Permutation_Jim
Established Member
With a floor now firmly under foot, I started staring at the walls. The house is old, and the angles are pretty unpredicible. As well, there's one (count 'em, one) electrical outlet for the room -- oddly enough, at the exact opposite corner of the TV antenna. A three letter acronym conveying mystified confusion comes to mind.
So, I wanted to "straighten" the walls, adding more power (always!) without undue damage to the plaster.
I came up with a leveled batten system that was proud of the wall enough to allow for electrical conduit under it. To adjust the surface battens a perfect 90 degrees from level, I found these really neat adjustable screws (bought from Screwfix http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/pro.jsp?ts=55692&id=92174). You pre-drill the wall with an masonry fixing (like a nylon plug), drill a hole in the batten, hammer this little chap through the hole, put the screw end in the fixing, and use a torx driver to adjust the angle of the batten.
If you're truely insane (as am I), you can even buy one of those rotating lasers to form a flat guide, such that every batten is perfectly vertical and level with one another.
I had seen a nice looking wall in the movie The Big Sleep (http://imdb.com/title/tt0038355/) with small, square panels. And once an idea gets in there, it's hard to get out.
Here's how it works...
Start by ripping 30 degrees off some reasonably straight boards. Mine started life 5-6 cm wide.
I'm happy with my Kity 419, but it still leaves a swirl-cut. So, I made a 30 degree jig for my belt sander, such that I could run long boards through and smooth the swirls quickly.
Then, you repeat that process for each side about 200 times. I also finish sanded and polyurethaned them at this stage, mainly because doing so once assembled would be nearly impossible. I also precut, sanded and finished several 12 mm plywood sheets to about 4 x 7 foot (used in the next step).
That's when assembly starts. In the first picture, I'm doing the outside edges, cutting each piece to length on a mitre saw (note: I had a Rexon 10" at the time, and while I was pleased with it, such tolerances were really beyond its design and you'll see what that cost me, later... I've since gone with a Metabo 8 1/2" sliding mitre saw, that is far more accurate).
I precut the bits inside and made a jig allowing each square to be consistent. Because the boards are held in place via screws from the back, I predrilled all the holes and started screwing.
By the way, I'm not in all these pictures because I'm vain (I am vain, but that's not why I'm in them). After driving a 3/4" screw into my forearm, SWMBO decided that being the site photographer would likely be her best contribution. Not that it daunted us, and we found an alternate use for the panels while waiting for them to dry.
Getting the panels to "butt" next to each other proved to be quite fiddly, but it turned out pretty nice in the end. The wood matched wit the floor fairly well, and even our skeptical friends approved.
So What Have We Learned (i.e. what did I screw up)
The tolerances of my Rexon mitre saw, likely compounded by my own impatience/inexperience in cutting this many components resulted in unevenness in many of the boards. It's not as noticable from the front, but you can really see raised ridges from the side.
That extra hole above the light is the result of reading my cutting measurements upside down and putting the hole in (obviously) the wrong place (but a bit of "decorative trim" solved that problem).
And using knotty pine for boards can result in some warpage, despite varnishing all sides.
But It's Not All Bad
I managed to solve a few problems with homemade jigs, I found a neat way to "create" custom brass fittings to match those from the store (lightly sand a white plastic plate, cut the required openings, spray paint with metalic automotive paint, then finish with clear polyurethane spray), and most important, SWMBO is happy.
So, I wanted to "straighten" the walls, adding more power (always!) without undue damage to the plaster.
I came up with a leveled batten system that was proud of the wall enough to allow for electrical conduit under it. To adjust the surface battens a perfect 90 degrees from level, I found these really neat adjustable screws (bought from Screwfix http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/pro.jsp?ts=55692&id=92174). You pre-drill the wall with an masonry fixing (like a nylon plug), drill a hole in the batten, hammer this little chap through the hole, put the screw end in the fixing, and use a torx driver to adjust the angle of the batten.
If you're truely insane (as am I), you can even buy one of those rotating lasers to form a flat guide, such that every batten is perfectly vertical and level with one another.
I had seen a nice looking wall in the movie The Big Sleep (http://imdb.com/title/tt0038355/) with small, square panels. And once an idea gets in there, it's hard to get out.
Here's how it works...
Start by ripping 30 degrees off some reasonably straight boards. Mine started life 5-6 cm wide.
I'm happy with my Kity 419, but it still leaves a swirl-cut. So, I made a 30 degree jig for my belt sander, such that I could run long boards through and smooth the swirls quickly.
Then, you repeat that process for each side about 200 times. I also finish sanded and polyurethaned them at this stage, mainly because doing so once assembled would be nearly impossible. I also precut, sanded and finished several 12 mm plywood sheets to about 4 x 7 foot (used in the next step).
That's when assembly starts. In the first picture, I'm doing the outside edges, cutting each piece to length on a mitre saw (note: I had a Rexon 10" at the time, and while I was pleased with it, such tolerances were really beyond its design and you'll see what that cost me, later... I've since gone with a Metabo 8 1/2" sliding mitre saw, that is far more accurate).
I precut the bits inside and made a jig allowing each square to be consistent. Because the boards are held in place via screws from the back, I predrilled all the holes and started screwing.
By the way, I'm not in all these pictures because I'm vain (I am vain, but that's not why I'm in them). After driving a 3/4" screw into my forearm, SWMBO decided that being the site photographer would likely be her best contribution. Not that it daunted us, and we found an alternate use for the panels while waiting for them to dry.
Getting the panels to "butt" next to each other proved to be quite fiddly, but it turned out pretty nice in the end. The wood matched wit the floor fairly well, and even our skeptical friends approved.
So What Have We Learned (i.e. what did I screw up)
The tolerances of my Rexon mitre saw, likely compounded by my own impatience/inexperience in cutting this many components resulted in unevenness in many of the boards. It's not as noticable from the front, but you can really see raised ridges from the side.
That extra hole above the light is the result of reading my cutting measurements upside down and putting the hole in (obviously) the wrong place (but a bit of "decorative trim" solved that problem).
And using knotty pine for boards can result in some warpage, despite varnishing all sides.
But It's Not All Bad
I managed to solve a few problems with homemade jigs, I found a neat way to "create" custom brass fittings to match those from the store (lightly sand a white plastic plate, cut the required openings, spray paint with metalic automotive paint, then finish with clear polyurethane spray), and most important, SWMBO is happy.
