5 December 2009

The wall cabinets finally get a coat of paint, once the doors are back on they'll be finished.

I got some of the plumbing done, the pipes for the tap and the waste water will be done when the cabinets are installed.

The finished kitchen cabinets...

The final part for the kitchen is a movable cabinet that will house a small 3-way fridge, hopefully the cabinet will sit the same height as the main cabinet when its on its wheels, why wheels? So i can roll it out next to the BBQ and have extra bench space for preparations and cold drinks available at hand.

28 November 2009

Shellaced and polished the bench top, varnished the doors, this caused them to be darker then the bench top, I would have preferred it to come out with a darker bench top but it looks ok.

I fixed the gap that was caused by the drawer, looks much better now.

Finished the doors on the wall cabinets, I just need to paint the cabinets themselves, also put all the handles on, there a bit 60's but do the job. In this photo you can see the fixed drawer.

31 October 2009

Back again with some pictures, some of the work was done 2 weeks ago, unfortunately I didn't have much time to post anything, so here goes.

First of, the bench top sanded and washed, I've only sanded it to #240, once my shellac and natural beeswax polish is ready I'll sand it to about #1200, this should bring out the grain nicely.


After the sanding there was plenty of painting, I've painted all the cabinets on the insides as well as the drawer and painted the base on the outside. this was done over the course of the last couple of weeks, a coat of paint here and there after work.

This weekend I finally got around to sanding the cupboard doors and managed to fit them as well.

Another look with all the doors shut, the two end doors need to be straightened out and then fill the gap between them and the drawer, apart from that I'm happy with the way its all turning out.

10 October 2009

Its been a couple of weeks again, I decided to laminate the benchtop with Tasmanian Oak, It's taken a bit of time give the glue needs to cure for 24hrs and the benchtop has to be done in 4 stages, the first was the right side of the top followed by the left side (shown below), The other 2 stages are the front trim ( shown further below) then the side trims.

Gluing of the bench.

The benchtop without the trims.

The benchtop with the front trim being glued on.

This was this weekends effort, I managed to cut and assemble two wall mount cupboards.

19 September 2009

Today seemed to breeze along, I got the cabinet doors done, the doors are made of solid core ply panels with Tasmanian Oak trims. The doors still need to be sanded and cleaned up but I was eager to see what how it would look.

I also managed to cut part of the bench top, the bench top is only 18mm MDF here as I haven't decided what I'm going to use as the actual top dressing, maybe laminated Tasmanian Oak, not sure yet.

13 September 2009

Haven't posted much lately, not to say i haven't been doing anything.

I've started building the cabinets for the shed, having an abundance of MDF laying around at work has made this rather cheap. Below are a couple of pictures, the first are the carcasses.

The carcasses on the base.


The end cabinet now with a drawer.


I mentioned a couple of posts back that I was installing a solar power system in the shed, below is the cabinet that will house the charging unit, fuse panel, pump timer and later the power inverter and anything else power related.

The sheds finished... well almost.

The personal access door is finally finished with the lock fitted, at the moment the door can only be opened and closed from the inside, I haven't decided yet if I want to extend the lock to the outside.

The gutter at the rear of the shed is now up as well so that completes the roof, I only need to attach some temporary drain pipes to the gutters until i can get my water tank.

Council have done their inspections and all is good so the shed has passed!

The only shed related work to be done now is to put the windows in (these weren't required for the inspection as they are not deemed part of the sheds structural design.)

I haven't had a chance to post much between being slack and other commitments, however I have been doing some things with relation to the shed, though not at the shed.

I have purchased a solar Panel, charger and battery as I wont be connecting mains power just yet. I have to build a bracket for the solar panel so I can mount it on the roof I am also making it adjustable for seasonal sunshine, more on that later.

Picture of the finished personal access door.
The door from the inside.

The guttering at the rear of the shed.

Steady as she goes...

Finally getting close to finishing the roof, the barge capping is now fitted on both sides and I managed to get the gutter on on one side.

Now all thatss left is put the gutter on at the back of the shed, silicon the gutter ends in and the droppers, after that comes the pipe work to divert the water to the 'yet' to come water tank.

The last two bits left is to place trims around the PA door and put the windows in.

The barge capping on the far side of the shed.


The guttering on the front of the shed.

The roof is almost done!

I only managed a half days work today, in that time I put the roof capping on finished putting the remaining screws in the roof, after much wrestling I also got the barge capping on one side of the shed.

The barge capping which comes in at 6.4 meters is rather flimsy for its length, the idea is to cut one side of it and let it over lap on the side of the shed, unfortunately no matter what I did to one end the other end would do something entirely different so I cut the capping in half an put it up that way, it should cause any leaking but I'll silicone the tops just in case.

Since the other side of the shed needs the roof sheeting trimmed to allow the barge capping to sit flush against the side wall I left it till I have more time, so instead I put the locks on the garage doors since I now have the screws to put them together, The shed can now be locked.

Now with 2 doors.

Since my helper had a party to go to today, I decided I wasn't going to do anything on the roof, I'm not real enthusiastic about getting on the roof as it is and to go up there without anyone near by wasn't going to happen, as it turned out it wasn't the best day for being on the roof anyway, it was that windy I spent the best part of the morning either catching the ladder before it hit the ground or picking it up all together, just as well I wasn't on the roof!

As I couldn't do the roof I decided to put up the corner trims on the shed. The next item that I figured I'd better do is get the wall sheets on the gable sides of the shed screwed in properly, I had only done the bottom row and the middle row and was going to do the last row when I put the end capping on, with the wind the way it was I thought it safer to get them in now so the wind wouldn't damage the sheets.

Last week Mum had cut the trims for the top of the roller doors to length, so I decided to screw those in as well.

When we fitted the roller door a couple of weeks ago we had lifted the second door into place and temporarily fastened it so it wouldn't move, at that stage we couldn't seat it properly because we had to cut the axles to length so they would fit side by side, I cut those and managed to seat it properly, the hardest part was to seat the guides properly on my own, in the end i got it all working.

Some Pictures of the inside.






Now with 2 doors.

The Roof Pt. 2

When we arrived at the block we noticed the normally dry water hole had water in it. The last week must have produce some decent rain on the block, we were to find out later the effects of lots of rain here.

We started of the day with our usual cup of coffee, then we got started on getting the sheets on the roof, the ground at the back of the shed sits higher then at the front and at the front left sits higher then the right.

To get the sheets on the roof Mum would be on the ground lifting and pushing the sheets over me and i would be on the ladder guiding the sheets onto the roof, as the middle of the sheet passes over me the sheet would fall and stay on the purlins allowing me to push it home and screw it into position.

By the time we hit the 5th sheet we started running into some problems, firstly the ladder wasn't high enough for me to comfortably balance while placing the sheets and to put the screws in i was working at head height. This caused by the slope in the land and the rain had soaked the ground so the ladder would sink making it shorter.

We drove to the hardware store and bought a 2.1 meter 'A' ladder that can be made in to a 3.6 straight ladder (not that i ever anticipate to use it at that height!)

Back to work it was, we got the rest of the sheets on the roof, i had to reseat them so they all sit straight, halfway across the roof the drill died, back to the hardware store again, bought a new drill, back to finishing the roof sheeting. Im glad the hardware store is only 15mins from the block!

To complete the roof i still need to put the top and side cappings on and put the final screws in.

The Water Hole.

The New ladder and the 'anti sinking and stabilising' measures.

The second part of the roof done.


While i was putting more screws on the roof, Mum measured and cut the side and top flashings for the rollerdoors. (Hard to tell here, between the front wall and the roller door was exposed wall edges, they now have the colour of the wall.)

The roller doors

Today would have been the least productive of days, the weather forecast was more showers then sun. I'm not real keen getting on the roof as it is, with rain around its just not an option. My plan now was to get the roller doors up and make the shed lockable.

When you get a kit for a shed it pays to look in every bag of miscellaneous bits to see what you actually get.

I spent half an hour a couple of days ago trying to work out how to mount the roller door brackets, for some reason it was in my mind to use 8 screws per bracket, this is after reading the manual several times, i didn't like this for two reasons, 8 screws aren't going to hold the door and there wasn't enough 'meat' to screw into.

Mum and i decided to go for a drive to one of the shed companies display areas and have a look at how they mounted the brackets (a mere 60km round trip). Upon arrival i see a shed the same layout as mine, looked inside and found 3 bolts per bracket, much better idea.

Driving back to the block puzzled at why i didn't get any bolts in the kit we passed a hardware store, i bought the necessary bits and off we went. Back at the block i go about marking and drilling holes, go to mount the brackets and find the bolts i bought were not threaded far enough towards the head to tighten the assembly (back to the hardware store swap bolts).

Finally i have the right bits to continue and i mount all the brackets.



When lacking brawn, brains come in handy, we couldn't lift the doors high enough to get them on the brackets, so we used ratchet tie down straps and the ladder to 'see-saw' the door high enough to lift it into position on the brackets.

Once we had one end of the roller door on the bracket i put a U-bolt in to stabilise the door and stop it from rolling of the bracket, Opening the bag that had the U-bolts and roller door handles we also found the nuts and bolts we needed for the door brackets!

The Door is up U-bolts tightened, measured, centralised and tensioned, now we get to fit the side tracks. For something i figured to be a difficult process the door seated nicely and runs smoothly!

By now it was getting late so we raised the other door onto the brackets and temporarily bolted it down.

With still only half the roof done and now only half the doors done we end another day.

Walls up roof to go

The last wall up and onto the roof. I thought the wall sheeting wasn't all that easy, well the roof isn't much better either, it took the best part of today to sheet half the roof and get it straight.

Lining up the sheets



Starting to look like a shed.

Up goes the wall sheeting

I thought putting up the sheeting would have been easy, i thought wrong, it doesn't take much for one sheet to be slightly skewed for the rest to follow with almost disastrous results, needless to say this only happened on the first wall i did, and i quickly learned and got the remaining walls up almost perfect.

The first wall done.



Cutting the sheets freehand with an angle grinder.



Just under 3 walls done, i ran out of angle grinder blades.

Putting the roof frames up

Today just seemed as though very little was accomplished compared to Sunday.

Putting the middle trusses up didn't quite go as planned, unlike the outer trusses the middle ones need to be bolted down rather then screwed, in its self not difficult unless of course you find that the only socket set and spanner set you brought are 2mm to too small. so they will get done tomorrow.

Up went the purlins and finally the strapping to give the roof some tension. If anything the most time consuming was going up and down the ladder all day screwing the purlins to the trusses.

Four of the eight purlins up and it was almost lunchtime.

Placing the purlins in position ready for fastening.

Trying to work out were best to screw the strapping.

Another days work done.