work bathroom drywall fix

We have back to back bathrooms at work.  We no longer have any girls working with us but when we did apparently they used tons of baby wipes and flushed them.  So eventually the pipes were totally clogged.  The plumber came out and tore the whole wall open (conveniently in OUR bathroom) and took care of it.  Fair enough, he wasn't about to fix the wall when he was done.  We left it for a long time then I went and picked up the minimal supplies to do my first ever drywall fix.

Didn't really have to frame anything, though I did add one small piece of framing in a corner, just a bit of 2x6.  It was pretty tough to get down low behind the toilet but I did my best.  We had some shelves on the wall there, the plumber tore them off, you can see the outlines of where the braces were.  As you can see there were some complex edges to this, it was a real mess.

red roll stands

I built these for a job in New Hampshire.  I wanted something collapsible that I could take apart and put into a gang box.  I also needed them to be able to be reassembled quickly and easily with a minimum of hardware.  I wanted to be able to drop the pipe into the stand as opposed to inserting it through the frame.

I used some skids which I cut down to size. I started by screwing a piece of plywood to the top of each then I screwed the 4x4s to that.  After that it is just the two pieces which cross there, they are secured at three points with carriage bolts and wing nuts.  I built two of them.  The big UHMW shields and shaft collars turned out to be unnecessary as you can see in the video which made roll change even quicker.

winder table

I did not build the fancy winder you see here of course.  But I needed to be able to use that winder with a counter so I could wind at will and just watch the counter.    I realized that using our 50' cutting table would just monopolize that and I only needed to be able to do 12" wide.  So I grabbed this old folding table and went to work.

I mounted the 1" strip of UHMW on one side and had that as my fixed edge.  The other edge I also planed to use a moveable 1" strip but unless it is firmly fastened to the work surface, 1" is too thin to stay straight.  It is very whippy.  So I used a full blown 6" wide piece because I already had those.  But then I realized that the board was bowed up at the edges and the material would slip underneath it.  So I built a fulcrum from this aluminum corner stock.  I mounted it with spacers to the 6" UHMW board, which I actually tapped threads into.  Then I used hex head bolts and nuts to create transverse pressure against the corner stock which pushes teh edges of the board flat.

I cut two grooves into the table with a router and used hardware so it could slide into the fixed width then be fastened tight to the table.

The counter mount was difficult too.  I toyed with ideas of springs and all kinds of different elaborate mounts.  Bear in mind also that the material thickness can vary (though all are around 0.6-1.5mm).  Then it hit me - just use hinges! Now gravity will push the counter wheel against the material, no matter the thickness.  I even got some fancy corner braces which look nice even if unnecessary.

salvaged picnic table

We had this really old deck on the side of the house, it was really falling apart.  Those benches were nailed to the deck.  So it had to go.  So I tore it all apart, tore it out of the ground.  And as always, salvaged any wood that might be useful.  Then I figured I could build a table as I did save the benches.

So I did supply some lumber of my own.  Those two cross pieces under the table top are 3x3 or something weird, I decided to use nails to put it all together up top.  The legs are 2x6 (of course) and the frame around the bottom was built from the frame for the deck which sat in the dirt for who knows how many years.  You have no idea how difficult it was to salvage even 4 pieces for that, it was all trashed.

But I did it!  Later, I painted everything and added the 2x2 cross pieces on the sides to get rid of some wobble.  I also cut down one end of the long bench which had an unsupported piece that if you sat on it would almost flip the bench like some slapstick humor.

Below is my original quote that I wrote on social media when I did this:

It only took about 3 hours...those 2x8s are 84" long and i was only able to savage 1 and 1/2 boards for the table! the other 42" came from another random piece i found laying in the weeds.  im really glad i was able to pull out the benches without destroying them...id like to meet the carpenter that put this all together, he used like 8" nails in places, not a screw anywhere in sight. i had to keep it old school and used nails of my own to attach the table top to the cross pieces that connect them. that was 16 nails and about tore my arm off...im spoiled. but im glad i brought them...they ended up being used strictly for aesthetic purposes but i was worried that screws might destroy old wood. luckily i used them carefully and everything is intact. it was a ton of fun!

garbage can stand

I replaced the old one and made it a bit smaller.  I made a new frame and buried it, out of new 2x4s and then cut down these massive green boards to suit.  My width was determined by how many of these boards I could salvage because they were splitting and falling apart. So as such, this is exactly wide enough for the two garbage cans with about 3" to spare.

work office drywall fix

I moved into a new office and immediately had to take care of this.  There was a window where you could reach through the wall to get to the printer.  This did offer a small convienence but had a number of issues that I hated.  For one, the people in the office would use the window as a means of communication when they didn't feel like walking back to the shop.  So people could eavesdrop, etc or interrupt.  Also it made locking the door useless as someone could easily climb through.  Not that I have awesome valueables in there but still.  So I removed the glass sliding doors, yanked out the tracks and pried out the wooden sill.  Then I framed it.  I used 2x6s because as always, that is what I had available.  And I needed 2x2s (I think that is what they were) because based on the thickness of the wall itself, that is what would fit.  As you can see I used my Kreg kit to hold everything together.

I built myself a small jig to determine where to place the 2x2s so when I was done, the drywall would be flush.

Once got all that done, it was relatively simple to bang the drywall in, pretty much a square piece.  I did a decent job of cutting it tight so minimal mud was needed.  Here you can see the view from both sides of the wall which is my office on one side and an IT room on the other.  Both have since been painted.

blue microwave table

This may be the very first thing I ever built.  I built this years ago but just took the photos today.  I wanted to be able to get my microwave off my counter, as my counter space is extremely limited to begin with, and the microwave ate up a big chunk of it.  I cobbled this together out of 2x4s, I assume they were salvaged.  This is long before I started getting access to old 2x6s.  I remember the plywood was definitely taken from a busted up old crate.  I had to have a guy I work with drive me home and help me carry it inside (he put it inside his SUV).  I don't remember if I had the recycle bin back then but it did make a convenient home for that as well.  As well as my suck wrapper and sous vide circulator!

I did not have access to my cut off saw as I do now so I remember being surprised when the frame that makes up the top shelf went together and was blatantly out of square.  Doesn't matter, still does the job quite well.  Not sure why I painted it blue, I don't think this was old paint, I think I bought it but not sure why I chose that color.

Here is a very early photo I just found of the shelf apparently around the time I brought it home.

black clothes rack

This project had a few goals in mind.  I had very specific dimensions to stuff this rack so I measured carefully and built to fit.  I wanted to use long carriage bolts to hold the feet to the uprights and I used one additional carriage bolt out of the one side to put hangers on.  Everything is built from 2x6 as usual and I used some matte black exterior paint because it was premixed and cheap.  I had to let the paint cure for days before the fumes went away and I could bring it inside.  The supports for the shelves are Kreg'd into place and had to be hammered between the uprights, they are really tight and strong.  Which is ironic given that they hold boxers, socks, shirts, etc.  The strength of the feet to the uprights (and the clothes hanger-hanger) could probably withstand 1000lbs of force but alas they will never support much at all.  Built to last, as always.

reframe under kitchen sink

So under the sink it was totally collapsing.  All there was was the thin and very old laminate to hold up whatever was in there.  Worse yet, I discovered once I start to demo that it was one continous piece that went to both sides and the adjacent cabinets.  So you had two cabinets plus under the sink, all unsupported and held by 'wood' that was about 3mm thick.

So I smashed it all out under the sink and then used a sawzall to cut it as flush as possible.  I cut three sets of 2x6 and screwed them together.  I banged them half way underneath on both sides, so you had one 2x6 under the adjacent cabinet, and the other exposed under the sink to mount my plywood to.  I then added cross supports and used the Kreg (really my only option here) to hold it all together.

Later I cut my plywood and used a holesaw to cut the holes for the hot/cold water supply pipes.  Then I used the sawzall again to cut straight down through the holes so I had two halves.  I used nails instead of screws to attach the plywood to the supports.  I even built a small trap door in the front right 'compartment' with two tiny hinges so secret things can be stored there.

back door fix

This is not much of a fix but I did discover I had old photos of it, including one of me working on it.  The door frame here is pretty beat and the door closer hardware just tore right out.  So I put a small piece of wood and buried two really long screws into it and put a new closer on.  This has held up for at least three years.

cat shelves

These were fabricated from some drawers from an old crappy desk.  I reinforced the inside with a 2x2 and then put a tiny piece of trim, maybe 3/4" square on the back and drilled through both.  I needed the tiny trim on the bottom because the bottom of the drawers are recessed.  Everything is held to the wall with two toggles each.  There are actually 4 drawers but I don't have a good shot of the entire wall.  These are the top boxes, there are one more on each side so the cats get climb up like stairs.

The bridge is a salvaged piece of wood, some really odd dimension.  I cut the ends on angles to match and fastened it to more 2x2 which is also cut to the same angles.  I buried tee nuts in those 2x2s and used machine screws to attach.  That way the bridge can be taken off if needed.  We wrapped the bridge in rope, using hot glue periodically and a hammer to make sure it was tight, then using staples every could inches as well.  The cats have beat the hell out of that rope but it hasn't budged.

under sink brace

I got my 3 stage Aquasana water filter for Xmas 2015.  I didn't really have anywhere to mount it under the sink because my cabinet is totally messed up.  So I needed to not only build something that I could screw the Aquasana to, I had to at the same time create something that would brace and rebuild the structure of the cabinet.

The issue seems to stem from the fact that whoever put my cabinet together just sawed a cabinet it half so the stove could fit.  So it doesn't even have one side, the white you see there is the stove.  Like a house that lived through a tornado, and one wall is gone and you can see inside the house.  When I moved in I cobbled together some junk boards and screws and it was pretty crappy.  So I tore all that out and took a million measurements and fabricated this gem at work the next day.  The top right side reaches up to where there is a fake drawer that actually pops open, maybe so you can use it as a garbage shoot.  I knew I'd only be able to get one screw into that but I also knew that would be all I needed.  I even cut it a bit short so I'd have to shove the cabinet face back a bit and let the brace hold it there forever.  It all actually worked really well.

You can see that there are numerous layers of plywood in the right places, I wanted to be able to have my screws for mounting the water filter kit be thick enough to hold screws and this is pretty cheap board.

pyrex corner shelves

I built these from scrap 2x4 and plywood.  The plywood was probably pulled off some kind of crate that I sawed into pieces.  I wanted something to hold my Pyrex collection and the corner seemed like a natural fit since I am low on space.  I planned on putting an overwhelming four toggles in each.  I did have a problem getting all four in, I hadn't thought about that once two are in it is difficult to align the other two.  I did get that done but I had a much larger problem with one of them where the clearance was limited behind the drywall so I only got 2 of 4 in.  A few months later I tore it all out and redid that shelf and got a third one in and was satisfied that it was now secure.

slitter infeed

This ancient device needed an infeed section to keep tension on the material.  It was easy enough for me to source the rollers but they needed the frame to hold it together.

I built the outside frames in two halves, then I used some black pipe maybe 1/2" diameter with shaft collars to squeeze it all together.  I figured this was a stronger way, and a way to keep things more square.  I should add that I drilled the holes for the rollers before I did this, I put the two halves together and clamped them then drilled through.

On the inside I ended up building a big 'table' for storage and to give it even more weight and keep it stable when the material was pulling through.