Home DIY

Interesting, thanks for that. I'll do some research into that but I had been thinking of an off the shelf product - could be tricky to get consistent colour with a home-made solution I'm guessing.

Also, it's to do one new section and one old section (although not right next to each other). As stripped, they have quite different patinas and I'd be concerned that they'd look very different after staining. Was thinking maybe a gel stain? Anyone with experience of those?

New v old would be very difficult to match no matter what you use.
The solution allows you to do multiple dips/coats to achieve as deep a colour as you need. This of course depends on the wood used, some are harder to penetrate but again this would be true for whatever stain is used.
Unrelated, but it takes undyed leather to true black instantly.

Bit late to this one but check out the mitred join on those boards, that's how they get the grain to look right in the corners. It's tricky to cut the mitre at 90 degrees to the edge of the board and at 45 degrees. Then you have to join them with small biscuit joints. I do them with 4mm domino joints because that machine is specially set up to cope with long mitred joints.

It's a small detail but it adds a need for accuracy to the project. You're also hanging quite a bit of weight off the wall so you need strong fixings and remember that some people like to sit in the sink if there's no bidet!

you sir, are a fantastic wealth of knowledge.
I don't think I will need too much joint wise as the sides of this set up are going to be the walls so it's essentially going to be two shelves with a couple of non load bearing uprights to form compartments.
you have machine for mitred joints? I am jealous. I have a power saw and little else...

I'm liking these tiles with the yellow grout

very avengers..

You'll have to explain that one to me :(

don't worry it's not an arcane passport/pineapples meme

saw the bathroom pic and subconsciously linked it to john steed and emma peel, because it's quintessentially '60's

Any suggestions for a wireless doorbell. Doorbell unit needs to be battery powered. Receiver can be mains or battery powered.

Cheap ones seem to pack up fairly regularly and often you don't know this until someone tells you so. Although for a bit of variety my current one has taken to playing Old McDonald had a Farm at random times of the day and night.

Not exactly DIY, as I'm going to get contractors in to do the electrics and core drilling, but I want to run my plan making my bathroom less damp, cold and mouldy past the LFGSSDIY hivemind. The plan is to get one of these:

and hang it above the doorways between my bathroom, kitchen and porch. This will extract damp air from the bathroom and push in slightly warmed, fresh air into the kitchen. I'd like to put the inward air further into the flat, and push air right through from the front, but I can't see any easy way of doing this, that doesn't involve pulling down ceilings / boxing in ducting. The fan has a boost mode that'll hopefully be triggered by a humidistat and manual timer, if I can figure out whether I can get the two to run in parallel.

The other option is to save 100quid by just not drilling through into the kitchen, and out-putting the airflow directly below the fan unit, but my feeling is this will drastically reduce extraction on moisture from cooking from the kitchen.

At the same time I'm going to have install a dual fuel towel rail, in place of the current, tiny radiator. This will be on a separate time switch like this

I'll also be getting the bathroom window changed for a double glazed one. the plaster either side of this is currently really damp and crumbly, and the cill is a bit swollen but should be ok with new paint, should I look to get these replaced at the same time or just wait until it dries out and re-paint?

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Have a look at Richlite cascade boards, they look quite a lot like your example.

To cut long mitres like that I use a track saw, the Festool TS55 and join it using the domino. It's not always perfect though and with pre-finished board would be a sweat inducing job, at least with painted mdf you can fill any small gaps.

Yep.
You are good arent ya?
I'll prob make a mess somehow...

I don't trust myself that much, always measure twice and cut once. Experience helps, especially the bitter type. Almost every project I start I have a knot in my stomach about what I might not have planned for or what could go wrong, it's rarely a disaster but I admit to swearing my way through the day (unless there are children about!).

I'm just going through the process of qualifying as an electrician and it's great to be on a course where you can ask loads of questions and someone with massive amounts of experience saves you hours of head scratching. Most of my years on site have been alone, sweating, dusty and worrying!

I'd like to know as well. Been looking at the wifi Internet app type. But Damn.... They are expensive.

!Google says
http://m.lightinthebox.com/en/list/video-door-phone-intercom-systems_5087

But that's just a quick search

There's skybox or something

How to boil over with rage

1. Go to Ikea Croydon
   
2. Order specific parts for old type kitchen from Germany
   
3. Pay through the nose because it's legacy parts
   
4. Wait two weeks
   
5. Build drawers and attach fronts
   
6. Remove perfectly set cupboard fronts and everything inside the cupboard
   
7. Try to attach new sliders only to realise THEY'VE SENT THE NEW & INCORRECT FUCKING FIXTURES
   
8. Re-attach cupboard fronts and put everything back where it was
   
9. Spend your Wednesday evening driving back to Ikea Croydon
   

How to boil over with rage

1. Go to Ikea Croydon
   

Yep.

You're right, I definitely could have stopped at 1.

I just went through the rest of the process to be thorough.

Anyway, I feel your pain. Have got our new kitchen mostly fitted - Ikea carcasses with new doors (bespoke, artisinal natch). We have a tall cupboard with internal drawers but the hinges that came with are not the ones that extend and open, so currently you can open the cupboard door, but are unable to pull out the drawers. Grrr.

We're looking at doing much the same in our new kitchen, could I ask where you went for your bespoke artisinal doors? (or where anyone else has got good ones from)

Anyone used a router table much?
I'm trying to use it to cut box joints in 18mm ply... made a lovely jig and everything.
My problem is that the bit is delaminating the ply, and also kicking the work piece around a worrying amount. I'm using a 25mm bit - is this too big to use?

We've got them through a joiner via our builders. Quality is good but as we were due to finish in July, I'd hesitate to recommend. (not only their fault, mind).
Depending on the look you want there are various places that just do doors, or look for a joiner to do something specific.
(not very helpful that)

causes:

tool too big for 'weight' of material it's cutting into
you're being too ham fisted and feeding in too much of the tool at each cutting pass
you've not taped the cutting side on the workpiece
the workpiece is not clamped securely enough

@Airhead will be along to deliver the definitive sermon

25mm does sound like a large bit. I'm not sure that using ply is helping either, can't remember routing ply in 25 years of joinery! It's highly likely to delaminate if you are routing it. Is it high end furniture quality ply or ply shuttering?

Laminate in that sense is used to describe a core material which has a thin layer of something usually more durable or decorative stuck to it. Lamination in ply is a description of the layers of ply bonded together. So ply has maybe 20-30 layers of very thin board glued together which can come apart at the edges because the router creates so much friction while cutting it.

If you are cutting a laminate kitchen worktop it makes sense to score it, some saws have a function for this. It saves the edges of the laminate from 'shelling', leaving rough edges on the finished piece. You can also put a strong masking tape over the cut line to help stop it happening although that's not a great method.

You can try routing a material in stages to avoid destroying it with vibration/friction. That will sometimes work, I don't know with Ply because I've never tried it and probably never will.