Posted by Jerry on January 6th, 2007 — Posted in DIY, Journal, Woodwork
Whether making one book case or several – as I am doing – there are a few tricks to make it a quick and painless process – remember we’ll be building this book case in under two hours.
Firstly, when making the sides (the uprights), cut them in pairs – that way they will always be level with each other. You will need for each book case a pair of sides of equal length – the size is up to you. For floor-to-ceiling book cases they are likely to be a fairly standard 2.4 metres. The ones I am making today are designed to fit under a window, so mine are 830mm tall – which will leave a 20mm gap for a final smooth top to be fitted along the length. But the principle is the same, whether tall or short.
For each book case you will need at least four shelf-length pieces – in my case about 750mm. These will comprise the fixed elements of the book case. They will be used as follows:
- a top for the book case
- a kick board at the bottom front
- a bottom shelf; and
- a middle shelf
All other shelves will be adjustable to allow for different height books.
Measure once, cut many times
In contrast to the old dictum about ‘measure twice and cut once’, we’ll reverse that for this project! Even for one book case you will have several pieces that need to be of the same length. The trick is to measure one (carefully!) and clamp a stop-block to your saw bench – after that, forget measuring and just slot each new one up to the stop block and cut away. Providing the block doesn’t move they will all be be the same length.
Fit around the skirting board
When all your uprights are cut, the next thing is to cut a notch to fit the bookcase around the skirting board – that way the back will be flush with the wall. To do this we use a contour gauge – there are several types, but all use the same principle – a collection of stiff wires trapped between two flat straps. When you press it against an irregular object, the wires deflect, leaving an imprint of the contour – in this case, a skirting board
Then you transfer that shape with a pencil to the lower back part of your book case sides
Now cut out the shape with a hand saw
And the shelf sides will now fit your wall
Assembly
With all the pieces cut to size it is time to assemble the bookcase. Find a large flat surface – in this case a couple of sheets of melamine placed across the saw bench extension.
Lay the two sides face downward so that the skirting board cutouts are facing up. Now place the kickboard and the bottom shelf in position.
Assembly is with screws – you can glue the joints as well for added strength. Pre-drill right through the side into the kickboard. Then countersink the hole and finally screw in the screw – I use chipboard screws for just about everything!
Here are the steps in pictures – I use quick-change drill bit, countersink and screwdriver bit – they save a heap of time 🙂
Once the bottom shelf is on, make sure the bookcase is square and add the top shelf using the same procedure. You can make it easier on yourself by using a mitre clamp to hold the pieces together while you drill and screw them together.
Adjustable shelves
Now you should have a bare bookcase carcass. Place it on one side and using a template – I use a length of pegboard to guide the position of the holes. In this case I had a part of an old bookcase where I had drilled all the way through the side – so I used that as a template this time.
Note that I have used masking tape on the drill to give me a depth guide to ensure I don’t drill all the way through the side!
Now insert some shelf supports and add the centre shelves. And aside from the varnish – that’s all there is to it!
For a tall bookcase I would make a fixed shelf about halfway up to prevent bowing. With practice you can build one in about two hours 🙂
Tomorrow I’ll finish off the other bookcases and and then we can look at how to make built-in bookcases using this construction technique – the secret is to build in modules and hide the joins with some 40mm beaded trim 😉
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on January 5th, 2007 — Posted in DIY, Journal, Woodwork
Well, Christmas and New Year have come and gone, and with twelfth night fast approaching I was contemplating our growing pile of books beside the bed, and on the computer table waiting to be dutifully entered into our LibraryThing catalogue – one of a few New Years resolutions!
I realised something was up when Sharon made me a cup of coffee. Perhaps it was something in the tone of “I was thinking…” that suggested I really should be paying attention, and words like ‘book cases’ started to enter the conversation – hypothetically of course….
Yes, an expansion of our book cases is long overdue – far too many books wedged in sideways on the shelves – and then there’s the alarmingly tall pile beside the bed – on each side. I did some quick figuring and named a suitably large sum thinking that would be the end of the conversation.
There was an abrupt flurry of activity which somehow included me gulping down the last of my coffee as we headed out the door and a short while later my shed started to look worryingly like we had just transferred the entire Timber Department from Bunnings!
What a satisfying trip to the toyshop!
Tomorrow: how to make a book case in two hours – and built-in book cases within four days 🙂
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on January 1st, 2007 — Posted in Journal
Between thunderstorms, hail and rain, we celebrated news years eve in Canberra with our neighbours – nothing quite like a barbeque under the covered deck with good friends. We watched the Sydney fireworks on TV, had a few quiet ales and some good conversation.
Happy new Year to everyone 🙂
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on January 1st, 2007 — Posted in DIY, Journal, Woodwork
One Christmas gift was a book on making whirligigs and kintic toys – now this looked like great fun! So, armed with some scraps of wood and the book, I headed out to the shed to see how difficult it would be to come up with something…
One of the pieces in the book was a crank-driven piano player. And there is a reason I chose this one.
You see, my grandfather used to play piano. He played entirely by ear – he could go to the movies once and come home and play all the main theme tunes. And he used to play down at the local pub as something companionable and fun to do. Interestingly he was a teatotaller, and the top of the piano would fill up with pints of beer that people bought him – and they would remain there all night as he played all the old favourite sing-along songs of the day. I guess that’s where I inherited my music ability from. So with that in mind, I thought I’d have a go at a piano player.
By the end of the evening – about four hours, I had a ‘proof-of-concept’ version that looked like this:
Using a hole saw I cut out four 4cm (1 1/2″) discs from some scrap pine. I then drilled them to accept thin dowel in an offset from the centre hole, and used three of these discs to form the crank. I also cut two small discs of 1cm (1/2″) to act as spacers to stop too much lateral movement of the crankshaft.
I then made up a simple ‘stage’ from three pieces of white melamine chipboard and another piece for the piano upright.
I cut out and roughly shaped the head and torso of the pianist from some scrap pine and then cut out the arms and legs with a scrollsaw. It was important to put an angle on each thigh as the legs need to splay outward to enable the control wires to pass between the legs and attach to the wrists to provide the movement.
The wrists were drilled and the arms and legs attached to the torso. The nail holes in the arms and legs were drilled larger than the nail so they would move freely when attached – the nails are only holding into the torso.
The seat is just a small block dowelled into the stage, as is the piano. Once in place, positioned either side of the line of the crank I drilled two holes inboard of the arms into the stage to allow the control wires to pass through the stage to the cranks.
I then drilled (slowly) an oversize dowel hole in each end of a large popsicle-stick and cut it in half. Then I drilled a small hole at the other end of thepop stick to accept the wire. Then I fitted them to the dowels as I assembled the crank.
The fourth disc I used as a spacer for the handle. I then cut a larger disc of 6cm for the handle. I then drilled near one ege to accept a small brass cupboard handle.
After doweling the pianist loosely to the stool I took a couple of pieces of fine piano wire and attached it to the pop-sticks on the crank and fed them up through the holes and finally bent them through the wrist holes.
Once I had established that the hands would move up and down I then clad the piano in some thin pine offcuts, provided another block for the keyboard, attached a couple of ends and printed out some keyboard line-art and glued it onto the keyboard block.
Then with a nod to my late Grandfather I made a beer mug from some dowel with a pop-stick handle.
And here is the result
Click here to see it in action – complete with the crank mechanism!
You can get more information on automata like these at Automata.co.uk This one has good information on how automata work – their mechanisms and how to design your own.
And there are some great online displays of kinetic toys, such as these:
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on December 23rd, 2006 — Posted in DIY, Journal, Music, Woodwork
Many years ago one of my fellow Mucky Duck Bush Band members – the late Barry Halpin – made a flute for me from PVC pipe. It was a transverse Irish Simple System flute (6 – holes) that worked on the same fingering as a tin whistle.
Several house moves later and that flute is long gone. But recently I came across Doug Tipple’s instructions on how to make one of these flutes and decided to make a couple.
The internal diameter of Australian PVC piping is a little different from the measurements that Doug gives, but using a tuner I found that Doug’s measurements give a good approximation. Using his metric sizes on some 20mm pvc tubing I made a couple of quite passable and playable flutes. Here’s how I did it. I made mine in the key of D – if you want to make one of a different key, try using Pete Kosel’s ‘Flutomat’ – just follow the link and set the desired key in the key selector at the bottom of his chart and you will have the necessary measurements
Pete Kosel’s Flutomat
First, I bought two one-metre lengths of 20mm white pvc tubing. I cut it to the overall length of 570mm
Then I attached a length of masking tape along the length to prevent tearout when drilling the holes.
I measured 525mm from one end and drilled a 9.5mm hole for the embouchure (for blowing). I stopped one end with a cork and blew across the embouchure to find I could make a fairly decent C# – The taking the flute back to the mitre saw I took a couple of salami slices off the end away from the embouchure until I could get a consistent D – the total length was now 563mm.
Then I laid out the holes with the following measurements as measured from the bottom of the flute:
hole one = 98mm (8.0mm drill)
hole two = 137mm (11.0mm drill)
hole three = 166mm (9.5mm drill)
hole four = 223mm (8.0mm drill)
hole five = 260mm (9.5mm drill)
hole six = 297mm(9.5mm drill)
Before drilling, don’t forget to centre-punch the marks so the drill doesn’t wander on the curved surface. And the drill needs to run slowly to avoid tearout and chipping the pvc. As you drill each hole, you need to test the flute against a tuner and make adjustments to the hole to bring it into tune by slightly extending the hole into an oval to make it sharper.
Once you have the holes drilled and in tune you will need to clean up the edges with a half round needle file
You may want to file the embouchure hole into a slight D shape to make it easier to make the notes. But that’s all there is to it. With a bit of patience and careful measurement you can build one in about an hour – this flute cost me a total of AUS$3.70!
Click here to hear a scale played on this instrument – please note that I am not a flute player!
Enjoy!
Cheers
Jerry
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