ModernChivalry.org
Miscellaneous => The Sallyport => Topic started by: Sir James A on 2012-01-18, 23:04:08
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So I had a 3 day weekend this past weekend, and I decided to make it a productive one. My truck is still out of commission, so I thought I should buy enough wood to make it worth renting a truck to pick it up. I saved enough by buying bigger sheets of plywood and cutting it down, as well as fitting all the dimensional lumber in one trip versus 3 or 4 with the car; huzzah!
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-14133254.jpg)
As the weekend went on, I realized I'd bitten off the proverbial more than I could chew in 3 days. Over the 3 days, I made 5 separate runs to Home Depot. Good thing it's only 1 1/2 miles away. The first "plan of attack" was to finish my "almost completed" japanese weapons case. All it needed was to build, install and stain some doors (to keep the cats off the weapons).
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-14174024.jpg)
Eh, might as well make a second case for the european weapons, right? I disassembled the case I posted previous pics of, to reuse the "guts" of it for another 4' x 7' case, replacing only the outer pieces, adding a backer board, and building doors for it. If you haven't tried, building plywood doors is NOT fun with the low-end quality lumber, especially thinner stuff like 1/4". It warps and wiggles. A lot. With the amount of time, effort and "adjustments" I had to make to use the plywood doors, I wish I had just built out a "traditional" paneled door with plexiglass to see through. I opted not to originally, since it would be $99 of plexiglass per case and I've never worked with it; but for the price of the plywood, the 2 boxes of tiny screws to attach the small trim strips, the trim strips themselves, and the time to measure/cut/install/stain the little trim strips, if I did it again it would be worth the ~$50 difference to upgrade to plexiglass doors, and would take at least a few hours off the assembly time for each case. I also found out the 2 hinges make the doors "wobble" when opening; I'm going to get more hinges for the top/bottom of the door to reduce that, and again, with a framed plexiglass door vs the plywood, the framed plexiglass wouldn't have the problem since the door frames would be 3x-4x thicker. Sigh. So the "office" is pretty messy with all the weaponry waiting for a new home:
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-16113506.jpg)
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention I also got wood to build a new bed frame, another armor stand, and plywood bases for the armor stands to have them "freestanding" and not just leaned against the wall. I did get 3 stands mounted to the plywood before calling it quits until the weaponry gets moved to it's new home:
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-16124952.jpg)
Still on the list? Acquire and install the extra hinges. Stain the second case (I finished the first one last night). Then relocating the fish aquarium into the other room - because I forgot the lights in the room I was going to put the second case are wired into the wall and two cases won't fit. And install "magic sliders" on the aquarium stand to keep it from messing up the wood floor. At least that's motivation to finish the baseboards that I replaced when I replaced all the flooring last year when the water heater busted and ruined the floor... they're puttied and sanded, now to pick up some paint brushes and get finished by Friday so I can post some "completed projects" pictures instead of just pictures of a mess. :)
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ahhahahahahaha
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Wow, you're getting a lot done, even if you're running into some frustrations along the way. I really need to build some display cabinets or racks or something too, but it needs to wait til I get to the next house, since there's no room here.
My goal is to have most of my swords and armor on display in the "man cave", but for now, out of necessity, things are all over my house. The armor lives in duffel bags (one for each kit), swords are on walls, mostly, etc.
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You'd shame me into action, Sir James- if I had space for anything like that.
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Some more progress has been made. The aquarium has been relocated, and I got the first finished case into place and bracketed to the wall (where the aquarium was), along with the brackets for the second case. Extra hinges were installed at the top and bottom of the doors; it helped dramatically with the "wiggle", and I'm going to relocate the magnetic clasps from there to the area where the doors meet to "click" them together.
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-20231713.jpg)
The second case construction (european weapons) is finished, I just need to stain it (on the list for tomorrow morning) and get it inside, attached and filled with sharp 'n pointies. The office is partially cleared and the Japanese weapons have returned to their home. Huzzah!
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-21011550.jpg)
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HOLY CRAP THAT IS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! yes all in caps!! hehehe man that is way cool (are the claymores real ? ahhaha) ehehhehehehhe jkjk
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Yeah, that's looking fantastic. I can't wait to see the other one with it. I can see though that I'd probably want plexiglass when I get around to doing something like this.
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WOW! Man that looks great! :)
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It's VRRRY nice!
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HOLY CRAP THAT IS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! yes all in caps!! hehehe man that is way cool (are the claymores real ? ahhaha) ehehhehehehhe jkjk
WOW! Man that looks great! :)
It's VRRRY nice!
Thank you, gentlemen. :)
Yeah, that's looking fantastic. I can't wait to see the other one with it. I can see though that I'd probably want plexiglass when I get around to doing something like this.
I think once I finish some other long-since-started projects I may go back and revisit the doors on these and attempt plexiglass. It's the first time I've done a case with doors on it, so it's been a good learning experience, if nothing else. If you want to do a smaller project for the swords you have around your house, there's always the option to do a "shadow box". They don't take up a whole lot more space on the wall than just the sword itself. I may make a couple for when I get an Albion and it's worthy of it's own separate display case. Something like this:
(http://www.honyockerfurniture.com/images/041222sSwordcase.jpg)
(All these pictures below are clickable. I figured out how to make Photobucket do the easy clickable thumbnails so I don't have the full-size pictures on the page)
I got the second case stained, moved inside, and bracketed to the wall today:
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/th_2012-01-22154928.jpg) (http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-22154928.jpg)
Filled with european goodness:
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/th_2012-01-22154710.jpg) (http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-22154710.jpg)
I couldn't fit the halberd or spear since they're over 6' 10" long. I'll figure out something else for them. :) I got a better picture of the japanese weapons when I figured out how to force the flash on my phone camera:
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/th_2012-01-22154827.jpg) (http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-22154827.jpg)
Both cases filled with "2012 / Zombie Apocalypse" equipment:
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/th_2012-01-22154812.jpg) (http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-22154812.jpg)
The office is almost cleaned.....
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/th_2012-01-22155057.jpg) (http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-22155057.jpg)
Later this week - pics of the new armor stands w/armor on them. I've got half of them done, and did the armor attachment a new way; and it's rather awesome!
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I've always wanted to do a shadow box like the one that sabre is in.
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Looks great! Yeah, the shadow boxes are definitely a possibility. I don't think it would be too hard to build some basic ones.
I still need to look into what the best methods are for cutting plexiglass. I'm afraid that the circular saw (or the jigsaw) will just rip up the edges way too much. And I know already that the dremel tends to make a very wavy melted edge, when using a hard cutting wheel. At least at the speeds I ran it. I haven't tried the saw blade for the dremel yet. I'm thinking something with fine teeth and a slow speed might be good... so maybe a metal-cutting blade on the jigsaw?
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Looks great! Yeah, the shadow boxes are definitely a possibility. I don't think it would be too hard to build some basic ones.
I still need to look into what the best methods are for cutting plexiglass. I'm afraid that the circular saw (or the jigsaw) will just rip up the edges way too much. And I know already that the dremel tends to make a very wavy melted edge, when using a hard cutting wheel. At least at the speeds I ran it. I haven't tried the saw blade for the dremel yet. I'm thinking something with fine teeth and a slow speed might be good... so maybe a metal-cutting blade on the jigsaw?
That's one of my concerns too. I don't want to drop $99 on a sheet and butcher it.
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If you buy them at Lowes, they'll cut it for you.
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That`s brilliant !!
G.
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If you buy them at Lowes, they'll cut it for you.
And apparently $47 for a 3' x 6' sheet, which is $99 a sheet at Home Depot. Great idea, thanks! Now I'm *twice* as sad I didn't go that route to start with. :)
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Almost there... the right half is done.
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/th_2012-01-27100135.jpg) (http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-27100135.jpg)
And "finished"!
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/th_2012-01-27140903.jpg) (http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-27140903.jpg)
(http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/th_2012-01-27140916.jpg) (http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t8/jba3/medieval/projects/2012-01-27140916.jpg)
At least, finished as in, I haven't done another generic mail-hanging thing for my hauberk, or stained them, but ... gotta get materials (and money for materials) first. And I'd like to do something so the plywood base isn't so obvious; not sure what yet. Another day, another project. So done for now! :)
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Nice samurai kit...never noticed it before! This looks excellent Sir James...and I know you're glad to have the 'clutter' cleaned up!
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Connor McLeod's war room has nothing on you!
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Connor McLeod's war room has nothing on you!
+1
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James, looks very cool. The items in the shadowbox case are an Arisaka Type 99 bayonet and a WWII Japanese police officers sword.