PEP Badge: Oddball

I decided To Make a carving for a relative for Christmas, so I thought I would post my progress on here.

I used poplar wood for this project.

I am not sure which category this would fall under. This may fall under animal care but again I was unsure.  My son and I built this guinea pig tractor so we can put them outside on good days to both fertilize the ground and reduce feed cost.  We live in a new development and the building company just laid sod down a few months ago, so we are trying to build the soil as quickly as possible with our pets. The majority of the wood was taken from construction dumpsters nearby. I did buy the chicken wire but the round rod was a closet rod I had repurposed. This took my son and I about 6 hours to complete but would have taken a pro probably much less time.  But for a bonding project this was great and he still brags about it.  The back opens up to put the GPs in, there is also bedding in there with about 1/2 inch opening along the back wall so when I lift and pull the tractor it spreads the bedding out on the ground.  We have four males currently and they are pets but we have a friend up the road with 4 females and could start breeding for meat source in the future.

Thank you Mike for the help getting this where it belongs.

I just finished making and wood burning a pair of knitting needles for a relative for Christmas. they ended out pretty smooth and symmetrical. I used a knife, some sand paper, and a wood burner for this project.

This is my first attempt at an Oddball BB.  I apologize if it falls under another category, but I did not find anything similar on the lists.  I changed the spark plugs in my  '94 Chevy Blazer.  I had half of them done before I realized that it might qualify for BB's, and I ran out of daylight the first day to finish the maintenance (kids helped clean up so the first old spark plugs ended up in the garbage that day).  So, the photos were taken the following day from changing the last three, and that is also why I only have pictures of three old spark plugs.  Probably took me 3 hours total.  It runs much smoother and nicer now, starts better too.

The fateful day of December the 25th was closing in quick. Thankfully I managed to get this gift done just in time!
It took a bit longer than I had originally thought but I enjoyed doing it and I think that the final product was worth it!
For those of you who don't know these characters are from a nice anime that my gift recipient really enjoys, called Spy x Family. (Would overall recommend.)

Anyway for this project I only used an average pencil and a wood burner. Glad I finished in time.

I made a mason jar carrying and emptying device from oak.  It holds three 1/2 gallon mason jars and there's a locking cross bar so you can empty all three at the same time without them falling out.

To make it a bit trickier, I did it without any metal or glue.  The joints are all box joints or, I guess, tenons.  They're pinned with oak pegs.  It's very sturdy and I learned a lot in the process.

If the square mortise the tenon fits into is wider than the tenon, when you pound in the pegs they have an easy time splitting the tenons.  So keep them snug!

Last winter I did a big project.  The staircase down to the basement wasn't built to code, it was a head knocking annoyance.  I redid the rise/run of the steps to be as steep as allowable and just barely get the head knocker to go away (and meet code).

The oak treads for this came from a tree I had milled for lumber about a decade ago.  Routed the edges to a standard stair tread profile. The length had to be very precise and wasn't always exactly 90 degrees.  So I had to use a template to mark out each end of each tread.

The risers were plywood since I needed to save every 1/4" to hit the rise/run.  

To save a bit of money, for the skirt boards I glued together three boards and cut both skirts from the same board.  Otherwise I'd have to waste a bunch of triangles of wood.  It worked splendidly. The skirtboard is outside the treads so it had to be accurate to within 1/2" on top and damn near snug on the risers.  So laying it out correctly was a pain.

I could get at the bottom side of the stairs so I attached it all together with screws (not glue) so that I could fiddle with it if I didn't like how it turned out.  The mounting blocks for all the treads were to correct for uneven stair stringers and allow for mounting from below.  I made a jig to locate those before attaching them.

The bottom step wraps around the wall a few inches as well.

I've never installed a garage door.  Time to give that a shot...  It's not the hardest job, you just have to be able to read mediocre directions and figure out which hole (of 8 possible ones) the next bracket screws into.

The garage door on the two car garage stopped going up unless we helped it.  I figured one of the two springs was broken and that's what it turned out to be.  It's a Wayne Dalton so the springs are hidden inside a metal tube where you can't see them.  

I took it apart.  The challenging part is that you have to pull out the plastic sleeve to get the spring out.  I wasn't sure if that was supposed to be removed but youtube eased my worries.  Ordered two new springs and they came with new sleeves.  Popped them in and reinstalled the whole thing.  And it works!!

Ok, last oddball submission for a little while....

I needed a person door to go from the main garage to the new 1 car garage.  So I picked a good spot in the wall and made it happen.

I went with a 32" rough opening so I could just remove two cinder blocks.  Luckily one edge of the blocks lined up with the studs.

I slid over the other stud 3" to be the king stud and added the jack stud next to it.  I cut out the OSB and the tops of the studs for (I think they're called cripple studs?) above the header.

Made up a header from some 2x8s laying around and attached it all.

Lastly I had to knock out those two cinder blocks without messing up the blocks on either side.  I hammer drilled out the mortar as much as I could and then tapped on them with a hammer to try to get them out.  It didn't work so I ended up demolishing one block and popping out the second one.