Onward

The blog has lagged behind the work, so in the next few entries I'll catch you all up.

We left off with my re-establishing the triple bead pattern. Besides the one major divergence I showed you last time, the work went pretty well, although I discovered that I had to do the upper third of the other side as well.

After that, I returned to the replacement of the missing piece of trim at the top of the casing. To review, this was the condition of the area in question when I began work:

 

 

As I've mentioned, I faced this situation with dread, because it necessarily required my fashioning a new piece out of wood to replace the missing part. I'd not had much success with freehand cutting of curves in wood, and here I was faced with a piece of complex shape that had to match up at least well enough so as not to attract the eye.

That actually went pretty well, as you know, but now I had to put the piece in the right place and patch up the seams. First, however, I had to prime the back of the piece, and sand and prime the wood that would be behind the piece.

I primed the whole apron piece after patching and sanding it, just so I could see at that point where I had to patch it further. I also primed behind where the cap piece was to go (and I primed the back of the cap piece, too). It's always a good idea to back-prime; not only does it provide extra protection, but in the case of trim pieces, it helps to avoid the cupping that can happen when more moisture gets in the back of the piece than the front. 

I was determined to take every precaution to make sure the patch piece went in exactly the right place and stayed there, so I glued it in with one-minute epoxy and then nailed it in (after pre-drilling, of course),

There's that danged mis-matched grain again! Well, at least it's in the right place. From here, it was a simple matter to patch it in with epoxy putty.

So far, so good! It looks as if I've aced this job. We can't be sure until I've primed it again, but I want to finish all the patching first.

I'd like to show you just how effective the LiquidWood is at thoroughly re-integrating fractured wood, and I think this picture should do it:

I needed to pull this piece back level with the casing, and the screw is in the perfect place to get that done. Notice that I was able to place it right on the repaired crack with no fear of opening the crack up again. LiquidWood is designed specifically for wood; it penetrates on both sides of the repair, so that when it cures it locks the two pieces together, making the piece stronger than the wood ever was on its own. The piece may in time crack again, but certainly not where it cracked before!

After this, I replaced the cap piece that I repaired earlier, resulting in the casing's looking like this:

There's still some patching to do, most notably the sill, but this is already a huge improvement. This casing is going to come out just fine.

* * *

It grieves me to report that our dear golden girl Nellie passed away last Tuesday. We got her full-grown from the pound a little over thirteen years ago, so by our reckoning she was fifteen. But she retained her great beauty and joyful spirit right up to the end. We loved her and depended upon her, and we will miss her terribly. 

I will write more about Nellie in due course over at the Journal. Until then, I offer a brief memorial in photographs.

Nellie, c. 1996 - October 4, 2011