Behold these marvels of my creation!

Ok, I’m not fishing for complements here. I’m uploading these two project pieces as examples of my work prior to becoming a Lumber Jock lurker or reading any reference material. Obviously there’s shortcomings in these pieces and perhaps when my honey to do list allows I’ll redo them with a higher level of competency.

The first piece is an aquarium lid and light combo. About 2 months ago I was gifted this aquarium without a lid, and upon shopping for a new one, the pricing was such that I decided I could save $50 and make one myself. (Which is about right, new lids were around $40 plus $80 for a light, my build expense was round $60).
The lid is made of furring strips, MDF and Plexiglas. I used a rope light with foil backing on the lid to direct lighting and spliced the power cable to add an external on/off switch. Black spraypaint finish with a chrome drawer handle.
The joints are simply glued miter cuts. I routed a grove inside the strips to make a slot for the Plexiglas. The lid and light anchors are screwed into place.
Short comings: the rope light is more dull than I would have liked. It provides a nice warm light which I think actually mimics daylight pretty well, but it doesn’t help show the fish in the tank. The on/off switch is in a bad location as whenever the lid is opened by tiliting, the switch gets toggled and the light turns off (I specially propped the lid for the photo). The joints are pretty weak and while I sealed the lid pretty tight, I’m sure the finish is allowing moisture through.

The second piece is the pine wood derby car I made for my son’s Cub Scout derby. Basically I built the car and he did the finish work. Not much to say here, its a simple block of wood that I added some extra pieces around to shape it like a Hummer.

Well thats it for now,
Stay thirsty my friends.