Tomorrow is the final electrical/plumbing inspection. Provided everything passes, I plan to begin work on the interior on Sunday. (My wife’s birthday is Saturday so I’m taking the kids while she has a “spa day”.)
I’ve been reading “the Workbench Book” by Scott Landis and plan to read Ron Schleining’s “The Workbench” based on recommendations on Amazon and elsewhere, and my head is swimming with ideas for finishing the interior. At this point I have a pretty decent handle on the cabinetry for the long wall - opposite the fireplace - where the radial arm and DeWalt 706 miter saw will live and share a fence/stop system.
I build a lot of case goods and am frequently drilling shelf ping holes, routing dadoes for shelving, installing hardwood drawer glides, etc in substantial plywood panels. In the past I’ve used “back-to-back” straight-edge clamps to hold these on the workbench. I also enjoy cutting my own custom veneers. Therefore, I’m also thinking about building a rolling assembly table/veneer press that will live behind the table saw, underneath a flip-up outfeed table. I’m thinking the outfeed table will hinge on the fireplace wall (actually attached to the bricks) and flip upwards to reveal the assembly table which may also be wheeled around to make more room. In my head, this table is roughly 3′ x 6′ and features two full-width end vises, one on each 3′ end, along with a row of bench dog holes on both the front and back edge for clamping the wide stock.
I’ll post the plans for those once the drawings are complete.
In the meantime, I’ve finished the time lapse video of the exterior construction…from breaking ground through landscape repair. I may make some additional edits in the future…maybe make a 3-4 minute version (this one’s ~6mins. long). But at least for now…here it is:
I spent this past weekend installing Knotty Pine tongue and groove paneling in the new woodshop. As with the floors, I cut costs on materials by purchasing the “value line” stuff (offcuts, etc.) However, unlike the flooring, this stuff was awesome! When they said that most of the pieces were 3′ - 8′ long, they weren’t lying — in fact, there were far more 8′ pieces than I expected and though I tried to stagger my usage, I ended up running out of the smaller pieces before I was done. The 1′ - 4′ pieces were simply more convenient to handle when cutting out notches for doors, outlets, ceiling peaks, etc. This is good stuff and I highly recommend these guys.
The only real downside was that FedEx freight from Michigan cost nearly 50% of the cost of the lumber itself…however it was *still* comparable in price to buying the crap T&G paneling they sell at Menards or The Home Depot. In fact, I was a bit concerned that I would run out near the end and went to HD to buy a piece or two of theirs to use in an unseen area. Not only didn’t it match, it was just plain bad stuff…full of checks and dings and just not very attractive. I wound up buying a couple 8′ pine boards and milled a bevel top and bottom to match the look. I wound up with 2 8′ pieces left over after using 3 of the “mock” T&G boards.
Did I mention that I didn’t have to discard a single piece of of the paneling…or cut around any defects? Honestly…it was all good.
It was a very busy Labor Day weekend. On Saturday I began the process of installing 300sq ft. of “utility grade” Oak hardwood flooring from Lumber Liquidators. This stuff is only $.89 sq. ft. — and for good reason. Much of it was under 10″ in length (many pieces significantly less). There were numerous pieces that were improperly milled, missing tongues, missing grooves, etc. I originally purchased 330 sq. ft of the stuff, but upon further reflection decided that I should have purchased less utility grade stuff - maybe closer to 250sq. ft. and maybe 100sq. ft. of good stuff (select Red Oak). I ultimately wound up buying around 60sq. ft. of select Red Oak so that I’d have at least a few long pieces to weave in periodically. Inserting the occasional 8′ long piece after working with tons of 6″ pieces also served as a morale boost - speeding up completion of that row significantly.
All things considered, I probably saved less than $200 in materials. However, I actually prefer the “patchwork” look for a workshop floor and it will definitely be easier to stomach the occasional inevitable incident that results in nicks, scratches and potentially gouges in the hardwood.
The next question is: How do I finish the floor? Do I apply Polyurethane? Water-based? Or should I leave it unfinished?
I’m fairly certain that at some point someone is bound to knock over a can of stain in the shop…and without *any* sealer, the wood will soak it up like a sponge. I’m also concerned about mud and water damage in the traffic areas. However, I’m also leery of a heavy - and occasionally slippery - polyurethane finish. For now I’m thinking of filling, sanding and then using a sanding sealer or possibly a light coat of water-based poly. Research continues.
There’s still a lot of work to do on the interior…but here’s a time-lapse of the weekend’s endeavors below:
The “kid” helping me in the video is “Mike” — he works for the GC who built the addition. My GC recommended him to me and my wife insisted I hire an assistant. My back thanks all three!
Here’s the most current construction time-lapse video. So far we cover groundbreaking through roofing. The trades were here today installing plumbing and electric. We’re closing in!
Here’s my first post of the developing construction process time-lapse video. I started with a single camera mounted in a tree facing the back of the addition. It worked, but was a bit tighter of a shot than I would have preferred. I kept the camera here through the foundation dig and pour and the first day of carpentry. At that point, it became clear that sometime the following day they would be erecting the back wall, effectively blocking out all further (interesting) imagery.
Original Camera Position
My main dilemma was that I only had a single camera and wasn’t quite sure when the workers would be erecting that back wall. Would it be the first wall they put up or the last? I thought I would purchase a second camera and quickly install it…but was unable to locate a single retailer in my area who stocks the DLink DCS-G900.
So, I made an “executive decision” and moved the camera to a roof-mounted position. This turned out to be a rather poor idea. First off, I quickly discovered it wasn’t far enough away to capture the entire site. However, it was now closing in on 8:00PM - too late to turn back, so I quickly set about aiming and focusing it. This was rather tricky as I was basically hanging off a ladder manipulating the focus ring on the camera lens while my wife was directing me from the addition floor with my notebook on her lap. Being a rather inexpensive (cheap!) camera, it has extremely poor low-light performance and by this time the sun was long gone…so getting an accurate focus was simply not possible. Spot lights only served to create “hot” areas in the video which didn’t help at all. I basically turned the focus ring until we thought it might be acceptable and crossed our fingers.
Annalise eying the camera
Thankfully it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. It wasn’t very good either…but I did manage to edit together a short snip of video to insert into this point in the time-lapse.The following evening — beginning at 6:00pm to ensure I didn’t once again run out of daylight — I decided to follow my wife’s day-earlier suggestion and mounted the camera to a tree just across the sidewalk roughly 35′ away. Why I don’t simply take my wife’s advice at all times I’ll never know. The distance proved a bit much for my WiFi, but a quick stop to tigerdirect to buy a 7db gain antenna solved that problem quite nicely. It was installed and focused well before the sun went down and I was able to help put the kids to bed!
The position is nearly perfect so I plan to keep this camera there for the remainder of the build. Of course, this camera is unable to capture any of the interior of the project — so I naturally needed to purchase a second one.
This unit is currently mounted in the garage, ready for the crew to break through the back wall. I’d love to put it inside the addition, but there really doesn’t appear to be a place that would provide both a reasonable field of view and still be guaranteed to be out of the way of the workers. Since I’m not present to move the camera while they work, I can’t afford to mis-place as I’m not prepared to pick up the smashed pieces of a camera later that evening!
