The Shed - Metalwork

New Zealand Railways celebrates 150 years

16 July 2026

In 2013, Railways in New Zealand marked the anniversary in October this year of 150 years since the first broad-gauge public steam railway opened between Ferrymead and Christchurch City in 1863, a distance of seven kilometres. The original gauge was five feet three inches (1600 mm) wide, although the standard gauge for New Zealand railways was to become three feet six inches (1067 mm).
As the Railways 150 Years Committee describes it, “People and goods were barged from the Port of Lyttelton to Ferrymead, then taken by rail to Christchurch. The Ferrymead Line operated for ten years from 1863 until 1873 when the 2.6-kilometre tunnel connecting Lyttelton and the Heathcote Valley was completed and commissioned.”
The celebrations for the anniversary in 2013 are focused on operations and displays at the Ferrymead Heritage Park during Labour Weekend and include heritage steam trips with the restored locomotive Ja1240 from Christchurch to Arthur’s Pass, Timaru and Ashburton. The Railways 150 Committee includes representatives from rail organisations such as the Ferrymead Railway, the National Railway Museum of New Zealand, the Mainline Steam Heritage Trust, the Plains Railway, the Weka Pass Railway, the Steam Canterbury Preservation Society and others. Additional help and assistance is provided by KiwiRail.

From armour to fighter

4 June 2026

An unassuming garage in the Hunua Ranges south of Auckland is the current shed of Gordon Turner and home to his latest project – a full-sized replica cockpit of a Messerschmitt Bf 109E fighter plane. Made from plywood, timber and aluminium and five years in the making so far, it will never take to the skies. But it is eventually intended to become a flight simulator, giving the ‘pilot’ a realistic experience of flying one of World War Two’s most famous aircraft.

Westland Industrial Heritage Park: From trash to treasure

30 April 2026

The West Coast has a history as rich as it is rugged, with a past steeped in mining, logging, and dairy farming on a forest-clad strip between the mountains and the sea. Up by Hokitika airport is a sheddies’ paradise where relics from this past are being resurrected by an enthusiastic and capable band of volunteers.
“It all started back in 1981. Everything was going by train out to scrap, so we formed a club to stop it,” says Mort Cruickshank. The “we” were four young men – Spike Jones, Jim Straton, Mike Rooney and Mort. They formed the Westland Farm and Vintage Machinery Club and started salvaging old machinery that had been destined for the dump. With no premises, they kept it in their backyard sheds and met sporadically to plan the future.
Four decades on, and the Westland Industrial Heritage Park, spread over several acres up by Hokitika airport, is packed with machinery, sheds and enthusiasts. It is a hub of community activities, has a Menzshed on site and is increasingly a drawcard for tourists.

Making a gate – the blacksmith way

22 April 2026

Joe Parkes is a blacksmith and as a youngster learned his trade the hard way. In 1958, aged 12, he was apprenticed to his grandfather and he quickly learned not to make mistakes. His giant Scots grandfather, Jack James, was a smithy of the old school. If young Joe got something wrong he had his head dunked in the half barrel of water used for cooling steel from the forge. He learned quickly.
“My grandfather, I called him Pop, was a big bugger, standing 6 ft 11 inches (1.8 metres) tall and weighing in at 20 stone (127 kg). He was a hard bastard, but he was my mentor. I once saw him pull a man through a high hedge and throw him over the top. You didn’t mess with him. If the blacksmiths got into a scrap you kept well clear.

Hot stuff in Taranaki

9 April 2026

Hot rods – we see them rumbling round the highways and byways, big V8s burbling, immaculate finished body and paintwork and obviously someone’s pride and joy. Many people don’t realise the work that goes into customising one of these gleaming machines. Some are old cars reshaped and rebuilt, and some are made from scratch, often using the classic designs and lines of cars built in the 1920s, 30s and 40s.
In the little town of Normanby in South Taranaki there’s a workshop set up to create these beasts. We caught up with guys from three businesses in a row having smoko together. An upholstery business, a custom fabrication shop and an engineering shop. All mates who work in together in a way that can only happen in a small town.

Choppers with pedal power

5 March 2026

Geraldine High School technology teacher Alan Minnear built pedal-powered choppers with his Year 11 students because he wanted something to capture their interest. He says he initially got the idea for the choppers from another local teacher but then discovered the Atomic Zombie website (www. atomiczombie.com) which opened his eyes to possibilities with the clear instructions available. He paid for and downloaded the PDF files for the two choppers named Vigilante and Overkill that caught his eye.
Because of their relative inexperience, the students basically followed the book for the choppers they built. However, the book gave no measurements, wanting builders to create their own design from the basics.

The ultimate man cave

15 January 2026

It’s tempting to think of Gregor Kregar’s work space as the ultimate humongous man cave. The 410-square-metre studio in a gritty industrial area of Auckland’s New Lynn certainly has all the “boy’s toys” to make the most avid sheddie happy.
Vises, grinders, table saw and cut-off saw? Check. MIG and TIG welders and drill press? Check. Two electric and a gas-fired kiln? Check. You get the picture. This is a serious space set up to work on all manner of materials.

Hammering history

31 October 2025

You can probably count on the fingers of one hand the number of Kiwi women who have become blacksmiths in their 60s. Judy Waterston of Livingstone, inland North Otago, is one of them.
As a child Judy spent hours in her engineer-father’s workshop sorting nuts and bolts, tidying away his tools, sweeping up, and watching him make things. She says her love of tools and machinery came from her dad.
The blacksmithing seed was sown in 1972 when Judy first saw Nicol’s Blacksmith Shop in Duntroon, some 40 km from Oamaru up State Highway 83. The building was being devoured by periwinkle planted 100 years before to act as a fire retardant. Most of the windows were smashed and it was draped in cobwebs.
“I looked through the broken windows and when I saw the anvil and bellows they took my breath away,” she remembers. “I’ve loved this building ever since.”

Metal and wood shelving

21 October 2025

No matter how much storage space you have, there is always a need for more. One solution is to make better use of existing cupboards and wardrobes. In my own house the third bedroom is used as an office, so the built-in wardrobe was an obvious target for conversion into a storage place for files and computer supplies.
I had already tackled one shelving upgrade. We have a hallway cupboard used for many things that don’t have a place anywhere else, including toys for the grandchildren when they visit. The space was not used well. My solution was homemade shelving using frames of steel with plywood shelves.
For this cupboard, we had to allow for a basket of toys and chillibin on the floor level and picnic items and other bits and pieces on other levels. Once the shelves were installed, better use of space meant more room became available. One of Murphy’s Laws soon came into play and other items found their way into the open spaces, making good use of the variety of shelving.

Forging ahead – take a knifemaking class

3 October 2025

Knifemaking has undergone a resurgence in the past few years. It may be the fact that it requires only a modicum of equipment. You only really need a file and gas torch.
Of course the more elaborate the knives you make, the more gear you will need but this is one of those hobbies that can grow with you. Naturally, having a forge, some sort of anvil – even if it is only a lump of hard steel or a bit of railway line, a grinder, and a hammer will extend your options and none of these are particularly expensive. There are a number of knifemaking classes springing up all over the country to cater to this interest. Shea Stackhouse runs classes in basic knifemaking, making Damascus steel and blacksmithing

Getting a grip

29 August 2025

I’m currently making a mould for a rotational moulded boat. It’s a complex project with barely a square angle in it and dozens of folds and welds. It’s the sort of job that requires precision and the often needs more than two hands.
Clamps are useful but they are usually fiddly and can have a tendency to slip at the last moment especially where there aren’t any flat even surfaces to get a purchase on. So I wasn’t expecting too much when I was asked to try the Strong Hand utility clamps.
They are lighter than cast clamps so I had some doubts that they would have the clamping strength I needed for the more difficult pieces.
I was a bit dubious about the sliding action, too. It’s unusual to use sliding F-clamps in engineering but I’ve seen them used in boat-building and woodworking.

Letting off steam

21 August 2025

“Steam is the only way to go,” says Win Holdaway, a Blenheim-based enthusiast who builds working models from scratch in his backyard shed.
Over the years, Win has spent thousands of hours constructing immaculate scale locomotives, including an 1870s’ Baldwin Standard TE, BR standard class 9F, and a Burrell Special Scenic Showman’s road locomotive. He is currently working on an inch-and-a-half scale 1925 Pennsylvania A5S 040 switcher, complete with tender. “It’s one thing to make a model that looks authentic and another to make it work,” says Win, whose working models can all hold 90-100lb of steam.
Win reckons he spent around 5000 hours building his Burrell Scenic Showman’s road locomotive alone. It is fittingly named Lynette after his wife. While he probably spends more time in his shed than the house, she is his greatest supporter. “It’s more than a hobby. This is his life,” says Lyn, a legal annotator who knows the importance of precision.
“I’m out here most days,” admits Win who, if not in his own workshop, can often be found down at Brayshaw Heritage Park with fellow model engineering enthusiasts.

In pursuit of perfection

5 August 2025

If David Curry was to be summed up in a single word it would almost certainly be precision. But that’s not enough – it would be absolutely vital to add artistry. Putting them together amounts to a search for perfection, so perhaps that’s the word to use.
Here’s an example: David is at present building a dauntingly complicated perpetual calendar skeleton clock, which has 38 gears, one with 165 teeth, all of which have to be individually machined. Clearly precision is paramount. But the levers and some parts of the frame look a little utilitarian, so he’s redesigning them with a few artistic flourishes. For inspiration he looks to a skeleton clock built in 1855.
“The engineering has to be right so that the parts work properly, but they also have to look right,” he says.
The clock tells the time, has a second hand, notes the day, date and month, and knows whether the month has 30 or 31 days. David is adding a second chiming system so that the half hour, three-quarter hour and quarter hour chimes have different tones from the full hour strike.

Lights galore

15 May 2025

If you are interested in adapting and using discarded bits and bobs to make something useful, then building lights, table lamps, and the like, offers an endless source of relatively inexpensive projects to amuse you. What’s more, they make unique gifts and nice conversation starters for visitors. Lamps are also a good way of supporting a decorating theme. Whether you are into an Art Deco, Arts and Crafts, modern or industrial look, it is nice to enhance your chosen theme by constructing a light from an object that is reminiscent of it.
Of course you are dealing with 240-volt electricity, which is potentially lethal, so it is essential that you use common sense and particular care when wiring up lights (see the safe wiring tip box). The advent of 12-volt downlights powered by small transformers has also made the construction of lights much safer. Lights can now be wired in such a way that the 240-volt transformer is remotely located or secured and independently earthed. There is no electrocution risk posed by the 12-volt wiring in the rest of the light.

Welding: Standing to attention – lathe bench build part 2

4 April 2025

I ordered some drawer slides of the appropriate length (350mm) and worked out the width of the slides and thus the width of the drawers. The drawer slides are rated at 45kgs. I couldn’t be sure what weight I would be likely to load but this should suffice. I elected to run with eight drawers and make the second opening in the frame a cabinet to house larger components like the four-jaw chuck. After some fiddling I settled on two drawers each of 75mmx70mmx60mm, and 50mm high, separated by 10mm.
I bought three sheets of cold rolled steel 1mm thick. This is within the limits of the panbrake and I had hoped the material would be stiff enough given that the drawer had to span over 500mm width. I broke the material down into half sheets to make it easier to handle.

Metalwork