Tag: stool

Repairing a Stool

On By MVFlaim FurnituremakerIn Furniture3 Comments

Back in the summer, my wife bought a stool for $5.00 at an antique show. I honestly forget which show it was as we go to one every weekend. The stool was in decent shape, it just had a broken rung which is why it was only $5.00. She asked if it could be fixed and I told her I could fix it pretty easily.

The first thing I did was clean out the hole the rung sat in with small drill bits and awls. I then cleaned up a bit of the glue residue with a small wire brush.

I needed a rung that was 3/4″ in diameter so I grabbed my shaving horse and went to work. I hardly use this thing so anytime I get a chance, I jump on it. Shaving horses are a blast to use.

I used my drawknife and spoke shave to get close to the final diameter, then I used a scrap piece of wood with a 3/4″ hole to check final dimension. I could have just bought a 3/4″ dowel, but where’s the fun in that?

I removed the rung from the other side of the chair to determine the length my piece needed to be. I then glued and installed the rungs back into the chair while using strap clamps to hold everything tight while the glue dried.

The seat needed to be reglued a bit as well so some glue and clamps did the trick. When everything was dry, the stool was sturdy as a rock.

I thought Anita might have painted the stool, but she decided to keep it natural. She didn’t even stain the new rung dark to match the other rungs. The stool looks nice as a plant stand and for $5.00, I’m not complaining.

Replacing a stretcher bar on a stool

On By MVFlaim FurnituremakerIn FurnitureLeave a comment

My wife was considering picking up this stool at an antique mall the other day and asked me if I could replace the stretcher bar in the middle. I told her more likely I could so she should go ahead and buy it.

The old stretcher was completely broken off and only the ends remained in the holes where it was attached. I took an 1/8″ drill bit and drilled a pilot hole in the middle of the holes on each end.

I then took a 1/2″ forstner bit and drilled out the hole cleaning it out. The pilot hole served as a guide for the point on my forstner bit so it would not wander off the center of the hole.

I then found a piece of scrap wood around the shop, measured how long the stretcher needed to be and then turned it so the middle was 1″ in diameter while tapering each end to 1/2″ in diameter.

Once the turning was done, I checked the fit of the stretcher at the hole. If the stretcher was a little tight, I shaved off some of the wood with a spokeshave so that the stretcher would fit in the hole nicely. I also had to loosen the legs a little bit by taking out the screws that held them to the frame to give me enough room so that the stretcher would pop into place. Once in, I screwed the screws back into place.

 A half hour of work and a piece of scrap wood, the stool had a replaced stretcher. Now it’s my wife’s turn to finish the stool.

Using Pinterest to Promote Your Blog

On By MVFlaim FurnituremakerIn FurnitureLeave a comment

I’ve been a member of Pinterest for a few months and have added a few Pins onto my Boards but never messed around with it too much. It’s a fun site where I get ideas on furniture designs or things that just catch my fancy but I never really knew of its potential as a marketing tool.

Then tonight while I’m browsing Pinterest, I see a stool with yardsticks as a seat. I’ve seen them before in stores and always wanted to make one but haven’t gotten around to building one yet so I decided to pin it. When I looked at the photo I clicked on it and it took me to the lady’s blog where she talked about making it.

When that happened I thought, I’ll be damned, how did she do that? Every pin I ever uploaded came from a picture off my computer. The Link box was already filled with where the picture was being pulled from. I had no idea how they were linking their pins to their blog.

After messing around with one of my pins for a while I figured it out. First I added the picture and pinned it. Then I went back in and edited the Link to my blog page. Too simple. 

What can I say, I’m not the most tech savvy guy out there. I’m still trying to figure out what Twitter is for.

Here’s one of my pins. http://pinterest.com/pin/134052526380084266/