Project: Workbench

A real man needs a real work bench.  So I built one.

I was getting pretty tired of (and sore from) doing all my shop work on the floor of my garage.  At least, that's my official excuse.  In reality, I want to build a tool shed to store all the tools I need to make a tool shed.  And to build the shed, I need a proper table.  And to build a proper table, I need some tools, but more on that later.

Since my wife refuses to park on the driveway, I don't have enough room for a traditional work bench so I designed one that folds up nicely beside my car.

The structure is made of 2x4s and has a pine top.  Pine is a soft wood, but the frame was already pretty heavy so I opted for something lighter that is both easier to lift and puts less stress on the hinges.  If it becomes a problem, I may replace the top later.  I was just barely strong enough to install it alone, but once hung it's not heavy at all - the wall bares most of the weight.

The legs swing down from beneath the table.  To prevent the legs from collapsing accidentally, I use a 6' piece of dowel that sits on a couple screws.  I'm considering adding a second 2x4 to each leg to make it more stable, look a little better, and give a little bit of room between the table and the wall when it's closed.  With this extra room, I can install plywood or pegboard beneath the table for extra tool storage. This would help as my tool chest is full, possibly because of all my screwdrivers!!

I did make a few mistakes when building the table.  It's designed to sit 36" above the floor and I measured it where the floor meets the wall.  My garage floor is slanted though, presumably to help water escape and flow away from the walls.  So the back of the table was 36" off the floor, the front-right was 36.75" and the front-left was 37.75" (that's a full inch drop from right to left!).  Since the legs weren't quite long enough, I had to remove the 2x4 support on the wall and screw it in 3/4" lower to accommodate.  Just when I thought I was done!

Next, the door hinges I bought caught on the wood and prevented it from moving.  If you look at any door in your house, you'll notice that the axels of the hinges hang off the door, in the air.  In my design, there is no gap between the axel and the wood so there was a lot of friction when I screwed in the hinges.  I fixed it by installing washers between the hinge and the wood.  In the picture below, you can see the washers and a set of four holes (two of which are unused after moving the 2x4).  You can also see that the hinges don't support any weight when the table is open - it's all on the feet and the wall mount.

To smooth the table, I bought a hand-held band saw.  This turned out to be useless - it made the surface more rough than when I started - so I had to fix the sand job by hand.  Next time I'll know to ignore the advice of the Home Depot employee and use a random orbital sander.  But now I have a belt saw.

And now I can build things for real!

The sound of OOF

Staying home from work today, I sent this email to my team:

The bad news is that I’m not feeling a whole lot better than yesterday.

The good news is that to get you through this troubling time without my presence, I provide you with rap.

Please read this in the voice of a thug, as who has street cred.
…and rather poor rapping skills.


Diagnosed with streptococcus.
It’s got me down; I cannot knock this.
Stay at home to rest and cough. It’s
Hard to be away from the office.
Try to remote in but they’ve blocked it!
Password’s expired and can’t unlock it!
All I want to do is log in!

Now my rage is engaged.
Feels like I’m encaged.
There's a war being waged.
How can it be in this day and age
That my body’s upstaged by a bacteriophage?

Word.

[sound of microphone hitting the floor as I walk away]

Project: Soft Box Mount

Helping to build my home studio, my mom gave me a Neewer 250 Watt strobe for my birthday and I want to attach a Loadstone Studio Ultimate Soften Light Soft Box to it.

The only problem is that the strobe has a non-standard mount...or maybe I just don't know the standard.  I guess that's what happens when you buy online without real knowledge.  Also, my soft boxes are designed to fit around a custom quad light socket mount.  The strobe has an outer diameter of 3 3/4" and the soft box base has a diameter of 6 1/4" with four post holes.

The Novatron N7301 Universal Speedring would be perfect for the job, so I bought it.  Unfortunately, The ePhoto Universal Speed Ring arrived instead, labelled as the N7301.  Amazon's customer service is pretty amazing though (again ranked #1) so I'll return it.

This leaves a whole in my studio.  I wasn't able to find another brand and I can't trust that I'll receive what I order next time, so to Home Depot I go!

They carry a 2"-4" bushing for PVC pipe:

A 4"-6" bushing would be perfect, I could just screw holes for the soft box rods and add some tensioning screws, but Home Depot doesn't carry that size.  Amazon does, but it costs $22 plus shipping, which is more than the N7301.

So back to Home Depot!

Here's what I bought for just under $20:

• A 7" light reflector (which fits on the back of some random light)
• Four 3/8" coupler nuts
• Some copper attachments used to secure piping
• Weather stripping

Here is it partially assembled.  I lined the interior with weather stripping and drilled eight holes using a hand drill.  You can see a tiny piece of weather shipping sitting on the right side of the ring where the next coupling nut will go.  I use this to keep the nut from slipping and to provide a little lift since the metal ring is slightly curved and I want the nuts to be square.  Plus, I had a lot of extra stripping left over.

Beware!  Drilling metal is not like drilling wood.  It's not sufficient to hold onto the part with your bare hand (and it's dangerous to use gloves with a drill, since catching a glove will cost you more than a little bit of skin).  If the drill bit catches the metal ring at 2000RPM, in a battle between your hand and the metal disk, it's not hard to guess who would win.  I'm glad I used my foot and proper shoes to hold down the piece as the metal did catch once after drilling my first hole - I lifted my foot before the drill bit stopped completely.  Bad move.

Also, use protective eye ware.  Metal chips are not your friend.

Here is the unit fully assembled and sitting atop one of my strobes.  It's not as pretty as it could be since I ran out of small screws.  To a keen reader, you'll notice that I'm also using my tripod-to-light stand tip adapter.

And finally, here is the unit assembled on my birthday light with the soft box inserted.

And for a little fun, here is the soft box I built quickly for my first test shoot that the new unit is replacing.  It worked okay, but kept falling down under its own weight.  I expect this new one to work much better.

Project: Light Stand Tip

I've been working on setting up a home studio, mostly to see what I come up with.  However, it's quite expensive so I've been doing on the cheap.  Also, I enjoy building things.  So when I needed to mount a background light, the obvious choice was to use an old tripod that's too weak for my camera.

See mom, it's good I don't throw anything away!

In order to do this, I needed an adapter form the tripod mount to the light stand mount.  I could buy one from Amazon for $12 including shipping, or I can spend half an hour at home depot wandering the halls.

The end result should look like this:

Obviously, it would be best to use a lathe, but getting one of those would push the price a little bit past $12.

Here's what I did:

Using a large washer, small washer, 1/4" coupler nut, and small 1/4" bolt, I screwed the nut onto the tripod and the screw onto the nut.  That's all!

And all for less than $2, given that I only needed to buy the coupler nut.  And here it is doing it's job:

Your mother's kitchen

Growing up in the 20th and 21st centeries, I've become accustomed to the race of technology.  When I was young, our TV was black and white and our remote control (which was awesome) was wired.  Now I can hook up my phone to a projector, both of which fit in my pocket, and watch movies anywhere.  Then there are computers, wireless HDMI, self-driving cars, and 3D printers. The world today is unrecognizable from the world my parents grew up in.

Which is why is surprises me that my kitchen hasn't changed.  The same appliances that exist today existed when my mom was my age.  There were microwaves, stand mixers, blenders, fridge-freezer combos, garbage disposals, ovens, stoves, and can openers.  With all the technology in the kitchen I would expect things to progress faster.  Even knives are the same.

More people now have espresso machines, and I'm sure the Slap Chop hasn't been around for long, but tell me it isn't odd that your grandmother would be immediately at home in your kitchen but likely be stimied by the operation of your TV or telephone.

And why is this?  Is food inherantly simple?  Have we been playing with food for so long that we've done everything possible to it?  Or is innovation slowed by either the multitude of useless single-function vapourware they sell on late-night TV that all appear to be variations on the blender or, at least, the belief that these are all useless?

I don't know, but it surprices me.

Crown Royal Maple Review

I like Crown Royal.  It's my favourite whiskey.  When I was younger I drank Crown and coke, which is still my staple at the bar.  As I've matured and become able to afford better alcohol, I've switched to either Crown Royal Limited Edition and coke or occasionally Crown Royal Special Reserve on the rocks, as it's painful to mix that.

Crown Royal recently came out with a new flavour - their first flavoured whiskey - Crown Royal Maple Finish.  As soon as you crack the bottle you'll notice the difference.  This isn't a subtle hint of maple.  The smell is potent.  The moment you twist the lid your friends will perk up, step out of their rooms, and come to the kitchen expecting pancakes.  It's like smelling the deep heart of maple syrup kingdom, which I assume lies somewhere in central Quebec.

After opening the bottle, Tom and I poured ourselves a drink, mixed with coke.

And it was horrible.  It's hard to describe how bad this was, but those two liquids shall hence forth never again be mixed.  We resolved to finish our drinks and I even poured a second, vowing to drink what I bought, and immediately regretted that decision.  While I did finish both drinks, it was through sheer pride and I would refuse another if one were to offer.  Ian's rating: undrinkable.

So time passed and the shock dissolved.  I brought the bottle to Aaron's place as a prank.  We each had a small cup neat.  It was much better on it's own, but still not great, and Aaron labelled it the pedophile's whiskey on account of the sweetness.  It is as good as drinking Crown Royal original unmixed, which is doable but not pleasant.  Ian's rating: passable.

Then Aaron tried it with coke and was immediately horrified.  I was pleased.

Next, I tried mixing it with lemon juice.  Ian's rating: also undrinkable.
Then, I tried it with limeade.  Ian's rating: drinkable but not entirely pleasant.

I was nearing my limit.  If it's maple then I will allow it to do what maple does.  I will fulfill it's destiny.  I will make pancakes.  And that's what I did.  I replaced the milk with whiskey and milk powder and the results looked great:

And with my first bite I was much more than surprised.  Shocked might be a better word.  That is a lot of alcohol for one pancake.  But the pancake was okay.  And then the burning sensation set it.  I don't know if the whiskey became more concentrated in the process, the alcohol boiled off and just left contaminants, if whiskey and flour should never be mixed, or water is necessary for flour to become edible, but whatever it was, it burned.  Except for that, and the overwhelming alcohol taste, the pancakes weren't bad.  Ian's rating: regretfully inedible.

And finally I tried Crown Royal Maple Finish with lemonade.  Surprisingly after the previous episodes, it was not bad.  One might even make the claim that it's good.  Ian's rating: well worth a second cup.

In the end I made it work, but seriously, don't waste your money.

We're smarter now

Within thirty minutes of returning home with four jars of my mom's jam, my wife and I had a serious conversation on how to handle the situation.

The decision was unanimous and we labelled the jars.

Crisis averted.