I finally bought a house in Cave Country! W00T!!!

[RayfromTX]

Chris,
Better to spend the money on the enclosure and supplementary dehumidification in Florida. The problem with ground source heat pumps is the install cost is too high. I’m heating and cooling a 4000 sq ft house in Texas with a 2.5 ton 13.6 SEER unit for 5-600$ per year. There is no way to justify the extra 1,000+$ per year in install cost for the 150$ a year in savings. That money would be better spent on the enclosure or photovoltaics.

That ignores the issues of potential pump failures and I have also seen wells fail due to ground water levels. That issue can cause loss of cooling for a long time. I wouldn’t let friends or family go that route without a big lecture and waving of hands.

 

[The Chairman]

All of December has passed and I haven't made an entry. Sry. Since then, I've built a riser for my washer/dryer, added a few odds and ends to my tractor, was almost thrown off my tractor and was visited by a very precise tornado. Whew!

First the riser... my washer and drier are front loaders, so you really have to lean way down to load/unload them. In addition, the washer/floor interface was incredibly LOUD. You really had to crank up the TV or stereo to listen to them when it was going. Finally, these heavy things are almost impossible to service on my own. I want to check the mechanisms of the washer, but getting to the back requires an additional person. I spent a bit of time looking at Pintrest and other sites for ideas. Some were "OK", but none were perfect for my situation. I have actually been thinking this through for six months, but nothing seemed to click. Then I saw an open front design that allowed you to slip laundry baskets under it. Wow. No, they weren't stout enough for me, so I set about designing it in my head. I started by constructing an I-beam inspired "3", with castors on the bottom. I planed the wood to get it straight and smooth, overlapped the seams to increase strength and rigidity, and put three furniture appliance casters on the bottom. The wood is fastened with pocket screws, copious amounts of glue and some hidden screws at this point.

​

I squared the 2x4s up with my table saw, and had an issue with a blade going bad. You can see the marks in the picture. All the marred parts are hidden in the final piece, and I made these so that the weight of either machine would be supported with only tiny moments of inertia. I then added more support on the front and rear of the supports and planed the boards to fit flush. I also added a simple fascia all around to keep the rubber pad in and to give me a 3/4" lip. Those were planed and run on a jointer since these are seams you will see.

​

I gave myself several points off for not hiding the screws, but this is utility furniture and that's kind of expected. Lastly, I painted it white and @Moose helped me install it.

​

Everything fit perfectly, almost too perfectly, and it's really hard to hear the washer now. I love it.

 

[Bubblesong]

Gorgeous!
Unfortunately, like all middle-aged women, I can’t resist making suggestions instead of allowing you to bask in your success.
So what about one of those fold down ironing boards that attaches to the wall? Or a hanging rail for hanging up clothes before they get wrinkles? I know! A wall mounted, fold up drying rack for cashmere sweaters!

 

[The Chairman]

While I was building the riser, I was helping a friend take off the valves of some old steel oxygen bottles. These were tapered pipe threads and after making a socket fit, I found that my Ryobi impact wrench was not up to the job of taking these valves off. Man were they tight. So I thought I would create a tank vise, since I wanted one anyway. Commercial designs were going in excess of $400, and so I put my designer's cap on. Recently, I had joined Gainesville Hackerspace, so now I have access to mills, lathes, welders and such. So I ordered some 4" aluminum channel and went to work. I milled 4- 3/16" x 2 1/8" slots to accommodate cam buckle belts and attached it to one leg of my mobile work table.

​

I had to add a bit of rubber mat left over from the riser, and exert well in excess of 250 ftlb of torque to break that puppy loose, but it worked with no slippage. I probably won't need the mat on any scuba tank, but the idea that it won't mar the finish works for me.

FWIW, I also cut off the bottoms of those tanks so he could turn them into wind chimes.

 

[Akimbo]

@Bubblesong

Ironing board, rails, and racks? What on earth would a single male need them for???

 

[The Chairman]

So what about one of those fold down ironing boards that attaches to the wall? Or a hanging rail for hanging up clothes before they get wrinkles? I know! A wall mounted, fold up drying rack for cashmere sweaters!

No iron or even cashmere sweaters on the property, so no need for an ironing board or drying rack. But, I have been thinking about a rod to extend from the bottom of the cabinet above the machines for exactly that purpose.

 

[The Chairman]

My next door neighbor and I were talking about the north fence between his, my and his daughter's house. It's been covered in Hercules club. If you aren't familiar with it, it's an oak like scrub tree covered in thorns and it hurts when you're mowing past it. Cut it and it scrubs right back up and they seem to love fence lines. Grrrrrrrr.

So, when Darryl put in a gate between his property to mine and then to his daughter's house, I took a moment to go pull the roots that were now fence free. As I was doing this, Darryl asked if I wanted to do the who fence line like that. Sheeesh, that seems a lot of work, but he said he would take care of the fence, if I would do the tractor work. SOLD! So together, he and I rebuilt that half of my North Fence.

Lots of roots on the burn pile.

Fence gone, poles pulled and everything mostly leveled.

Me drilling holes, most of which Darryl redid since they were't straight enough in a line for his taste.
I kept saying: "It's only a fence!", but the man is manic about his fences being straight.

Darryl resetting posts.

Ma~ doing her final inspection before putting the fence on.

The man has mad skills!

Darryl has a right to be proud of this.​

 

[tbone1004]

@The Chairman not sure where you're hosting those pix, but two of them won't post. fourth of you doing the drilling and the last one

 

[The Chairman]

@The Chairman not sure where you're hosting those pix, but two of them won't post. fourth of you doing the drilling and the last one

Sometimes it takes them a bit to load from here to the server. You should remember that I live on the very end of the digital dirt road. Sry. What post number?

 

[tbone1004]

Sometimes it takes them a bit to load from the server to here. Sry. What post number?

617 the most recent one