Up-cycling an old shoe shine box...

A short video where I up-cycle an old shoe shine box into something more useful, in this case an easy to carry sewing box.

The box didn't really need much doing to it, just a new handle and a bit of sanding, I did make a small tray for the inside to add extra storage, all in all I'm happy with the results, and again another object given a new life and saved from the bin and for no cost other than a little effort.

I've found over the years that although an object might need some work the way it was built is much better than modern equivalents and was made from better materials, I guess more effort was put in to making an item that functioned well but would also last for many years and production costs were less of an issue.

Anyway the video is below.

Thanks for visiting.

Cutlery canteen up-cycle...

This is a project I completed a while ago, but I was pleased with the results and it was better than putting the box in the bin, it's worth thinking about other uses for things before chucking them out, especially when peoples finances are, shall we say stretched.

During ww2 the UK government at the time introduced the 'Make Do And Mend' campaign (amongst others) and perhaps in the world we currently live in it's something we should re-visit, anyway, below is a video I made of me re-purposing an old cutlery canteen.

Here's the video -

Turned out nicely, and had I not converted it, it would have ended up in landfill, which would have been a shame.

Thanks for visiting.

Sewing Box Renovation...

It's been a while since I've written a post on here, the last few have been cross posted from my Youtube channel, so I thought I'd do things the other way round maybe.

I have over the years repaired many things, and this sewing box that I recently acquired was in need of some attention.

Sewing box (cat for scale) - 

The box was made around 1930 / 1940 and it's made from Oak, and has it's original Bakelite casters, a nice thing, it was lined with a silk like material, however over the years it had become badly stained and I think maybe moths had been at it as well, the wood work also needed some tlc, nothing drastic just joints re-gluing and the finish was very patchy.

So as with most jobs like this it has to get worse before it gets better, time to take stuff apart, which wasn't that hard seeing as time had done some of the work already.

Pile of bits - 

You can see the green material, which was glued to very old board, what was also interesting is that whoever made the box had used 2 bits of board to fix the legs to the box part, which meant I needed to find a way of fixing the 2 bits back together, but first sanding the old finish off and removing the years old glue that seemed to be everywhere.

Right most of the sanding done, time to start putting things back together, a good idea when doing something like this is to use a tub with a lid for any screws and other fixings you take off, that way they don't get lost.

First the top section which makes up the box needed to be glued back together - 

I had to do this in stages, but it worked well in the end and once that was done it was on to fixing the box section back onto the legs, to replace the board I removed I cut thin strips of oak salvaged from an old table (made around the same time as it happens) and used these to glue and pin the 2 sections together, I used a load of clamps to make sure there was good contact between the 2 sections.

Many clamps - 

I also used strips of wood as wedges to push the strips of oak into the top section, this was also necessary as the top had a bow in 2 sides which is now gone.

In the image the black lines indicate the new strips of oak that fix the 2 parts together, the bits with red marks we just wedges.

 

I did also need to cut a new pieces of wood for the base of the main box, the drawer and the 2 smaller top boxes as these had been lined with the green silk and none were salvageable, another good tip if you do anything like this is to try and remove the parts in one piece as this will give you templates for any new parts you might need to make, just makes life easier.

Once I had it all glued and pinned back together it was just more sanding to remove access glue and then the wood needed to be stained (I used a light oak stain) mainly because the sanding process removed some of the colour, and after the stain had dried I applied a dark oak wax and buffed it to a nice shine, and then I've applied a further clear wax to help maintain the finish.

And here it is, all done and ready for many more years of service, very pleased with the end result.

Saved from landfill, now just got to sort the other one I have out (some assembly required)

Yes there's a bit more work in this one, but once it's done it should look similar to the one in the picture below, which was another sewing box I renovated a while ago.

Thanks for visiting.

Replacing a failed sealed unit...

This is a job I've finally got round to fixing, basically one of the double glazed units (sealed units) in our wood framed double gazed windows failed a while ago, by that I mean condensation was building up between the 2 panes of glass and rather than replace the whole frame i decided to just replace the sealed unit.

I found a company near to us who can make sealed units to whatever spec you want so I ordered one, much cheaper than replacing the whole frame. The sealed units in upvc windows can also be replaced in a similar way and it's cheaper to replace them rather than the whole window frame, how to's can be found online and a few minutes searching will find companies near to you who can make replacement units, you will need measurements though.

Here's a video of the process, obviously this will be different for upvc windows -

Thanks for visiting.

This is not one of my better ideas, but I have always (for some reason) wanted to turn chipboard (particle board) to see what would happen, well now I know.

It's not something I'll ever do again, chipboard or particle board as it's known is horrible stuff to turn for obvious reasons, the end result is oddly pleasing, but the actual turning was very messy, lots of dust so it goes without saying that you need a proper dust mask and eye protection (even when turning proper wood)

The end result is oddly pleasing though.

Here's the video -

Thanks for visiting.

Turning a spinning top...

A short video of me turning a spinning top from oak, it's a simple turning project, but the end results are always pleasing, who doesn't love a spinning top, and it's a good use for those little odd bits of wood you end up with after a project (or is that just me?)

The oak is still a bit green, but it turns well, there's a small video at the end of some of the tops I've made recently.

Here's the video -

Thanks for visiting.

Handmade pin cushion without a lathe...

Another pin cushion I made recently, this one was made without using a lathe, and it's made from a piece of spalted birch with a tie dyed pink cushion, and in a droplet style shape.

It's something that can easily be done with hand tools and is a bit different from the usual round pin cushions I've made, it's a really easy wood working project and one that you can get creative with, this one like all the things I make is made from reclaimed materials, so not only is it a good project it's cheap as well.

I do sell some of the things I make and I've now listed the pin cushions on my website, there's a load of other stuff on there as well - www.the-shed-and-beyond.co.uk

Droplet shaped pin cushion - 

And here's the video I took while making it - 

Thanks for visiting.

Making pincushions...

I've been trying to use up some of the scraps of wood I have, I tend to hoard small bits of wood as they might come in useful at some point, I've made pincushions before on my lathe and it is a quick and simple use of any small off cuts of wood and indeed material as well.

The one's I've made in the video are all from recycled materials, even the polyester padding, it's from an old cushion, I'm quite pleased with the way they turned out.

Here's a video on how to make them - 

And here's a picture of the ones I made recently - 

Thanks for visiting.

Handmade wooden dibber...

A quick guide on how to make a dibber, perfect for planting bulbs of all variety's, cheap and quick to make, this one is made from an old pallet, or at least part of an old pallet.

Obviously you'd need a lathe to make this, it's what I used, but your could make one like this with hand tools easily enough, it'd just take a bit longer.

This one would be good for planting bulbs as it's quite thick and with the added lines down it, it will be easy to make sure things are planted at the right depth, the marks are made at 1cm intervals with a total of 12cm in all.

Here's the video of me making it -

Thanks for visiting.

Handmade valentines gift...

I've strung together some of the steps I used to make this gift for my wife, it's made in the same way as the hanging Christmas decorations, just slightly more elaborate.

I used Cherry, Pear and copper to make it and each material has a meaning or symbolism attached to it which varies from culture to culture, as an example Cherry trees in Japanese culture symbolise good fortune, new beginnings and revival and in old Buddhist stories the Cherry represents femininity, Pear wood has similar meanings as Cherry, and the shape of the fruit has long been associated with the female form and Pear trees usually live for a long time and Chinese culture associates this with immortality.

The Copper elements also have similar meanings, the metal represented Venus the goddess and the planet in Roman beliefs and copper has long been used by the Celts for making jewellery, it was in ancient times a highly regarded material, which is why it's often found in burials along with other metals such as Bronze, which is a Copper alloy.

Here's the video -

Thanks for visiting.

Hanging decoration how to...

For many years I have tried to make some kind of decoration for Christmas and a couple of years ago I made some hanging decorations similar to the one I make in this set of videos, I've broken the steps into 3 parts, and yes it's either very late or very early depending on your view, but it is relevant for this time of year because I'm using the same method for making something for my wife for valentines day.

If you've visited this blog before you'll know I try to make things for various occasions during the year, and valentines is no exception, I'll be putting a video of that make on the you tube channel as well.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Hopefully you'll be able to see all the steps, and although I use my lathe and various other tools this could be made using just hand tools, it'll just take a bit longer.

Thanks for visiting.

Making awls from odds and ends...

 Just a quick post on my latest experiment, that being making awls from bits of wood left over from other projects and old drill bits.

They are simple enough to make, just take an old drill bit, and cut a length off it, then sharpen one end to a fine point, then all you need is a wooden handle, as I have a lathe I've used it to make my handles, but you could just as easily make them by hand.

Here's the ones I've made so far - 

Turned out well I feel

Not much to them really, all three are made from scrap bits and pieces I had in my workshop, I recorded a video on how I made them, which you can watch on youtbe.

Video -

Thanks for reading / watching.

Homemade sanding stick...

Now that the garden and allotment are starting to wind down a bit I've had more time to get round to a few projects, one of which is making a tool to hold sheets of sand paper so I don't have to put my hand inside things I'm turning on the lathe.

I've made a couple of video's, one is of it being made and the other is of me using it, but basically it's a round handle that you can attach a sheet of sandpaper to, there's a coupe of pictures below and the video's as well, all I've really done is to turn a round piece of wood and then cut a slit into it, it's into this slit that the sandpaper slides, it's very simple, but saves catching your fingers on fast spinning bits of wood.

Pictures - 

Really should've made one sooner

Check out the video's, there's a couple of pictures of the brush pot I made for my daughter at the end of the shorter one, onto the next project.

Making the sanding stick - 

Using the sanding stick - 

Thanks for reading.

Homemade bowl (friction) sander...

 Thought it was about time I made myself a bowl / friction sander for my wood turning adventures, don't know why I haven't made one before now (no excuse) but now I have, and to my surprise it works quite well, so here's a video of me going through the steps I used to make it, and at the end of this post is a very basic plan with some measurements on it, the measurements will change depending on what size bearings you use and what sort of size you want to make it.

Homemade bowl sander - 

The plan - 

Should give you a rough idea of how it's made.

As I said it's a basic plan to give you a rough idea of the dimensions of the one I made, hopefully you find it useful.

Thanks for reading.

Keep on trugin...

It's been a while since a made my last trug (about 6 years I think) and as I had some wood from an old shelf unit I though it was about time I made another, this time I've made one with a fold-able handle.

And here it is -

One rustic trug.

Here's the material for this project -

Doesn't scream trug does it?

As I said this is an old unit, which up until recently was in my daughters bedroom holding her ever expanding book collection, she now has an antique oak bookcase which I recently restored so this old slot together unit was surplus to requirements, I was just going to lay it on it's side and line it with plastic to use as a planter, but as we're changing the garden around this wasn't very practical.

There's quite a bit of wood here, but I felt like a trug was in order, and because all the bits of wood have notches cut out I was wondering what else I could do with it, there are loads of things I could make, but I like making trugs.

Firstly I cut two pieces of wood with a curved side, these make up the sides of the trug, then the idea is to nail slats between these two pieces to make up the basket part of the trug.

Sides cut - 

Should make for a good trug.

Marking curves onto wood is easy enough, have a look here at the last trug I made, it also has a quick guide on how to make curves on bits of wood - Simple trug how to (opens in new window)

So with the sides done it was time for the slats, these I cut using my bandsaw, but a table saw or even a hand saw will do just as well.

Slats cut - 

I'll tidy these up later.

Each slat is about 20mm thick (3/4 of an inch) and 25.5cm (10 inches) long the length of the slats gave me the width of the trug, so it ended up being 25.5cm (10 inches) wide and about 35.5cm (14 inches) long and about 9cm (3 and 1/2 inches) deep, so it's not huge but will hold a fair amount of stuff.

I glued and nailed the slats to the sides of the trug - 

Yes it has gaps.

The gap between each slat is roughly 20cm (3/4 of an inch) so it has gaps, but it's okay for apples or spuds and other things, and it's easy enough to put a bag or cloth liner in it for smaller items.

I used a good quality wood glue and annular nails to fix the slats, it's a good idea to drill small pilot holes for the nails to prevent splitting, just use a drill bit that's thinner than the nail.

Annular nails have what looks almost like a thread running along part of them, this helps the wood fibres to bind to the nail and helps prevent the nails being pulled out, if you've ever taken a pallet apart you'll have no doubt come across this type of nail.

Annular nail - 

You can see what looks almost like a thread.

With that done it was on to the handle, this is made in three parts, two sides and a top piece. The two sides are held to the main body of the trug using a wooden peg, this is what also allows the handle to fold.

To make the handle I drilled out the hole for the peg in two bits of wood, and then set about drawing a shape onto each bit of wood, then I cut out the shape on the two bits of wood, I ended up with a kind of fish shape.

Two sides of the handle - 

I did say kind of fish shaped.

The top piece of the handle is fixed to the side pieces using a couple of screws and glue on each end.

Rather than have just a flat handle I've cut it into a bow shape to fit the hand better.

Marking out the handle shape - 

It feels better in the hand, rather than just a flat bar.

To fix the handle to the body of the trug I've used two pieces of 9mm dowel, the dowel is glued into the body of the trug and the handle is held onto the pegs using a small pin, this gives the trug a more rustic look, well I think it does.

Handle peg (trug body) - 

You can make out the wooden dowel.

Handle peg and pin - 

The pin is easy to tap out if the handle breaks.

And here's the finished trug after a coat of wax - 

Perfect for apples.

That's about it, it's a really simple thing to make, it uses very little wood, I've still got enough to make a few more like this left over, it's something that would make a good project for kids to try, you don't need loads of power tools, it can be made totally by hand and in numerous different designs and it's practical as well, even if you don't use it for collecting apples it would make a great fruit bowl for a kitchen table.

Thanks for reading.

Simple swivel boxes...

So while we're waiting for the allotment and gardens to defrost I though I'd write a quick post about the valentines gift I made for my wife this year (yes I know that was last month) it was a quick make and I used mainly hand tools to do it, I did also intend to pyrography the lettering into the wood on the inside of the box, but ran out of time (hence the piece of paper)

Here it is, a simple heart shaped swivel box -

Made from tropical hardwood.

These types of boxes aren't a new thing, but they are easy to make if you don't have a lot of time, I didn't take pictures of the heart shaped one as I made it, so I made a couple more quickly to demonstrate the method, which have since disappeared into the depths of my daughters bedroom.

So I took a plank of wood, for this box it was just a bit of pallet - 

It is what it is, a plank of wood.

I cut it into three pieces roughly 7cm square, top, middle and bottom, I cut a hole in the middle piece with a forstner bit, but you could use a hole saw or spade bit, there are numerous ways to make holes in wood.

Once I'd made a hole in the middle piece (this makes up the void where things will be stored) I glued the middle piece to the bottom piece with wood glue and used some clamps to hold it in place.

Here's a picture of the steps mentioned above - 

Once the glue had set it was on to the next step.

Okay so now we need to make a swivel point so that the lid can slide open and closed, you can just line your pieces up and drill straight through them, but I didn't want to see the pin from the outside of the box, so I used a dowel setting tool (I have various sets in various sizes)

Basically these are small metal inserts that have a point on one end, the idea being you drill a hole in the wood (using a drill bit with a depth guide) place the insert in the hole and the use the point to mark where the other holes should be drilled, and in theory when you drill out the holes they will all line up and your dowels will be nice and straight.

Hole for the peg that the lid will swivel on drilled - 

That was easy.

If you have access to a post drill or one of the guides that you can mount a drill in it's best to use it, the straighter the better for this as you want your holes to be as straight as is possible, you can also make a guide block from two bits of wood in an 'L' shape.

Once the first hole is drilled you place the metal insert in the wood - 

Like so.

And with that done you then press the other bit of wood down on top of it to mark the next drilling point, and that's it, it's worth taking your time to make sure things are all nicely lined up and I've found that making the swivel point before the final sanding and shaping is better because if things are slightly off you can then shape and sand any miss-alignments out.

Next drilling point marked out - 

You can just make out the marks in the picture.

And that's about it, once you have holes in both pieces of wood you can put a pin in, I used a piece of dowel, but you could use metal or plastic, the length of the pin will be determined by the depth of each hole in the respective pieces of your box.

I decided to go a step further with this particular box, I've added a couple of small magnets to help keep the box closed, and I've used the same method as I did with the swivel part, that being using dowel setting tools to mark out a couple of shallow 8mm holes in the base of the box and the lid, which are a perfect fit for the 8mm neodymium magnets I have. 

Here's a picture of that process - 

Basically the same, just a larger hole.

Once that was done I roughly shaped the box with a sander, I also made a small round box on my lathe with a swivel lid in exactly the same way, I turned the two halves of the box and using the dowel setting tools made a swivel point on it, obviously if you want to make a shaped box, be it heart shaped or whatever floats your boat then cut each piece into roughly the right shape and once you've got everything lined up then do the final finishing.

There's no reason you can't make the boxes deeper by adding more sections, or why not take a log and using a hole making bit (forstner or spade) hollow it out for a rustic looking log box, you can buy small metal (brass etc) catches which are easily attached with small pins or glue, planning on getting engaged ? why not make a small wooden swivel ring box ? just a thought.

The finished boxes - 

Thanks for reading.

We've been making stars again...

Last year we made some wooden stars with led lights in them, and as we try to make some kind of decoration for Christmas we decided to make some more stars using the same method.

Here are the ones we made last year -

They survived the loft I'm pleased to report.

Here's a link to the blog post I wrote about those - Wooden star decorations. (opens in new window)

We used the same method to make this years star decorations, only this time we've made a load of smaller stars so that we could make some garland type decorations, and my daughter also wanted to make a star to hang in her room, so a lot of the pictures in this post are of my daughter making her star, she made a few to decorate in different ways.

This really is a simple make, and even with out power tools it's really easy to do, my daughter is quite young and apart from me cutting the parts out with my bandsaw all of the other work was done by her, at least on the larger stars anyway, I made the fourteen smaller stars for the garlands.

So using a template we made last year she marked out the five parts of the star - 

Templates make life easier.

All the stars we made are made from pallet wood, so basically these were free to make.

I cut out the segments roughly with my bandsaw, and my daughter then sanded each segment to the lines she'd made.

Sanding using a bench sander - 

Handy things to have.

I made sure she wore a dust mask whilst sanding the stars, I also wore one and she also wore a set of goggles to stop dust going in her eyes.

Almost done, nearly ready to glue it all together - 

Good fit on each segment.

Sanding off the feathering - 

Nearly ready for some glue.

Time to glue it all together - 

I highly recommend gorilla wood glue.

Left alone for the glue to dry - 

Looks good.

Once the glue was dry it was on to sanding the stars off so they could be decorated.

She used the smallest sander I have, the larger ones are bit heavy she said, and quite noisy, but this little one works well.

Sanding - 

Ready for some decoration.

She decided that she'd stain one of the stars with a purple wood stain, this one now hangs above her bed, and the other ones will be decorated in something festive (probably involving glitter....shudders) the wood stain is water based and was mixed especially for the star and for another Christmas decoration project.

Applying the stain - 

It looks black, but it really is purple honest.

Stain drying, it did dry a lot lighter than in the picture - 

Phone camera didn't really do the colour justice.

And here are the other three large stars we made, ready for something glittery (shudders) -

Nice wood considering it used to be a pallet.

We (mainly me for this one) made a load of smaller stars to hang from the ceiling, they were made in the same way, just on a smaller scale and to hang them we drilled a small hole through one of the points and then threaded a bit of natural string through, this allows the stars to hang from another long length of string which we pinned to the ceiling.

Like so - 

Easy peasy.

We made two garlands, each with seven stars, and in total each garland is about nine feet long, that allows for a gap of about a foot between each star with about a foot extra each end.

Here's one hanging from the ceiling - 

It was difficult to get a good angle, but you get the idea.

And that was it, not much too it, yes it was a little repetitive cutting out each star segment and then sanding and gluing, but it's worth it in the end as they look good, well we like them, and like the larger stars these were also made from pallet wood so cheap as chips.

My wife has also made garlands before and this year she's put a simple how to on her blog on how to make some excellent pine cone garlands, you can read her how to here - Pine cone garland. (opens in new window)

Thanks for reading.

Homemade polytunnel...

Yes I built my own polytunnel and it only took six years, well it took a couple of days really, but it's taken me six years to get round to it, I did think about building one when we first got our allotment but if I'm honest we soon filled up the space so we put it on hold, but now that we have a much larger plot we decided to build one.

And here it is, with it's nice polythene coat on -

Hopefully it'll prove productive.

It's made mainly from wood and some bits and pieces I had lying about, to get the curve in the roof I used some old yellow gas pipe I have, which I've been using to make covers for our veggies to stop the birds and other animals getting at them.

The construction was easy enough, but if I were to make another one I'd probably do things differently, but saying that it works and it's pretty sturdy for what it is.

I made the frame work from 2.4 meter lengths of 63mm x 38mm cls timber, some of which I cut in half on my table saw.

The frame done, starting on the uprights - 

Pretty basic, I was making it up as I went along.

Better view of the work so far - 

Uprights on one side done, on to the next.

Adding some extra support to the uprights - 

I wasn't being too accurate.

Okay, pretty straight forward so far, the base is about 18 inches longer than it is wide, so the whole thing ended up being 8 feet wide by about 9 1/2 feet long and overall it's about 6 feet in height plenty big enough for our new plot, and we should be able to get a good crop of tomatoes and other heat loving plants, like melons if I'm honest I'd quite like to get a good melon plant growing, but I digress.

So I've got the base done, and the uprights and I've added some extra support, now onto the roof sections, basically for this I'm using gas pipe, which is a pretty tough plastic tube. it does bend, but not as much as the blue water pipe you can buy.

To fix the pipe what I did was to make holes in the ends of each upright using a forstner bit, a spade bit would do just as well, the idea was to use some old rungs from a climbing frame to slip the pipe onto, the reason for this is because I'm building the polytunnel in our back garden, at some point I'll need to take it apart and transport it to the allotment, so I'm making it as sort of a kit basically, one that can easily be taken apart and put back up again.

Metal tube fixed into the wood (I'll explain the metal strap in a minute) - 

Okay, now to see if the plastic pipe fits over the metal tube.

The plastic pipe fits snugly over the metal tubing - 

Well it works.

Doing things like this meant I could detach the roof section in one part, just a case of sliding it off the metal tubes, and now to explain the metal strap, as I'd cut the wood in half it was on the thin side really for drilling into with what turned out to 19mm bit, and because of this the wood was in danger of cracking where each tube went into it, so I made some straps from an old steel band (one that used to hold a packing crate together) I put a strap round each upright where I'd fixed the metal tubes in, this is enough to reinforce the wood and stop it cracking (I hope)

And that was about it really, I added a beam that runs from front to back to give more support to the roof struts, mainly because I wasn't sure how much weight it would take once the polythene went on, and I also added a door (always handy) and some diagonal supports on the front and back ends.

Here are a couple of pictures of it up on our new allotment plot, before we gave it it's coat, this should give you a clearer view of how it's made, as I said I made it up as I went along, and although it might not be built like a conventional polytunnel / greenhouse it works, and it's sturdy enough to cope with strong (ish) winds, and of course it was cheap, in the end it cost about £45 and we have plenty of polythene to patch up any holes that develop, in fact we have enough to cover it completely again.

Front - 

Doesn't really get much simpler.

Back - 

And here it is again with it's coat - 

Here's to growing a melon or two.

A couple of points before I go, I've used white duct tape to tape up the few joins in the polythene I may upgrade this to small wooden battens at some point, I also ran lengths of the tape over each roof strut and wrapped the metal straps in tape as well mainly to stop the plastic catching and tearing on any rough bits, I do also need to add some wooden battens to the door to hold the plastic on better, I used clout nails and staples to fix the plastic in a few places while we put it on, but mostly the plastic is tucked underneath the framework and I have also built up the soil all the way round the polytunnel, this will also help keep the plastic where we want it and not on someone else's plot after a strong wind.

Thanks for reading.