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The New Twisted Knot Woodshop
watch and live vicariously as I build my new shop
Most of my cyber friends are aware of my antics during the time where I thought our moving to Virginia would be a good idea. For those who aren't then you may be interested in reading my account here. If you'd rather not read it now, I'll nutshell it for you. I sold the shop building, loaded all my tools and equipment into a school bus, moved to Virginia. We stayed two months then moved back to Montana. Now, the loaded bus sits in the driveway and I'm shopless.
This is about to change.
I'm certain several have pondered the question, "What happened to the original Twisted Knot Woodshop?" Believe me, it's a question I ask myself on a daily basis, but you may wonder no more - it sits directly across the street from where it used to be. I invite you to watch as I bring into existence the new
(and improved) Twisted Knot Woodshop. First, the plan...
This is a good start so watch this space for pictures, verbal details, thought provoking commentary and general comedic diary-like entries. Click HERE if you'd like to see a description of all the equipment you see situated in the above floor plan.
Remember, living vicariously is almost like doing it yourself!
March 2, 2003 - Ground Breaking. Today Rich and I began the construction phase by breaking ground with a skid steer loader. We took a lunch break and used the opportunity to fetch the transit, tripod and grade sticks and when we returned the loader wouldn't start because of a loose wire on the starter. In the processes of tightening the nut, I dropped the extension and socket and watched as it disappeared into the bowels of the machine. Luckily, we were able to lay down on the wet, cold ground and fumble with a 75 lb inspection plate that was held on with 5 rusted bolts and remove it to reclaim the tool that was previously sucked into oblivion.
April 12, 2003
- Footings. It took a great deal of effort on my part to get the area ready to form the footings. Today I started working on the footings. I can't afford to form them and pour them all at once so I'm going to do them in four sections and each section will require 3 yards of concrete. These footings will be 16" wide and 12" thick and reinforced with 1/2" rebar.
June 17, 2003 - Foundations walls are poured. At 2:30 PM the concrete pump, followed by a mixer truck, pulled into the site. For the previous nine days I worked non-stop on the forms and the only help I had was on Father's Day when I scheduled a work party.
It took 34 sheets of 5/8" OSB to make up the forms. After it was stripped from the walls I stacked it to be used later for sheathing on the roof. Doing it this way saves money because it's serving a double purpose. Doing all this myself allowed me to form an opinion on concrete form work for foundation walls.
It sucks! But, they turned out great!
June 18, 2003 - Walls are stripped and area cleaned up. I hate contractors who believe the crawl space area should also serve as a landfill. I can't count the times I've entered one to find all manner of shit left there by these boneheads; scraps of wood, soda cans, bent over nails, you name it. After the forms were stripped I raked the entire area to remove all the concrete splatter left from the pour. It may not be perfectly level but you ain't gonna kneel on something while you're crawling around down there either. The right photo shows the building that housed my old shop, which used to sit here in this spot in front of you. The white pipe sticking up is the sewer connection.
July 6, 2003 - The front elevation. For the past couple of months I've been working on the elevation drawings. The front or south elevation will look like this...
I wanted a western theme but at the same time I want to have some of those wonderful Victorian details, so I married them to get what you see here.
The use of Spandrels was a detail typically found in the Victorian home and were used extensively inside and out.
Another detail I'll use can be seen in the
balusters that make up part of my porch
railing. They'll be sawn from 3/4" x 7" stock and this method for dressing up a porch was typical of the Victorian era.
While I've been waiting for the necessary funds to fall out of any given tree, I did a little work on the electrical plan...
The multi-colored lines represent different circuits for the outlets and the different colors going to the lights represent separate switch legs. Since I had so much time, I even drew the service panel detail...
That's all I've got so now if you'll excuse me, I need to go outside and check underneath them trees.
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