10-11-2011, 12:52 PM
Hi,
What a wonderful compliment Joe; thank you.
I've always thought a cabinet restoration to be 80% patience and 20% skill and still do. I never begrudge the time I spend working on a restoration in fact the longer it takes the better for me because once it is completed it becomes just another set to dust down and switch on occasionally.
David is correct in saying that I've not had any training whatsoever in woodworking or cabinet-working. I did woodworking at secondary school but hated the subject and thought the teacher would have been better teaching needlework; I failed in the subject.
I'm considering selling a number of my sets to make space in the workshop; I enjoy cabinetwork more than the electrical side so am thinking of concentrating more on veneering and French polishing but as yet am undecided.
I sincerely hope Steve enjoys his first cabinet restoration leading to others. At first it is highly frustrating and many silly mistakes are made but I hope by adding my notes onto the forums many of the mistakes I made can be avoided and my notes also give suppliers names of hard to get materials which was a major problem for me when I started out.
Whatever you decided to do Steve do it very slowly; take one day at a time and build on your small successes; be mindful of what you want the cabinet to look like and work towards this in small steps; to try to tackle the lot at one go will end in failure and disappointment; your first cabinet restoration will seem very slow and this is normal; you will still be slow as you gain experience but once the mistakes have been made and corrected leaving you with your dream I'm sure you will do more.
I accept that we are all different and there are many approaches to restoring a cabinet; my key to success is not skill but more down to patience and determination after all skill will come with practice and the very first restoration will cover most of the mistakes. If there is a difference about me it is only patience.
My Ekco T311 TV cabinet restoration took four months to complete and all during this time I was working in the worst winter ever recorded and having to learn many new techniques as the cabinet was in dire condition resulting in me not only re-veneering the entire cabinet but in replacing over half of the timber including both side panels; I enjoyed every minute whilst doing this and all through the work there was never any guarantee of success.
Materials are cheap and as long as care is exercised not to cut through to bare timber whilst flatting then it is hard to make a lasting mistake. Brush marks; curtains or runs in shellac are no great problem if the shellac is allowed to dry overnight. As long as a good thickness of shellac is built up then any imperfections can be flatted out. I once applied shellac that resulted in a nightmare finish but after six hours of careful flatting the finish turned out perfect; I'll try to find the pictures then everyone can see that not everything goes right all the time for me.
My chum David (Yorkie) has just completed his first veneering job; this being on a lovely wooden box he made from scratch. David exercised patience throughout; he made the box with perfect comb jointed corners; veneered it in oak and finished it and it didn't take him long as David kindly kept me up to date with work in progress and pictures via email. Nice one David;another success story.
My approach works for me but as I say we are all different.
What a great tread this is and I hope it encourages others to have a go at cabinetwork.
Kind regards, Col.
What a wonderful compliment Joe; thank you.
I've always thought a cabinet restoration to be 80% patience and 20% skill and still do. I never begrudge the time I spend working on a restoration in fact the longer it takes the better for me because once it is completed it becomes just another set to dust down and switch on occasionally.
David is correct in saying that I've not had any training whatsoever in woodworking or cabinet-working. I did woodworking at secondary school but hated the subject and thought the teacher would have been better teaching needlework; I failed in the subject.
I'm considering selling a number of my sets to make space in the workshop; I enjoy cabinetwork more than the electrical side so am thinking of concentrating more on veneering and French polishing but as yet am undecided.
I sincerely hope Steve enjoys his first cabinet restoration leading to others. At first it is highly frustrating and many silly mistakes are made but I hope by adding my notes onto the forums many of the mistakes I made can be avoided and my notes also give suppliers names of hard to get materials which was a major problem for me when I started out.
Whatever you decided to do Steve do it very slowly; take one day at a time and build on your small successes; be mindful of what you want the cabinet to look like and work towards this in small steps; to try to tackle the lot at one go will end in failure and disappointment; your first cabinet restoration will seem very slow and this is normal; you will still be slow as you gain experience but once the mistakes have been made and corrected leaving you with your dream I'm sure you will do more.
I accept that we are all different and there are many approaches to restoring a cabinet; my key to success is not skill but more down to patience and determination after all skill will come with practice and the very first restoration will cover most of the mistakes. If there is a difference about me it is only patience.
My Ekco T311 TV cabinet restoration took four months to complete and all during this time I was working in the worst winter ever recorded and having to learn many new techniques as the cabinet was in dire condition resulting in me not only re-veneering the entire cabinet but in replacing over half of the timber including both side panels; I enjoyed every minute whilst doing this and all through the work there was never any guarantee of success.
Materials are cheap and as long as care is exercised not to cut through to bare timber whilst flatting then it is hard to make a lasting mistake. Brush marks; curtains or runs in shellac are no great problem if the shellac is allowed to dry overnight. As long as a good thickness of shellac is built up then any imperfections can be flatted out. I once applied shellac that resulted in a nightmare finish but after six hours of careful flatting the finish turned out perfect; I'll try to find the pictures then everyone can see that not everything goes right all the time for me.
My chum David (Yorkie) has just completed his first veneering job; this being on a lovely wooden box he made from scratch. David exercised patience throughout; he made the box with perfect comb jointed corners; veneered it in oak and finished it and it didn't take him long as David kindly kept me up to date with work in progress and pictures via email. Nice one David;another success story.
My approach works for me but as I say we are all different.
What a great tread this is and I hope it encourages others to have a go at cabinetwork.
Kind regards, Col.
Happiness is a wreck of a cabinet to restore.
