Re: Cabinetmaking questions from a beginner

[Andy Dingley]

I would love to see some of the pix of your copperwork. Can you post >some??

Sorry, I don't have any good photos.

There are some rubbish photos of some badly made tea trays in this style at:

've ironed the production problems out now, but I don't have any for sale at present (and won't until the Summer at the earliest).

Can you recomend some books or sites that have info on how to do >this??

Mainly you need copper, hammers, and a torch. It's one of those skills that's simple to teach, but hard to learn. There's a lot of skill to it that comes with practice, rather than being especially complex.

If you're unfamiliar with working non-ferrous metals, then Tim McCreight's "The Complete Metalsmith" is a good read

He's also responsible for the useful "Color on Metal"

which is rather cheaper than the classic "The Colouring, Bronzing and Patination of Metals"

The techniques I use for those trays are basic sinking, hammer texturing, annealing and colouring. Any 1950s school metalwork textbook should tell you enough to be going on with.

Getting a good Stickley hammered finish is tricky. It needs the right hammer (10 oz mirror-polished ball pein with a very long shaft), the right anvil (1/2" steel plate), the right patina (I now use chemical patina, but those trays were done with peanut oil and heat). Then finish with Garryflex or Roebuck blocks and a coat of Renaissance wax.

For riveted copperwork, I used to use bronze boat nails, but these things cost a fortune and they're hard work to rivet. Now I use cheap copper roofing nails and have much less trouble.

[Lawrence Wasserman]

Man, you could write a book to answer all those questions. In fact, peaple HAVE written books with the answeres. Why don't you read one?

[J. Clarke]

This is just a suggestion, but make sure the tub is properly levelled--if it's a typical built in then it will have a tile flange on the 3 sides that are in contact with the wall. It should be levelled so that any drips will flow toward that flange rather than out onto the floor but not so far that they'll pool above the height of the flange. I figured out after much frustration that mine was sloped a bit the wrong way so I got far more water on the floor than I should have, an ongoing problem with this house apparently--the previous owner fixed the floor but didn't level the tub, so now the floor is rotted out again (plywood, not particle board or MDF). And my impression is that he inherited the problem from someone earlier--he said something about the sheetrock in the tub surround not being waterproof and the rest of the house is all plaster on metal lath--if there was sheetrock there then someone had already fixed it once before he got to it.

If the tub keeps pouring water on the floor then it's going to be repair after repair.

[Andy Dingley]

I'd hate to see someone set off on a Mission, and find themselves reading either of these books:

[John Paquay]

Modern porcelain tiles are extremely hard and resistant to chipping.

Where considerable dirt and/or water are likely, a good option to common sanded mortar grout is epoxy grout. It's water-proof and will not become soiled like ordinary sanded grout. It's considerably more expensive, but in bathroom-typical quantities, the overall cost difference will be very small, if not negligible (assuming that you can find a source for small quantities -- tile contractors always have small quantities left over from previous jobs. You just have to find one that has a color you can live with).

John

John Paquay [e-mail]

"Building Your Own Kitchen Cabinets"

Glory and Passion No Longer in Fashion The Hero Breaks His Blade. -- Kansas, The Pinnacle, 1975

------------------------------------------------------------------

[foo]

You can buy a teflon grout sealer to apply to your grout. It repels water, stains, and the yuck you don't want.