Author Topic: Outdoor projects while self-isolating due to covid-19 (Read 6341 times)

haunted · « **on:** April 05, 2020, 07:55:17 PM »

I've been feeling pretty bad for my 4 year old not being able to do much so I built him this slide out of scrap wood and pallets. I added a balance beam the next day to it.

haunted · « **Reply #1 on:** April 05, 2020, 07:57:32 PM »

Today I started on another project. A tree house/fort. I set 5x5's and leveled the frame for the floor so far.

|iR|Focalor · « **Reply #2 on:** April 05, 2020, 09:06:58 PM »

Shit man, I ain't even been out to cut my grass yet this year, haha. My yard looks like SHIT. And I live in a nice neighborhood, with covenants, and people with Lexus'seses and Land Rovers and shit. I trimmed one of my crepe myrtles back as per usual every year back in Feb... but the other small bush sized one on the other corner of the house I haven't done yet. I have 10 boxwood bushes along the front on one side that I didn't trim last fall because I was afraid it was too late and the frost would burn/kill the cut ends. So they are all like 400% their normal size, and look like Quadz's avatars fuckin' hair. I got SOOOOOOOO many fuckin weeds in my bushes and pinestraw beds, it's crazy. And I guess the Chem-lawn fuckers have either not come or did a really shitty job of spraying for pre-spring weeds, because my lawn is slap full of the damn things. Been procrasterbating like hell getting out there and at least spraying all the weeds in the bushes and beds with whatever weedkiller I have. Gonna HAVE to get out there and do SOMETHING by next weekend though, or else I won't be ABLE to cut the grass once it gets taller than the mower can handle. Which means... gas station trip.

If I have to go get gas, which I probably will, I'm bringing a can of lysol and hosing down that fucking pump before I use it... if the damn gas station is even OPEN, I dunno.

I was considering doing some woodworking at some point myself. I have a about a 5 or 6 ft x 2-3ft piece of plywood that I was thinking about sawing up into strips and making a guitar pedalboard out of it. I don't wanna do something all at one angle though like a Pedaltrain board. I want the front edge of it to be angled and deep enough to fit about a 11-12in long wah and volume pedal, but then I want the area above it to be elevated more (like steps) so my foot doesnt hit any pedals on the first row when accessing them.

Sgt. Dick · « **Reply #3 on:** April 06, 2020, 04:25:02 AM »

Haunted for making it happen with what you have around.

I'm sure your kid is thrilled and probably enjoys being part of building it.

haunted · « **Reply #4 on:** April 06, 2020, 08:07:45 AM »

I went behind a boat yard and scooped up a truck load of pallets (with permission) for free. Building stuff out of pallets is popular these days, but to make it a lot more practical ya need to get them from a place like I did. There's like 20 different kinds of pallets opposed to the standard 4x4ft flimsy ones. As an example I got one yesterday that consisted of 6 2x8's with no gaps in between the boards. Bracing them together underneath are 2 4x4's. All solid oak and it's some quality lumber. That frame I used for the floor of the tree house is just an XL pallet about 5x9ft. All oak 2x4's and 1x6's. I haven't started yet but I'll pry the rest of the 1x6's off with a crowbar(I had already started) then I'll reattach them so there's no gaps. I got another 5x9ft pallet just like that one so I'll have plenty to finish the whole floor.

Trying to finish my indoor honey-do list fast so I got a couple of hours to work on it. Rearranging EVERYTHING in my living room, sitting room, and kids room. The "sitting room" is really a dining room that we repurposed, so we're changing it to actually be a dining room now. My kitchen table will go in there, then where the kitchen table is now we're going to make into the kids play area. That way my wife can watch them while working in the kitchen.

haunted · « **Reply #5 on:** April 10, 2020, 03:32:01 PM »

A little bit of progress to show.

+ Pilings anchored with concrete
+ Floor finished
+ Stairs

Bonus pictures:
-My yard is a mess
-the tree that I threw my hammer at when this POS wood kept splitting

|iR|Focalor · « **Reply #6 on:** April 10, 2020, 05:16:10 PM »

So far so good. I remember when I used to have the energy to do that kinda stuff, lol. But... not to shit on your hard work... pallet wood is gonna weather quickly outdoors. Without some Thompsons waterseal or something, it's gonna start looking pretty ragged after 12 months.

haunted · « **Reply #7 on:** April 10, 2020, 06:53:42 PM »

Thanks. They make pallets out of a lot of different types of wood. The most common ones are soft pine and oak. I made sure to get all oak and I'm building it to handle my weight since I'm sure other people's kids will get on it. Of course it's not pressure or salt treated, but other than the psuedo-1x6 flimsy pallet planks it's regular ol decent oak. Particularly the 4x4's, 2x4's, and 2x8's I snagged.

That being said I was planning on just painting it, but my wife said today that it would look tacky. She wants the wood color. So yeah I'll probably get some Thompson's clear/transparent water seal. Maybe I'll get one that looks like varnish, might look nice.

I threw out my shoulder throwing that hammer at the tree, damn it. Started aching when I got in bed.

haunted · « **Reply #8 on:** April 10, 2020, 07:06:38 PM »

Also, holy shit are pallets a pain in the ass. It's a popular do it yourself hip thing these days, but they leave out all the shit you gotta do to PROPERLY re-use the wood. Thankfully I got a big crowbar but it's still very time consuming. I've been even reusing the nails, lmao. I hammer out the bends in them. I have 1 box of large nails, so I'm only using them for foundation/structure/frame. My skill saw is at my parents house too 5 hours away. I've made every cut with an electric chainsaw, so this is the epitome of zero cost and doing it with what ya have.

Sgt. Dick · « **Reply #9 on:** April 11, 2020, 05:58:55 AM »

It is turning out pretty good, especially with the tools you have to work with.

I saw the mini sledge in the one picture and was going to comment about that being good for throwing when things go bad, but then I saw that you have already done that

haunted · « **Reply #10 on:** February 11, 2021, 09:33:46 PM »

Update:

I procrastinated on this project for awhile. I told y'all about my son's condition. Fun, happiness, and socializing reduce his condition big time. I still haven't finished the platform, but this is what I did:

+Custom swing set, purchased cedar cut for an a frame then added whatever swings we wanted (got chain/mounting kits off Amazon for cheap)

+"Rock climber" we already had, bought used for 80 I think off Facebook marketplace.

+The side, platform, and balance beam I had already built.

+ Mini trampoline for jumping in place

+ Stepping stones made from a hickory that fell inmy yard during the last hurricane I cut with my chainsaw

+Random hickory logs

+Excavator with sandbox with sand from the island I grew up on

+60 bags of mulch or so, landscaping paper beneath it

+Bordered with cheap landscaping timbers (lumber is expensive right now)

Simple but I like the end result.

|iR|Focalor · « **Reply #11 on:** February 12, 2021, 01:59:40 PM »

I hope that things a good many feet from your house. All that bark bedding is a termite magnet. Hopefully your house was treated completely for termites and they didn't miss any spots. When I was a teen, my folks used pine bark in the bushes because it looked nicer than pine straw and lasted longer. They didn't know how bad it was about attracting termites. The house was treated well, other than the pillar between the two garage doors. They ate the living shit out of that, even got into the attic and started eating some old antique furniture stored up there.

But damn. That's one helluva play yard. You gotta get some walls and a roof on that platform thing, turn it into a little covered fort or something where they can campout at night or something. Somewhere to hide from adults when they're about 12 and they find a discarded Penthouse or Hustler on the side of the road. Do kids still do that anymore? Most of us, that was our introduction to female anatomy. You find that ratty old rained-on titty magazine with half the pages dried together sitting in a ditch beside the road. It's like the porn-fairy travelled around the country back then, tossing out dirty magazines for children to find. God bless that porn fairy. One of the fondest memories of my childhood was finding that Swank magazine in the woods by the creek where the older neighborhood boys would camp out at night. And most of us had a similar experience like that, right? Kids these days don't get that experience. The internet and it's abundance of conveniently accessible porn killed one of the most important rites of passage for American boys.

Sgt. Dick · « **Reply #12 on:** February 13, 2021, 07:05:50 PM »

Nice work

|iR|Focalor · « **Reply #13 on:** August 01, 2021, 04:09:06 AM »

Interesting video I found. Dunno how "affordable" this kinda project is anymore considering the ridiculous prices of lumber these days.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOOXmfkXpkM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2ejcEddQt8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-B_9Xzy9ds

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSRWAIn4G88

|iR|Focalor · « **Reply #14 on:** August 20, 2023, 10:46:00 AM »

This guys house is AMAZING.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_exBnQINFs

That last video shows a water wheel system for generating local power. This one uses a PMA (permanent magnet alternator) and 4 water jets from a gravity fed piping system run from a creek to turn it. Interesting stuff.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2QoKRWANs4

Author Topic: Outdoor projects while self-isolating due to covid-19 (Read 6341 times)

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