Faking It!
Jerry had a way with building; cheap and nasty.
Take this little gem of a cover over the hole where he should probably have put a bolt to secure the beam.
Another Examp;le of Jerry's Handiwork
Underneath was a hole filled with some sort of mastic. To match the nuts and bolts on the staircase, I needed to create a dome headed bolt that could be screwed or fixed into the hole.
Just as I did when I created the dome-headed bolts, I cut a small length of studding. In this case though I just cut the head off of a brass bolt.
Off With Its Head
That way, I won’t get any electrolytic effects because of dissimilar metals.
A Completed Bolt
The picture shows a completed bolt.
It was then a simple matter of gluing the bolt into the hole using No More Nails.
The Installed Bolt
I suppose I could have used just an ordinary brass bolt, but felt I needed to use the dome-headed theme of the staircase.
London Is Heaving
There must be something going on in London later in the week.
I was trying to locate some lights for my hall, so I decided to take the Underground to Warren Street and then walk to Selfridges by way of Habitat, Heals, John Lewis and Marks and Spencer.
A couple of years ago I bought some bedside lights from John Lewis, that are touch on and touch off. I would show you a link to their web site, but they are not there, although they were in the Oxford Street store. Here’s a picture of the bedside light.
John Lewis Touchable Table Lamp
They work well and what I want is three tall ones, so that I can place them at strategic points in my hall. And as I walk past in the dark, they will automatically switch on, when I touch them.
In fact, you can play lots of games with this type of concept. Perhaps, when you are out or it is pitch dark, they should switch on and they could text my mobile phone to say that someone was about.
The possibilities of this sort of technology are endless. The text message facility could even be used to locate where you have put your mobile phone. I once had an e-mail from a friend, asking to call his mobile phone, as he’d left it somewhere in his house and couldn’t find it. Like many these days he didn’t have a landline. He does now!
I finally found an elegant tall lamp in Selfridges, but why are there so few?
I can’t be the only person, who when they enter their house in the dark, doesn’t have a light in the hall, that is close to hand. But I have a space between the door and the wall, where I could put such a light.
A Space for a Tall Lamp
Ideally it would be touchable, but a foot switch would be an alternative. Note the switches on the wall. They are for the outside lights, or at least I can’t get them to work any others. At least, I’ve got a suitable powerpoint, but note the cracked plaster above it. Jerry’s electrician didn’t have a clue.
You might argue, why I don’t have a light in the hall? Jerry didn’t put one in to save money and to put one in would mean trunking all over the place as the ceiling is a concrete slab. Wall lights are so naff! And yes, I’ve got lots of really hideous ones, probably bought in some bastion of good design like Fred’s El-Cheapo Lighting Emporium in Dalston Market. Don’t knock that market, as I think, Lord Sugar started his business careeer there.
The trip wasn’t helped by the fact that London seemed to have many more people about than normal. To make matters worse there were lots of smokers lining up outside the shops having a cough and a drag. Some were even sitting on the floor, creating more unseen hazards for people with limited vision. I did think about deliberately falling over a particular well-upholstered couple dragging away with one hand and eating a burger with the other but I decided against it, as I would have hated to have contact with such an awful pair of individuals.
Let’s hope that London gets a little bit less busy as the week goes on. I have a lot of shopping to do!
How Not To Put Up Blinds
The blinds in the living room are broken and haven’t worked since I moved in.
The Best of the Broken Blinds
This picture shows the best of the unuseable blinds.
Yesterday, I decided I’d had enough and decided to take them down.
It wasn’t as easy as it should have been as Jerry or one of his ilk had struck again.
Plugs In a Wooden Batten
Look how in the picture, he’s used plastic plugs to attach the brackets to the wooden batten under the lintel. Consequently, he’s split the batten.
What a Grade A Tosser!
The Latest Example of Jerry’s Handiwork
One of the features of my house is the chocolate-coloured steel beams used to hold up the roof, form the staircase and as a design feature. This picture shows the beam above the windows in my living room.
Steel Beam Above the Window
You will notice what looks to be brass bolts holding the beam up. In fact they are not bolts at all, but crude brass-coloured pads stuck on the beam.
Yet again Jerry has done the cheap and nasty, rather than followed the instructions of the architect. Well I hope so, as if the architect specified foundations in the same way, the house will fall down.
It looks like I’ll be making some special bolts again.
Lakeside by Train
Jerry never spent any excess time choosing anything when he built this house. Every room is illuminated with a series of cheap wall lights, where you play a game of chance to see which switch is used to turn them on and off.
I had thought I had found a suitable replacement and the company that sells them had an outlet at Lakeside. Or rather in one of the related retail parks within walking distance of the centre.
Fenchurch Street Station
The picture shows the station where I started my journey, Fenchurch Street. I took a train to Chafford Hundred, which is linked directly to the centre by an eclosed bridge.
Lakeside Shopping Centre
This picture is the view from that bridge.
THe bridge led me into the centre into a rather run-down House of Fraser store and it took me a couple of minutes to find my way out and then find a toilet, which seemed to have to be accessed by a lift. And when I got there, the toilet paper was so thin, I almost forced my finger up my backside when I wiped it. But at least I had some decent tissues in my back-pack.
I have a feeling that Lakeside is losing market share and they seemed to be doing a lot to cut costs.
I didn’t enter any shops at the centre and made my getaway as fast as I could to the lighting shop I had intended to visit in the first place.
Escaping from the Lakeside Shopping Centre
As you can see it is not a very good walk on a narrow path alongside the road. I suppose it is designed to keep punters in the centre, when there is quite an attractive lake that might be worth a walk past on the way to the other shops, where I was going. But then if punters walked, they couldn’t be shopping, could they?
Was the walk worth it?
No! The shop didn’t have the lights I wanted and they didn’t even have the Internet, so that I could show them what I wanted. But I don’t think I’ll be spending just short of a hundred pounds on a fitting I’ve never seen!
But at least there was some weak sunshine, as I walked to IKEA to have some lunch and check out a few things. I did buy another couple of racks and jars before I walked back to the station.
And what a walk that was, involving several crossings of a busy dual carriageway without any pedestrian lights. There is plenty of space and surely a few signs to the station would have helped. But then Lakeside is for people with cars and people like me are the enemy, so if I get run over and killed, that’s one less stupid pedestrian.
Was there anything positive about my visit?
Yes! The trains were comfortable, clean and warm! But the station though was bleak, cold and there were few places to sit.
It did think about complaining to Thurrock Council about how pedestrian and cycling-unfriendly and downright dangerous the area was, but they don’t give a direct e-mail address, just a complicated form, which wants all of your details down to the inside leg measurement, so you won’t fill it in fully and they can put it straight in the Deleted Items folder.
Lots of Naff Lighting
Jerry used cheap and nasty light fittings in this house and I’ve looking for something more stylist.
Yesterday, I walked round several shops in Central London and didn’t see anything that was in the least bit inspiring.
I’ve found this one on the Internet and it looks promising, but I’d like to touch and feel one before I buy.
Ftustrating IKEA
I need some rails and drawers for two built in wardrobes. At present they have some useless fittings that were built by Jerry, the builder.
IKEA do some nice standard fittings, but they don’t come in a width to fit my wardrobes! They are just five centimetres too wide! They make them to fit a range of heights, but why not widths?
It is all so frustrating as getting ones made to fit will cost a fortune and probably won’t be as nice as those from IKEA.
The Hopefully Very Last Bolts
The staircase is now almost refurbished and needs just a few things.
I think it would be improved if oversized washers were put on my dome-headed bolts.
But perhaps the last thing to do is replace the three brass-painted coach screws with dome-headed coach screws.
A Dome-Headed Bolt and Coach Screws
The picture shows shows from the top; a fake dome-headed bolt, a stainless steel coach screw and one of those used by Jerry, the builder.
It would seem that the solution is to saw the head off the stainless steel coach screw, put a screw thread on it and then screw on a dome-headed nut.
How to Make Dome-Headed Bolts
As I have said several times on this blog, the builder of my house was possibly named Jerry. His worst piece of work was undoubtedly the staircase, which instead of using brass nuts and bolts, as probably specified by the architect used brass painted steel ones.
I have got part of the way, but to fix the staircase to the floor of the house, Jerry used Rawlbolts, which couldn’t easily be replaced, as they were set in concrete. I got this far and you can see it looks a bit better but some are round one way and others the other.
In the end I decided I wanted some dome-headed bolts. But just like the perfect woman doesn’t exist, the perfect bolt doesn’t either. Although there are some good ones about.
So I had to make my own. I started by purchasing some 10 mm. mild steel studding from Thomas Brothers at Archway. I used steel rather than brass, as this might give less trouble with dissimilar metals in contact causing corrosion and anyway Thomas Brothers don’t sell brass studding. They also were kind enough to cut the studding in half, so that I was less likely to poke someone’s eye out on the bus home.
I started by securing the studding in my Workmate.
Studding Secured in the Workmate
I then sawed off an appropriate length using a standard hacksaw, The stud was cut to be perhaps two centimetres longer than the steel bolt I wanted to replace.
The Cut Length of Studding
The problem with cutting any screw threads is that when you cut it, you damage the threads and nuts are difficlt to fit. You can mitigate the problem by putting a new blade in the hacksaw, but you really need one of these.
Hexagonal Screw-Cutting Die
It is a 10 mm. hexagonal scre-cutting die, that effectively cuts threads in round bars. Or in this case recuts damaged threads.
My father had lots of these, although his were round and were held in a special wrench. But because they are hexagonal, you can use them with a good ring spanner to cut the thread. I’m doing just that here, after first mounting the cut stud vertically in the Workmate.
Recutting the Threads
I actually turned the die from one end of the stud to the other to make sure that all damaged threads were repaired. All I had to do then, was screw a dome-headed nut onto the pristine length of studding.
A Dome-Headed Bolt
They are now all installed in the staircase.
The Bolts in Place
You can’t tell which ones are my fakes and which are the ones the builder put in the right way round. Or was it the wrong way?
He didn’t put them in level either!
The Improved Staircase
I’ve now replaced a lot of the bolts with brass ones and I think it looks a lot better. But then I’m biased.
Here’s what it looked like.
The Old Bolts
This picture was taken today from a similar angle.
The New Bolts
Note the domed heads of the brass nuts, all round the same way.
But it’s not all perfect yet, as this picture shows.
Not All Perfect
I need to get some special bolts made with domed nuts as heads. This shouldn’t be too difficult. What complicates matters is that the steel is held to the floor using Rawlbolts, so how Jerry got two backwards I don’t know. I suspect that the best way to deal with the problem is to screw the new bolts in using some strong bonding agent.
The Anonymous Widower 