Ok, so say cash isn't a problem. Say supply isn't a problem. Neither is time or conservation concerns. And you have all the skills, tools, help (if needed/wanted), and materials to do the job.
What would be the one thing you wanted to build the most in your lifetime? It could be anything, as wild or as wonderful as you want. Floor a gym with solid ebony, carve a replica of the Mt. Rushmore from solid holly, build a house out of lignum vitae and thuya burl, whatever.
For me, I would love one day if could build my own piano. I started playing piano when I was 5, and it was a big part of my life through college. I haven't owned a piano in years though, and it's bothering me. Now that I've gotten into woodworking, I don't just want to have a piano, I'd love to make one. I don't know what of....maybe a rosewood -- kingwood perhaps. Maybe macassar ebony....
Build my own house, Includes building furniture. House would be probably around 3,000 sqft. of regular living space. Automated to today's technology and ready for tomorrow. Large Deck in back made out of cedar. Pool under a Greenhouse like canopy. And a large shop attached.
I'd like to build the interior of my own house. Have the plumbing, electricity and insulation basics done and leave the rest to me. Let me build the room partitions, cabinets, kitchen, finish the basement and stuff like that. Guess I'd need an elevator to get to the basement or upstairs if there was one, but that would be about it. Shove a pizza and some beer in the door once in awhile and let me go at it.
Considering what houses cost these days, this dream has a reasonable chance of happening since I'd sooner be able to afford the basic frame of a house without all the luxuries.
Yes, building a house, and the furniture. It would take a long time, because I would have to think about each room and each piece of furniture till I had the right idea. Accessible runs for plumbing and wiring would be included. No corners cut to speed construction or reduce the price. Maybe a "rustic room" with hewn oak mantle over the fireplace, and a "high class" study with cherry wainscoting and mid-victorian furnishings. Another room for the arts & craft style. Blending all these different styles into a single house would present a most interesting challenge. What would the unifying theme for the exterior be . . . hmm.
On 29 Aug 2003, D K Woods spake unto rec.woodworking:
I just finished a dream project, of a sort. Well, it's not finished, and it wasn't all woodworking, but the heavy lifting is done and there's more woodworking to do.
Our 150+ year-old house had a 36 sq.ft. afterthought of an upstairs bathroom - a blue cast-iron tub, blue toilet and sink. Almost enough room left over for one person to turn around in, if she kept her arms by her sides. The rest of the house is quite roomy and comfortable, but the bathroom had been put in with the advent of indoor plumbing, and it was seriously inadequate.
I took all of last week off. The first day, LOML and I filled a 6 cu.yd. dumpster with lath, plaster, and three layers of flooring. I had already framed new walls and put in a window, using room stolen from a large adjacent utility room and hallway space.
The second floor of this century-and-a-half old house is anything but level. I spent a day sistering in new floor joists, to make the new floor even. LOML's brother is a contractor, and green-lighted the stuctural changes - the new room spans two sections of the house that were built at different times, and we didn't want the new room to cause further sagging or other problems.
A day and a half of tearing out cast-iron drains, re-routing and replacing them with PVC, then roughing in and sweating 50' of copper supply and heating lines. A big sigh of relief when I turned the water back on and my 60 or so sweated copper joints all held, no leaks. This room is over the downstairs library/music room, which we renovated a few years ago, and we weren't hoping to re-do the ceiling any time soon! We ended the day by putting down the subfloor.
Next day, I installed the new bath - a 50 gallon Jacuzzi, big enough for two. (Does that sound like a gloat? It was meant to...). This required a new 15amp line and CFGI, which had to be run from the service box (in my shop), up to the attic, and down through the second floor ceiling. Another circuit had to be wired for an overhead light on a three- way switch, and a third for the lights over the sink. This took me most of the afternoon.
Next day, we framed in a new ceiling, and hung 1/2" green sheetrock from it. We postponed taping the seams for a bit. I am utterly inept at taping sheetrock; fortunately, LOML is very good at it, and she's been taking care of that this week. We spent the rest of that afternoon putting cement backerboard up around the tub. That evening, we tiled the tub surround - it was almost midnight when we finished. That was one long day!
It's now Friday. We laid cement backerboard on the subfloor, grouted the tub surround, and tiled the floor. On Saturday, we grouted the floor, installed the toilet and took care of a few other loose ends, then spent the rest of the day cleaning the house, which was a disaster area from the plaster dust, sawdust, etc.
So, a week later, the 36 sq.ft. bathroom is now 102 sq.ft.; has a tiled floor and tub surround; a working Jacuzzi; a green, untaped ceiling; naked lightbulbs on pigtails hanging from the walls and ceiling; no doors; and raw studs for walls. We think it's beautiful ;-)
I'll spend this weekend building the vanity, which will have a tiled countertop to match the tub surround. An alcove at one end of the room will become a linen closet in a few weeks, then the walls will get sheetrock above and bead-edged T&G wainscoting below. Lots of nice finish carpentry details to attend to yet - moldings at the ceiling, door and window casings, etc. Ought to be finished by Halloween.
1) A full matching set of furniture done in a Nakashima/tansu sort of way for every room in the house.
2) Redwood hot tub
3) Sauna
4) Maloof style chairs
That's 55440 cu/in or about 32 cu/ft. There are about 7.4 gallons in a cu/ft so if you fill it to the rim it is ~237 gallons. A 200lb person displaces about 25 gallons if they are totally in the water. The math just doesn't work
one doesn't usually fill a tub more full than the overflow. one doesn't usually get a tub much larger than the contents of a normal sized water heater, and a 60 gal water heater is larger than most.
On 29 Aug 2003, Gfretwell spake unto rec.woodworking:
The 60x42x22 is the outside measurements of the tub... the actual 'bowl', if you will, is smaller, of course. The 50 gallon figure is Jacuzzi's estimate of average operating water usage. It would take a while to fill if you needed 200+ gallons/bath. Never mind the water bill.
Isn't it amazing that you post what you did and get jumped on for the gallons in your jetted tub?
Gotta love Usenet.
I just finished turning our garage into a master suite. Jetted tub, shower, etc. Here's a gloat for you - American Standard had the wrong faucet locations on the sheet that came with the tub, therefore the holes I drilled wouldn't work. I had to tear the tub out and exchange it. American Standard wrote me a check for my time and material. The tub ended up costing us $45.00.
As soon as the tub was in and hooked up it started seeing use. There were still some bare studs and just a sub floor but it sure felt good after working your ass off all day.
That sucks, but sounds like it worked out OK. The one SNAFU I ran into was my own fault... I used the rough-in specs on the sheet provided by Jacuzzi, only to find that the overflow on the tub was offset 5" to the right, instead of the left, as shown on the sheet. An hour of swearing and PVC drain pipe moving later, all was well. I was ready to tear a new orifice on somebody at Jacuzzi, when I realized that I had ordered a left- motor tub... the specs were for a right-motor. It didn't SAY to reverse them for the LH version, but I should oughtta figgered it out myself.
Ditto. We discovered empirically that the rim of the tub is wide enough to hold a bottle of champagne. Wonder if they designed it that way?
First choice: the house interior/funiture project. But realistically, it ain't gonna happen.
Realistic probability: a stand-up desk, with a gallery on top w/ displays for (1) remotely-sensed weather stations (measuring points spread out over the ranch, cliff house, beach house, and town home); and (2) a series of clocks for various global time zones. All that I need now is the ranch, cliff house, and beach house.
Fri, Aug 29, 2003, 9:51am (EDT-1) snipped-for-privacy@dreamdynamics.nospam.com (D=A0K=A0Woods) ponders: Ok, so say cash isn't a problem. Say supply isn't a problem. Neither is time or conservation concerns. And you have all the skills, tools, help (if needed/wanted), and materials to do the job. What would be the one thing you wanted to build the most in your lifetime? What about you?
Only one answer to that:
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we're all God's children, what's so special about Jesus?
Life just ain't life without good music. - JOAT Web Page Update 28 Aug 2003. Some tunes I like.
To build a house like the church I'm building for my company. The worship area is about 9000 (that's thousand) square feet with a finished ceiling max. height of 44 feet. The steel stud walls are 16 feet tall and the cathedral ceiling (go figure) goes up at a 5/12 to a clerestory that's 24 feet square, all windows.
The best part, though, is the structure. Huge laminated oak beams that form a tic-tac-toe board over the plan view of the church. These beams were made by a company in Montana and the total weight of all of them is approx. 48,000 lbs. They're 13" wide and 54" thick and they're made of what looks like 1x that's been bent and glued. We had ironworkers assemble them. Now that we've got the building closed in, it's truly breathtaking.
The only difference is that this is all one room, and I'd stretch the exterior walls a little and put bedrooms, etc around the ring on the second floor, with a huge atrium going up the middle. On the bottom, one large room. Wide open spaces, as the Dixie Chicks say.
Since I live in the real world, however, I'll go with SYP rather than Red Oak on the beams :).
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