Not the end of the road, yet.

Good day and welcome back (to me too I guess).

A reader sent in a comment asking if I was done and thought I'd do a quick post about the status of the ship.

We spent this past summer and fall taking actual vacation time and working on a few other projects.  Had to build a new raised chicken coup that would blend in to the surroundings.

The chicken coup was partially built out of used pallets.  That's a bit where we're heading with some of our projects, salvaging and giving new life to materials.  My wife has been spending quite a bit of her online time on Pinterest and she found some nifty uses for used pallets.  There is one project in particular, a small cabin made out of pallets that is just amazing and we have started to collect pallets to make one.  We have maybe 8-10 pallets but I guess we'll need about 100.

We also decided it was time (the Mrs. has actually been asking for one for years) to build a greenhouse.  So I recycled to metal frame from a used temporary garage and added in some wood components and we covered the thing with greenhouse plastic sheathing and voilà, instant greenhouse.  Actually, it wasn't as instantaneous as that.  I built sidewalls so we wouldn't have to shovel snow away from the sides during the winter.  Still need to rearrange the interior but I should have some neat pics of this project up at some point.

Other projects ahead in 2015:  well in continuing with out recycling theme, the workshop is in for a major overhaul.  Yes, the little red barn that we had always planned on demolishing once we got around to (and have the budget to) building a garage, will be SAVED!  We are going to tear down sections that are not salvageable but the main 2 story section will be saved.  We will add a small garage (22x12 maybe) and also a covered porch section in the back.  Be sure to check in on this project, should be a fun one.

So the list for this summer is now (not necessarily in order of completion):

• finish pirate ship
• renovate the red barn into something AWESOME.
• Finish greenhouse (it is pretty much done but once we start using it, there will undoubtedly be some changes to be made).
• Finish chicken coup (actually only a few pieces of trim remain and we'll probably finish that this winter)
• Finish the actual barn (this is the one with the actual farm animals in).  It's a board and batton but I never actually got around to putting the battons on.  Also need to rethink the windows in the hayloft as some rain does make it's way in.

Lots of other small projects but the big ones will be the ship and the red barn.

On the pirate ship, I'd be interested to hear your ideas as to what you think is missing.  Here is what is planned.

• Crows nest with rope bridge to the bridge.
• Finish railings
• Cargo net (we bought one but I find it very flimsy so will buy a spool of rope and make one from scratch)
• Possibly use some netting to make a mock-sail.  I don't want something that will catch too much wind but would like something that "simulates" a real sail.
• Finish the cabins (need to put in some sleeping areas) and brig area.
• "Child proof" a few hatches.  I don't have any springs or pistons slowing down the shutting of hatches and although doors aren't too bad, the hatch in the middle of the deck has ALMOST caught a few fingers.

That's it for now I guess but check back soon for progress reports on the ship and any other projects I'll have on here.

And to everyone, a very happy 2015!

André

I'm BACK!

Well, it looks like winter is finally over.  We celebrated by going for a few days of spring skiing last weekend but as of yesterday, there is no snow left.  That means I'm about to start work on the ship again.

I have to say, it came through winter pretty good.  I noticed last night that the stain had weathered a bit so I may need to put a coat sometime this summer but I'll likely wait till I'm all finished.  Noticed also on one side of the ship that the ground settled a little and I have a few support points to adjust (re-shim).

So over next few weeks, I'll be ordering some of the accessories (rope ladder, cargo net, ship's wheel, etc...) and finsihing the design of the crow's nest, which I'll get my neighbour the master welder, to make. 

So no new pics today but I wanted to do a quick post to say that the project is still alive and I am looking forward to finishing it soon.

Will update soon....

A.

Backyard Pirate Ship Playhouse - The Chest (the sequel)

When we last tuned in, I had built a treasure chest that was too big for it's lid.

So last night I got home, put Mathieu to bed, puttered around the house a bit and it was garbage night so put those to the curb, then I headed out to the workshop.  My plan was to dissassemble one side of the box then rip off a side of the box by running the whole thing lenghtwise on my table saw.  So I took all the screws out but remember when I said carpenter's glue holds wood together better than nails (or screws), well here's the proof.

May be a little hard to make out but the first board I took off actually broke as the edges of the boards were glued together and that joint was actually better than the actual grain of the wood.  A glued joint is definitely not your weakest point.  So I thought so what, I can just cut 2 pieces to replace this face but the more I tried, the more evident it was that this thing would not come apart as I wanted.

So here it lies in the corner, now a scrapped pile of wood.  It's a shame as I should have just left it as is and used it as a nice storage box as I now ended up starting the box from scratch.

I don't even remember why I bought this 90 degree clamp and I know I had definitely never used it but boy was it ever perfect to start a box with.  I predict I will use this clamp again in the future and when the wife saw it she also started dreaming of all the projects she could use this for.  Just goes to show, this thing has been hanging on the wall in the workshop for a few years and I'm just discovering it's usefulness. 

This time around, making the box a little shorter (with one 1X6 and one 1X4), I decided to stagger the boards, 1X6 for bottom board on the face and back and the 1X4 as the bottom board for the sides.  Seeing how strong the glued joints were on the let's call it the prototype, I figured it made structural sense to have staggered joints.

Now doesn't that look nice.  I drilled 2 holes in each side that once this thing is painted, we'll run some rope through and make a rope handle on each side.  I also broke out the palm sander and with some 80 grit paper sanded the joints on the lid and this thing turned out way better than I ever hoped for.  Still need to fill in a small crack with some wood filler and it may not come out as good in a pic but I am more than pleased with this lid. 

Obviously when the munchkin saw this this morning he ordered his mother to paint this "tout de suite".  I'm taking him with me this weekend for a reno project I'm doing and on one of my inevitable trips to KBS or Home Depot, we'll pick up some hinges and a latch so when we get home Sunday we can complete the chest.  I'll post some pics of the finished product.

Till then, as always, thanks for dropping by.

A.

Backyard Pirate Ship Playhouse - Props

A little late with my post this week, or a little early, depending on your frame of reference.

Well winter is almost upon us as it was pretty cold this weekend and let's not forget, more rain.  Anyways, didn't get out to the ship much but last night I decided that I really couldn't go a weekend without doing something for this ship so I tackled something Mathieu has been asking for, the treasure chest. 

This is one of several props (I'm sure) we'll end up making ourselves.  I've been looking for small cheap wooden barrels to simulate gun powder kegs.  I may end up duplicating one technique I used you'll see a little later on this page and make the barrels myself.


So, I started off by cutting all the pieces, which really didn't take too long.

Assembled the box.  You may notice a jar of carpenter's glue next too the box.  If you've never used it, do not underestimate glue in a project like this.  Once that glue is dry, I could likely remove all the screws from this box and it could still take a beating and hold together.



Next came the lid.  Now again, I'm no genius here as I just got inspiration from a small chest I saw in a decoration store and I just improved on the design.  The one I had seen in a store they just built the lid with straight edge pieces so they had cracks between the pieces.  I cut mine at an angle on each side.

Assembled (bu missing last piece) you can see the result.  With a little sanding on the edges where the pieces but against each other, this thing should look really nice.  This is how I may end up making the wooden gun powder kegs.

Now next pics are with the lid on the box.

You see my mistake?  Obviously something went wrong and that something is that after I had already cut the rounded sides for the lid, I went and made a slight design change in the box.  I opted to glue and screw the sides on the outside of the bottom board  instead on top of that bottom board.  This added and inch and a half that I failed to compensate for.  Ordinarily I wouldn't have posted these and would have waited until I had a "perfect" result but I wanted you to see that sometimes, a slight change of plan can have some embarassing results.  My wife couldn't believe that me, the planner, could have made such a rookie mistake.

So Wednesday night I'm going to have to modify this box to accept the lid.  I will need to empty it out first as my wife has advised me that Mathieu has already loaded it up full of pirate treasure.  I left the house before he was up this morning but by what she's told me, he was VERY happy with this new pirate item.

Hope to have some pics of it finished soon.

Drop by again soon, ya hear....

A.





Backyard pirate ship playhouse - the paint job

Hi there.

well, it's been a couple of pretty good days.  I got some more boards to finish up the bow as well as start the trim work on the railings etc...

So Saturday I started by completing the boards on the port (left) side of the bow.  I also put in a porthole on that side as well in the bow as when you look at the ship from the front you see two identical sides.

Then I was planning on staining the bulk of the ship but the threat of rain was omni-present so I decided to keep working on some structural stuff, framing in railings and such. 

Now as for the choice of colours... as previewed, the wife and I had a lengthy discussion about choices, what each colour made us feel about ourselves and about each other, what our choice of colours symbolized.

I'm just kidding, we actually agreed pretty quickly.  And I have just spent all day outside staining this behemoth.  Have a look.

Now you can't see it from this vantage point but the main deck and bridge have also been stained, but in a dark slate colour.  Doors and portholes will eventually be stained yellow.

Now I want to write a bit about stain vs paint,  we went with a semi-transparent stain to give it some colour while still seeing some of the wood grain come through.  It's all about personal tastes but on a project like this I prefer stain.

Today was a good day to do this as it was about 16 degrees celcius outside, not dry but not overly humid and thos conditions were forecasted for the whole day.  The somewhat cool temperature ensured that my coats didn`t dry too quickly, a good thing especially for the novice painter.  If you've ever painted on a scorching July day, you know that your technique has to be pretty good to avoid brush or roller marks, picture framing, etc...  Now I did only finish staining the deck around 5 PM and dew point was around 8 PM so I was cutting it a bit close.  Also they were calling for rain after midnight so I'm a little worried.  The stain would certainly be dry but if you start drenching the whole thing too soon you may end up with some issues.  Tonight will be the test.

Now, to roll and brush or spray.  A colleague did lend me his Wagner sprayer but when I started today it was way too windy for a sprayer.  So, I got a nice roller with 19mm thick material, does a great job with stain.  You need a thicker rooler than you would with pain as stain isn't as thick and you want to make sure your roller soaks up enough stain.  Also, the thicker roller is great for rolling some stain into cracks and grooves.  I used the brush to cut out everything and I'm pretty pleased with the end result.

Now doors and portholes will be painted yellow as well as the ladder going to the bridge.  And although it`s not visible from the outside, to protect the wood from the inside we are still going to stain those inside walls in the cannon room as well as the hold.  We're going to go with a stain that let's the natural colour of pine show through, mayeb even just a clear coat, not sure yet.

Rain tomorrow morning and I have some work to do for the office so I'll be busy but later on in the day it's supposed to clear up so we may end up doing a bit more work on the railings.  If I do you can rest assured I'll do another update tomorrow.

Until then, thanks for dropping in...

A.