Bowling for Lumber... or "How Many LumberJocks does it take..."

Good score!

Those don’t look nearly as bad as the ones I used.

Those nails are a real pain! There is one about every 12 inches. On my lanes there was douglas fir for about the first 6 feet.

-- Gary, East TX -- The longest journey begins with a single step.

saweet!

not really the most educating shots safety wise… should have brought my eye protection (luckily nothing flew in) and ear muffs (I regained my hearing the next day… I think). it was easy to get lost in the excitement of free lumber.

Thanks for stepping in and offering to join forces Ryan- mission accomplished.

Gary – you bench and Karson’s were an inspiration for me for the last year – I have been stoking craigslist for bowling alleys ever since I saw your benches, and finally saw an add last week – only to (ironically) find out there was just no way to actually get it over… bummer…. so Ryan’s help made me “see the light” again. Now to deal with the nails… I’ve actually noticed that there seems to be glue oozing from the bottom of the boards – so taking these boards apart to get the nails out might be out of the question. but if it is – how did you take the laminated pieces apart? crawbar?

-- When in doubt - There is no doubt - Go the safer route.

YES YES YES! Great job of team work! ...oh, and the wood!

-- Never board, always knotty, lots of growth rings

That is what makes this site unique…..no excuses guys, two more benches comming soon….....:P

-- Francisco Luna, San Francisco Bay Area.

I’m going to guess 4 because by the time you two got them loaded you weren’t much help anymore :-))

Did you guys take the whole pile? Looks like more than one trip for a mini-van!

-- Debt is nothing more than the 21st Century's form of slavery.

Why do you need to take the alley sections apart at all? I would just plane/sand the top and wrap the edges, then mount it to a base. You might hit a few nails drilling dog holes, but I don’t see that as a big problem except for a dull drill bit. Is there some reason for prying them apart that I’m missing? I remember seeing Gary’s bench project when he did that and I always wondered why. I left 3-10’ sections of alley at my old house because I didn’t want to move them to the new house. I think I can get them back, though.

-- Tony, Ohio

great team work pays off

-- Jim from Heirloom Woodshop Southern Oregon

If you are drilling and hit nails it will be a mess unless you use a bit like a ship auger wtihout any flukes beyond the botom of the bit. You need to have a good grip on the drill when a good sharp ship auger eats 16d nails. I’ve done it many times drilling frame construction.

-- Debt is nothing more than the 21st Century's form of slavery.

The reason I wanted to remove the nails, it that adding holes for for bench dogs later was bound to run into a nail. And those are hardened spiral cut nails, impossible to drill through. Besides all the boards were loose with gaps. If I were able to grab it by one edge and pick it up, I would be able to wiggle it like a piece of cloth. Besides it allowed me to make it exactly the dimensions I wanted.

PurpLev – If you do decide to take them apart, get a cats paw to remove the nails. It will make it a lot easier.
I found that the “glue” was a filler for the gaps and chipped out with an old chisel.

If I had it to do again, I might have bought new wood, but for free you can go wrong.

-- Gary, East TX -- The longest journey begins with a single step.

Awesome! Looking forward to seeing whatever it is these things turn into.

-- It is better to wear out than to rust out. --Cumberland

Topamax we ‘only’ took 2 of those full length 16’ers. I have auger bits. and will probably use those if I choose to go with round bench holes – unless I chose to go square. still undecided.

Tony – I hope I don’t have to take this apart, but I might need to reduce the width – depending on the design I choose to go with (either Frank Klauz or the 21th century bench) I’ll need narrower strips – another reason would be to reduce the weight of those million of metal nails in there… it’s already heavy as hell as is.

Thanks Gary. I’ll keep those things in mind, and will look for a cats paw (someone here posted today also about a Nail-Hunter tool… looks pretty cool)

hopefully this will turn into a work bench, coffee table+end tables set…ahhh… as if the “to-do” list wasn’t long enough.

-- When in doubt - There is no doubt - Go the safer route.

thanks, all…

I’m definitely going to have to cut mine down to make a bench… my shop will only let me go with 24” or 30” (30” wide is definitely pushing it!) by 66” length max, so I’ll definitely end up cutting this down to size. My hope is that the nail pattern is standardized, and that if I pull off a few sections on one side, I can figure out where all the rest of the nails are (or approximately where they are) in the rest.

There’s no way I’m going to try to break this apart. Those boards are solidly together, I couldn’t even slide a razor blade between any of them. I’m most worried about the strips of nails that I can clearly see running across the top at regular intervals. They look like 3d finish nails, and they’re going to make flattening the top tough. I think I’ll end up chiseling away about a half-inch on each side, down to about half-inch (using an old chisel, to be sure!) and hopefully that will give me enough to grab to get those guys out. I figure I’ll inlay a piece of oak or something in there as an “accent piece”. Necessity is the mother of creativity!

There’s definitely a bench in my future!

Sharon, thanks so much for your help on this. I’m glad that we were both able to help each other out on this one. What’s gonna work? Team Work!

-- Ryno

Anytime, Anywhere Ryan! it also helps you’re close around.

I’m going to try and stretch mine as much as I can – my current bench is 60” and works well, but having such a big slab now – I’m tempted to use as much of it as possible (while keeping it realist to lift it up to place) – I think I’m going to go with 80”. a workbench is one of those things you can never have a too big of…

for the top/bottom, I’m thinking I’ll use a metal grinding wheel to scuff up the surface around where nails might be to remove material without nicking any blades in chisels/planes – then pry nails out, and then routing the surface flat – finish with a smoothing plane/scraper. then adding another lamination of maple on front for bench holes, and breadboards on the ends. I’ll try to accent it with mahogany or cherry if I can put together enough shorter pieces to make for the length.

-- When in doubt - There is no doubt - Go the safer route.

PurpLev – That nail-hunter won’t give you near the leverage you will need to pull those nails.

These are the nails I pulled out of about a 30 foot section.

These are hardened. I wouldn’t try to drill them with any drill. You’re asking for trouble.
That is unless they used a different type of nail. Each of these is about 3” long.
.
.

.
.

-- Gary, East TX -- The longest journey begins with a single step.

Holy crap that’s a lot of nail-pulling, Gary!

And Purp, I squinted as I passed the set of pics with you sawing with no protection! I’m going to go put on eye protection right now, just until I stop being freaked out :)

Oh, and those sections are great. What a score! I’d try to clean up the surface where the diamond inlays were and just make a table out of a square of it without going through all that nail-pulling work. Maybe a poured-on bar top?

-- Gary, Los Angeles, video game animator

Thanks Gary, per your suggestion – I picked up a Cats paw earlier today, and pulled a couple nails – I realized that It requires a bit of leverage to pull those out, and as you said – the nail hunter might not be able to provide much of that. the nail-hunger and nail-jack look promising, but at 3 time the cost of a cats claw at the local big box, and having to wait for shipping – I chose to go the fast route, and it seems to work well. Thanks for the pics, and info – very helpful.

you should sell those on eBay :o) lol.

-- When in doubt - There is no doubt - Go the safer route.

Gary – I was going to “save” that piece with the diamond inlays for a coffee table – but then thought about it, and well – it’s kinda easier to inlay a new material into anywhere I want it to be, than to worry about “saving” that piece… plus – those are spaced pretty far in between, so some will have to be cut off. but yea- I have it in… might be the piece for the workbench, or I’ll go with the bigger piece to get a longer surface… still have to decide on a design – I like the 21th century concept, and “ease” as it’s made of smaller lighter pieces put together, but I really would like to build a Frank Klauze bench with the shoulder vise, and traditional tail vise. both I find that I can use everytime I work on my bench.

yes- I squinted when I saw those pictures too – I feel bad about leaving protection at home – it was stupid and bad idea – esp. since the thought have come to me prior to leaving the house – bad, bad, bad! cutting this much lumber is LOUD, and and takes a while = bad, bad, bad for your ears…. I can’t stress that enough.

-- When in doubt - There is no doubt - Go the safer route.

PurpLev – Does yours have the same nails? Mine did have some standard nails on the outside board.

That cats paw made my life a lot easier. That and a hammer.

-- Gary, East TX -- The longest journey begins with a single step.

GaryK – so far I’ve only remolved the nails from the spacers that are nailed+screwed to the bottom of the planks (to raise it from the floor) and those were half straight (upper half where nail head is) and (lower) half spiraled like your pic shows. total about 3” long.

When I’ll reduce the width of the plank (~42” wide) to the bench needs (~30”) I’ll probably have to take some of the nails between the maple strips, so I’ll post the findings if you’re interested.

I have recently took apart some hardwood pallets apart – with a hammer (took too long – cats paw would have been a life saver there as the hammer technique caused nail heads to break…) and those were all the same as what you posted in your pics though… a real PITA.

-- When in doubt - There is no doubt - Go the safer route.