80, Front Door, part 11, (the last!). Leadlights, part two.

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In order to speed up the cutting of the pieces of glass for the borders, I set up the simple jig, seen in the above photo. It worked very simply and was able to produce very accurate cuts. When it came to the curved pieces, needed for the arc on the tops of the upper panels, the ruler was exchanged for the red bar shown. The difference in the curvature of the inner and outer radius's required was barely perceptible and the right hand side of the bar was filed to their average. The pieces only needed trimming to length and virtually no clean up of the edges was required, as I achieved an accuracy of about 0.2mm.

My soldering was far from perfect, but I was very happy with the results nonetheless. The joints looked very lumpy and obvious, but after completing the puttying and polishing, as seen on the left hand panel above, they became very inconspicuous.

The puttying was a horrible, messy job, but the results were speaking for themselves. I found that I had to wait a few days after doing the first side, before tackling the other. This was to allow the putty to harden sufficiently and prevent it from being forced back out.

Jumping back to the start of this part of the project, much deliberation was carried out when selecting the glass colours. In the above photo, I set up this mock up using pieces of glass that we already had. I felt that the overall look may turn out to be too dark and gaudy, so opted to source some paler shades for the lighter colours.

The almost completed entry!, only a bit of touching up of the paintwork on the glass beadings to be done.
As happy as I am with the finished product, with hindsight I regret the decision to lighten the colours. They looked very nice on the work bench, but when installed and with backlighting, to me they appear very wishy washy against the rondels and red borders. They are not actually as bad as they appear in this picture though, the best I have been able to take so far.

78, Front Door, part 9, Painting.

In preparation for the painting and to avoid trying to mask the stone around the complex shapes, I slipped sheets of 'greaseproof' paper between the frame and the limestone. The curved 'Ovolo' moulding, to trim the head was left off and painted before it was fitted.
A coat of primer was then applied, grey behind the darker colours and white for the remainder.

With all surfaces needing at least 3 topcoats, it was a long drawn out process. The intricacy of the detail and amount of cutting in meant that I was unable to use anything larger than artists brushes for most of the work.

Difficulty in neatly priming the door with it in situ had me remove it and it spent some considerable time on stools as the details were picked out.

Unforeseen and not noticed until the second glossy topcoat, was the machining marks in the timber. Prior to painting, the wood felt silky smooth and it seemed that minimal sanding was required. Much elbow grease was expended and a lot of sandpaper was clogged, trying to rectify the problem. The above photo was taken afterwards, the corrugations in the light green, closer to and within the frieze still bearing testament to my ignorance.

In an effort to simplify the painting, I had one trial of the use of masking tape. For this purpose I purchased the best quality tape available from the local 'Bunnings' store, but as expected, from all my previous experiences with the stuff, it was a waste of effort. Despite the most meticulous care in positioning it and ensuring that the edges were firmly pressed down, much 'bleeding' still occurred. To increase the frustration, in a couple of spots, some of the underlying paint also lifted when the tape was removed. From then on, a steady, (of sorts!), hand was used for all the 'cutting in'.

The finished product, it was a huge relief to complete the last brushstrokes!.
I am very happy with the result and are in 2 minds as to whether to highlight some more detail. I had intentions of colouring the rings on the columns red, but fear it may be too much. For now I'll just leave it as is until I have completed and installed the leadlights.
The colours used are; Deep Bronze Green, Deep Indian Red, Eau De Nil, (Light Green) and Eggshell, a Haymes colour.

76, Front Door, part 7, the Door.

To individualise the door I chose to embellish the lower panel in a similar fashion to the shamrocks on Foynes; http://www.winkieg.blogspot.com.au/2012/08/67-front-door-part-1.html.
Lots of ideas passed through my head, but my love of the Quercus genus and the slowly expanding plantation of these here for my Truffle venture, had me settle on the carving of an Oak leaf.

As we were now well into Autumn, there was plenty of leaves on the ground, from the myriad of variety's of Oak planted all around the property. I picked through the piles, collecting as diverse a range of leaf shapes as possible for a final selection.
For me, the best example that represented the Genus, that was also of pleasing proportions was the smallest one in the above photo. It belongs to Quercus Robur, the English Oak, probably the most widely planted variety in Australia, hence the familiarity. I photocopied the leaf and enlarged the image until a suitable size was attained for tracing on to the panels.
Some of the other leaves shown are a selection of American variety's, with the deeper lobes, Canary Oak, in the centre and some Mediterranean variety's, with the serrated edges.

The door was to be made entirely from Lebanese Cedar. I formed all the panels in the same way, laminating various pieces together to make up the widths and then applying bookmatched veneers to the inside faces. The bulk of the waste was then removed from the front. The edges of the raised section on the panels were routed to the finished profile with extra thickness allowed for the patterns.
Using various templates and jigs, a rough outline of the leaf shape was routed out. This ensured a flat and even background was attained. The leaf was then more finely carved to profile with chisels and the surface was veined and lightly contoured, to give it a bit more life.

The shield patterns on the upper and intermediate panels were routed using mdf templates and a bastardised rounding over bit. I couldn't locate a suitably profiled bit from the local suppliers, so the nearest alternative I could procure was carefully ground on the bench grinder, until it was close enough to the right size.

The door was assembled using the normal methods of wedged mortise and tenon joints. I ran a large quantity of bolection mouldings, more than sufficient for all of my external doors. This was owing to the amount of setup required, for the multiple passes over the router table, to achieve the desired finished profile. From memory these totalled about 7, not including the initial sizing and the final rebating. The rebates are matched to suit individual doors, dependant on the depth of the finished panel from the face.
Once completed, the hinges were sunk and the door was hung and lightly trimmed to suit the opening. The inside face was finish sanded, then, as per the frame, was also stained and lacquered before final installation.

A suitable mortice lock for the door proved rather difficult to source. Currently, the lock ranges available, incorporating a brass finish are very limited, the common response from suppliers was that it's now "out of fashion". The combination of a long case, to provide a greater visual separation of the handle from the key barrel, and the correct 'backset', left only one available option, which had to be ordered from the manufacturer in Tasmania. Unfortunately though, the supplied striker plate, the only that was available for this model, was a universal fit that looked rather flimsy and daggy with it's one long slot. Visits to a couple of restoration supplies found nothing else suitable, so I sourced some brass plate and made my own!.

The hole is finally plugged. Plywood was cut to temporarily fill the glazed openings until the leadlights are designed and made. 

The shameful self promotion couldn't be helped for this external shot, the ladder is lashed to the scaffold in that position, for access higher up!.
The only thing left to be done now, before painting, is the carved Brackets, (or Modillions), which sit above the capitals, the subject of the next post.

75, Front Door, part 6. Installation.

Monday, the 13th of May, was a bit of a highlight for me. The frame was finally ready to be installed. All the loose bits were taken off and put aside, then, with the aid of a number of ropes and shackles, I lifted  it off the stools and dropped one side to the floor.

Resting on the reveal, I was then able to slide the unit through to the entry, where, using the ropes again, I lowered it flat to the floor. The temporary frames were left in the corner sash openings to help avoid any damage.

With the bottom positioned on the cill, I reattached ropes to the head and via shackles, fed it up to the rafters and back down to within easy reach. I was able to lift it up in stages by hand, holding it, after each grunt, by the rope. Owing to imperfections in the hand hewn bluestone cill, which I felt would be too hard to copy to the timberwork via measurements or templates, I opted to leave the frame slightly oversize and mark scribe lines on it, once in position. This, thankfully, worked satisfactorily the first time and I only needed to lower it back down once for trimming.

I was more than happy with the fit, just like the proverbial glove. The sides were screwed, through the reveals, into trimmers bolted to the stonework.

The stone cill already had holes sunk into it from it's previous life and I was careful to make sure that the mullions would cover them when designing the frame.

Grooves were chiseled in the base of the frame and the pedestal backing block to accommodate a stainless steel bolt. The bolt was then epoxied in place, sandwiched between the timbers with the head located into the rearmost hole.

With the frame all secured in place, the sashes were trimmed and fitted and a start was made on the attaching of the appendages.
First up, the pedestals were boxed out and capped. The Lebanese cedar that I used for these and the upper portions of the plinth, came from a tree removed From Kardinia park in Geelong. The poorer, slower growing conditions there, other than that at Daylesford, from where the rest of my supply originated, created a tighter more attractive figure in the timber. The difference is quite apparent in the above photo, where a comparison can be made with the infill panel. For the lower, larger portion of the plinth, I used Celery top pine, which, being much more dense, should cope better with any knocking or scuffing.
During assembly, I am placing the "grease proof" paper behind the timber, to avoid getting paint all over the stonework. Hopefully it can simply and cleanly be pulled out later.

73, Front Door, part 4. Bits on the front!.

With the inside surfaces sealed, light temporary frames, about 20mm thicker than the sashes, were lightly fitted into the four corner openings. The frame was then flipped over and rested on these frames, which protected the inside finish.
The entabulature, fixed to the outside face of the transom rail was tackled first. The "Cyma reversa" moulding, being the most difficult section to produce, was machined from some Lebanese cedar using multiple bits and a number of passes over the router table. Once it was ready, fine tuning of the dimensions for the other components could be completed. The frieze pattern, cut out from 6mm Hoop pine marine ply, was varied slightly in the horizontal plane in order to match on the mitres. The "Cap" was machined to a tapered profile and was mitred over all the projections. This had the top surface sloping outwards to prevent the pooling of any moisture.
The untrimmed pieces for the two ends have been left loose at this stage. They will be trimmed to fit neatly against the stone reveals, once the frame is installed.

Making the proverbial "Silk purse from a sows ear".applied to the making of the turned columns. From my stash of "accumulated" timber, I grabbed the most accessible pieces that were of sufficient dimensions and durability, some old 5 inch square, Red gum and Jarrah verandah posts, complete with cracks, charred faces and embedded nails. The nails, some of which had been previously broken off and were hard to detect, obviously needed to be removed, hence the chiseled holes seen in the photo. Only one was missed and ultimately discovered by the roughing gouge when on the lathe!. All the pieces had deep cracks along one face, however as the columns are planed flat at the back, to fit against the mullions, these could be hidden there.

The small shoulders on the ends were cut on the bandsaw for mounting in the lathe chuck, once roughed down, (at a very low speed), a truer rounded shoulder was shaped alongside and the square section cut off. With the blank remounted, a 1 inch diameter hole was drilled in the opposite end to accommodate the "live centre", this hole would be used for dowelling the finished pieces together. The blanks were then returned, down to about 105mm diameter and roughly shaped, as seen in the above photo. The lathe speed was then cranked up for pieces to be finished off and sanded.

The next step was the "fluting" to the lower half of the columns, this I was able to do this on my lathe. I attached my little trimming router to a flat base which would slide on a fabricated a table, bolted onto the lathe bed, all adjusted to align with the horizontal centre line of the work. After much thought on how I could make up an indexing head for the purpose, I found that the shaft lock on the head would serve, having 12 separate positions. Excess slop in the spindle with this method was overcome by filing down a screwdriver shaft to as tight a fit in the locking hole as possible and then clamping it down firmly for each flute.

More than happy with the results, the first one is completed and the next is waiting for it's turn in the lathe. I opted to turn the bases separately, as the total length of the columns was too long for my lathe. The pieces, as they are, only just fitted between the centres.

I put much thought into how to decorate the upper section, finding the originals I was emulating, a little plain in this area. I chose to continue the same style of column through, topped off with Doric capitals, as seen in the above picture of the dry fitup. These would be a little less heavy than the Corinthian capitals, that would be topping off the lower columns, and the subject of my next post.
Not having any suitable timber of sufficient size to turn the larger diameter, I laminated some pieces of Lebanese cedar for the purpose. Using this instead of hardwood was not only much easier to turn, especially given the large volume of wood to be removed, it was also less vicious on the tools.

72, Front Door, part 3.

Having some time elapse since my attentions were drawn away from the door frame construction proved to be rather advantageous. The Celery top pine, on the dry fitted assembly, which I had assumed was very stable and had been sufficiently seasoned, shrunk somewhat in the dry summer heat.

The worst affected area was the joints on the large transom rail, where it crosses the mullions. The shrinkage caused the joints to open, creating an unsightly 2mm gap. This seemed quite excessive, but, given the width of this rail, the amount of movement was less than 1%.
Fortunately, with the inside face of the rail needing some form of embellishment, the fix was rather simple.

Firstly, I routed a 100mm wide rebate out along the centre line, 18mm deep, then sawed the piece in half.

When reassembling the frame, the two halves were wedged apart to tighten the joints. Then neatly cut infill blocks were inserted, to line up with the mullions.

Lebanese cedar veneer was then laminated to some 3mm ply, which I placed in the bottom of the rebate before the application of bolection mouldings. It did seem a pity to hack into such a nice section of timber, but as mentioned earlier, it needed some form of decoration.
With the main frame now permanently assembled and prior to inverting the whole unit, the inside face received a light staining and a couple of coats of clear lacquer. This would save any extra flipping of the heavy unit and protect the surface from any moisture damage. My main fear at this stage is from the risk of the resident "leaky" possums, who enjoy scurrying around on the exposed joists overhead. These, I am unable to exclude from the house, until the door and frame are completed and installed.

The joining of the lower rails to the mullions and jambs needed to be very solid. They would need to withstand any movement  generated by the swinging and slamming of the door. To keep it all tight I drilled right through from the outer edges to within about 20mm of the door rebates on the mullions.
Pockets were drilled in from the outside face to intersect with the ends of the holes These allow for the fitting of washers and nuts to10mm threaded rod, which was pushed through the hole from the opposite end and they will later be covered with the frame pedestals.

68, Front Door, part 2.

With the main components prepared, assembly of the frame could begin. The curved joints on the Head were first. I figured that these would be the hardest to form and get the shape right. Once I was happy with them, I was able to set out and mark the rest of the pieces.

The Transom was halved over the Mullions and rebated into the Stiles

After two and a half weeks and much routing, chiselling and trimming, all the major components are finally dry fitted together.

The sashes were next on the agenda, then, with these ready, I was able to move on to the machining of the external embellishments. That was when the trouble started, the thicknesser refused to power up, with the main motor only producing a loud humm.....I was about to head off sideways again.....

66, ...and in they go.

Before the windows could be installed, the vertical stone rebates needed to be trued and trimmed out with a jamb. The three earliest window openings, which I had constructed prior to the building of my stone saw, were made just wide enough to fit a window in snugly. Subsequently, I realised that a timber jamb would need to be fitted, in order to provide some method of securing the frame. In the photo above, the rebate on the right has now been shaved out to the required 100mm to accomodate a 21mm thick hardwood jamb, with the left hand side waiting to recieve the same treatment. The mortar joints needed to be chipped out before I could rough out the rebate using a chainsaw, with chisels and sanding blocks used for the final shaping. This wasn't one of the most fun, (or cleanest), jobs I have had to endure!

The 90 x 21mm hardwood jambs were glued and screwed to the limestone using 100mm galvanised, countersunk "batten screws". These were driven into pre positioned, Ultra Long RamPlug's, which were glued into cleaned, pre drilled holes using "liquid nails", before allowing a couple of days for it to set.
For subsequent windows I have found that a product called; KF2,  a Polyester Injection System, (picked up from eBay, of course!), offers superior holding power for the screws and I now set the RamPlugs in with this. It is, although, more labour intensive, with a pilot hole needing to be bored, using a masonary drill, into the cured plug.

Working on my own, I was easily able to manouvre the windows around on their sides using pipe rollers, however, getting them up the steps and into the front of the house was going to be somewhat more difficult. To achieve this, I jury rigged an pole, with a swivel coupling, to the scaffold frame. This was supported, using a chain, from a higher level. I positioned it so that an attatched electric winch would pivot between a point above the landing, which was about the same height as my van floor, and the centre of the verandah. This system worked flawlessly and once at floor level, it was a simple matter to roll them where required.

With the bottom of the window frame shaped to fit into the rebate in the stone sill, the plan for the installation was to form a table at sill height, lift the unit on to it, apply the flashings and mounting brackets, locate the timber sill into the opening, then lift the window up into position. What I didn't allow for was the internal stone arch, which prevented the side/angled bay windows from being tilted up in this manner. To compound the problem, after wiggling the window almost into position, I was reminded of another issue.
Some years back, when laying the stone sills for this bay, a stuff up, on my part, had me place them about 10mm too high. This error wasn't picked up until setting out the limestone quoins, which were adjusted to suit, to ensure that the lintels were all level. I had completely forgotten about this by now and, of course, these were the only openings not checked when calculating the window dimensions. So then, of course, the odscenities started!.

Following my 5th attempt, after much planing, trimming, adjusting and swearing, the first window was finally in, but I am more than happy with the result.

To secure the windows to the jambs, I made a number of brackets from 3mm stainless steel angle. These measured about 30 x 22mm and were about 20mm wide. The long leg was screwed through the ply backing into the inner lining and roofing screws, fitted through the other leg and drilled into the jambs, pull the frame firmly into the rebate.
I didn't notice until uploading this image that this particular mount was the one that needed to be rotated slightly, this was to enable a new hole and screw to be drilled into the jamb. With all the refitting of this window, at least one screw had to snap!.

65, Windows, finally getting somewhere!

With a decision made on the glass, I could now make the glazing beads to suit. In the past, for this type of moulding I would make up a cradle to fit inside the thicknesser and run them through one at a time. There was usually a high mortality rate with this process, the rollers,when set firm enough to overcome the friction in the cradle, tended to crush the wood, causing it to curl. A lot of wastage was also normal, with about 200mm of the ends needing to be docked, this being due to excessive chatter occurring until the leading edge of the mould was steadied by the outfeed roller and after the trailing edge cleared the infeed roller.
My newest toy, the sander was pressed into action. I cut a tray, slightly longer than the longest bead, onto which I tacked and glued some sawn wood, of the same profile. The beads, sawn slightly oversize, were then placed in the corrugations and passed through the machine. I could sand six at a time and found the method worked perfectly, with no pieces being rejected or needing trimming as a result.

I produced enough beading's for all the windows, with about an extra 50 for spares, should any be needed down the track. With these ready, more monotonous labour then ensued, with the bulk of them being primed and receiving one top coat, all around.

Next on the agenda was the glazing. For the cutting of this, I stretched a blanket across my work table and clamped on a few wooden blocks, to cradle a large square.
The upper and lower sashes were made to have identically sized panes and I had taken great care to ensure that they were all true and of the correct dimensions. This enabled me to pre cut all the pieces of glass to set sizes.
From the same supplier as the double glazing materials; C.R.Laurence, I also purchased a number of silicon carbide sanding belts to suit my 4" sander. I was rather hesitant to go anywhere near the glass with this machine, as had been recommended to me, but it proved very successful in removing the sharp arris as well as sanding true any mis cut or oversized pieces.
I fitted the glass using a bead of "glazing sealant", a product by ROCOR. This stuff is water based and comes in cartridges, for use in standard caulking guns. It is designed for use with timber frames only. It forms a skin on it's surface but remains permanently soft and flexible. Any clean up of misplaced or squeezed out material is easily carried out by waiting for it to skin and simply rubbing it off. It is also just as easy to clean out, down the track, when replacing glass. It can be a bit hard to source but is available in Australia from Lincoln Sentry. I find it far superior to silicone, which can be a nightmare to clean off.
Once I had the sashes glazed, the outside faces were given another coating of gloss enamel before the final assembly. With that out of the way, the scales were then given a workout. The sashes were weighed and the cast iron weights were cut to suit. They were imbalanced by about 1/2 a pound, to give a slight bias to keeping the sashes closed.
More consideration was given to the provision of parting slips and I opted to fit them. If the idea of double glazing rears it's head again, sometime in the future, they would be necessary to prevent square cast lead weights from interfering with each other. Made from two laminated strips of 3mm ply, I screwed them to wooden blocks fixed at the top of the box's. They are normally poked through a slot in the head and secured by a dowel, but limited space over the windows precluded this method. If not fitted now and installation of them was required at a later date, it would necessitate the complete removal of the windows. After the weights were fitted, the box's were sealed with 10mm ply, screwed to the linings.

Finally, I could start to see some of fruits of my labour, the first completed window awaits loading into my van to be taken down the hill.
The brass latches were purchased via eBay from the UK. This was another typical example of how we are "ripped off" in this country. The total price, (buy it now), including the relatively expensive shipping cost of these items, manufactured by our Asian neighbours, was less than 50% of the cheapest Australian retail price I could source.

62, Sash assembly.

One detail, previously not mentioned, is the beading I had run on inside faces of the sash pieces. When I built my initial cottage, seen here in the beginning, It was designed and built around the 2 front windows. These I had rescued from one of the last remaining, original cottages in Torquay. Sited on the main Geelong road, it was being demolished to make way for the exploding surf industry. You can't stop progress, but it was all I could do at the time to preserve the past. The wood stove from the kitchen was claimed as well, but unfortunately, the chimney came down, rather quicker than was expected, and reduced it to scrap.
The beading's on these windows are the standard Victorian profile with the size matching the glazing rebate of 1/2" x 1/4", (12.7mm x 6.4mm). The curve segment is less than 1/4, giving it a flattened appearance. The balance of the windows in my cottage were a combination of some crappy recycled hardwood frames and 3 other sets I made myself, my first foray into this area. For these I purchased "off the shelf" moulded cedar, (western red), stiles and rails, although the beading moulding was different. I was happy with the results and the kitchen window is still working beautifully, the other two were removed to make way for the "extension". The construction of these gave me the confidence to completely make, from scratch, a new Bay window, shortly before I commenced the extension. This was to replace the large, rotting hardwood frame that I had installed in the west wall. This time I made some effort to replicate the original beading's using a small, 1/4 segment, concave router bit. I tweaked the stepped shoulders to get the nearest visual likeness that I could. This worked reasonably well, but, when it came to the windows for the main house, my standards were improving and near enough wouldn't be good enough!. For these I bit the bullet and ordered a new router bit, custom profiled. During my travels I had managed to procure an old wooden hand moulding plane with the correct blade for doing these, however, my enthusiasm for the construction did not quite stretch far enough to go down that path!.

Having all the main pieces machined, things became more hands on and fiddlier. The faces of all the stiles, at the base of the horns, adjacent to where the meeting rails join, had to made flush with the rebate and sanded smooth. The beading on the lower stiles was shaved back and scribed, however, on the upper stiles it was cut flush as, on these, there is no bead on the meeting rail.

The opposite ends of the stiles required rebates to be formed to accommodate the haunched tenons, this prevents the top and bottom rails from twisting. Then the beading's were also cut back and scribed.

A test fit of a meeting rail and a stile for a bottom sash. On the lower sashes, the glass fits up into a groove in the meeting rail .

No shed is ever big enough!. I could only scrounge enough room to set up two gluing tables and with the exception of the narrow sidelights, shown in the upper photo, I was only able to set up enough clamping for four sashes at a time. This worked out to be sufficient anyhow, as it was taking anything up to an hour to prepare each sash, this included the previously mentioned trimming and the fine tuning of the shoulders and scribes to true up the joints. I struggled to keep up, having enough sashes prepared for when the glue on the previous lot had set.
For 6 days straight, I had 2 clamping sessions per day, one about midday and the other about midnight. These sessions took about 2 hours each, by the time I coated the glued surfaces, assembled the sashes, lightly clamped and squared them, tapped the wedges firm, hammered in the joint wedges and then wiped all the excess glue from the faces.
I do possess an odd collection of sash clamps, but, when set up for this sort of work they tend to be unwieldy and hard to control. With their average lengths being about 1800mm, (6 ft), they would also require a lot more space. For this project I opted to assemble simple clamping jigs using wedges. The back blocks, being screwed down, could be easily relocated to suit the differing widths. I hadn't tried clamping this way before but was very happy with the method, it was very simple and effective.
By the last night, I was buggered, but was certainly glad to have had this bit over with.

At last, the sashes are together, all ready for trimming and sanding. They all look good, bar one. In my haste, (or stupor), to clamp up the final batch, I was careless with one joint, then over clamped it to close the gap, which led to it twisting. Fortunately though, it was for one of 2 sidelight windows which are fixed in place.

This simple jig, set up on my bandsaw, allowed me to quickly and neatly trim the waste from the wedges and tenons.

The joints are trimmed and the sashes are ready for sanding, before the trimming of the stiles, bevelling of the bottom of the lower sash's, grooving the sides for the ropes and fitting into the frames. There's still a long way to go....