1.31.2019

A bitter cold night with howling winds - thankfully we didn't lose power.  Jim is continuing to keep heat in the wood shop floor overnight, which is keeping the shop warm all day.  Jim says it's a little too warm but right now it's good to keep the heat in the building with it being below zero outside.  It also is allowing the heat to the apartment to not work as hard.

You can see he's working in just a long sleeved shirt!  Today he finished sanding all of the frame pieces for the bathroom window.  Then he started staining.

 He's very happy with the design so now it's time for some assembly line work - first up is the spacer frame for the double hung windows.  He starts out with planks - as you see in this picture against the wall.  He first does a rough cut on the bandsaw to cut the pieces into strips.

Then he uses the planer to make all the strips 1" thick.  Next, he cuts the planed strips to the right length.  Tomorrow he will cut them to the right width - there are 3 different widths to each spacer frame.

High 10/Low -8 (wind chill advisory)

1.30.2019

Like a big portion of the country, it's freezing again.  Actually, we were colder a week or so ago but it's still freezing.  Plus, between yesterday and today, we got another foot of snow.  Right now, the temperatures are dropping and the winds are really howling - we're in for the really cold temps now.  The winds were so strong this evening that it built up pressure in the auto bay attic and blew Jim's insulated foam board into the shop!  He put a few more wedges both in that door and the one in our bedroom.  Hope everyone stayed safe and warm today!

Jim waited until mid-afternoon to go out and do the driveway because it kept snowing.  The good news is that he was able to get the chute on the snowblower to work better by raising the engine RPM on the Bobcat - yay!  It's definitely an easier task when he can just sit in the Bobcat and plow rather than have to keep getting out and trying to manually get the chute to move each time.  You can see how high the snow is building up - it was really high at the end of the driveway from the plow trucks.

Jim continued work on Design 3 of the window frame work - he's happy with this one so he's proceeding on.  He made the first spacer piece that will attach directly to the window.  He made a rabbet which is a raised section of the wood.  This first piece he used his table saw to rabbet the edges.

Then he experimented with making the rabbet on his jointer and it worked really well.  He made the window jamb extension pieces and was showing me how the spacer piece will attach to the extensions...

He's happy with this design so he'll be putting these into production!

High 21/Low -5 (8" snow; wind chill warning)

1.29.2019

Okay, so this is cute, but Jim felt like anything but this today.  We had lots of snowflakes today - about 8" so far and it's supposed to keep snowing overnight.  Which meant that he had to go out and plow all those snowflakes.  Unfortunately, even after all the work Jim did on the chute of the snowblower, it still doesn't work correctly, which makes the job so much harder and more frustrating.  But he'll get it figured out one way or the other and meanwhile, it works well enough that he got the driveway all cleared.

These lights for bay 3 in the metal shop were sitting up in the wood shop and getting in Jim's way, so he attached them to the ceiling and put in the new ballasts.  They'll be ready when he wants to work on them further but for now they are up and out of the way.

Speaking of lights, it's been a frustrating experience trying to get the correct reflectors for these lights.  I've called enough times about them that I am on a first-name basis with the customer service person at the lighting company.  But we still don't have an answer as to when we'll get the replacements, although I did get her to give us a small credit for all the hassle.  

Jim was back at work on window jamb extension design today.  For a glimpse into the design issue, you can see that there isn't a lot of wood on the actual window for Jim to attach the jamb extension without fear of a fastener going through into the window mechanism.

His first design was to make it in one piece, but he didn't like that.  Design 2 (pictured below) was to make a smaller spacer to attach to the window first and then he can build out.  He's working on design 3, a modification of this, right now.  Stay tuned!

High 24/Low 7 - 8" of snow

1.28.2019

Jim had the driveway as good as it could be for my early morning venture out - but he got up early and was on standby if I needed him!  Thankfully, I had no issues getting down or coming back up.  I did some shopping when I was out - we have a winter storm warning out for tomorrow and Wednesday for more snow!

Jim worked on the second bedroom door jamb today.  He assembled it in the wood shop so that he gets perfect corners and everything is aligned.  Then he staples a piece of plywood on the bottom to help stabilize it while he brings it upstairs.

Then he has to get it all aligned and plumb in the door opening - it looks so good and makes the room look more finished now!

The rest of his day he spent working on making pieces for window frames - he's still trying to perfect the way he wants to make them.

High 19/Low 6

1.27.2019

Jim continued doing woodworking today - he did all the millwork for the hinge and lock locations and rounded all the edges of the door jamb pieces...

Then doing the final sanding...

Finally a coat of primer on them!

 We got another 3" or so of snow, with snow squalls all afternoon.  So Jim went out and did some plowing and driveway work.  I have an early errand tomorrow morning so he was making sure it would be in good shape for me.

High 31/Low 2 - 3" of snow

1.26.2019

Kind of a short day - Jim took me to the post office and the grocery store this morning to make sure the driveway was okay.  Thankfully, because of the gravel he put down, the car made it up and down without any issues.

Jim spent the rest of his time doing woodworking in his shop.  After gluing up the pieces for the door jamb yesterday, today he assembled it and did the millwork.  He made the stress relief cuts on the pieces, used the router to round the edges, and assembled it.

Door stops made too.  He has to cut in the hinge location on these tomorrow - they'll be ready for priming soon!

We're off to church...

High 21/Low 9

1.25.2019

Jim spent time working in his wood shop today.  It's so nice to see him in there after all this time of building!  But now it's time to pay some attention to his tools.  Here he's working on aligning the jointer...

He did a lot of planing today and he's got various pieces being glued now...

More gluing...

This afternoon, he got out the Bobcat again and tried to scrape off more gravel from the frozen pile.  Then he shoveled gravel onto the steepest part of the driveway.  The Bobcat was able to go up with no problem now so our cars should be good too - although it's still completely treacherous out there with all the ice!

High 28/Low 9 - some light snow

1.24.2019

The weather woes continue - after 2 feet of snow, way below zero temperatures, yesterday and today it warmed up a bit and rained, which made for a thick slushy coating of water on top of the ice already on the driveway.

Jim first had to tackle all the snow that fell off the roof.  We are now used to the sounds the snow makes as it falls off the roof - if you didn't know what it was, you'd think it was an earthquake or something - the house feels like it shakes!  But it's wonderful that we don't have to worry about all that snow buildup on the roof - it was all clean today.  Except for the feet of snow around the garage and man doors - Jim had to get the Bobcat and shovel out to take care of all that.

Then, I needed to take a mailing to the post office and my ever-patient husband said he would take me, even though he told me that the driveway was going to be an issue.  My car (with Jim driving) did great going down the hill but coming up was another story.  It got stuck part way up the hill and wasn't budging.

Later, Jim got the Bobcat out.  He first went to our gravel pile to see if he could use the bucket and scrape some gravel - it was so frozen that he said it was like trying to scrape concrete.  He finally got a little bit collected and then headed down to where my car was stuck.  He had to drive down the hill totally on the snow or we would have had two stuck vehicles!  He's again so thankful that we have the Bobcat with the tracks - our old wheeled Bobcat could never handle this weather.

You can see he threw down some gravel to get enough traction to enable the car to make it up the hill.

Ahh....my car is all tucked back inside where it's going to stay for awhile!

Jim took the bucket off the Bobcat, put the snowblower back on and drove it into the auto bay.  He's loving this space to work in!  The extra height on the garage door in this bay lets Jim drive in with no issues.  Then the lighting and access to his tools makes it a great space.  He sure deserves it!  

He took apart the rotating mechanism for the chute - it seemed very loose.  He cleaned out the bearings, greased things and put it back together.  Once he backed the Bobcat out and tried it - it worked great!  We'll see how it is the next time he needs to use it - hopefully that's all the fix it needed.

To continue making this space better, Jim worked on the air compressor too.  He finished the connection into the breaker box, put oil in the compressor and turned it on.  He's thrilled with how smooth and quiet it is.  He still has some plumbing work to design for hose connections but it's working now!

High 45/Low 20 - rainy

1.23.2019

Jim continued working in the metal shop today.  Since I picked up the clamp he needed, he was able to finish the conduit path for the air compressor line.

Around to the auto bay side...

Next, he worked on mounting his hose reel, putting it up high enough that it was out of the way yet still accessible to him.

Putting the hose reel up...

Some hose is all wound up now!

Now that the conduit is all attached, time to put the rest of the wire through for the compressor.  Jim put the fish tape through and then had to split the strands and attach some through the eye and get it all taped up for the trip back through the conduit.

 Pulling the wire out...

While I helped feed it through and keep it from twisting...

Next was the green grounding wire.  The conduit is full now so it was quite the workout for Jim to push the fish tape through this path and then pull it out again with the wire attached.

But he got them all through the turn box and over into the auto bay...

Getting the compressor motor wired up...

All wired and closed back up...

Jim still has to get the armor cable for this side but for now, things are in great shape!

High 30/Low 30 - winter weather advisory - wintry mix