What did you do today?

[Mark J]

Tom King, you're a modern day Paul Bunyan .

[Mark J]

Here's some quick pictures of the class projects:  

The class did two other projects that I skipped (I'm a slow worker).  The cube was my own plan.  The idea of spinning a cube corner to corner has been done before, but I wanted to see how it works.

A couple of the pieces are more complete than the other two, but none is done, and none has been sanded as much as I'd like.  

The cube I'm definetly going to work on more.  I might come out the side walls, or leave it a bowl.  

[Spanky]

Well, it looks like you may have passed. 

[Chip Sawdust]

Started a curved front desk and am looking at starting a Pennsylvania spice box for my wife to stash her small precious things in. Most likely it’ll never see spices but that’s not the point   The desk is for me, and will be of maple since that what I have on hand. The original I think was cherry, and I have very little of that. 

[legenddc]

@Tom King - Time for some "farmhouse" picnic tables and another 0 at the end of your pricing. It's crazy what venues charge.

[Tom King]

Yes, I have no idea what it's really worth.  That was the first offer, and sounded good to me.   I'm thinking of making two Gazebo's.  One a formal one, and one a rustic one, both on wheels, that I can pull down there to the end of the point as required.  I'll build a building to keep them in when they're not being used, so there shouldn't be a lot of upkeep.

Also, there is plenty of room for the big, white tents.  The place I rented the mini-excavator from rents those too.  I've been talking to him about permanent sockets for the poles, and anchor points that don't require driving stakes.  He's all for it, and will pay me a good fee for each referral, plus they come to put the tents up, and take them down.

There is a nice Lions Club building, not too far from here, that rents for Receptions all the time.

Looks like I'm in the wedding planning business now.  The ladies that looked at the place before we cleaned it up are going to freak now.  I've had a crew working on it for several days, and it's looking like a different place.  We also limbed up all the trees, so the view is pretty spectacular now from anywhere on the point.

[drzaius]

How about some pics when you get things all set up Tom?

[Tom King]

I will.  Right now, the ground is mostly bare dirt.  I have to fix a tractor before I can do the final grading, and then plant grass.  There are already a couple of old pictures of the point here.  I'll find those. 

First picture is the whole point, from the top of the hill behind it, when I was burning piles of limbs left, a couple of years ago, when I had all the Pine trees taken down. Since then we have taken down some more of the smaller trees, and limbed up the larger ones, so you can see way up the lake now, different from that view.  The point is a lot larger than it looks in that picture.  It's a couple of acres, and between 5, and 600 feet long.

The second one shows one side of it, towards the end, back when I was cutting the overgrown grass.

We thought we'd build our house down there eventually, but Pam was doing Pottery before we got married, and wanted a pottery shop first.  We figured we could fix the pottery shop up good enough to live in for a while.  It's back in the woods, up the hill from the lake.  We've lived there for almost 20 years, raised two children there, who are now grown, and gone.  The little pottery shop has been added onto a number of times, so it's not really "little" any more.  We like the privacy better than living down there, with visible neighbors.

 Third is the cove to the left of the base of the point  That bare ground on this side of the neighboring retaining wall is now green with grass.

.

[Tom King]

I took a couple of pictures today.  I'll probably leave it bare dirt until early Spring.  The fill in the stump holes will settle, and it's almost impossible to grade grass, but easy to finish grade bare dirt.  We didn't take down the small trees on the right side of the point. 

The guys with the dump truck, and Bobcat are picking up the last of the Sweet Gum logs.  They enjoyed working here, and had never worked for anyone that also ran equipment.  They use Pro chainsaws, but none of them could sharpen one.  I taught their new, young guy how to sharpen a chain, and he can really do it now.  I'm amazed at how many people use a chainsaw for a living, and can't sharpen one.  I was outcutting their 70cc Pro Husky with my smallest homeowner saw-Stihl 180.  A sharp chain on any saw will beat a dull one on any other saw.

The stumps near the Brick____house are in the drain field for the septic tank, so I left them.  There are a few others, but none left on the part that will be used for traffic, parking, and where people will be walking.  I got tired of digging up stumps, so will just plant low growing Azaleas (or such) around the ones left, and let them rot.

Going to do something else tomorrow, if it doesn't rain.  That job will be interesting too.  We're going to use the little excavator to tear a rotting garage addition off of an 1864 house.  If we don't get rained out, I'll try to remember to take some pictures.

 

 

[wtnhighlander]

Nice work, Tom! Good on you for teaching the kid to sharpen his chain. He'll be running the crew in no time, now!

[Chestnut]

Tom you do some of the coolest stuff. Thanks for sharing it with us it's always interesting.

[legenddc]

He really does. Always makes me want to go down there too. If my sister didn't just pick a wedding venue I might have had an excuse to!

[Chestnut]

Threw some rocks at houses. Managed to steal 2 (my team is yellow).

[Tom King]

This is the 1864 President's house, at the original Randoph Macon College site.   The garage was added on sometime mid 20th Century.  Questionable design with the gable shedding water back to the house.  I almost forgot to take pictures, and had already started tearing the shed off the back of the garage before I thought to get off the machine, and take the picture.

We were rained out, but the machine is due back tomorrow at 1, so we'll finish up in the morning.  I have all the old structure off, but need to pull up the concrete too.  I started on it, and it's breaking up pretty easily.

This place is only ten miles from where I have to take the excavator back.

 

[Mark J]

Made a few shavings.

[treeslayer]

Looks great Mark, that looks like a monster spinning on there. sell the shavings for guinea pig bedding to buy more wood !

[RichardA]

And don't click your heels while standing in that pile, friction causes sparks and flames.

[lewisc]

Any knife makers here? I cut this out today. Having a go at making a skinning knife. There will be some timber work eventually but for now it’s shaping the steel. 
 

 

[Just Bob]

Made a few, what type of steel?  Really like the shape, have you decided on the scale material?

[lewisc]

Scale material? Yep. This is gonna be a good learning curve. Is that the handle material?

edit. Just googled that one. Not sure yet. I’ll probably find a nice figured hardwood for now. 

I bought some 1075 steel. Apparently this was a good place to start for beginners. I found this website to buy the steel from and they also have a page of a knife makers designs. All you need to do it print them out and the sizing is good to go. 
 

https://tharwavalleyforge.com/articles/free-knife-designs

[Just Bob]

Yea scales are the handles.  I make my knives from 01 but 1075 is similar.  Read up on the heat treat process, especially reaching the critical temp (1500 Fahrenheit) and the quench.  Be forewarned, knife making is another black hole, it can suck you in.

[Mark J]

9 hours ago, treeslayer said:

Looks great Mark, that looks like a monster spinning on there. sell the shavings for guinea pig bedding to buy more wood !

Was hoping to add to it today, but no go.  Our club demonstrates wood turning at the  SOFA show in Chicago and I was one of the demonstrators.  Nothing special,  just a simple bowl, but it was an all day affair.

[Mark J]

But today is a new day, and a new pile.

[Chip Sawdust]

Nothing quite like making sawdust  

[legenddc]

Well after taking my only router out of the table, I decided it was time for another router. I've bought some stuff from Direct Tools before and had gotten an email with the Ridgid trim router (used) for only $42. I wish I knew what accessories it comes with but I figure the worst that happens is I return it and I'm out a few bucks.