There has been a lot that has happened since the last time I posted but for starters I am no longer working for the Commercial beekeeper.  I wont go into detail on the internet but lets say it wasn’t pretty.   So I had time yesterday to try and finish up a few projects and to try and figure out this bee box issue.

I am happy to report I have solved the issue of the box joints and I can produce thousands of boards with thousands of joints now in a short amount of time and I didn’t even have to buy new equipment!  How did I do it?  Trade Secret!  :)    Okay I will give you a hint I, I created a Jig that fits in both miter gauge slots in my crappy less than a hundred dollar (free to me though) table saw.  This jig will accept 24 boards sanding on end held together with a brace.  Then I cut each groove the depth  of 3/4 inch and once all are finished I go to the scroll saw and cut the last cut crosswise.  Its not as efficient as the dado blade but it allows me to get a lot done at once.  I am going to invest in some wood for equipment and try to get a demo set put together so I can take pictures and such and put them on the website.  I have a whole lot of things to make but I am making the jigs as I go so that when I do them again it will go faster.

I bought a 110v electric paint sprayer from Harbor Frieght and tried it out yesterday.  Besides vibrating my hand to death, it worked great.  I had been using a paint brush and hand painting boxes at that place I was working but am no longer working at now and it would take me an hour to do what took me 5 minutes with that spray gun!

These boxes below are a combination of new and repaired boxes.  The repaired boxes were junk boxes that guy I was working for didn’t want and said he would burn them or I could have them.  I repaired them and whala its as good as new. I am no longer ever going to paint another bee box (for myself, might do it for someone else) from now on I am using Stain only!  You never have to scrape a box when you stain you can just add more stain and seal it.  In the picture below the green boxes have been stained with a one coat stain that is both a color and a sealer.  So I cut out a step.

Now the Barn project has been at a stand still while I was working so much, I have done tiny bits of work to it so tiny I couldn’t tell you what it was.  But yesterday I was a man on a mission since I know I got to go back to work soon I have very few days to get as much done as I can.  So I worked till dark and managed to get up the House Wrap I got from Lowe’s with my tax refund.   Today I hope to finish the House Wrap and make some head way on the siding I picked up over the weekend.

We have several saw mills around and not one of them has the same prices as the other.  I am glad I did my research because I finally found a mill that had whole bundles (that’s a measurement of about 4′x4′x9′  and contains about 300 sqft of lumber) for only $100 and that is cheap!  Most places were wanting to charge $0.60 a board foot, thats as expensive as going to Lowe’s!  This wood apparently is not a high grade but it doesn’t need to be its going on a barn as siding and it will be painted over.

Hopefully I will make some headway on it today.  Harrison Arkansas is this friday and Brandy and I are going, myself, to play Old-Time music, Brandy, pooor Brandy she’s got to wait around till I’m Done :)  Maybe I can get her to video tape! You think?