the smell of metal

There is nothing like the smell of metal. There is a unique odor given off when metal is cut with a circular abrasive saw or with a torch. I lack a torch, but I do have the cut-off saw and I used it plenty today. I actually only made eight little spot welds to tack together the frame for the top of the bench I am making, but that was really quite nice. I had to figure out what the heat and wire feed speed wanted for settings, and I dared not just weld great hunks of stuff until I know the pieces I've got are going to fit together properly.

I took the initiative and weighed all of the parts and pieces today. I need to make sure that they do not weigh more than 75 pounds or I can't ship the thing via UPS. So far with all the big metal pieces totaled up, I've got just over 50 pounds. It's still gonna cost to ship, but at least it won't be refused.

Here's a picture of the frame for the padded top on the baby scale. Yes, it is a baby scale. I inherited it from my first mother-in-law who used to be a rural outreach nurse. I normally use it to weigh fish. This is a perfect application, though.


If you look closely, you can see that the frame weighs between 14 and 15 pounds. It's an old scale, but is still quite accurate. I think babies get weighed on digital scales nowadays.

OK, next exciting news of the day: I went up to Lowe's and bought the el-cheapo $100 benchtop model drill press. The gal asked me if I'd like the extended warranty (for two years). I told her that if the thing lasted through the next month, it will be fine. I don't know if I can kill it that quickly, but it's possible. I've been drilling all afternoon through 1/8 inch steel plate. I have to start out with a little pilot hole, then drill a bigger one and then another bigger one until I get the size I need. Note the little shards of metal everywhere:


And the metal on the floor by my feet. Notice the spatters of oil. I have to use oil when drilling through metal or else it will get too hot and burn up the drill bits and they won't work any more. So I have oil and little culicues of steel. Everywhere.


And here is the bench next to the drill. That metal stuff gets everywhere - and it's sharp! I have to be careful not to cut my fingers on the shavings.


While I was at Lowe's, I also picked up some of the fastener bits that I am going to mount to the bench. There are 30 of these little darlings just waiting for my creative application of them.


This is what my workbench looked like by the end of the day. And when I say the end of the day, I mean 11:30 p.m. That's how long I was at this today. I got almost everything cut that needs cutting, most of the pieces fit together and clamped so I can get a look at them, and several pieces drilled out to accept bolts. Tomorrow will involve more actual welding and tacking and such, plus lots more drilling. And lots more clamping. It's going to be another busy day. But I got so much done today that I feel really great about it. Like this thing is actually going to happen.

Oh, some bad news. It's not going to tilt. Not this one. Maybe a later model will have that option, but for my first one, that's just more complicated than I want to deal with. This is going to be the sturdiest spanking bench on the market, and it's going to look fantastically cool.

Crawlspace

What a beautiful day it was today: sunny and up near 70 degrees. There was no wind to speak of and everything is drying out nicely. Except for the north side of this cabin I've been working on. I put in a shower stall last week and the owners liked my work enough to hire me to put a screened in porch on the front of the little cabin.

I had to retro-design things because there is a false dormer over the front door, so I decided to drop the platform by about six inches and run a very shallow-pitched hip roof out from under the existing eaves. At this point, the plans are all still in my head. Not to worry, though. There is plenty of room up there to store them or to lay them out flat and turn them around.

So I have been working on the platform of the porch, framing up the 20 by 6 foot base and propping it up on blocks and odd scraps of wood pending its final attachment to the cabin. Now I should mention here that this is a summer rental cabin. It has no basement or even a pad - it is supported by blocks of concrete at the corners and in a couple of spots underneath. It is not insulated, and only lattice covers the rudimentary foundation. There are lots of leaves under the building, some spiders, and a handful of scrap boards and odd pieces of PVC pipe. In short, it's a cruddy little hole that never sees the sun and probably never entirely dries out.

The blocks are important to the story because I needed to mount the porch to something, and because I had to drop the platform six inches, I was left with nothing to nail to but a few concrete blocks (not great in the nailing department) and some spider webs (certainly no better). So, I bought some bits of metal at the hardware store the other day and brought them home to weld into reinforced brackets. I can now attach the brackets to the platform via some half-inch carriage bolts, and to the support beam/floor joist with some equally nasty half-inch lag screws. I welded six of these brackets and spaced them appropriately along the back plank and then set about to mounting the things to the underside of the cabin.

Not much maneuvering room under there. Certainly not for a plus-sized lesbian and her tools. Damn. I was under there five minutes and had soaked through my knees and elbows in mud, had fetched my head a nasty crack on a broken cement block, and dropped two washers and a nut in the leaves. It took some doing, but I got a mostly workable system under there, and I have a few little odds and ends to finish up tomorrow and then I can start laying the decking and building the walls.

But today was a muddy, dirty, cold, nasty adventure.

To be fair, I did spend enough time standing at the chop saw and walking around that I managed to get a sunburn on the back of my neck. It was warm enough as well for a few mosquitoes to venture out. I slapped a few but did not get bitten. This too shall pass.

In another vein, I am getting disgusted with vehicles. We have three, but not one of them has a valid sticker. And today, on my way to work on this cabin, a golf-ball sized rock spun out of the top of a dump truck and smashed into my windshield directly in my line of vision. It looks like a fake, it is so perfect. Except I got a lap full of glass shards. I had to hold Quinn very still on her side of the seat (she was pretty freaked out) so she wouldn't get into the sharp stuff. Glass guy says it will cost $225 to fix. Add that to the muffler and tailpipe, the leaf springs, shocks, struts, front brake job and the rest, it's going to eat up almost every penny from this job. It is depressing. Some days it feels like I make a few steps forward only to get kicked back six more. Damn.

Quinn and I were ok, though, so that's a good thing.