All
the DIY which was on my pre-op To Do list is now finished and whenever
the hip replacement does take place I'll be ready, thanks to
self-isolation, the new term for getting on with things you were
procrastinating about.
Sawed, glued and screwed blocks of wood to make feet for the sofa. Lifting the sofa took some serious pondering but I eventually remembered the ancient leverage principle by which the pyramids were built. I pushed the head of a hammer under the sofa and lifted the handle: presto the sofa was up-ended and my hip joints not strained.
When the feet were in place - they're not pretty but pretty is not the point - I had to undo and re-do the DIY upholstery I made a few years ago because the foam block is too wide and overhangs the seat.
I Googled "cutting foam rubber" and there's a great demo on YouTube of a nice American slicing a neat chunk out of a big foam block with a bread knife. I laid the block on a table, measured and marked the cutting line, took a bread knife and, like the man said, began lightly scoring along the line. And scored and scored and scored while little gobbets of foam rubber floated around sticking to my clothes and everything else. The American's foam rubber must have been a different kind.
Eventually the excess amount of block came off and I stitched back together the "stockinette" (ha ha stockinette!) bag in which the block is held. Put the block back on the sofa and sat on it. Dimensions now good but foam sinks in too much, not hip-joint friendly. Took two left-over machined wood floor planks, fitted them together and laid them on the sofa under the foam block. Perfect fit. Sat on it. Nice and firm now. Re-fited the fabric over the seat, tucked everything in. Finito!
That was a lesson on how to use your self-isolating time while simultaneously procrastinating about something you really should be getting on with.
Sawed, glued and screwed blocks of wood to make feet for the sofa. Lifting the sofa took some serious pondering but I eventually remembered the ancient leverage principle by which the pyramids were built. I pushed the head of a hammer under the sofa and lifted the handle: presto the sofa was up-ended and my hip joints not strained.
When the feet were in place - they're not pretty but pretty is not the point - I had to undo and re-do the DIY upholstery I made a few years ago because the foam block is too wide and overhangs the seat.
I Googled "cutting foam rubber" and there's a great demo on YouTube of a nice American slicing a neat chunk out of a big foam block with a bread knife. I laid the block on a table, measured and marked the cutting line, took a bread knife and, like the man said, began lightly scoring along the line. And scored and scored and scored while little gobbets of foam rubber floated around sticking to my clothes and everything else. The American's foam rubber must have been a different kind.
Eventually the excess amount of block came off and I stitched back together the "stockinette" (ha ha stockinette!) bag in which the block is held. Put the block back on the sofa and sat on it. Dimensions now good but foam sinks in too much, not hip-joint friendly. Took two left-over machined wood floor planks, fitted them together and laid them on the sofa under the foam block. Perfect fit. Sat on it. Nice and firm now. Re-fited the fabric over the seat, tucked everything in. Finito!
That was a lesson on how to use your self-isolating time while simultaneously procrastinating about something you really should be getting on with.
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| The lion lives on this sofa. |
2 comments:
Cutting foam. Have I ever done that? Can't be sure.
But I can profit from your experience. Foam being foam it would compress mightily under the pressure of the knife; there'd be a good chance the blade would then diverge from your measured marks. The need would be for a super-sharp knife, so sharp it required next to no pressure. An old-fashioned razor blade might have worked, perhaps an Xacto . I have a double grinding wheel, a carborundum set in a wooden frame, and - for day-to-day kitchen use - a sharpening steel embedded with diamond dust. I am a sharpening freak. But it all depends on what type of steel is used for the blade. Stainless steel is hopeless; a flexible blade can be problematic; thin but very stiff is the best.
But here's the irony. The great DIY tragedy is that we do so many tasks just once. Next time we'd be experts, but a next time never arrives.
Robbie, the guy with breadknife was absolutely right, a serrated edge works whereas a straight knife no matter how super sharp,doesn't. The best tool for this job is a a special foam-cutting hot knife but the bread knife is good enough, if slower. You're right about pressure, that's why the guy in the video says to use very light, repeated strokes. Also the quality of the foam block needs to be good. Mine wasn't great. True enough, I won't be doing this task again.
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