Show Me Your Pallet Projects!

[fuzzi]

My latest pallet project! I've been thinking about making an old-fashioned well to cover our wellhead for a long time and I finally gathered and broke down enough pallets and had good enough weather to build it. Took me two afternoons. It cost me nothing (except for the screws and glue)!

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I want one!

 

[gtaus]

I put together a riser and mounted it on one of my raised beds. It'll make the soil deep enough for growing a little patch of potatoes. I made it with free, scavenged scraps of wood I had laying around. Not fancy, but it'll work.

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What a wonderful way to solve a problem. You already have a raised bed, you have some scrap wood, you want a deeper bed for potatoes, why not just make a riser and put it on your existing bed! Great, practical idea!

It got me to thinking about maybe growing some root vegetables that I have not grown before because my hügelkultur 16-inch-high pallet wood raised beds have the bottom half of the bed filled with wood logs, leaving only 6-8 inches of topsoil for growing food. Heck, I could just add a riser of whatever size I needed!

FWIW, the plants don't care about fancy and neither do I. Great idea. Thanks for sharing.

 

[gtaus]

Using an angle grinder to break down pallets sounds interesting! I've only ever used angle grinders on metal and metal projects. It's a great tool to get the job done. Certainly has its own danger potential, just as every other tool does. Whatever works for you, works.

It took me by surprise as well because I have only used angle grinders on metal. It's an interesting idea to use a wood cutting disc (or demoltion disc) on the angle grinder that seems to work for @chickengr. I just caution people that the angle grinder has always been considered one the most potentially dangerous tools in the shop. But yeah, if it works for someone else, great.

I once used a chainsaw to cut 2x4s to frame a wall.

I used to watch a Homestead Rescue series on YouTube with that guy from Alaska and his kids. He used a big gas chainsaw all the time for rough cutting on sites without electricity. He always seemed to get the job done.

 

[gtaus]

I think my Makita angle grinder is meant to use only dished, offset wheels. I'm not sure if it would be unsafe to use flat wheels on the thing.

I have seen some people using angle grinders with cheese-grater-type carving discs for woodworking carved totems and such. But I don't think I have ever seen an angle grinder that could not use flat wheels. I thought all angle grinders mainly used flat wheels.

 

[gtaus]

Pallet Wood Birdhouse Plan and Instructions

After making all those pallet wood raised beds in my garage this winter, I have a couple storage bins full of smaller off-cuts that I was looking to use someday. One idea I have had for some time is using some of that scrap wood to make bird houses. Who doesn't want to have more birds around the yard?

I spent a couple evenings looking at many YouTube videos on the subject. Most of the bird house builds are very simple to make. Most of them didn't have anyway to clean out the birdhouse after you build it. I guess if you want to build a new bird house every spring, that is OK. But I think it makes more sense to build the bird house so it can be cleaned out if/when needed.

There were some bird houses that were really fancy and would require more skill in building. They looked pretty, but, again, none of the videos I watched had the ability to clean out the house after you put it together.

Anyways, this evening I came across what I consider to be the best pallet wood bird house design so far. Not only does he make the front capable of opening so you can clean out the bird house, but he also shows you how the inside of the front panel has a series of cuts in the wood which will allow the baby birds to climb up the wall to the opening in the front.

Some bird house designs do not consider that the baby birds need to climb up that front wall to reach the opening to get out of the birdhouse. If you used a smooth board for the front, you would essentially trap the baby birds inside to die! Making a series of horizontal cuts as a ladder into the inside front wood panel is one solution. Another option is to tack something like hardware cloth on to the inside front panel. Those baby birds need something to grab on to when they climb out.

Yeah, I just learned that last night. But it makes total sense because the inside of a hollow tree would not have a smooth surface. The baby birds could climb out easily in natural wood.

This 6-minute video link shows how to assemble the pallet wood bird house kit this guy sells, so he does not go into dimensions of the birdhouse. But you can probably come up with measurements close enough on your own just by watching the video.

The only addition I was thinking about was maybe drilling a small hole under the opening to put a dowel/branch for a perch. Lots of bird house designs have a perch under the main hole opening, but, at the same time, many don't.

Well, it's something I am going to look into because I have bins full of cut-offs that might be good for small projects like bird houses.

 

[chickengr]

I don't want to say that I am afraid of the angle grinder, but I give it a lot of respect. It has an exposed blade spinning at about 15,000 rpm's. If you lose control of it, it will cut anything it touches.

I would never let Dear Wife close to my angle grinders. She just does not have the knowledge or experience to handle a tool like that. Nothing she does would require use of an angle grinder.



That's about it for me as well. Maybe I use an angle grinder 3 or 4 times per year. And, yes, it's the perfect tool for when I need it. I just don't have much call to use it.

I had to learn how to use angle grinder. I make coops with iron so only angle grinder can cut it. I avoid wood in my coops as I had bad mite infestations in the past. only roosts are wooden.

 

[chickengr]

Well, I was intrigued at the idea of using an angle grinder to breakdown pallets, but I have circular saws, reciprocating saws, and jig saws. All of those are safer for me to use.

For anyone who wants to consider using an angle grinder to cut wood or breakdown pallets, you might be interested in this 5-minute-long video on the subject...

my grinder is battery operated and I work away from any electricity source. not much choice I guess.

 

[gtaus]

I had to learn how to use angle grinder. I make coops with iron so only angle grinder can cut it. I avoid wood in my coops as I had bad mite infestations in the past. only roosts are wooden.

I imagine you are a lot more comfotable with an angle grinder than I am. I only use my angle grinders maybe 4X per year. If I worked with metal more, I suppose I would use it more. Mainly I use my angle grinder to sharpen lawn mower blades or to cut off a rusted bolt once in awhile.

my grinder is battery operated and I work away from any electricity source. not much choice I guess.

I have been around a few years. My grandfather and father passed down some corded electric tools to me. I still have them. Most of the tools I have purchased in the past 20 years have been cordless battery tools. I prefer to use the cordless most of the time.

IIRC, you got your tools stolen a while back. Did you ever replace everything?

 

[Smokerbill]

Mainly I use my angle grinder to sharpen lawn mower blades...

Wow, I never thought of using my angle grinder to sharpen my mower blades. I replaced the blades on my riding mower last month because the old blades were in really bad shape from two years of hitting dirt and rocks.

The cutting edges need major work in order to bring them back up to snuff. I don't have a bench grinder, so your angle grinder idea is just what I need. Thanks!

 

[gtaus]

Wow, I never thought of using my angle grinder to sharpen my mower blades. I replaced the blades on my riding mower last month because the old blades were in really bad shape from two years of hitting dirt and rocks.

The cutting edges need major work in order to bring them back up to snuff. I don't have a bench grinder, so your angle grinder idea is just what I need. Thanks!

You can save a lot of money by resharpening your own mower blades. Eventually, they will get worn out and need to be replaced. But sharpening mower blades with an angle grinder is very easy.

The only thing you want to make sure of is that the sharpened blade is balanced. There are a number of ways to make sure the blade is balanced. I just use a little gizmo like this...

For those that don't know, an unbalanced blade will cause extra vibration when spinning and that can negatively affect the engine/motor. You may have noticed that the mower blades started to vibrate after you hit some rocks or dirt and dinged up the blade, causing it to go out of balance. If you learn how to sharpen your own mower blades, you can "fix" those small dings in the blade and get your mower running smoothly again.

Here are a couple of YouTube videos on how to sharpen and balance your mower blades. It really easy to learn how to do it and can save you a lot of money. And, no, you don't need a $200 angle grinder for this project. A cheap $10.00 Harbor Freight angle grinder special on sale will get the job done just fine.

FWIW, I always clamp my mower blades down on a bench vise. For my safety, I insist on having both hands on my angle grinder. I prefer to use the flap discs for blade sharpening, but you don't need to buy them just for that job.

A new set of 3 mower blades for my riding lawn mower might cost about $60.00. Well, a Harbor Freight angle grinder and some discs would be a whole lot cheaper than replacing my blades even just one time.

This grinder goes on sale at HF all the time for around $10.00...

And a flap disc does not cost very much either...

Of course, I bought my supplies on sale. Sometimes you can get a 20% or even 30% off coupon at Harbor Freight for those <$10.00 items. Or, Menards usually runs rebate sales on stuff like those flap discs once or twice a year.

Anyways, it is a good skill to learn how to sharpen your lawn mower blades and it can save you a lot of money immediately. That's a win-win in my book.