Thursday, 26 May 2011
putting up the flats
Henry jones worked with us in putting u the flats. we began by placing each one against a wall at the side of the room in the rough place where it would go. we started with the study corner. making sure that the two flats are flush we then simply screwed into the struts to hold them together. this continued all around the room. a major problem that we faced was the floor being uneven. because of this we had floating drawing room walls. to correct this we added wedges underneath the flats and then used a 'zipper' effect to screw this flats together. this is where we screwed from the bottom, up, changing the sides in which we screwed with each screw. we had a few wobbly walls afterwards due to not putting header in so Rob, Dan and myself screwed a length of pine between the door gaps to strengthen everything.
making a flat
Flats:
17- 4x8
7- 2x8
1-3x8
1- 3.5x8
1- 1.5x8
3- 3x3 (footers)
2- 4x1.5 (headers)
Making a flat is fairly simple however, when creating a set you need many of them and this can be quite tedious and time consuming. First of all we cut out 3x1 pine to the lengths that we needed them. We then screwed them together to make a basic rectangular frame. Then we screwed struts between the frame at 2 foot intervals. This was the basis to a flat. It then needed skinning. For this we used a sheet of plywood and nail gunned it to the frame. The router was then used to cut off the excess from the flat. This was then painted and hand grained. We continued this until all of the flats were completed.
17- 4x8
7- 2x8
1-3x8
1- 3.5x8
1- 1.5x8
3- 3x3 (footers)
2- 4x1.5 (headers)
Making a flat is fairly simple however, when creating a set you need many of them and this can be quite tedious and time consuming. First of all we cut out 3x1 pine to the lengths that we needed them. We then screwed them together to make a basic rectangular frame. Then we screwed struts between the frame at 2 foot intervals. This was the basis to a flat. It then needed skinning. For this we used a sheet of plywood and nail gunned it to the frame. The router was then used to cut off the excess from the flat. This was then painted and hand grained. We continued this until all of the flats were completed.
japanese plates journal entry 3
i was asked to make three sets of japanese plates for the drawing room. the first set was three square plates that i painted as a set of cherry blossoms. these were hung on the drawing room wall. the other two sets were unfortunatly incomplete due to the two smaller plates of the sets breaking. however i did paint two large plates with cranes and two other with a samurai and geisha. the samurai and geisha were not used as i decided that they did not suit the room and were not of good enough quality.
personal reflection on furniture
i was asked to construct a desk with Nuria and a bookcase with dan however, as we were all working on something together we all pulled together to build the desk, bookcase and cabinet. i enjoyed making three large pieces of furniture however it was a push to make such large pieces in the time given. i personally enjoyed the desk the most. being inducted on the lathe was good as it is a skill i wanted to have but it was very time consuming. i also think that the desk looked the best out of the three pieces. the cabinet was possibly the hardest to make as we had no autocads to work from so we had to guess appropriate sizes. each piece had its share of problems but i beleive that the team overcame them well to get the furniture finished in time for the deadline.
construction of the cabinet
the cabinet was not something that i was originally asked to make however dan, nuria and myself decided to make all three pieces of furniture together. we had a design for the cabinet however no autocad was produced so we had no measurements to work with. because of this we had to use our own opinions to create this piece. first of all we decided that instead of the cabinet being tall and thin (as it would resemble the bookcase too much) we would have a fairly low cabinet and quite wide. we recycled the door that was taken from the what not and used it as the door to our cabinet. to determine how big the sides of the cabinet would be we simply took a piece of 18mm MDF and drew around the curve of the door, then drew another curve on each side of the first. then we cut two of these out and added a rectangular back with braces. this gave us the shape of the cabinet.
two walls were the put up inside the cabinet to seal off the middle curve. we attatched two shelves in there and attached the door. three curved shelves were put on each side of the cabinet. when putting the top on we used a nail gun and as shown below we ended up with a bit of a nail graveyard inside which we had to correct.
the whole thing was then sanded and varnished. at first we were going to carve legs for the cabinet but we decided that it would look incorrect and therefore left it as it was. the cabinet was places between the two windows in the drawing room.
two walls were the put up inside the cabinet to seal off the middle curve. we attatched two shelves in there and attached the door. three curved shelves were put on each side of the cabinet. when putting the top on we used a nail gun and as shown below we ended up with a bit of a nail graveyard inside which we had to correct.
the whole thing was then sanded and varnished. at first we were going to carve legs for the cabinet but we decided that it would look incorrect and therefore left it as it was. the cabinet was places between the two windows in the drawing room.
construction of the desk
we began the desk by carving the legs. as the autocad design for the legs was slightly too complicated and time consuming we decided to change the design slightly. we then used 4x4 pine to make the legs. this was done on the lathe by Dan and myself. due to the size of the wood it was quite time consuming however we acomplished the design that we hoped for. the legs were the sanded on the lathe and stained with dark oak wood stain.
we ran into complicaions as the autocad sizes were not quite correct this left our desk legs considerably shorter than planned. to correct this we added leg extensions. blocks of the same size pine were cut to size. i drilled holes into the top of the pine and we hammered some 13mm dowel into the holes. we then lined the dowel up on the top of the legs and drilled a further two holes in each. once placed together, the extensions were complete and we sanded the tops to make them level and smooth.
the top of the desk was a simple rectangle of MDF screwed to the top of the legs. the desk was extremely flimsy at first so we strengthened it with braces, like the ones used to join the flats of the set. they were nailed onto the desk, using the air nailer, flush with the edges of the table, between each of the legs. we then used angled pieces of pine to strengthen these braces. the second job of the braces was to hold the mounting around the desk. these were pieces of pre-cut 6mm MDF that we attached to the braces, flush with the top of the desk. we used blocks of 18mm MDF to strengthen the corners between mountings.
when everything was attached we then marked on the design of the mount and cut it with the jigsaw. to make the top of the desk look more sturdy we cut a piece of 18mm MDF 2cm bigger than the original tabletop and glued it on. after it was in place we used the hand router to round the edges. we then varnished the mounting and tabletop. Nuria pre-cut some rectangles of 18mm MDF which i then glued together with a hot glue gun, this created the boxes that nuria glued onto the top/back of the desk. smaller pieces of 2mm MDF were then stuck onto the front of the boxes to create draws. i used dome headed brass pins to make draw handles. the mount that we were going to put on the back of the desk did not look of good enough quality so we decided against using it. the whole desk was then given a coat of wood stain varnish and placed into the study by the window.
we ran into complicaions as the autocad sizes were not quite correct this left our desk legs considerably shorter than planned. to correct this we added leg extensions. blocks of the same size pine were cut to size. i drilled holes into the top of the pine and we hammered some 13mm dowel into the holes. we then lined the dowel up on the top of the legs and drilled a further two holes in each. once placed together, the extensions were complete and we sanded the tops to make them level and smooth.
the top of the desk was a simple rectangle of MDF screwed to the top of the legs. the desk was extremely flimsy at first so we strengthened it with braces, like the ones used to join the flats of the set. they were nailed onto the desk, using the air nailer, flush with the edges of the table, between each of the legs. we then used angled pieces of pine to strengthen these braces. the second job of the braces was to hold the mounting around the desk. these were pieces of pre-cut 6mm MDF that we attached to the braces, flush with the top of the desk. we used blocks of 18mm MDF to strengthen the corners between mountings.
when everything was attached we then marked on the design of the mount and cut it with the jigsaw. to make the top of the desk look more sturdy we cut a piece of 18mm MDF 2cm bigger than the original tabletop and glued it on. after it was in place we used the hand router to round the edges. we then varnished the mounting and tabletop. Nuria pre-cut some rectangles of 18mm MDF which i then glued together with a hot glue gun, this created the boxes that nuria glued onto the top/back of the desk. smaller pieces of 2mm MDF were then stuck onto the front of the boxes to create draws. i used dome headed brass pins to make draw handles. the mount that we were going to put on the back of the desk did not look of good enough quality so we decided against using it. the whole desk was then given a coat of wood stain varnish and placed into the study by the window.
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