We’ve created a bit of a stir
Since we offered local schools free timber for their woodworking departments we’ve created a bit of a stir, so thought I’d share a few of the comments we’ve been getting with you! [Read more...]
06/06/2013 by ·
21/05/2013 by ·
Free timber to schools – I’m overwhelmed with the response!
In my last blog post, I was appealing for schools local to us to get in touch if they needed some free timber offcuts for use in their woodworking departments and to be honest, I’ve been buried under an avalanche of emails and phone calls! So far three schools have been promised some timber from us but many are missing out.
[Read more...]
17/05/2013 by ·
Calling any secondary schools in Denbighshire, Conwy or Flintshire
Well more specifically Design Technology or Product Design (what ever happened to the good old woodworking department; think it was CDT in my day, but I digress!) teachers at Secondary schools in Denbighshire, Conwy or Flintshire.
Are you suffering budget shortages and struggling for timber for your pupils’ GCSE or KS3 project work?
23/04/2013 by · Leave a Comment
We’re now Accoya approved joinery manufacturers
If you’ve visited our website recently, you may well have noticed that we added Accoya to the timbers that we use. Not only that, but we’ve recently undergone training from those nice people at Accsys Technologies (the brains behind Accoya) and are pleased to announce that we are now certified (not that kind of certified!) users of Accoya modified softwood.
28/03/2013 by · Leave a Comment
Keep your hammer clean and improve your efficiency (and avoid the dreaded hammer rash).
Do you find you cannot hammer a nail home cleanly? Do you find that as you attempt to drive the nail home (*or a screw, if you’re really rough! 
) that your hammer, as it comes into contact with the head of the nail, glances off?
It doesn’t have to be a nail, the same thing can happen as you’re driving wedges into your mortice and tenon joints, resulting in hammer rash, which looks like a crazed maniac has taken his frustrations out on your work. Annoyingly, this means you’ll have to spend twice as long on the finishing of the job than you’d normally would, as you sand the timber to within an inch of it’s life to get rid of any hammer indentations. [Read more...]
08/03/2013 by · Leave a Comment
Sparkly new shiny website
You may have noticed recently a new site design both here and over on the main part of our website. It’s been long overdue, if I’m honest, and probably ended up taking me (yes me!) slightly longer than I wanted.
Originally (about 12 months ago!) I decided we needed a new site, something a bit more modern – so off I went and started a redesign, only to come to a halt because of lack of time – I was spending my days in the workshop and evenings on my computer sorting the site out.
20/12/2012 by · Leave a Comment
The end of the world is nigh….
Unless you’ve been living in a shack somewhere cut off from all known civilization for the past few weeks it cannot have escaped your attention that the Mayan’s predict the end of the world at some point on 21st December 2012. When exactly during the 21st December is unknown as they didn’t think to give us some idea of a time! So much to do, so little time left!
05/12/2012 by · 1 Comment
How to ease a sticking door
Sticking doors can be quite a tricky problem to solve. The first thing you need to do is figure out whether the door really is “sticking” or whether the problem is with the hinges, screws or latches. It’s a good idea to check latches and oil the hinges before taking any drastic action. If that solves the problem, great! You have just saved yourself a lot of work. If not, you probably do have a sticking door. Read on for some tips on how to solve this problem.
23/11/2012 by · Leave a Comment
Bespoke gates with raised panels (Part 2)
Continuing on from Part One (Not seen part one yet? Then what are you waiting for, it’s here) of our look at some bespoke wooden gates with raised panels: we’ve got the gates together dry (with no glue holding it together), we’ve worked out the sizes for the lattice infill in the top section of the gates, so now we can move on to the raised and fielded panels in the bottom section of the gates.
31/10/2012 by · Leave a Comment
Bespoke wooden gates with raised panels
From time to time, as we are making a bespoke gate, (by bespoke I mean a gate made to our customer’s own design, rather than a made to measure gate from our own range of gates), we like to show you exactly goes into one of them so you can get an idea how we make them and the quality to expect in everything we produce. So once again, we’re going to have a look at a bespoke wooden gates with raised panels; if you don’t know what raised panels are, then all will be revealed!
These gates were influenced by our St Asaph driveway gates, which are part of our standard range of made to measure gates, but the customer saw our ‘customise your gates’ page and decided to go for something a bit different and we were given this sketch to work with…
05/10/2012 by · Leave a Comment
Breathe new life into your wooden floors
Solid wooden flooring can make a timeless and beautiful addition to your home, but without the right maintenance programme the complexion of your wooden floor can become dull and lifeless. Aftercare is vital especially when preserving high quality flooring for years to come, so why not breathe new life into your floors with our guide to maintaining solid wood flooring. [Read more...]
17/09/2012 by · Leave a Comment
HSE Fee for intervention – are you ready?
Are you ready for the HSE Fee for Intervention?
On the 1st October 2012, the HSE will introduce their Fee for Invention. This basically means that from 1st October 2012, if your company is found in ‘material breach’ by a HSE Inspector, then you have contravened the Health and Safety law and the person responsible will be notified in writing.
07/09/2012 by · Leave a Comment
Joynerbolt review
A while ago, the creators of Joynerbolt started following us over on twitter (you can find them on twitter here) and after a nose at their website they offered us a free sample, so I thought I’d talk a little bit about what they sent us and what it does!
If you’ve ever worked as a joiner on a site and had cause to join two timber members together (joisting/roofing etc) then you’re probably familar with using coach bolts to hold the two pieces of timber together. [Read more...]
14/08/2012 by · Leave a Comment
Joinery grade softwood – what is it?
We’re getting more and more people asking for Joinery Grade Softwood at the moment so we thought we’d do a little blog post to tell you a bit more about the timber we use in our softwood gates and doors, as well as exactly what Joinery Grade Softwood means, as it can be a bit ambiguous, and in the case of Unsorted Softwood, a bit of a strange term unless you know why it’s called Unsorted Softwood.
Well, to start with, we use Unsorted Scandinavian Redwood in our Softwood products, preferably Swedish Redwood as we feel it is of a far higher quality than either the Russian or Finnish equivalents, which can be quite knotty at times.
What is joinery grade softwood?
We’re getting more and more people asking for Joinery Grade Softwood at the moment so we thought we’d do a little blog post to tell you a bit more about the timber we use in our softwood gates and doors, as well as exactly what Joinery Grade Softwood means, as it can be a bit ambiguous, and in the case of Unsorted Softwood, a bit of a strange term unless you know why it’s called Unsorted Softwood.
Well, to start with, we use Unsorted Scandinavian Redwood in our Softwood products, preferably Swedish Redwood as we feel it is of a far higher quality than either the Russian or Finnish equivalents, which can be quite knotty at times.
What is joinery grade softwood?
27/07/2012 by · Leave a Comment
Can I use butt hinges to hang wooden gates?
So you’re all ready to hang your wooden gates and you’ve decided to opt for butt hinges…Stop! Don’t do it! So why don’t we use butt hinges to hang wooden gates? If you’re unsure where butt hinges are normally used then you probably don’t know why you shouldn’t use them on any externally opening door (i.e. a side-hung garage door) or a driveway or garden gate.
06/07/2012 by ·
Experienced joiner required for North Wales Workshops
We’re currently on the lookout for an time-served experienced workshop Joiner for our busy workshops in Rhyl, North Wales, to help us meet our ever-growing workload. You must have some relevant experience in using woodworking machinery (e.g. circular saw, planer, tenoner etc), and you will be expected to set out, when required, as well as assemble and finish. Ideally, you will be able to work both independently as well as get stuck in as part of our team, depending on the job in hand.
Are you an experienced workshop joiner? Does this sound like you?
29/05/2012 by · 2 Comments
Still cannot remove that splinter?
If you’ve half-removed the splinter and some of it remains, or you just cannot get it out (if you can only see the end of the splinter and it’s gone straight in, rather than side on, then these can be difficult to remove easily) then you’re going to need to give it a helping hand! [Read more...]
16/05/2012 by · 2 Comments
How to remove a splinter
If you’re a joiner (or other occupation that works with timber), then getting a wooden splinter is an occupational hazard. If you leave the splinter and do nothing, then it will eventually become infected and may become uncomfortable, if not painful. How soon it becomes infected depends on a lot of things, from the type of timber the splinter is from (the timber Greenheart, for instance, can become infected quite quickly resulting in blood poisoning, as well as the Greenheart splinter wound turning septic, there is also risk of secondary infections due to fungi and bacteria) to how clean the timber you were using is. So here we look at a couple of ways of removing a splinter. [Read more...]
30/04/2012 by · Leave a Comment
What is a gate closer and why would you need one?
Ever get annoyed when callers to your home leave your gates swinging in the wind, leaving them to slam shut with a thud that can damage the gates? You could put a ‘please close the gate’ sign upon the entrance way but let’s face it, it will probably be ignored! So what’s the answer?
20/04/2012 by · Leave a Comment
Wooden gates to deter Denbighshire metal thieves?
An article caught my eye this week in our local daily newspaper, The Daily Post. It seems that recently, metal thieves have moved on from targetting lead on roofs to stealing people’s metal gates in the Denbighshire area, no doubt in order to take them to scrapyards to weigh in for cash?
In Rhyl alone, four pairs of cast iron gates were stolen in one night…………..
