So with the ability to build shelves firmly under my wing (or rather under my stairs) I started on my second carpentry challenge, to – Box in the thermal store and build a cabin bed in the second bedroom. Basically, to enclose everything on the other side of the internal door shown on this photograph…

From Barn Conversion 2011

This is a much more involved job than my simple shelves. As I’ve previously described it “The cabin bed will run along the length of wall … with wardrobe doors on the left to allow access to the tank then the entrance to the bed to the right of that … the header tank that sits above the door and the poor positioning of the roof-light in relation to the main tank are going to make boxing in tidily very challenging“. In effect I’m boxing in the whole of one wall – full height cupboards on the left and a raised cabin bed with shelves underneath to the right.

I thought plans were in order but nothing too complex as I was bearing in mind this quotation…

“It took more brain to put it together than to invent it, I allow.”

Robert, page 106, The Worm Forgives The Plough, John Stewart Collis.

…I knew I didn’t want to over-plan or over-design. The devil was always going to be in detail with this build. So I measured extensively and drew up my plans, always bearing in mind that the hard work was yet to come.

The main plans, on the right page of the first photograph below are the most important as they layout the full face of the cupboards and bed. The rest are my various scribblings, workings and notes.

From Barn Conversion 2011

From Barn Conversion 2011

The main structure will be built with 4×2 timber sourced from a local building supplier – better quality and cheaper than the usual DIY stores. There is some variance in the size of the wood, it’s somewhere around 44mm by 96mm give or take a milimetre or two. But there’s a good mix and it’s pretty easy to marry up similarly sized pieces – I’ll double-up the timbers in the main structure for added strength.

I also ordered shaker style doors, (a full height pair to enclose the thermal store and a smaller pair for under the cabin bed) from this company – Doors Sincerely. They are due to be delivered today so more on them shortly.

The cabin bed will be built as one piece. A solid rectangular box with a sloping top to allow for the sloping roof. Cupboard doors on a basic frame will hide away the thermal store. I then need to think of a clever way to bring the two together semi-permanently – to make it look like a single unit across the whole of one side of the room, whilst retaining the ability to move the bed out of the way to allow full access to the thermal store and associated equipment. That’s where I get into “It took more brain to put it together than to invent it” thinking.

My first proper foray into DIY carpentry at the barn has been constructing a shelving unit to sit under the stairs. The shelves are required to provide storage, box in the under-stairs area and muffle the sound from the under-floor heating pumps.

The timber I chose was basic off-the-shelf stuff from B&Q – planed smoothed softwood boards. My original intention was to paint or stain the wood so the appearance of the untreated wood wasn’t of great importance. However, once finished I’m relatively happy with the finish of the wood and the gentle contrast between the whitened oak of the stairs and the clean pine boards of the shelves so untreated they will remain.

I toyed with the idea of attempting fancy joints, inspired by sites such as The Joiners Apprentice beautiful hand-cut dovetails tempted me. But fear of my abilities held me back and instead I decided upon using simple dowelled butt joints for the corners and dado dowel joints for the shelves. I’ll save fancy joints for a future project. I’ve put together this Sketchup model to demonstrate my shelf joints.

You can download this model from my Sketchup library – Dado dowel joint model.

The space the shelving unit needed to fit is pretty standard and similar spaces are found in most homes with traditional staircases. The forty five degree slope of the stairs almost forms a triangle, the exception being the vertical edge of the bottom step. Geometrically in 2D the shelf unit, viewed from the front or back is a quadrilateral trapezium.

The under-the-stairs area had become a pretty handy dumping group for tools, left over materials and my sons toys so a general clearout was in order prior to commencing work.

From Barn Conversion 2011

From Barn Conversion 2011

I started by cutting the four ‘sides’ for the ‘outer’ structure and then the three shelves. The side pieces were cut to exact measurements and the shelves cut longer than necessary to allow for trimming to the correct length later. The two vertical ‘side walls’ have bevelled tops, cut at 45 degrees on which the sloping top sits. Similarly, the shelves have one perpendicular end and one bevelled end, the bevelled end meeting the sloping top of the shelving unit. I did all this cutting with a combination of my circular saw and a borrowed table saw that is stuck at 45 degrees!

I then used my router to cut the three dado joints into tallest side wall. I had a cutter that was almost wide enough to allow me to cut the full width of each dado in a single pass. I clamped wooden guides in place, cut the dado then widened slightly with a hand-saw, then used a small chisel and sand paper to tidy up. One of the dados ended up deeper than intended as the guide for the router depth had worked lose so a little remedial filling with a sliver of wood was necessary.

I then drilled and glued the dowels in place – two per joint. The trickiest joints were those holding the sloping top in place. I eventually settled on drilling straight through both pieces of wood from the top straight down into the upright rather than drilling one side of the joint then marrying it up with the other side and drilling the ‘recieving’ hole.

From Barn Conversion 2011

The final job was to fix the back panels for which I used some external plywood I had left over from boxing in the eaves. The ply had a surprisingly pleasing finish to it so it has remained untreated like the rest of the wood-work. I had already spaced the shelves in such a way that they would cover the joints between the panels, so I simply tacked the back panels into place.

I also built a small rectangular insulation lined box to cover the heating manifold and pumps which I slipped into place before positioning the shelves. The main job of this was to muffle the sound made by the under-floor heating paraphernalia when it was in operation, a job in which it has pretty much failed and that I’ll need to address again at a later date.

From Barn Conversion 2011

From there it all came together – some liberal filling and sanding helped me to paper over the cracks of my inexperienced cutting.

Despite having planned to make the shelves a centimetre or so narrower and shorter than the gap they were to fit in, my measuring went awry somewhere along the line and they turned out to be a very snug fit. Some gentle bashing and a couple of wedges was all that as needed to fix the shelves into place.

Overall I’m pretty pleased with the results.

From Barn Conversion 2011

I’ve prepared Sketchup model of the shelves that you might like to take a look at….

You can download this model from my Sketchup library – Under stairs shelving unit model.

Over the last couple of years I’ve kept on returning to the question of carpentry. Not in a general sense, but specifically in relation to my ability to turn my hand to the following projects:

1. Build shelves under the stairs,
2. Box in the thermal store and build a cabin bed in the second bedroom,
3. Build a high level, long, wide shelf in the kitchen,
4. Put up shelving in the utility room.

…OR the alternative of hiring a professional. A steady accumulation of tools over the period (chisel, hand saws, a circular saw, jigsaw and sander then most recently a router and whole array of cutters) has pushed me to test my skills or risk losing face and admitting to recklessly buying ‘boys toys’.

Just to set the record straight (and start work on any future defence of my position) I’ve not been recklessly or pointlessly buy these tools. I have been putting them to use – boxing-in pipe work in the bathrooms (and there has been a lot of boxing-in to do as the fittings were moved around from their planned locations due to my wayward planning and purchasing), fitting skirting boards, oak floors and trim between the stairs and floor. But there is still plenty more work for them to do.

As a proof of the concept that I’m up to doing all this woodwork, I’ve made a start on the shelves under the stairs.

Step 1 – THE SHELVES UNDER THE STAIRS

(Quite an ominous title that one).

From Barn Conversion 2011

The purpose of the shelves is two-fold, to provide storage but perhaps more importantly, to box-in and tidy up the under-stairs area including hiding the unsightly under-floor heating manifold.

Having drawn up the plans (incorrectly as it transpired) and bought the wood I started work…

In like a bullet this month, no messing about…

My tile-topped boxing-inin the bathroom (wooden frames, with painted sides and a slate and mosaic tiled top) has grown and expanded – it now runs between the sink and toilet, then further across to the ‘other’ side of the toilet. Three square feet of vanity case storage! I just need to finish painting, fixing and smartening them up a bit.

Getting the back-lit mirror working in the ensuite… has been a big failure so far… I’m keeping away from that job for the time being. Grrrrr electrics.

The fencing around the shed in the field is pretty much done, just the fastenings for the gates to complete. I can then fix the now horse proof satellite dish.

I’ve recently turned my hand to carpentry. I’ll be writing further posts on this over coming weeks and months. Suffice to say that my skills are ‘developing’. The first project is to build shelves under the stairs. These will have a dual role, providing storage and boxing in the unsightly underfloor heating manifold.

I’ve also spent quite a bit of time tidying the yard. I’ve shifted a lot of the flag stones that were out there to the garden ready to build my second patio. Much of the left over sand and stone has gone to finish filling the trench that carries the sewage pipe and satellite dish cable from the barn to the field. I’ve also built a temporary log store using a left over sheet of corrugated iron and the remaining bricks that were ‘reclaimed’ from the barn floor. Things are slowly improving out there.