Garage to Workshop (WiP)

[bodgermatic]

I've started the process of converting the garage into a workshop, It's a 50's concrete prefab job. You join me a little way in to the project as I haven't been taking photos up to now :roll: . Last autumn I replaced the corrugated concrete asbestos sheets with corrugated bitumen sheets, and replaced the fascia as well. Over the past month of weekends and evenings I've built a pair of legged and braced doors in 45mmx45mm and framing to reduce the size of the opening. The weekend before last I removed the up and over door and fixed the framing to the floor and walls with anchor bolts, and temporarily hung the doors while I waited for some projection hinges. The fffffflippin' big hinges have been fitted now, as have mortise locks top and bottom and a latch centre. The bottom foot of the whole construction has been liberally daubed in bitumen paint - which is perhaps a bit belt and braces Anyway, I know a photo whould help out about now, so here we go. One looking in:

One looking out:

And one looking at :

That's the old steel up and over door to the left, and the new doors on the right leaned up with a final coat of bitumen drying.

My joinery looks better from farther away :? :

Today's work was mostly tidying up, adding a tower bolt to the right hand door and a final coat of bitumen. During the tidy up I found the sadly abused internal door which matches the rest of the doors in the house:

It's been grain-effect painted at some point, but all of the internal doors have a facing of hardboard applied to them and many coats of gloss! They're really quite nice 1930's doors in keeping with the house, so at some point they'll go for dipping and stripping. When we moved in we found a lot of old issues of "Practical Housholder" from the 50's to the late 60's. I've spent a while browsing through them (as you do :roll: ), and the hardboard was one of many fabulous ideas suggested in the magazines. Along with adverts for melamine and wolf power tools :lol:

I also found something for the c*ll*ctors out there:

It's a Spear and Jackson saw, close up of the button:

Restoration project maybe?

Jobs left to do are facing the whole lot with feather-edge, a mortise for the top lock and latch, a tower bolt for the bottom, handles etc.. etc.. Then on to the rest of the workshop!

A major problem with the workshop-to-be is that the ground level to two sides of it is higher than the floor. After heavy rain, it gets a wee bit damp - wellies advised. So I also need to get someone in to build me a retaining wall on both of those sides to keep the waters at bay!

Still, all in a good cause, I think SBOH (significantly better other half) will be pleased when the tools get a home _outside_ of the house.

 

[davy_owen_88]

It seems the mods are a bit slow tonight so let me be the first to welcome you to this great forum, and to tell you that as a new member you are automatically assumed to be a porn link posting nutter :lol: Don't worry, that will go after a few more posts.

Davy

 

[Paul Chapman]

Hi Bodgermatic, welcome to the forum.

Cheers :wink:

Paul

 

[greggy]

hi bodgermatic, welcome to the forum, its looking good but i would get your tools derusted :lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[mrbingley]

What type of car do/did you have to be able to go up that deceptively narrow drive ?

Chris. :wink:

 

[bodgermatic]

Well spotted that man, it's not only deceptively narrow, it's actually narrow too I did once get the car up there, but opening the doors would have been another matter entirely. I reckon 2CV, Mini or Minor would probably be about right!

 

[pedder]

I also found something for the c*ll*ctors out there:

It's a Spear and Jackson saw, close up of the button:

Restoration project maybe?

looks like deep pitting. May be a little too heavy for successful restoration. :? But keep the screws/nuts, you will need them. :lol:

Cheers Pedder

 

[bodgermatic]

Slow weekend this weekend, but some progress. I've halved the thickness of some gravel boards, down from 25mm to 11mm on the table saw - had to make up a taller fence for the saw. Cut halfway through from each narrow edge, then finished the through cut with a handsaw and planed smooth. These will be used at the bottom of the doors and up the middle to overlap the gap between the two doors.

As I mentioned before, the rest of the front will be faced with featheredge and I have a question about how best to fix them. I replaced a couple of the rotten garage windows (there were 5!) with a similar frame/board/featheredge - but with the action of sun/rain over the past few weeks they've warped slightly and no longer overlap tightly. What's the correct method for fixing featheredge horizontally? Can I avoid this problem, or does it not really matter?

Cheers,

Chris

 

[PowerTool]

What's the correct method for fixing featheredge horizontally?

Don't know if it's the correct way,but I screw them on near the top of the board,then let the next one overlap by about an inch - which also covers over the screwheads on the previous board.
Only one fixing across the width of the board,as this allows it to expand and contract freely (which it seems to do a lot of )

Andrew

 

[bodgermatic]

That's what I had been doing, boards thick edge down, and screwing them on near the top of each board then overlapping each. I even tried looking at the end grain of each board and trying to guess which way it might lift and then screwing it down so it would warp towards the surface.

 

[bodgermatic]

Finally completed the doors last weekend, and got around to posting a picture today! I'm very happy with the result, but I'll probably change the handle.

 

[Waka]

Looking really good, can we have another peak inside?

 

[Chris Knight]

Re your idea to dip and strip.. I would recommend that you don't do this if possible. It does the doors no good at all and puts them in a horrid condition for re-finishing. I much prefer to scrape, plane and sand, either independently, often using all three techniques or sometimes just one, depending on the doors (condition, profiles of mouldings etc). I find that I can do about three doors a day this way, even when heavily painted/varnished. Very occasionally some Nitromors is useful in the corners of a complex moulding but I prefer to do without if possible.

 

[bodgermatic]

Looking really good, can we have another peak inside?

Will do later, it's pi**ing it down out there now :roll:
Not that there's anything interesting inside as yet - I need to get the exterior retaining wall sorted before I start keeping anything I care about in there

 

[bodgermatic]

Re your idea to dip and strip.. I would recommend that you don't do this if possible. It does the doors no good at all and puts them in a horrid condition for re-finishing. I much prefer to scrape, plane and sand, either independently, often using all three techniques or sometimes just one, depending on the doors (condition, profiles of mouldings etc). I find that I can do about three doors a day this way, even when heavily painted/varnished. Very occasionally some Nitromors is useful in the corners of a complex moulding but I prefer to do without if possible.

Thanks for the advice, much appreciated. In terms of scraping mouldings, could I make a scraper out of an old hacksaw blade or similar filed to the correct profile? Thankfully there isn't much paint on them due to the aforementioned hardboard covering they've all been given.