Old-Biker-UK
5th January 2016, 04:17 AM
One day I shall offer a thread on 'Just jobs' ie. the jobs you get when people find out you have more than one screwdriver and know which end of a hammer to hold.
They line up at your door with 'Can you just make one of these for me?' or 'Could you have a look at this?' or 'Any chance you could fix this?', jobs that can take from 5 minutes to a week.....
Some months back I was asked by a close family member if I would make one of those dodecahedron lamp shades, I took one look and said "No Way, Im too old, don't have the right equipment, life's too short" and any other excuse I could think of but to no avail, I was finally emotionally blackmailed into at least giving it a go.
Google being my friend I found two methods -
1/ Cut all the angles on all the individual pieces and glue up in a jig.
2/ cut & glue up the pentagons then cut the dihedral angles.
I opted for the second method, ripped down some softwood to 1/2" square (12mm for our more up-to-date readers), cut the 36deg each end on the mitre saw, made up a simple jig and glued up 14 pentagons (only needed 12 but by sod's law at least one would be scrap).
Next was the dihedral angle. I set the Coronet tilting table at 116.56deg (my Wixey angle thingy finally came in useful), made a sledge from MDF and cut the angles, not qite as easy as it sounds as the pentagons had a nasty habit of falling apart under the stress of the circular saw. Eventually got them all cut after several re-gluings. Then it was a fairly simple matter of glueing them all together after a trial assembly with gaffer tape.
A little wood filler, rub down, 2 coats of undercoat, a Perspex top to take the light fitting & it was done - ready to wrap up & put under the tree for Christmas Day.
Happily the recipient was well pleased.
367503
No - I'm not taking orders
Mark
They line up at your door with 'Can you just make one of these for me?' or 'Could you have a look at this?' or 'Any chance you could fix this?', jobs that can take from 5 minutes to a week.....
Some months back I was asked by a close family member if I would make one of those dodecahedron lamp shades, I took one look and said "No Way, Im too old, don't have the right equipment, life's too short" and any other excuse I could think of but to no avail, I was finally emotionally blackmailed into at least giving it a go.
Google being my friend I found two methods -
1/ Cut all the angles on all the individual pieces and glue up in a jig.
2/ cut & glue up the pentagons then cut the dihedral angles.
I opted for the second method, ripped down some softwood to 1/2" square (12mm for our more up-to-date readers), cut the 36deg each end on the mitre saw, made up a simple jig and glued up 14 pentagons (only needed 12 but by sod's law at least one would be scrap).
Next was the dihedral angle. I set the Coronet tilting table at 116.56deg (my Wixey angle thingy finally came in useful), made a sledge from MDF and cut the angles, not qite as easy as it sounds as the pentagons had a nasty habit of falling apart under the stress of the circular saw. Eventually got them all cut after several re-gluings. Then it was a fairly simple matter of glueing them all together after a trial assembly with gaffer tape.
A little wood filler, rub down, 2 coats of undercoat, a Perspex top to take the light fitting & it was done - ready to wrap up & put under the tree for Christmas Day.
Happily the recipient was well pleased.
367503
No - I'm not taking orders
Mark