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CHAPTER 1

Tools and Techniques

A clubhouse is essentially made of wood and nails, and a few common hand tools are all that are needed to build one. In this chapter, I'll show you how to use these tools. For more experienced builders or grown-ups, I'll add a few make-life-easier tools, including some basic power tools.

If you've never done any building before, be patient as you learn how to hit nails and saw boards. You're learning with your body as well as with your mind, and, as with dancing, tennis, or snowboarding, that takes a while. Once you learn the basics, you'll find it relatively easy to master other carpentry tools and to build bigger or more complex clubhouses.

The Nine Essential Tools

The first thing you'll need before building anything is your own set of simple, good-quality hand tools. Believe it or not, you can build an entire house with the nine essential tools listed here. Do everything you can to get your own set.

1. 1. A 16-ounce claw hammer. This is a "finish hammer," which is lighter than a "framing hammer" and just right for young builders. A wooden-handled hammer is fine, but a fiberglass-handled one will last longer.

2. A 15-inch-long handsaw, often called a "toolbox saw." Stanley makes good ones, and I don't have to tell you they are very sharp.

3. A tape measure. A 12- or 16-foot-long tape is easy to handle for young builders, while a 20- to 25-foot-long tape is more suitable for grown-ups.

4. A 7-inch rafter or speed square. Use this for marking boards to make accurate saw cuts. Although shaped like a triangle, it's called a square because it has two sides that make a right angle, which defines a square in geometry. Later, I'll show you how to use the marks on this kind of rafter square to cut boards at angles.

5. An ordinary pencil. You'll use a pencil for marking boards.

6. Screwdrivers. You can get a Phillips screwdriver (which has a cross-shaped slot) and a standard straight-slot screwdriver, or you can get a combination screwdriver with interchangeable blades. The combination-style screwdrivers include a set of smaller blades, but they have one drawback: The little snap-in blades can easily get lost. Make sure the blades or tips are made of hardened steel; cheap ones wear out fast.

7. A level. Look for a 9-inch-long plastic "torpedo" level. These are quite accurate and can fit in any toolbox.

8.A crowbar. You'll need this to remove nails and pull apart mistakes. I like the Stanley Wonder Bar or a similar flat bar bent to this shape.

9.Sawhorses. Sawhorses make building much safer and easier. The plastic fold-up kind are sturdy and a good height for grown-ups with power saws. Lower sawhorses are better for hand-sawing and for younger builders. You can build your own sawhorses with some common boards and these essential tools. As a practice project, I'll show you how to build them later in this chapter.

One more sort-of-tool: A nail pouch or nail apron to hold a tape measure, pencil, and nails will be useful. Lumberyards sometimes give these away.

Safety Means Taking It Slowly

Before you begin, take a deep breath and relax. Building always takes longer than you think, especially if this is your first project. Nails get bent, saws cut crooked, thumbs get whacked, and splinters get under your skin. Most of these annoyances and injuries are the result of not focusing or trying to do something too fast.

Here are a few things to remember about safety:

* Focus only on sawing when you saw a board. Find a friend to help hold the board down, or use clamps, and saw slowly. Stop sawing if you want to talk.

* The same thing applies when you pound in nails: Focus only on the nail and where your hands are.

* Don't leave nails sticking out of boards! Pound them back through, pull them out, or bend them over flat. Some barefoot kid is bound to come around and step on the one board in the whole yard that has that nail sticking out. A screaming injured child can kill a clubhouse project faster than you can say, "Oops." This also applies to nails that are poking through the inside of your clubhouse walls.

* Wear gloves if you are handling recycled or rough-sawn lumber. Old wood dries out over time and can get splintery.

* For you grown-up builders: Wear goggles and a dust mask when you're using a power saw. Also, unplug power tools even if you are going away for only a few minutes.

How to Pound a Nail, Measure, and Saw a Board

Before you get started on your first building project, you'll want to practice pounding nails, using a tape measure, and cutting a board. Think of this as batting practice.

Pounding Nails

You've probably pounded a few nails in the past, but pretend you're doing it for the first time. Get your hammer, a few large nails, and a long, thick board like a 2×4, and get comfortable.

If you are right-handed, hold the nail with your left hand and the hammer with your right. If you are left-handed, do the opposite. Hold the hammer handle at the far end, away from the hammerhead, and tap the nail into the wood hard enough so it stands up on its own. Then move your nail-holding hand away and drive in the nail. The drawings on the facing page show the right way to start and what can happen if you miss. Just keep trying.

Measuring a Board for Cutting

To measure a board, you'll need a tape measure, pencil, and square. Wear your tool belt or nail apron to hold the tape measure and pencil.

A tape measure has all those numbers and little marks that show feet, inches, and fractions of inches. Some tape measures also show centimeters and meters, but we'll only use inches here. The numbers tell you the feet and inches, and the little marks show the fractions of an inch. Each inch is divided into fractions of an inch, including halves, quarters, eighths, and sixteenths.

Get a board from your lumber pile, say, a 2×4. To find out its exact dimensions, hook your tape measure across the wide part of the 2×4. You'll see that the board is actually 3½" wide. (Why isn't a 2×4 actually 2" by 4"? See the box on the facing page.) Next, measure the board's thickness; you should get 1½". As you build with these boards, you'll be using these actual dimensions in your planning.

Now let's mark the board to prepare it for cutting. Say you need some 6-foot-long 2×4s to support your floorboards (which you will), and you have 8-foot-long 2×4s in your pile. Put one of these 2×4s on your sawhorses (or chairs or a bench until you build your sawhorses). Hook the tape measure at one end, and pull the tape down the board until you reach 72", which is 6 feet. The tape measure might say "6F" there, too, which also means 6 feet.

Using your pencil, make a mark on your board next to that mark on the tape measure, right between the 7 and the 2 in 72. Then set your square on the board, with its wide, or flanged, edge pulled tight against the bottom of the board. Set the square's other edge to your mark, and draw a cut line over your mark with your pencil, as shown below.

Sawing a Board

Now that your board has been measured, get your saw and sawhorses if you have them. (To build your own sawhorses, see facing page.) To start, see the drawing below to figure out how to hold down the board. You can have a friend help hold the board for you, or use clamps if you have them.

When cutting, use a sharp saw! Start by setting the teeth of the saw at the cut line, then pull up the saw to start the cut (see the drawing below). Saw with long, slow strokes. Leaning over your board as you work, push and pull the saw along the line you drew. You'll find that the push strokes do most of the cutting. If the saw wanders off the line, back up and slowly, patiently re-saw toward the line. After a while, you'll be able to saw on the line you're following with ease. When you get near the end, saw the last stroke fast so the scrap falls off without taking a splintery piece of your good wood with it. In the meantime, it's okay if the cut is off the line a little; don't worry, this is still batting practice.

PROJECT

How to Build Your Own Sawhorses

Now you're ready to build your sawhorses, right? This will be good practice, and when they are completed, you'll be glad you have them.

Find some old chairs or a bench or something to cut wood on. You will need some 2×4 and 1×6 boards, some scraps of ½"-thick plywood, and nails. Have your tape measure, pencil, saw, square, and hammer handy. Here is a list of what to gather up or buy to make two sawhorses:

Sawhorse Materials

2 2×4s, 6 feet long

2 1×6s, 8 feet long

1 2 × 4-foot panel ½"-thick plywood (or one 1×6, 4 feet long)

1 pound 6d coated sinkers or galvanized box nails

1 pound 8d coated sinkers or galvanized box nails

1 pound 12d or 16d coated sinkers or galvanized box nails

Step 1. For the sawhorse tops, cut four pieces of 2×4 that are each 36" long. To do this, measure to 36" from the end of each 2×4 with your tape measure. Mark the spot with your pencil, then use your square to draw a cut line at the mark. Saw along the cut line with a sharp handsaw.

Step 2. Find a hard floor or concrete surface on which to nail these together. Nail the 2×4s together with 12d or 16d nails, as shown in the drawing at right. Use four or five nails for each pair.

Step 3. For the legs, measure and saw eight 24"-long pieces from your 1×6 boards. Nail these to the 2×4 tops, using five or six 8d nails per leg.

Step 4. For the braces, hold a 1×6 board or a small piece of plywood against the end of the sawhorse, as shown at right. Draw lines where this board (the brace) covers the legs, then saw off the extra wood. Using three or four 6d nails per leg, nail the braces to the legs.

There, you did it! It probably took a while and you might have bent some nails, but this was good practice and also kind of a test. If you really hated every part of doing this, then now is the time to decide whether you really want to build your own clubhouse. On the other hand, if you feel good about having done this, even though a board split open and you banged your thumb twice, then by all means keep building.

Make-Life-Easier Tools

As you get used to using your nine essential tools, you'll eventually feel the need for more tools to make building easier and safer. These tools will also be useful to help put siding, roofing, and trim boards on your clubhouse.

* Clamps. If you feel your board is wiggling too much when you're sawing and all of your friends went home, you might want clamps to hold it down. Clamps are also great for gluing and other assembly. The new lightweight quick-grip clamps are much easier to use than the traditional iron C-clamps. I recommend a set of two 12" clamps or two 6" clamps.

* Pliers and wire cutters. A basic set includes standard pliers, wire-cutting pliers (great for biting off small nails that won't pry out), and needle-nose pliers for all sorts of uses.

* A utility knife with a retractable blade. Use this knife for cutting tar paper or shingles for your roof, making cut lines for cleaner saw cuts, or shaving wood too thin for a saw to cut off. Be careful — the blade is sharp!

* An awl or scratch awl. This is used for poking pilot holes for screws or for scratching a cut line if you don't have a pencil. An awl is also handy to hold the end of a tape measure to a piece of wood.

* A nail set. To sink nail heads into the wood, use a nail set, which you hit with a hammer. A medium size with a 3/32"-wide point is good for most needs.

* A 3/4"-wide wood chisel. The steel cap on the chisel allows you to hit it with a hammer, which is necessary for most chiseling. Watch for nails when chiseling — the hardened-steel blade will chip easily.

* A small hand plane or block plane. Planes are helpful for shaving wood, especially when fitting windows and doors. Make sure you don't hit any nail heads while using the plane ... very bad for the blade.

* A sanding block and sandpaper sheets. Use these for knocking off splinters and smoothing wood before painting. Get 100-grit or medium-grit sandpaper to start with. Grit size is roughly the number of sand grains per inch. The lower the number, the bigger the grains. Sandpaper at 400 grit is very smooth, while 50 grit is rough.

* A toolbox. You'll want one that is at least 19" long to put all your gear in.

* A longer level or a straight board. Once you start building bigger floors and higher walls, you'll want a longer level. An alternate trick is to attach your torpedo level to a straight 6 foot long or 8-foot-long 2×4 with rubber bands. Cut notches into the board where the rubber bands are placed so the board rests flat while you are leveling.

* A 6-foot stepladder. Someone probably has one you can borrow.

* Plumb bob and layout line. A plumb bob is a great tool for finding out whether something is "plumb," or straight up and down. Layout line, sometimes called mason's line, is strong white or colored string that usually comes on a handy plastic spool. These tools are both used to lay out a foundation on bare ground. An 8-ounce brass plumb bob is best. To make it work, attach a 9-foot-long piece of the layout line inside the removable top of the plumb bob.

* Chalk line. A chalk line is a long string coated with blue or red chalk that is used to make long saw-cut lines or guide lines, such as when nailing shingles on a wall. The line is kept in a chalk box that you fill with powdered chalk from time to time.

* Line level. This 3"-long level is designed to hang on a tightly stretched layout line. It will give you an accurate-enough reading for leveling a small shelter foundation.

* Framing hammer. A framing hammer is relatively heavy (at 20 or 22 ounces), which makes it easier to pound in all those 12d or 16d nails. Get one with a smooth face, rather than a waffle face; a waffle head chews up the wood (and your hand) if you miss.

* Sledgehammer. Get one with a 3- to 6-pound head to drive in stakes and for other blunt pounding chores. Choose the heaviest you feel you can comfortably swing.

* Long, wide tape measure. If you're building a large clubhouse or shelter, you'll want a longer tape measure, in the range of 20 to 25 feet long. Get one with a ¾"- or 1"-wide blade, which can be extended farther without bending.

* Caulk gun. This "gun" holds a variety of construction adhesives used for gluing sheathing panels to the shelter frame, as well as caulk for sealing narrow gaps between siding and windows. To use it, put a tube of caulk in the barrel, trim off or open the tip, then squeeze the trigger until the stuff starts coming out. To stop it, you sometimes have to loosen the plunger away from the tube of caulk.

* Medium-duty staple gun. This will come in handy when you are putting up plastic vapor barriers, roofing underlayment (tar paper), and insulation. Try out different models to find one that feels comfortable. Some heavy-duty staple guns require a powerful grip to staple and can get tiresome.

* Tool belt. A carpenter's tool belt certainly makes life easier. The best "system" I know of consists of a nylon web belt, a couple of bags, and a steel hammer loop. One bag is for nails and the other is for small tools such as your square, tape measure, pencil, chisel, and so on. Buy the bags, loop, and belt separately, and then adjust their positions to your liking.

Power Tools for Grown-ups

Once you have practiced with the hand tools that you've acquired, you'll likely want to get a few power tools to save time. A portable circular saw, a power drill, and a jigsaw or saber saw are all you really need.

A portable power circular saw can be intimidating at first. It's loud, it jerks when the motor starts up, and it has a sharp and fast-moving blade. But fear not — the saw is safe when handled properly. If you've never used one before, read the user's manual for your saw, especially the parts about how to hold the saw and how to adjust the blade for different board thicknesses. Also have someone experienced show you how to use it before you take over yourself.

When using a power saw, always cut a board so the scrap falls off the end of your sawhorses, never between them, as shown below. If you cut the board between the sawhorses, it will pinch the blade and the saw might kick back at you. While cutting, push the saw gently and slowly across the board — let it do the work. The saw throws sawdust all over the place, so wear safety goggles.

(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "Keep Out!"
by .
Copyright © 2013 Lee Mothes.
Excerpted by permission of Storey Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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