BUILDING THE BALUSTRADE, PART 3

  As I mentioned before, this is not just a weekend project.   

A total of 240 turned balusters must be cut to exact specifications.

A portion of the primed balusters await milling

3/8 of an inch comes off the top end

Taping off the bottom end getting an angle cut helps prevent splintering

Each bottom end runs through the table saw twice at a 12.5 degree angle.

Like soldiers all in a row

Short end squares

Long ends with 12.5 degree pitch

     Leftover ends must have some use in this world.  Any ideas?????    'Aunt Carlie's Craft Camp' and 'Art Camp for Boys'  campers will surely come up with some uses.  Until then I will store them in the eaves of the studio space.  After all, cedar fends off moths.

What a mess we made in Billye's room!

BUILDING THE BALUSTRADE

We now are continuing the task of building the balustrade.

   We are taking a pile of wood and ripping it.

(What a pile of sawdust!)

We are stacking it.

(The grain must go in the same direction.)

We are gluing and clamping it.

We are  routing it.

(Before routing)

(After routing)

We sanded it.

(Billye helped sand.)

(Wallace used the orbital sander to get the saw blade marks out of the wood.)

                     All this to duplicate the existing balustrade. 

A HANDRAIL IN THE MAKING

    As we've come to find out, to no surprise, nothing original to this house is available in your local hardware store or even the specialty lumber mills in the area.  What this means is we find the closest product available (such as the crown molding in the roof repair which has the same basic profile but is slightly less thick),

Missing crown from roof

Newly primed close match to original crown

 change to an entirely different product (such as deck railing pickets since the deck is a new feature),

New deck, new pickets

beg, borrow or 'steal' from areas of this house or another local house (thank you Garland house),

Old floorboards from our kitchen and Garland Street house sistered in to the  back room

 pay an arm and a leg to have a product duplicated (the stair spindles are so unique),

60 duplicated spindles .....  Ka-ching!

OR

we make it ourselves (because, I've been told so many times and I am now beginning to believe it,  "Carlie, there's nothing we can't do." - DLS).

    So, make it we did.  We purchased an outdoor handrail that was close in size to the existing original rail at the top of the back stairs. 

Original handrail atop the bead board (2nd floor)

We milled the rail to be close to the original.

Purchased fir rail with a portion of the right side bead cut off

Using the table saw to remove the bead on each side of the rail

The router will give us a curved side

Clamping the rail before routing

After installing the rail it was time to sand the peak off the top side of the rail (originally milled to be an exterior rail it required a peak to shed water).

A palm sander comes in handy for this task (Thanks Lucius for such an awesome gift years ago)

*We are far from finished.  Check the following posts for the magic of Bondo and the completed wall.