paint and do a bit of touch up on the front? <ducking>

 

[Steve Maskery]

It's had only one coat, but it's easier to paint on trestles than on the wall, so one coat before it goes up and a second to cover the filled nail holes.
So why not come over and wield a paint brush for an hour or two, eh? Eh?

 

[Adam9453]

What are you going to have to clad the boundary walls in now Steve, something non combustible I presume?

 

[Steve Maskery]

Yes, I have a short list of two. Neither perfect, but both will satisfy the BCO.
I'll keep you posted.
S

 

[Brentingby]

So why not come over and wield a paint brush for an hour or two, eh? Eh?

I'd love to but I think I hear my mum calling me.

 

[beech1948]

What is really frustrating is that there are no recorded cases of sheds spontaneously combusting. Shed fires have occurred but by human action either criminal or accidental. I know what the planning laws say but as we know the law is an asinine institution.

I'm curious about what you are going to use......cement based panels?, plastic ?, slate tiles, cement tiles, felt tiles.?

 

[Steve Maskery]

I've finished the front cladding today. Not a lot you can say about it!

I was quite pleased about how it lined up at the top. The biggest problem was that I couldn't get the top strip on over the one below it, even though I'd allowed some clearance to do that. If Ray had been here we probably would have managed it between us, but on my own, not a hope. I spent ages trying but eventually gave up and cut off the back of the groove to make a rebate. It looks the same and once the soffit is on there will be no gap at all.

There was one board that had got broken along the way.

I decided to replace it. I just hacked it out and slid in a new piece.

And that is how I discovered why I was so far adrift yesterday with the alignment of the boards. I had been as careful as I could to ensure that I'd started level, but I was 16mm or so too high on the left. This was the reason

I'd not bedded them all down properly, and it doesn't take many of those to get very out of line. But never mind, it's a shed, not a palace and I like what it looks like.

 

[SteveF]

I've finished the front cladding today. Not a lot you can say about it!



I was quite pleased about how it lined up at the top. The biggest problem was that I couldn't get the top strip on over the one below it, even though I'd allowed some clearance to do that. If Ray had been here we probably would have managed it between us, but on my own, not a hope. I spent ages trying but eventually gave up and cut off the back of the groove to make a rebate. It looks the same and once the soffit is on there will be no gap at all.

There was one board that had got broken along the way.


I decided to replace it. I just hacked it out and slid in a new piece.



And that is how I discovered why I was so far adrift yesterday with the alignment of the boards. I had been as careful as I could to ensure that I'd started level, but I was 16mm or so too high on the left. This was the reason



I'd not bedded them all down properly, and it doesn't take many of those to get very out of line. But never mind, it's a shed, not a palace and I like what it looks like.

Hi Steve

are u not worried about shrinkage and a gap opening ?

Steve

 

[Steve Maskery]

Well if that does happen I'll simply strip off that left-hand section of boards and replace them from the top down. It's not an enormous amount of work.
S

 

[monkeybiter]

it's a shed, not a palace

I've been thinking the exact opposite from approx. half way into this thread!

 

[n0legs]

Fairplay Steve that's a lovely looking building at the bottom of the garden, much better than the original.

 

[Woody2Shoes]

RSJs - My trick for moving large steel/timber beams is to use stone-age technology - make a 'trackway' with a couple of scaffolding boards or similar and three or four 'rollers' made from short pieces of scaffolding tube or similar. You can move a n00 Kg beam with one finger - not so easy up/down hill though! Cheers W2S