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The Shed, January–February 2018, Issue 76

In the January/February Issue 76 of The Shed, we decide the best way to enjoy summer is to create some outdoor fires that Sheddies can happily build themselves. Jude builds one for a measly $200 out of Corten steel and we follow the build of a block kitset fireplace that takes less than two days to set up. David Blackwell visits the Melbourne Working with wood show and we meet Des Thomson of Christchurch who endless skill-set sees him build a unique pod for his small campervan. His skills will astound you. 

In the January/February Issue 76 of The Shed, we decide the best way to enjoy summer is to create some outdoor fires that Sheddies can happily build themselves. Jude builds one for a measly $200 out of Corten steel and we follow the build of a block kitset fireplace that takes less than two days to set up. David Blackwell visits the Melbourne Working with wood show and we meet Des Thomson of Christchurch who endless skill-set sees him build a unique pod for his small campervan. His skills will astound you. Hugh McCarroll hears the call from his wife who needs a rolling stool made for her galley kitchen then we head to Oamaru to meet Alistair Allan who has old chicken sheds chock full of Kiwiana. Andrew Bellringer is an ex-diesel mechanic who now creates stunning art pieces out of steel junk and Coen Smit show us another way to use cast-off materials by using it to create interesting household lamps. Philip King is an Auckland antique furniture restorer and he shares some of his tricks of the trade with us and we visit the shed of Aucklander Simon Dew who restores BSA, Royal Enfield and Moto Guzzi motorbikes – to name but a few. We learn all about the Hallswell Menzshed in Christchurch before Enrico Migliano gives us more 3D printing tips and advice. Ritchie Wilson and Jude Woodside team up to explain all there is to know about universal sockets, sockets and spanner sizes through the ages before Bob Hulme gives us some choice tips on drills and drilling in our metalwork workshop. We close this Christmas and summer issue with Back ‘O’ the shed where Jim Hopkins is pleading with us to have a 2018 of living positively. Now The Shed is all for that! 

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Creative duet

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For Dave Pauling, making guitars is the natural fusion of two passions – music and wood.
Dave, who has been playing the guitar since he was 13, also knew the pleasure of pottering in sheds from a young age. His father is a “sheddie” from way back who, among other things, still spends many hours restoring vintage vehicles.
“I grew up helping him with his Model Ts, making bows and arrows, or working on a model railway we had in the loft,” he says.
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My tools and machinery were housed in an unlined shed for a few years, resulting in plenty of surface rust.
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Most of my affected tools were small enough to be immersed in the liquid. I had a container that I filled with Evapo-Rust, and an overnight immersion generally cleaned them up. The beauty of Evapo-Rust is that it’s reusable, so that container will last for the foreseeable future, probably a year for me.

A butterfly takes wing

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This simple butterfly pendant or brooch (depending on the back fittings) is a very good exercise in several basic goldsmithing techniques. It also can be decorated in several different ways to produce strikingly different finished pieces of jewellery.
I drew this design more than 25 years ago for a company that then made paua-shell jewellery. They stamped out their products, so I often made the master patterns in copper and from these patterns they spark-eroded the dies.
If this design was being made in an art school, it would be stuck to a sheet of silver and the basic shapes cut from there. If a design was made this way in, say, 18-carat gold and the wing outlines (as here) made from 2.5 mm thick metal, the outlay and waste material would be considerable from a 2.5 mm-thick sheet of 18-carat gold plate. But we will make it like a professional craftsman who has to live in the real world where costs matter.