Tag: bpway

How to Install a Garage Door Opener on a Box Truck

As seen on:

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Easy access is easy if you know what to do.

By David Frane

After our recent video series on his shop on wheels, Brian Way received several queries about the automatic garage door opener one the rear door of his box truck. Installing an opener on a truck is trickier than doing it on a house; the clearances are different, the voltages different, and there are issues related to the electric eye and how to get in if the unit malfunctions. Way deals with them all in the video below and explains the advantages of being able to access the back of your vehicle with the push of a button. Check it out.

 

 

Fastcap SpeedBrace

The Speedbrace by Fastcap is an extremely unique and strong design. It comes in black, white, primed, and stainless steel. As you can see in the photos, a 1 1/2″ aluminum angle was used as a continuous wall cleat. Of coarse wood can also be used, but many times the angle (although more costly) is both stronger and faster to install. There are 2 per drilled holes for your wire management too! The Speedbrace adds a touch of modern design and keeps the structural integrity without breaking the bank.

For purchase information, check out this link, SPEEDBRACE.

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Top 32 Quotes Every Entrepreneur Should Live By

Top 32 Quotes Every Entrepreneur Should Live By

 

The nature of being an entrepreneur means that you fully embrace ambiguity and are comfortable with being challenged regularly. Choosing this career path is completely irrational because the odds of succeeding are dismal, but most succeed because of their unwavering belief, laser focus on delivering and persistence.

Starting a company is a riveting roller coaster of emotions with tremendous highs and at times, difficult lows, but one thing that always helps me through the ups and downs is to connect with some of the greatest minds. Below are just a few of my favorite quotes:

1. “The best way to predict the future is to create it.”
– Peter Drucker

2. “Winners never quit and quitters never win.”
– Vince Lombardi

3. “Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”
– Steve Jobs

4. “My biggest motivation? Just to keep challenging myself. I see life almost like one long University education that I never had — everyday I’m learning something new.”
– Richard Branson

5. “Every time you state what you want or believe, you’re the first to hear it. It’s a message to both you and others about what you think is possible. Don’t put a ceiling on yourself.”
– Oprah Winfrey

6. “It’s fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.”
– Bill Gates

7. “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.”
– Warren Buffett

8. “One of the huge mistakes people make is that they try to force an interest on themselves. You don’t choose your passions; your passions choose you.”
– Jeff Bezos

9. “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”
– Thomas Edison

10. “Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.”
– Albert Einstein

11. “As long as you’re going to be thinking anyway, think big.”
– Donald Trump

12. “Success is walking from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.”
– Winston Churchill

13. ”Genius is 1% inspiration, and 99% perspiration.”
– Thomas Edison

14. “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”
– Mark Twain

15. “The price of success is hard work, dedication to the job at hand, and the determination that whether we win or lose, we have applied the best of ourselves to the task at hand.”
– Vince Lombardi

16. “If you cannot do great things, do small things in a great way.”
– Napoleon Hill

17. “I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.”
– Bill Cosby

18. “Success is not what you have, but who you are.”
– Bo Bennet

19. “Entrepreneurship is living a few years of your life like most people won’t so you can spend the rest of your life like most people cant.”
– Warren G. Tracy’s student

20. “To win without risk is to triumph without glory.”
– Corneille

21. “Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.”
– Mark Twain

22. “There is only one success- to be able to spend your life in your own way.”
– Christopher Morley

23. “Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve.”
– Napoleon Hill

24. “Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful.”
– Albert Schweitzer

25. “What is not started will never get finished”
– Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

26. “When you cease to dream you cease to live.”
– Malcolm Forbes

27. “Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune.”
– Jim Rohn

28. “The most valuable thing you can make is a mistake- you can’t learn anything from being perfect.”
– Adam Osborne

29. “A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.”
– John C. Maxwell

30. “The function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers.”
– Ralph Nader

31. “Choose a job that you like, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”
– Confucius

32. “Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.”
– Bill Gates

The Ultimate Drill Bit Systainer System!

Get your bits organized with the KISS Drill Bit System. With 82 color-coded bits, it eliminates guesswork when returning drills and help keep drills in the right place. It also helps identify broken or missing drills in your set. All KISS Drills are high speed steel split point jobber bits of the highest quality.

 

 

GET IT HERE!

 

Bosch L-Boxx Kaizen Foam Inserts

Are you looking for Pre-Cut inserts for your Bosch L-Box? Check these out.

L-Boxx Kaizen Foam Insert

       
l box Pre-cut foam insert for Bosch Lboxx 7/8″ – 20mm thick

    

l box Pre-cut foam insert for Bosch Lboxx 1 1/8″ – 30mm thick

 

 l box Pre-cut foam insert for Bosch Lboxx 2-1/4″ – 57mm thick

    

Thingamejig Scribing tool

Thingamejig Scribing Tool

By 
Brian Way

Thingamejig Scribing Tool

Play Slideshow >>

The Thingamejig is a precision scribing tool invented by an Australian cabinet maker who installs millwork and cabinetry. Instead of marking with the usual pencil it scores the material with sharp carbide blades.

The tool consists of a three-winged head with replaceable carbide cutters screwed onto each. A threaded shaft runs through the center, allowing the head to be raised and lowered in relation to the foot—which bears against the surface being scribed to. Once the setting is dialed in the operator secures the shaft with a lock nut.

The scriber has an ergonomic 3-finger grip, making it comfortable to hold and allowing the operator to apply pressure where and when needed. In use, the blades score easily, breaking through the finish so there’s no need to worry about chipping. The tool works amazingly well on cross-grain veneer—nearly eliminating the fear of tearing out grain while making the cut. I can usually get a successful scribe in one or two strokes, depending on the hardness of the material. Laminate sometimes takes an extra stroke to break through the surface.

The triangular blades can be rotated to provide three fresh edges. I have been using the Thingamejig for about a year and the blades are ready to be replaced. This is not a tool to be tossed around. Like any precision device, it needs a home and should not be carried in your tool pouch. I dropped it once and chipped a blade. The Thingamejig comes in a snap-top plastic bin, which is a good thing to store it in.

The scriber includes a non-marring plastic cover that fits over the shoe and prevents it from damaging finish surfaces. I use it nearly all of the time and recommend keeping some extras around because they themselves are easily damaged. If you use the scale remember to deduct 1/32 inch for the thickness of the cover. I rarely use the scale; I simply find the largest gap to be scribed and adjust the height of the winged blade, than snug the lock nut.

There are pros and cons to scribing with blades instead of pencils. Blades work best on painted and prefinished material, where the finely scribed line is easy to see. By breaking through the finished surface, the blades make it possible to cut to the line with a jigsaw without having to worry that the finish will flake off (I usually touch up with a belt sander anyway). The Thingamejig is not the best choice for scribing unfinished wood because the finely scribed line is hard to see on that material. I use this tool when scribing to straight, smooth, and flowing surfaces – as when fitting countertops, cabinet fillers, and moldings to ceilings, walls, and floors. The Thingamejig is not an all-purpose scriber and can’t be used to scribe around moldings and rough surfaces such as stone. Fortunately, there are plenty of other scribing tools that can do those things.

I liked this “thing” the moment I opened the box. Everything about it says quality: the precise machining, the laser etched scale (metric or imperial) on the shaft, and the triangular carbide blades.  With an $80 price tag, this scriber certainly is not for everyone. Some folks will say they can achieve the same result with a $3 compass scriber; they can’t – at least not efficiently. The Thingamejig will pay for itself by increasing the quality of your work and reducing the amount of time it takes to do it. If you are like me—a scribing maniac—then you’re going to love this tool. It can be purchased at many industry suppliers, which for some reason are mostly located in the Eastern half of the U.S.

 

by

Brian Way

Not your “Ordinary” Award

There were many challenges in bringing this bar back to life, some of ( as you can see in the below photos) were bringing the old wooden cooler back to life, recreating some old carvings & fixing broken carved panels.  Many people don’t realize that the actual bar top is original, although mended and epoxied together in many sections, we felt as though the old top told many stories, so it was our goal to do what we could to save it and make it up to code and useable.  We stripped it down to bare wood, filled all the holes with epoxy, sanded, stained & installed a new bar rail to clean up the edge. We gave the bar top a conversion varnish finish. Although it is not the way it was done originally, we felt it would offer the most durability for the bar top itself.

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TO SEE MORE PHOTOS OF THE PROJECT, CLICK HERE

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A Little History:

The Hotel Taft became the center of New Haven’s popular social life and its proximity to the Shubert Theater and Yale University made it the destination of students, professors, tourists and actors. Some of the famous people who were guests at the Hotel Taft include presidents, actors, writers, producers, scientists and athletes. Woodrow Wilson stayed at the Taft while on his presidential campaign trail in 1912. William Howard Taft, pictured on the upper left, was known to have stayed here while he was searching for a home, while he was a Yale professor in 1914. Babe Ruth, pictured on the top center, stayed at the Taft in 1932 and was completely mobbed outside by young fans. Other notables who have visited the Taft include Humphrey Bogart, Spencer Tracy, The Marx Brothers, Katherine Hepburn, Henry Fonda, Marlon Brando, pictured on the bottom center, Thornton Wilder, Eleanor, Roosevelt, pictured on the bottom left, Jack Dempsey, Albert Einstein, pictured on the top right, and Lou Gehrig. A number of accounts mention that Lincoln came to the New Haven House and likely was a guest here too .   CLICK HERE FOR MORE THE AMAZING FULL STORY!

Some other related links:

PRESS –

New Haven Independent – Storied Richter’s Tavern to Open New Chapter

Yale Daily News – Richter’s bar set to reopen

New Haven Independent – Caseus Chef Poised to Revive Richter’s

Chew Haven – Ordinary

New Haven Independent – An Amazing -& “Ordinary” – Powder House Day

The New Journal – Of All the Gin Joints in this Town

A Tricked Out Miter Saw Cart

The mobile base carries a miter saw stand and multiple tools—including a compressor and dust extractor. The stand is a BestFence Pro 3 and the dust hood is a prototype of a new ChopShop hood. Both tools are from FastCap. On the stand is an 8 1/2-inch Hitachi slide miter saw.

The rolling base reduces the amount of time we spend walking to the saw, by making it easy to keep the cut station close to the work.

To keep the stand from sliding around, the legs drop into 2-inch rubber pipe caps screwed to the base. A plywood frame holds the dust collector in place. Note the tool bag tucked between the compressor and vac.

Cutoffs and trash go into the orange bucket—which pivots out for easy access and tucks away for transport.

My company installs millwork and trim on commercial projects, some so large we might have to walk ¼ to ½ mile inside the building to reach the place where the work is to occur. And the work might be spread out over a large area, as was the case on a recent project where we trimmed a ¼-mile long corridor in a hospital.

At the beginning of the job I realized we’d have to set up our cut station multiple times or spend a lot of time walking back and forth from wherever it was. I didn’t feel like wasting that kind of time so I built a mobile base for our miter saw stand from a sheet of plywood, some casters, and a handful of fasteners. Including design time, the base took just over two hours to build—time well spent given the countless hours we saved by keeping the cut station close to the work.

The base has five 2-inch rubber casters, two at each end and one in the middle. The back edge is stiffened by a 6-inch vertical rip of plywood. The center wheel is at the non-stiffened edge so the base can float (flex) over humps in concrete floors. Because the casters are small, they offer enough resistance that there’s no need to lock them when using the saw; the stand only moves when I want it to.

The base was made to fit FastCap’s BestFence stand—though really, it could have been designed to carry any commercial or home-made saw stand. To keep the stand in position, each of its four feet lands in a 2-inch rubber pipe cap that is screwed to the base. Between the legs we carry a small ultra-quiet compressor, dust extractor, and the safety cones the hospital requires us to use. The dust extractor is held in a cradle to keep it from rolling around and the trash can swings out on a plywood pivot for quick and easy access. With all of this stuff on the base there is still room to store a tool bag, nail guns, and other small items. We hang our hoses and cords from the BestFence handles. When it’s time to move we simply roll the base to wherever the cut station needs to be.

I’ve built this cart more than once, modifying the design to suit the job at hand. Typically, I unload at the loading dock, put everything on the base, and then roll it to the work area. If there are stairs, I won’t load the cart till I get everything to the top-at which point I’m able to roll it around the facility. The base saves us a lot of time by making it easy to keep our cut station and associated tools close to the work area. We use it in much the same way as we use our mobile tool cart.

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