Got Wood?

Bubinga tabletop from
Owl Hardwood Lumber

Deep breath in, deep breath out. No anxiety tonight, and that is good. It was also good to hear some innocuous news about butterflies and pottery from Ellen (comments on previous posts). Every time I think of her, I think of the slogging clean-up she's having to do after Hurricane Harvey and all I see is endless, smelly, gooey muck. Butterflies are better.

Today Zaga and I did the inspections on the last two hives (all suited up of course) and it was a breeze. It was even a bit breezy and we HAD FUN! What a concept: Bees can be fun. This afternoon we searched for local hardwood emporiums where we could shop for materials for our steel and metal class (materials for her--I have a ton of blue pine to use for my desk and even a table or two). We went to two of the four I found--and one of those was a hardwood flooring supplier, not fine hardwood for furniture building so the trip was a bit of a bust. So far Woodcraft is the best we have seen, and Zaga was a bit disappointed with it. Apparently there is a place in Chicago called Owl Hardwood Lumber that has an enormous selection of all kinds and sizes of wood and it puts Woodcraft to shame. It's true there is only one small area for wood at Woodcraft as they also stock all the major tools and those take up most of their floor space.

Westbrook Metals

After Woodcraft we went to Westbrook Metals and I looked at i-beam, angle iron and tubing as candidates for the legs for my desk. I brought home small samples of each for $.50 a lb ($11 total--I love a hobby with relatively cheap materials!) and tomorrow when we unload the pine from the trailer and move it to the wood workshop I'll be able to look at the wood and the steel together. The slabs are really big and I need to balance the size and weight of the metal with the wood. It would look silly to have little, spindly one-inch steel tubing for the legs under a massive, three-inch-thick-slab desktop.  Right now I like the idea of i-beam standing on end and coming up all the way through the top of the desk so its end is flush with the surface. Somewhat like the leg on the bench below, but without the wood missing from one side of the i-beam, and the i-beam would not be all the way to the edge of the top either.

I think I'll use four-inch i-beam and put a leg in each corner... but who knows! I need to touch and move the wood around to see what I want to do. Big problem with that idea is that the long slabs of pine weigh about 176 lbs each, and the cut-offs weigh about 88 lbs each. I need a hobby that isn't so physically demanding. I guess I'd better figure out how I'm going to manipulate my materials. If I do use the i-beam for the legs the weight of the desk will jump to over 250 lbs (each leg will weigh about 20 lbs). And that's before I've added on any shelves or shelf hardware. Maybe I should cut the slab down to two inches thick--or I could make the desk six feet long instead of eight. That would be a better proportion of length to width anyway.

What an exciting project! After I do the desk for my class project I'll be in better shape to do the bed. And speaking of bed, I think I'll make my way to mine. Allergies are kicking my butt this week and I am TIRED!!