Saturday, November 15, 2014

Toy Workshop / General Meeting 11-15-2014 @ CFB Shop

There was a bunch (~6" to 10") of light fluffy powder on city streets this morning as 13 members and two guests met at the Club for Boys Shop in Rapid City for another Toy Workshop and a make-up session for the postponed Nov 2014 General Meeting of the Rapid City Woodworkers Association.



The temperature at game time was a whopping 8 degrees, so trips carrying boxes of completed toys to Rick's truck required parkas and hats and gloves!  Nevertheless, all the basketball games, caterpillars, and cradles were finished, packed, labeled, and loaded into Rick's truck today.

All 2013 Toy Recipients were notified this week;  updates for 2014 were requested.  A final tally of toys requested will be available by next weekend.

Attendees (13) today included:  Julian Wigen, Darwin Buus, Al Oines, Ben Shatraw, Rick Weisbeck, Grant Coffin, Frank DiCesare, Ed Pike, Wes Murphy, Steve Larson, Gary Graves, Kathie and Bob Buchanan.  Guests from the Northern Hills Woodworking Guild included Corky Witt and Wayne Jeffrey.

Tasks today included completion of Basketball Games, Cradles, Blocks, and Caterpillars.

The last of the basketball games were milled, sanded and assembled by Larry Borg last Saturday at Larry's shop by he and his wife Barbara.  Then on Saturday evening and Sunday morning, before the deep freeze arrived in the Black Hills, Kathie sealed them and sanded them in our garage.  On Tuesday and Wednesday, Bob assembled the hoop sub-assembly to the base sub-assembly in the comfort of the warm kitchen.  On Thursday and Friday, Bob heated up the shop and sprayed the final finish coat of lacquer on them.

Matched basketball game sub-assemblies

Sealing the basketball parts using fixtures made at the morning toy workshop
Applying the universal shellac sealer to the basketball game sub-assemblies
  

Sealer drying on basketball game parts and caterpillars

Assembling the Hoop Sub-assemblies to the Base Sub-assemblies using handscrews

Spray booth in the shop
At the workshop today, a crew of stringers added the string/ball sub-assemblies to the basketball games.  The location of the ball in the bowl of the Wendy's spoon is critical to a successful basketball game.  Julian, Al, Ben and Darwin carried out the tedious alignment procedures and completed all 100 games.  Then Kathie packed each game with two Wendy's spoons (launchers) into 10 boxes for moving to the store room.

Sharp basketball alignment crew

Adding two Wendy's spoons, and then packing the completed basketball games
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At last Saturday's workshop, Richard returned 13 completed cradles.  In the afternoon, Bob took them to his shop, and sprayed a final finish of lacquer on the cradles, in the driveway (on a comfortable 55 degree afternoon, also prior to the deep freeze in the Black Hills.) 


After adequate drying time, Kathie added homemade quilts to the cradles, plus the special small (Target) dolls, and tied them all up with a ribbon, ready for delivery.




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Today, Rick Weisbeck added wheels to 20 caterpillars.  These were the last of the 2014 wheeled toys to be made by the collective toy workshop crews.  These were then packed, labeled, and loaded into the red truck for movement to the storage location. 

The Rocking Chairs are one of the remaining toys to complete.  Rick Weisbeck has been cutting the sides of the rockers on the CNC machine, a very time-intensive operation. The sides and backs were traced last week by Richard and cut on the scroll saw and sanded by Bob during the past week.  Frank drilled the holes in the sides and backs today at the workshop.  Then the sides will be attached to the the sides and back.  This assembly work will be done at Rick's shop next week.


Other 


Over 135 toys were packaged on Nov. 15th and moved to offsite storage.  So, as of Nov 15th, there are 1987 toys in our completed inventory storage room.  Once again, thank you all for giving of your time, resources, and talents!!!

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Click on the link below to learn more about the Rapid City Woodworkers Association activities on the main page of the website:


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