This, that, and the other

[wroughtn_harv]

They aren't my first gates. I've been making them like this for ten years or more. I don't do many because they are expensive compared to having a crew of laborers mob a job with someone yelling "get'r done!"

I don't work that way. If I'm going to do the job them I'm doing to do it my way and at my pace. If I can't have fun I don't want to play.

 

[wroughtn_harv]

Yesterday we went to the woods and pulled the two biggest cedars left. We also grabbed the two best big cedars with decent crotches. We only found two and they were only eleven feet off of the ground.

Eastern Red Cedars have lousy branch geometry. They're usually too vertical and they're prone to splitting. We found two with a large crotches like that of large oaks and felt like we'd hit the lotto.

Today I've got to unload the big logs and then go back for saplings. There are probably thousands of cedar saplings four to six inches in diameter thirty plus feet high in these woods. I need at least one good trailer load of them.

What I've got is two timber entryways. One of them will be more along the line of the big timber gates you see in the mountains out west, three big logs on each side of the gate with an arched log overhead. The other will be rock columns with the crotch logs coming out of the columns with an arched log overhead head.

Both of them will have wood/steel gates on operators. Both them will also have wood steel rail fencing.

Six or seven years ago I was approached about the insanity of building a rail fence at the Texas Wild Exhibit at the Ft Worth Zoo. The architect had designed large western cedar posts and pipe rails. The contractor thought it was impossible and insane. We did it. We also got lucky. It came out really pretty.

When I got the final go ahead on these two jobs I went to my powder coater to look at a relatively new and expensive process where they coat metal with a wood grain UV protected finish. It is really nice, expensive, but nice.

The problem is it's almost impossible to use this process on a finished product. That's because of the way the process works. A base coat is put on the piece. Then the piece has a tube of what looks like expensive inside out Xmas paper put over it. The ends are sealed and a vacuum is pulled. As the vacuum sucks out the air the coating material is worked against the metal removing all the wrinkles and slack. Under vacuum the piece goes into the powder coating oven. When it's done the piece is brought out and the coating material is clear and the pattern is on the metal piece.

The problem here in the south with wood posts is they rot if they're not eaten by our bugs. My posts will be pipe with mortises made with smaller pipe. They will be powdercoated a knotty pine wood grain. The gates will be made the same way except I'm going to have to design a fastening system where they will be able to be reconstructed into a gate.

The finished products will have the appearance of all wood but all the advantages of metal and powdercoating for longevity. Metal posts with cedar rails and a metal gate where it counts.

This is my kind of project, lots of challenges and many opportunities to get lucky. After all, as Texas Don says, "I'd rather be lucky than good. Anyone can be good. That only takes effort."

 

[jinman]

They aren't my first gates. I've been making them like this for ten years or more. I don't do many because they are expensive compared to having a crew of laborers mob a job with someone yelling "get'r done!"

I don't work that way. If I'm going to do the job them I'm doing to do it my way and at my pace. If I can't have fun I don't want to play.

No matter what that gate costs, the owner will be paid back over the years with perfect operation and the "oohs" and "aahs" of everyone who sees it. I'm guilty of looking at a finished product and visualizing all the steps that went into the process of building it (a curse, really). I love the way you attached the square tubing to the big gate and the walk-thru gate.

I think your client's easement access problem is over...but now everyone will want to see his new gate.

 

[EddieWalker]

Harvey,

I really like the stairs and from what I can tell in the pictures, think they work great in that house. Everything depends on the finish, but the bulk and shape of the stairs really are what it's all about in my opinion.

The woodwork in the other house is just awesome. I love everything about that house except the kitchen. If there is something that doesn't belong, it's those cabinets. They look like sombody saw something they liked in another house and wanted that in the new house without regard to how it would fit with they style of the new house.

I've fought with clients on this fairly often. For whatever reason, they get it in their head that a feature in a house that they saw is something that they really liked. So when they start to build or remodel, they want that feature in their home. Sometimes it works, but sometimes it jumps out as a mistake.

If the client really wants it, then that's what they get. Their opinion is the only one that matters. LOL But if it was my kitchen to have designed, I think hickory cabinets would have really complimented that home with dark counters.

The gate is REALLY NICE!!!

I'm looking forward to seeing how you put the entrance logs together with the metal. I have an idea in my brain, but I've leaned over the years that you'll suprise me!!

Thanks for posting all those great pics.

Eddie

 

[rtdiggr]

They aren't my first gates. I've been making them like this for ten years or more. I don't do many because they are expensive compared to having a crew of laborers mob a job with someone yelling "get'r done!"

I don't work that way. If I'm going to do the job them I'm doing to do it my way and at my pace. If I can't have fun I don't want to play.

I have alot of respect for they way you work, to bad we live in a society that wants everything done yesterday OR you want "how much to do that job"
Shane

 

[patrick_g]

Harv, As always, you are having fun and getting to do some NEAT STUFF. I too have been out in the woods collecting Eastern Red Cedar (Juniperus Virginiana) off and on for a few years. Starting to run out of BIG stuff. I haven't seen one over 2 ft in diameter 10 ft above the ground in a while. Didn't see many to start with. I have maybe a thousand board feet left stickered and waiting on me to do something.

I'm curious... The tall fence... are they keeping things (people or other animals) out or in? I haven't seen fence like that since I was looking at a buffalo pasture. A fence like that and you wonder if they were going to bid on a DOC contract.

Pat

 

[wroughtn_harv]

Eddie, here in the DFW area we're plagued with that magazine pictures designing process. The best example of that is all of our McMansions. They're everywhere and define what a client on mine once explained as, "people whose only taste is in their mouths."

Jim, one of the first walk gates I did like that was in 86 or 87. A couple of months ago I did a drive gate for that family. When I explained how well the gate would work (they didn't have an operator in mind) she told me to hush up. They only thing that had worked as advertised for twenty years was the walk gate.

Shane, the problem is very few people today have learned to appreciate the work. The only way we can change that is to demand respect for our work. We do that by educating the consumer and not succumbing to the "get'r done" mindset.

Most of my clients at least know me by reputation. So I go in with them expecting a cranky old man with an attitude. That helps. And it gives them a story to tell about the product later on.

 

[wroughtn_harv]

Harv, As always, you are having fun and getting to do some NEAT STUFF. I too have been out in the woods collecting Eastern Red Cedar (Juniperus Virginiana) off and on for a few years. Starting to run out of BIG stuff. I haven't seen one over 2 ft in diameter 10 ft above the ground in a while. Didn't see many to start with. I have maybe a thousand board feet left stickered and waiting on me to do something.

I'm curious... The tall fence... are they keeping things (people or other animals) out or in? I haven't seen fence like that since I was looking at a buffalo pasture. A fence like that and you wonder if they were going to bid on a DOC contract.

Pat

That's standard eight foot board on board cedar privacy fence here in North Texas. Well, except the posts are pipe and not tubing, the post holes are three feet deep and twelve inches across instead of two by eight, etc and so on.

Our trees aren't that big. I'd guess eighteen to twenty inches at ten feet at best. I'll post some pictures tonight.

 

[rtdiggr]

Shane, the problem is very few people today have learned to appreciate the work. The only way we can change that is to demand respect for our work. We do that by educating the consumer and not succumbing to the "get'r done" mindset.


Amen to that.

Shane

 

[EddieWalker]

Eddie, here in the DFW area we're plagued with that magazine pictures designing process. The best example of that is all of our McMansions. They're everywhere and define what a client on mine once explained as, "people whose only taste is in their mouths."

Sad, but true.

Eddie