A Wood Shop of Sorts

One of the reasons, besides the Pacific Northwest winter weather, that I haven't been posting anything Bolero related is that I have been finishing up building and outfitting a small wood shop.

Why a wood shop of sorts? Well limitations on space and a bunch of other issues determined that the maximum footprint would be 10 ft x 12 ft. Also no permanent electrical service. So basically an over achieving shed.

Having just worked with Tim to find a way to have a modicum of comfort in an old skinny race boat I was optimistic that I could come up with a small shop that I could do real work in. I was also motivated to give up my existing outdoor front porch working environment.

After a bit of studying of various types and plans for small sheds I settled on the Saltbox design shown below.

I have always like this design and I thought it would fit nicely on the site that I had planned. It is pretty conventional although I did make a couple of significant changes. First I incorporated a structural ridge beam so I could have a high ceiling without collar ties for the rafters. And second, I elected to use two large skylights in lieu of windows in the walls.

The project was carried out over many months in distinct stages. Before you rightfully label me a slacker, which I am, remember I had some important sailing to do and a boat shed to build. Still, the Pyramid job probably seems fast by comparison.

Framing (February & March 2008)
I had already laid a gravel pad when I repositioned my irrigation catchment tank. I knew a small shop was coming so I sized it accordingly. That made framing easy since I had a nice place to work that was out of the mud. As seems to be the case, the stick go up quickly.

Roofing and Siding (Summer and Fall 2008)

For some reason I can't find my photos of the this stage of the building process. But the roofing went on first, after a lengthy roofing order delay, and the siding quickly after that. I also built a sliding door. All in all mostly finished by this time.

Insulation & Finishing (January 2009)

Two events cause work on the shop to come to a grinding halt. First Tim finished Bolero's construction and she was delivered to Lopez in late September. And every day I wasn't sailing I was working on the new Clearspan boat shed. So finishing up the interior languish until the new year.

Nothing special about this stage. Traditional insulation and I elected to use Luan plywood instead of drywall for the interior finishing. I also insulated the sliding door with rigid foam.

Electrical and Dust Control (January 2009)

With the insulation and siding complete I was getting anxious to wrap this project up. I had already moved many of my tools in and I was getting tired of moving everything every time I did something new to the interior. The dust control system was pretty straight forward as everything was going to run through my shop vac. The electrical system was a bit trickier. Since there isn't an electric panel in the shop I run everything off of two heavy duty extension cords from exterior outlet from the house. What I wanted to do was eliminate the messy and dangerous tangle of extension cords I was currently using. So I created and internal shop electrical system that plugged in (I also did this for my air compressor).

Pictures of my electrical system and dust control system will be in every picture in the tool outfitting section.

Tool Outfitting (February 2008 thru February 2009)

I did quite a bit of reading and researching trying to decide how to outfit my small shop so that I could actually use the tools after they moved in. I started out being drawn towards the Shopsmith system but could never quite commit to it. The big problem that concerned me was infeed and outfeed requirements for a table saw, jointer etc in a small 10 ft by 12 ft space. I finally stumbled onto Festool and their guide rail system. This has the advantage, for my small space, of moving the tool over the wood instead of the wood over the tool. So my basic Festool woodworking tools include the following.

• 2 Festool MFT3 Multifunction Tables
• Festool TS 55 Plunge Cut Circular Saw
• Festool Rotex RO 125 Dual-Mode Sander
• Festool OF 1010 EQ Plunge Router
• Festool CT 22 HEPA Dust Extractor

That is the new side of my small shop. There is also an old side with some classic "arn".

I always knew I wanted a bandsaw and a drill press but the more research I did the less I was drawn to the modern imported big box tools. Somehow I happen across the Old Woodworking Machines forum and quickly found these gems. The bandsaw is a 70s vintage Rockwell 28-200 14" and the drill press is a 40s vintage Craftsman 101.03622. Both are quite stout and working fine. I also have an old Atlas shaper which isn't shown (a small project).

In addition I have a slew of 18 volt Bosch hand tools, an Akeda dove tail jig, a Makita 2012 bench top planer and other stuff.

So that's my small wood shop. So far it is working out great. Time will tell if I can get the functionality I hope for out of such a small space. I do know that I have two pretty aggressive projects ahead to test the concept. A full size Murphy bead and an 8 ft dinghy. I figure if I can build them the rest will be easy.

Boat Shed Completed

Well tonight we wrapped up the construction of the Clearspan Shelter. I actually did a bit of work on Friday to finish off the anchor assemblies. This went so fast that I started to install the back wall. But the breeze came up a bit which prompted me to check the forecast. Gales and small craft advisories so the wall came down and a plan to finish up Sunday (today). So I cleaned up and finished my prep work.

That meant assembling the tubes that insert into the cover and pre-drilling the end wall clamps.

Today was the big day and the weather was quite cooperative. Mostly that meant "no wind". Although it was mostly overcast it was still quite pleasant. Laura came out today to help with the big event and she taped up the frame seems will I installed the end wall.

I had decided over the course of a few days to forego the front wall with the zippered roll up door. This cured a number of problems. First I could ignore the slight grade on the site where we located the shed. And second I could now place almost all of the mast inside the shed.

With the decision behind me I took advantage of the extra end wall clamps and really did a job.

With the end wall and taping done it was time to haul up the main cover. With everything staged and my helpers jumping at my every command I screwed up. Turns out that I had the cover oriented the wrong way and was trying to pull the front and back edge over the top.

I little humble pie and some well deserved kidding and we quickly righted my error by laying out the cover in the grass in front of the shed. I would be remiss if I didn't mention that this is what the instruction said I was suppose to do in the first place.

Okay, back up we go again. This time everything looked much better. I was probably much more careful that I needed to be but I didn't want to snag the cover on anything.

He is the completely lift main cover prior to any tensioning. I tensioned the back wall first, then the front wall. Then I loosely tighten one side then went back and forth cinching down the ratchet straps on each wall until the cover was tight.

Ta Da! Here is the finish shed. Sorry about the poor quality photo, it was getting dark.

Tomorrow I will clean up Bolero and move her in. I still need to tension down the ground anchors. I only hand tightened them since the ground was so soft and I didn't want to chance them pulling out. I figure if a wait a little bit the ground should harden up nicely and they won't be going anywhere.

Boat Shed Construction - Part 4, 5 & 6

Yes this blog is still about boats and yes, with the exception of a few distractions, I have been busy on Bolero's winter home. Actually I have been working on the shed much more than on the computer so this post will incorporate three days work.

Saturday - 1 Nov 2008

Not surprisingly, everything was just the way I left it a couple of weeks ago.

I started the day by laying all the frames out in the grass to get them out of my way and to stage them for their pending assembly.

After that I installed the lower purlins on each side using some spacers I made out of scrap.

Next I install the end wall cross beams. These beams are used to support the end walls and need to be cut to length.

Having the end wall beams installed shows some of the challenges of my sloping site. I still haven't completely figured out how I am going to compensate for this. I am sure the answer will come shortly.

This was one of those days were the progress didn't seem to keep pace with my work effort. Hopefully that will change as I am getting anxious to get Bolero out of the weather.

Tuesday- 4 Nov 2008

As I have mentioned a number of times my method of construction has some variation from the Clearspan instruction manual. The biggest difference is the use of short lengths of rebar to align and support the frames during assembly. So far this has been a saving grace. But is has caused a few complexities. The current one is the installation of the end wall support beams. These beams are meant to go after the frames are up. But in my case, because of the rebar inside the frames, I needed to install them first. So, I also need to install the end wall onto the beam and cut the fabric to size.

With this complete it was time to get busy on frame installation. I installed the back frame first, checked for plum and installed the diagonal braces.

With this done it was time to go into mass production and install all of the frames. This is where Craig's rebar idea really shown. All of the frames were perfectly happy standing with just the rebar for support. It is hard to see, but I have also begun the top and two upper side purlins.

I also spent some time replacing my ladder setup with Craig's scaffolding. This is really going to speed things up.

Wednesday - 5 Nov 2008

With the scaffolding setup and parts laid out from yesterday's effort, I was excited and got started early. I pre-assembled the remaining purlins and clamped them to in place. This really sped up the remaining assembly of the frames. In a couple of hours I had finished all but the end frame.

I need to do a little extra work on the front frame, again because of my rebar choice, but I quickly wrapped up this phase of the project. I make a special effort not to spend any time looking at or tinkering with Bolero. That would be a schedule breaker for sure. But I did have a peek today. Your can see the completed frame assembly in the background.

The fun job, not so fun job pendulum swung to not so fun. So after lunch it was time to finish off the anchor assemblies. You may recall in an earlier post that I was unable to drive all of the anchor completely into our hard clay soil. Well it was time to try and remedy this. My hope was that having started the anchors our rainy fall weather would have loosen up the soil. So armed with a short length of rebar I took after the anchors again. And guess what? All but two went in easy.

With the anchors well anchored into the ground it was time to attach the turnbuckles to the frames. This required drilling into the frames for the attachments which turned out to be surprisingly hard. After getting through about a third of them, I decided to wimp out and call it a day.

All in all, quite a productive day.

I started out the day thinking that I might get to hang the rear end wall. But my optimism was a bit much. But I am getting close. I think that I have 1 more day of anchor assembly and miscellaneous stuff and then I am going to try and hang all the fabric in one day.

Boat Shed Construction - Part 3

With the weather cooperating nicely I was back at it pretty early this morning. Well early for me anyway. As I mentioned, my goal for today was to finish the west side pad, level the gravel and install the earth anchors that hold the shed down.

Yesterday I started work on the row of 4x6s I was using for the base for the west frames. This pretty clearly shows the sloop I am dealing with. In addition the west side isn't quite as level and the 4x6 provide a stronger base in places that needed bridging. But mostly they are used as spacer to level the shed. I started out today double checking that my ends were level side to side. I then started work on the northwest padding that I hadn't got to yesterday.

This was problematic because of tree stump that we weren't able to completely remove. As it turns out I caught a break since I could leave a gap in the support base as there weren't any frames at the location where the roots were the most annoying. I did have to do some digging to level 4x6's on either side of the stump, but all in all not too bad.

After finishing and installing the west wall pads I drilled holes every 4 feet and installed the rebar that I am using to hold my pads in place and locate the frames. I also decided to drive the rebar in a bit deeper than I had been as I liked how much firmer they became. My guess is that I drove the 4 foot section of rebar about 2 1/2 feet into the ground.

With that done I quickly install the short section of each frame. The manual actually instructs you to assemble the frames using these short piece, but I like have a cover for my rebar and being able to assembly the first row of purlins.

With this done I started thinking about leveling the gravel a bit. It didn't take much thought for me to ask Craig if he could spare me 10 minutes on his John Deere. His 10 minutes save me at least an hour of raking.

With freshly leveled gravel I decide to have a go at the ground anchors. I had been dreading this job since I ordered the shed. I have dug enough holes to know that this wasn't going to be easy. Even with a fancy drill bit that Craig whipped up this task more than lived up to my reservations.

I had originally planned to install an anchor every other frame, per a conversation with the Clearspan folks. I quickly went to plan B which was install an anchor were I could actually set one. In the end it worked out okay. I got the anchors I wanted at the front, anchoring the first two frames, and most of the anchor I wanted along the way.

Some were perfect, like the one below, and I could set them all the way to the eye.

But others sternly refused to go more than half way in. I am not terribly thrilled with the quality of these anchors from Clearspan. The would easily twist due to the torque of trying to install them. I am still pondering what to do about the few recalcitrant anchors, but I needed to move on. Perhaps a little rain may help soften their resolve.

With the pads, rebar, gravel and anchor done it was time to move to the erector set portion of this project. This is the easy part or so I thought. The instructions read:

Select the six (6) pipes needed to assemble a rafter and arrange these on a flat surface as shown below for assembly.

No problem. Except where was I going to find a flat surface to assemble these 14 feet by 14 feet frames. Any twist at all at the joints results in a frame that is not planer. I tried laying out a frame on the frame pads and shimming the gravel but I wasn't happy with the results or the method.

About that time Craig took a break from his shop to see how I was doing. Her spent a minute looking at the problem and mention that I could always use the roof of his shed next to mine. It was brilliant. Off he went back to his shop.

Craig is truly a artisan Blacksmith. You can view is portfolio on his site CraigWithrow.com.

Armed with this great new idea I quickly went about setting up my rooftop framing assembly line.

Not much later, I had 10 frames ready to go.

About this point I quickly started to realize that my progress had eclipsed my planning so I call it a day.

Saturday is Bolero's haul out day so maybe Sunday I will be back at it.

Boat Shed Construction - Part 2

Sailing Bolero has been a major distraction to finishing, or even really starting, the Clearspan Boat Shed that will become Bolero's winter home. But with the stormy winter weather arriving and a haul out appointment set for Saturday, I picked up the project again yesterday.

Before I jump into my adventures, a disclaimer.

Disclaimer: I am not a professional builder. I have made building decisions based on my building site or personal preferences that may not reflect the intent of Clearspan and may not be safe for other situations. In the end you are on you own. This post is for enjoyment only and is not intended as building guidance.

Okay onto the adventure. I gather the tools I thought I would need, packed up the car and headed over to my building site. It was just like I left it after spreading gravel and playing with the layout a bit.

The first thing I wanted to do was lay out the footprint of the shed. The overall dimensions are 14' x 14' x 36'. It is a pretty nice site, but it did contain a fair bit of sloop to the west and a little bit to the south. Some of this Craig helped me level with his bulldozer but the rest I had to fix with my frame pads. But first I need to lay everything out.

I started with the with the east side since there is an existing structure on this side. This became my datum. I ran a string line parallel to Craig's shed and started working on leveling the pads for the east wall of the shed. Craig had made a suggestion that I jumped all over. He suggested that I use rebar to index the frames. This should help in a number of ways. First it locates the pad boards and second it provides some additional support for the frames.

For the pads on the east side I used some extra plastic wood that Craig had scavenged and drilled 5/8 inch holes for the rebar. They are placed on 4 foot centers to accommodate the forthcoming frames.

For the most part this side was pretty straight forward as it was mostly level for and aft. My gravel pad, however, did bulge a bit in the middle and taper of at the fore and aft ends so I had a bit of raking to do (and still more to do) to get this level. But all in all it went well. Here is the completed east pad with the rebar installed and a small section of frame in place.

One of the things about Clearspan shelters, which I knew going in, is that they are"temporary structures". This seems a bit of stretch at times. If you follow their instructions, and warnings, to the letter there will be a fair bit of concrete work (for the anchors and end walls). I have felt from the beginning that if I had my own land I would have definitely built a more conventional structure.

Here is where I left off at the end of the day. I am partially finished with the west side frame pads. I elected to use 4x6 for the west side pads to level the shed.

Today's goal, weather permitting, is to try and finish the west side pads, level the gravel some more and maybe start installing the frame anchors.