The Mammoth Bookshelf

The Mammoth Bookshelf

Along with one or two other projects, this one has been taking up the majority of my time. Originally it wasn't going to be anywhere near as big but as with the majority of things, minds were changed along the way and a behemoth was born.

The initial idea was a simplistic bookshelf with staggered shelves to make it slightly more quirky with DVD and CD sections. It then became a bookshelf to house cats as well. Then it had to fit floor to ceiling and around coving. I had a job on my hands.

The first thing I had to do was get the materials in and then some more. Standing at 2.34m high and 1.5m wide, a lot of wood was needed for this one. That and the shelves were doubly thick on 7 sections added to the number needed.

The first major task was to get all of the wood cut, which was a feat on its own. 10 sections at 25cm, 21 sections at 47.5cm and 5 sections at 2.34m meant a lot of work for the chop saw.

47.5cms

The first lot of the 25cm sections

Once I had the cuts made, I needed to grind away a lot of the damaged wood to get back to the grain and create curves on the front face. This took quite a substantial amount of time, but the end result was worth in my eyes. The next step was to start assembling the first of the 4 sections. Measure twice and drill once was the plan, but that went out the window straight. There was a lot of test and adjust with this one but it all got there in the end.

The first section assembly

Once the first section was pieced together, I stood it up outside the garage to take a look at it. It wasn't too bad to start and just needed 1 or 2 tweeks to get it right. Then it was on to the second part.

First section complete

The second part took slightly longer than the first as I couldn't use the drill to drive the screws in due to the size of the space. Had I thought about it I would have rejigged the construction to make it simpler. This section incorporated 3 of the 'Cat Shelves' which I managed to make by joining 2 of the 47.5cm sections together with a dowel joint and some wood glue. I then used the chop saw to take off the ends to try and make it cat friendly. I also wanted to try and retain some of the original features of the boards, so I grinded down some of the metal work and blended it back in to the shelves.

Second section complete

With the 'Cat shelf'

Cat Shelf detail

Frame Detail

Metalwork

As you would expect, the next task was to put together the third section which was a mirror copy of the first and it went on with relatively little fuss and the result of that venture can be seen below. At present, this is the bookshelf's state, but the fourth and final section will be on in the next few days. Unfortunately I suffered a casualty in the making of this one, as my trusty drill has packed in due to extensive use over the last 4 years. Off to get a new one in the sales me thinks! As for the finish, that has yet to be decided and is out of my hands. I would love for it to stay like this but as it isn't for me, it will be decided by the soon to be new owners. Check back in the next few days for the final result. This has been a labour or love so far and to be honest I now cannot wait for it to be finished as I have absolutely no room in my garage now for the other projects.

Third section complete

 Finally, the beast is complete with wax on top. As you can see it has taken up the majority of my garage space which has made it a bit of a nightmare to work on and check as I went through but thankfully it has all come together at last. As much as I would like to keep it, I'll be glad to see it go. I've learnt a lot of lessons on this one. Namely, I need better tools and I shall be getting some quality pieces over the next few months to hopefully make light work of future jobs. That and the fact that an angle grinder can do almost anything. I love that thing. Anyway, that's it for now. The next project won't start itself so I best get back to the garage. Many thanks for looking and check back soon for the next project as well as some pictures of this beast in its new home!

A Book-Holder for the missus

A Book-Holder for the missus

My wife to be had been complaining for some time that she had nowhere in the kitchen to hold her cook-books whilst cooking. I therefore took if upon myself to get out to the garage and come up with a suitable contraption to mend said ailment.

After a brief rummage around, I found several piece of wood that would fit the bill.

The first thing I needed to do for the lot of them was remove the rough edges by planing them all down to their finery. This took a bit longer than I expected but I got there in the end and was left with a lovely smooth finish over the majority of the wood.

Next I had to mark out the points that I would use for the dowel joints on each board. This was pretty straight forward and took a few minutes with my new go-to drill bit. Once I had the holes in place it was a case of cutting the dowels and gluing them all together.









Once they were set in place I needed to leave them for a while before I could continue with the rest of the work so that they were rigid enough to withstand some heavy kitchen work!

As I wasn't too worried about the back end of the holder, I opted to use 2 wood screws on the back for the stand. If I had had a hinge to hand, I would have used this so that it could have been folded down if needed but alas, I did not, so I decided to make the back rigid as well.

Now the lady indoors has a thing for all things pretty and feminine and as it was, the book-holder was sporting a rather manly look and needed some adjusting. So to get the heart effect in the wood, I marked out the area I wanted to use in pen and then made perfect use of my trusty angle grinder with a sanding attachment to get the grooves in its front face. This was relatively straight-forward and with a bit of practice on some more scrap pieces, I might be tempted to get even more creative in future. 

To finish the whole thing off, I used some left-over wax from a previous project an on the right here you can see the finished result. As you can see I also created some 'page-holders' by drilling 2 holes in the shelf and cut 2 more dowels that can be removed to fit differing sized books in the holder.

So that is this week's project completed, I now just need to figure out what the next one is going to be.

Thanks for looking and check back soon for my next adventure!

Cheers.

A just because bed-side table

A just because bed-side table

I found myself bored one day and decided that our bedroom was in need of a bedside table. So off I popped to get some wood and I took it from there. 

I purchased some nice rustic looking softwood (I was going to opt for Oak but didn't have the extra pennies required) and decided to use some spare wood I had in the garage left over from a pergola project as the legs.

As the wood came in 1.2m sections I only had to make 2 cuts to get the 3 individual parts for the top. After that I had to make the 4 legs for the table. The main lesson I've learnt from this project is that I NEED a table saw. The circular saw just wasn't cutting it when it came to getting accurate right-angle cuts and therefore I had to spend a lot of time getting the whole thing levelled. As I was making it for myself, I wasn't too worried about the underside, but if this was for someone else, it would have been finished off and secured in a much neater way. I used 2 spare sections on the underside to act as a brace to hold it all together and whilst they do they job, they are not that nice to look at. But as I say, this one was for me.

To finish it all off, I decided to go for a lovely dark oil so that it tied in nicely to our bedroom. Below is the finished article. I didn't want to take away from the overall rustic look of it so I decided to only give it a fine level of sanding. This meant that it is still quite rough to the touch which I love.

Thanks for looking and apologies for the dark pictures.