Tag: Fencing

June 7, 2022 – Is it Good? Check

June 7, 2022 /

So, I mentioned my Adirondack chair idea recently. Before I fully committed, I wanted to see if the wood was even viable. I pried a couple representative boards off the fence to see what they would look like if I cleaned them up.

The fence is made from Western Red Cedar. I don’t know how long it has been up, but I would guess 30 years at least. While that is a familiar wood, it is not something I have done any kind of ‘fine(r) woodworking’ with. What I mean is as rough as the boards were, I wasn’t sure how good of chair they would make.

I think the nominal fence picket is 5/8″ thick. Once I surfaced the boards, they were more like 3/8″. Laminating three boards together, gave me approximately one inch of thickness. That means for the structure of the chairs, I will probably need two or three boards per piece. That is time to surface more boards, glue and clamp and waiting for them to dry.

Doing things in this way, means that the overall construction process will be much longer than the half day I was talking about when I introduced my thoughts. So, the initial idea was inspired by having the materials and the time investment is low. This gives me pause in actually committing to this. I really want to do it, but honestly, I cant invest the time (this summer).

There is a secondary concern as well. Since I am paying someone to dismantle the fence, I will only be able to get the boards if I am available when the work is done. I could ask to have them save panels, but I don’t want to end up with a bunch of extra waste either. Based on those factors, the go ahead with this project is still to be determined.

End Your Programming Routine: If this were strictly a business decision, the answer would be no. Time is too valuable and the timing is wrong. All things being equal, If I had a stack of lumber I would make time later. It is going to boil down to whether I am around to get the boards in the first place and then it will happen some time after I finish the siding this summer.

May 3, 2022 – Knowing When to Say Uncle

May 3, 2022 /

I come from a long line of never give up, I can do it men. It kills me to pay for something that I can do. But, it is a matter of my time and what I can do (efficiently). For years our fence has been in poor shape and inexplicably part of it fell down last week.

This is a topic that has been coming up about once a year for the last five years or so. My neighbor has done a lot of shoring up in that period. The truth is, he is the cause of much of the damage anyway as there is a lot of weight against the fence so he has a vested interest in keeping it functional. There are wires anchoring it to trees and sistered posts. This is all on his side, so I cant see it.

In fact, I had spoken to him about a month ago that we planned to replace the fence this summer. I wanted to get a rough lumber cost to see if I wanted to do the job or not. After I saw it was $6 a fence board, I was hoping it would last another year. But, now that the fence has fallen down, we need to get it repaired quickly.

We are looking at getting five bids (still waiting for the first one however). What I can say is that five different people showed up to take measurements. Almost all of them we have some kind of affiliation with. Even so, I was surprised to get attention and action so quickly. Maybe it is the season is still slow or maybe things have cooled down quickly? I can’t really say.

The heart of what I am trying to get at is that while I can do it, I cannot do everything. We have a trip planned for Spain after school is out and I have another problem (project) that I will talk about tomorrow. In addition, with all of the family activities and business travel plus we need to keep our animals in the yard as well as the neighbors animal out. Plus, the weather is not great right now anyway.

Some times I do things because I want the experience. Other times I do things because they are in my wheel house and it is cheaper and faster for me to do them. Lastly, there are times when it is far more economic for me to do them because there is no real deadline. I know myself and my commitments and things always take significantly longer than I expect because I do not spend the time I would like doing the project. There is also the opposite opinion of what would you rather do?

With the price of materials, most of the cost is going to go to that. I have a feeling that labor is going to be a relatively small portion of the bid. There is also the factor that it will probably get done in a couple of days and I think all the debris will be removed. For me, I wouldn’t be surprised if it took all summer. If I had nothing else to do, I would love to do the job and save the labor cost. But the reality is I don’t really want to spend my entire summer doing this job.

The economics of the situation says in theory, if I can pay someone less than what I can earn with the same time, then possibly you save money. There is also the potential of having to buy single use tools and even skill deficits. I can’t use those excuses nor will I have another job to do instead of building a fence. I would say it is more that we need it done sooner rather than later. The truth is the adjacent fence has been broken for at least seven years as well. It has literally been sitting on the ground for years hanging on by a nail. So, it is time.

End Your Programming Routine: Maybe it is getting older and wiser or maybe it is becoming more confident that I am having a slight mindset shift. I would never consider paying someone to do something that I could do. But, since we have paid for yard maintenance, I have come to understand that I do things that I want to do rather than out of obligation. Hiring someone to replace the fence is not because I can’t but because I want to spend my time elsewhere.