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My wife pointed out yet another last minute issue before our first booking of the year. The closet in one of our guest rooms kept coming off of the track. After a few minutes of futzing around it was pretty easy to determine that a VERY bad installation job on the piece of thin aluminum track was the problem. The whole thing was bowed so far in that is was causing the wheels to rub and pull off the track.

I kept looking at the grooves, and thinking "I know I could do that with my beading plane", my wife was worried it would be an involved project, like everything else has been for the past two weeks. I decided that if I could not get it done in an hour, I would hang my head in shame and just buy the part when I was in town…

Total project time 1 hour 10 minutes (and 15 minutes of that was getting to that decent piece of oak I knew was at the bottom of the pile).

Tools used, in order of appearance:

Combo Square
Pencil
Dividers (about 3)
2 foot folding rule.
Crosscut Disston
Hatchet (great for dealing with the "L" that sometimes shows up in material I get a piece out of but don't full crosscut) one swing only.
Rip Disston
Jack plane
Thickness planer (Deduct galoot points)
Stanley 50 Molding plane and a 1/4 bead cutter
Block plane (to round over the corners)
Shoulder Plane (to clean up tearout on the sides of the grooves since I kinda sorta forgot to install the knickers in the 50)
Hand-drill for Pilot hole
Hand-drill for Countersink
Dead blow mallet for last minute adjustment.
Hand-drill to drive the screws in and lower my wife's blood pressure by several notches.

It works well enough that I have been asked to fix all the other closets in the house.

Gallery

Comments

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5,776 Posts
Woodworking projects that double as home improvement projects are the best. Good job.
 

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3,465 Posts
How many other people are using a beading plane in their home improvement projects? Not many, that's for sure!
 

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Great work pleasing the wife, that's the most difficult project of them all!!
 

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1,833 Posts
Nice solution to a problem… Well done.
 

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18,702 Posts
great idea. Better solution, less money, more galoot points.
 

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7,502 Posts
Gr8 solution for a good fix.
 

· In Loving Memory
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196 Posts
Great job. Wood looks better than metal anyway.

After looking at this it came to my mind that would be a good way to make a thickness plainer sled track for a router.
 

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156 Posts
Great job. There are few words to describe how I feel about sliding closet doors.
 

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79 Posts
Nice job but just remember that next time you need to fix something around the house you "need" to buy another tool to do it.
 

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+1 Shane.

Good stuff Ryan. Well done man.

"It works well enough that I have been asked to fix all the other closets in the house." - No good deed goes unpunished.
 

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It works well enough that I have been asked to fix all the other closets in the house

There's your mistake. Now you have to get the honey-do's out of the way before working on any of your own projects.

Very nice job, Ryan.
 

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It works well enough that I have been asked to fix all the other closets in the house

A reason to buy some more oak!!
 

· In Loving Memory
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8,391 Posts
Nicely done solution. I always admire DIY folks especially when it's combined with good woodworking as here. I've done it a lot myself, but I can't say that I enjoy it much though. I always find myself working on the floor or on the ceiling.
 

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More Oak, More Tools=Happy Wife

I'll let her know. Thanks guys for swinging in. It's really odd how sometimes you can be the most proud of the quick and dirty projects, but this one really did put a smile on my face to share.
 

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Great use of the beader!
 

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Just don't go finding out how to use your tools to fold laundry bro. Nice work!
 
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