Initial Reassembly

As you can see, I started reassembling the wagon.  It turned out better than I was expecting.  The brass hoops over the bamboo rims on the wheels are holding the wheels together nicely.  The brown/black patina on the brass makes it look like iron.  New leather harness tethers are attached.  I'll finish those up when I remake the harness.  I even put patina on the metal eyelets to give it a more authentic look.  Overall, I am pleased.

I will be taking a break for a while.  I have gotten this far and just have the horse's harness to do.  But I have some family business to attend to and cannot get to it for a week or so.   I also have to buy the leather and cut strips.  I'll be remaking the design of the harness.  It will be in keeping with the style of a wagon harness.  My grandfather's version was too bulky and awkward.  I'm sure he won't mind.  Besides, my cousin is a horse person...she'll know what the right harness looks like.

Wheel Bands in Place, Some Assembly Required

I was able to make all four wheel bands and slip them onto the wheels.  All are tight fits and this should now hold the wood splices in the bamboo securely and prevent the wheels from deforming over time.

The enamel paint did not seem to set up properly, and it remained soft after four days.  I did not remove the paint prior to slipping the bands on, hoping that the soft enamel on the bamboo will eventually harden and adhere to the bands, adding further stability.  However, the paint on the rest of the wheels was damaged slightly by all the extra handling.  So with soft enamel and paint damage, I decided it was best to begin stripping the paint I painstakinly applied, down to the bare wood.  I used an Exacto knife as a scraper, sandpaper, and finally a wipedown of lacquer thinner to remove all traces of paint.  Two of the wheels are now primed with Kilz multipurpose primer.  I have yet to strip the remaining two wheels.

A third reason to strip the paint was that I am still not satisfied with the pale yellow.  It still looks too intense.  I wish I could remember what brand of paint I used on my wagon's wheels.  It was a perfect match to what Granpa originally applied.  I can still remeber the shape of the jar it came in, short but larger in diameter than the Testor's paint bottles, about the diameter of a 50 cent piece.  I have some white to further blend with the pale yellow to get the desired color.  I will also add some thinner so I apply thinner coats.  That way each coat is thin enough to dry and cure properly between coats.  I will wait for the weather to break so the temperature and humidity are lower.  Currently, the temperature outside is in the 90's with dew points in the 70's.  Not ideal for painting.

In between working on the wheels, I have begun reassembling the wagon.  The new eyelets I bought look "too new".  It struck me that since I am applying a patina to the wheel bands, I should replace the zinc plated eyelets with brass ones the same size.  A little steel wool to break the surface on the brass will work for applying the patina to the brass hardware.  It will then all match the wheels, and together, it will look pretty cool, I think.

I have the wagon mounted to the undercarriage and the splash fenders reattached to the wagon.  I cannot do any more until I have the wheels done and on the wagon.  The last bit to be redone will be the new harness for the horse and the leather straps from the harness to the connection on the wagon.  Originally, these leather straps were looped through a leather loop incorporated into the harness Grandpa made.  I bought some tiny rings and will sew them onto the harness for the leather straps to be attached to instead of adding the bulkier leather loops when I make the harness  It will make making the harness easier, but also it will reduce the bulk and give it a sleeker look.  I found some examples of harnesses on the internet and will pattern the new one both on the old one, and the pictures I found. 

All these changes are making me reexamine my wagon.  Someday, I'll probably put metal bands on the wheels, and I may eventually change the harness to give it a sleek look.  I did not change anything when I refinished my wagon, and stuck completely to Grandpa's original design.  But the necessity of strengthening the wheel splices and other subtle changes on my cousin's wagon have me thinking that it would be OK to modify it a bit.  So far, I am liking the result of these changes.

I Must Be Lucky!

I bought all the things I'd need to make the brass hoop for the wheels and came home.  I bought extra brass strips because I knew I'd have to fiddle around with it and a couple would be trashed.  First bit of luck is that the brass strips are exactly the width I need, so I don't have to trim them down.  I carefully soldered a lap splice after measuring three or four times to be sure I had the right length marked.  The splice was made to make the hoop the tiniest bit smaller.  I cleaned the surface and applied the patina. 

Unfortunately, the patina rubbed off as I slipped the hoop over the wheel, ruining the paint job.  With a bit of light force, I got it secured around the bamboo.  It looks great!  Now I don't have to worry about the bamboo splice coming undone.  I do have to strip the new paint off of the wheel and repaint it.  But that's a small price to pay for fixing a problem like this.

Funny how the techniques from plumbing (soldering the brass), stained glass (the patina), woodworking, and knowledge of how wheelwrights applied the iron hoop all came together to make this work.  Now only three more to go.

Wheel Trouble

Somehow I knew those wheels were going to give me problems.  Even though I used the strongest wood glue to bond the splices in the bamboo, and clamped it in a circle for hours to set, two if them started coming loose slightly.  I used superglue to rebond them, but I am afraid that heat and humidity over time, will weaken them again.

My cousin had purchased leather in the hopes that one day she would redo the wheels and secure them by gluing skived leather onto the outside of the wheels.  Unfortunately, I think the leather will be too pliable.  In the end, the expanding joint will overcome the strength of the leather, and the joint will still deform.  Leather also becomes brittle over time, so it's not a permanent fix.  After thinking about this, I've come up with a solution I will try.  I can purchase thin strips of brass and fashion a hoop.  The lap splice can be secured with solder.  Once I clean the surface and buff it, I can add a patina to the brass hoop to darken it to look like iron.  If I make the hoop the slightest hair smaller than the bamboo hoop, I can borrow a technique from the old wheelwrights:  Heat the brass hoop in boiling water to expand it, and then quickly slip it over the bamboo hoop.  As it cools, it will contract for a friction fit.  The metal will not allow the bamboo joint to deform and it should hold it in a circle.

While not in the original intent of my Grandfather, it is in keeping with the technique and look of wagons from his childhood, which he used to pattern his replicas. 

The thing is, I'll have to be precise in my measurement, and quick in applying the hoop. If I fail, I have to come up with a different solution. 

New Wheel Pin

While the yellow paint is giving me fits because of it's transparency, I moved on to varnishing the stained wood and applying a coat of satin lacquer to the parts painted red.  Definitely, the dull finish is more pleasing.  I have to wait for the yellow enamel to cure for 48 hours, and with the varnish and lacquer are drying, I decided to cut a new wheel retaining pin from the aluminum stock I purchased.

It required a lot of hand filing after cutting it out with my saw, but I think I got it to the right width.  Fortunately, my wife has a pair of rounded nosed pliers for jewelry bead work that I could use to make the rounded top.  The pin on the left in the picture is mine, the other three are my grandfather's.  The rounded nose pliers did "too good" of a job as the top is nearly a perfect circle.  It appears Grandpa just used flat needle nosed pliers to shape his.  But this way, it will be easy to spot the replacement pin if one looks closely enough.  I haven't cleaned and polished the other three pins yet.  I will clean each aluminum piece as I reassemble the wagon. 

For now, I'm watching paint dry.  Once the wheels are lacquered and dry, I can start reassembling.  I still have to buy a bit of leather to remake the horse's harness.  Over time, it has aged and cracked to the point of falling apart.  I also found a place where I can purchase an acrylic display case for the wagon.  Not really sure I will like the effect, but I wanted to give it a try.  I have dusted mine in the past, and it's a pain in the neck.  So a case will keep it clean.  If I like it, I'll get a second one for myself.

Progress Photo

Here's a progress photo.  The red base is done.  The wheels need some touchup, and the wagon compartment only has stain and one coat of varnish.  I like the colors, but am unhappy with the gloss finish the enamel paints yield.  I have decided to finish the painting and then get Testor's Dullcote lacquer top coat to dull the finish to a matte appearance as well as protect the paint.  To me, the gloss makes it look more like a circus wagon than what my Grandfather originally intended.  I was unable to find a matte or flat finish in the colors I needed to match, so a clear topcoat will do the trick.

The wagon and other stained pieces will get a satin finish varnish to keep the whole appearance subdued.  The four lighter flakes that appear on the wagon's back seat were originally there.  It looks like there was a tear-out or defect in the wood Grandpa used, and by the looks of it, he glued in a veneer of oak to fill it in.  The glue and different grain accepted the original finish differently, and it remains visible, and even a bit more pronounced with the first coat of varnish.  I had tried to blend it in with more stain, but the pores of the wood were so closed, it did not accept the touch up.  It adds character to the piece and in a way, I like it.  Now you know why I accepted the imperfection in the floorboard I created to fix my overshot of fitting the new piece in.  Each imperfection lends more character, but does not detract from the overall aesthetic.  I had considered painting the back seat black, to cover the veneer, but I only considered it for a split second.  I am thinking of making a seat cushion from green fabric, though.  It would be my own little added touch, and it completes the color scheme of the Lithuanian flag.  Grandpa chose these original colors to mirror the Lithuanian flag, so it would be in keeping with his intent, I think.

Stain Color Chosen

I took a piece of the wagon to the hardware store to match up the color with the stain chart, just to be sure.  I thought Minwax's Speical Walnut #224 was a good choice and I had that on hand.  But I wanted to be doubly sure.  Yes, that color was a very close match, given the age of the wood and the fact that it did not have coat of varnish or lacquer on it.

Confident in my choice, I came home and sanded the whole compartment of the wagon with 220 grit sandpaper to freshen the surface.  There were also some minor marks that would darken too much if I tried to blend in the stain, so sanding these would help.  I didn't let the stain stay on the old wood very long, just enough to blend everything together.  The new floorboard was stained, but I let the stain soak in longer to get closer to the old wood in color. 

I now have the floorboard in and the seat glued in place.  I decided not to glue the floorboard, but let it float in the bottom to allow for expansion and contraction.  When I varnish it, the varnish will seep in the cracks and hold it in place further.  But for now, the seat will hold the floorboard into place as I work on it.

A New Bottom

Yellow is such a transparent color it does not hide well, so several coats on the wheels are needed. With the hot humid weather, that means 24-48 hours between coats.  So I set to work on a new bottom for the wagon.  Fitting it had to be done by hand.  The compartment was not square, and 3 of the 4 sides were angled.  But I took my time and got it almost right.  I say almost because if you look closely at the picture on the left hand side, you will see I added a thin piece of wood.

So what happened there?  I had gotten the front and two sides just the way I wanted, but had cut the piece long on purpose so I could sand it to fit.  Well guess who got too vigorous sanding?  Yup, me.  Everything else fit so perfectly, I figured if I cut a new piece, I'd never be satisfied with the result.  So I glued a strip on the end and secured it with wood pegs drilled into the ends.  Did I cheat?  Yes, but it's one Grandpa would be proud of.  The splice will be located under the seat when complete.  So you'd have to turn it over and look very hard to spot it after the staining and the varnish.  It is so thin, you won't notice.  But a gap that big you would notice.

Every woodworking project of mine has at least one mistake that no one spots.  But I know they are there.  It used to bug me.  It had to be perfect.  But wood is not perfect.   Now, I think that it's my signature.  One error that is nearly undetectable.  Something corrected in a way that masks it's presence.  I don't go out of my way to make a mistake.  They just happen.  It reminds me that none of us are perfect.  While we try to attain perfection, we must accept the imperfection as well.  It doesn't make it any less useful or detract from it's appearance.  There is now a story behind that part of the wagon, hidden away under the seat for the next person to find and wonder, "What happened here?"

Wrong Color for Wheels

I painted the wheels with a coat of Testor's Yellow #1114.  Oh my goodness!  It looks like I used traffic paint yellow.  It's too intense.  After I painted one, I had to do the others.  While I was mulling this over, I realized that this seemed familiar.  When I repainted my wagon's wheels, I had trouble with the yellow being too intense.  I needed a paler yellow.  But I cannot remember if I mixed white and yellow, or found the pale yellow. 

I am going to the hobby store to look at the options.  So for now, I have a primer coat of VERY yellow paint.  If I have to, I'll mix my own color, but will try to find the right one in a bottle first.

A Few Odds & Ends

While I was reassembling the wheels, I decided to prepare and repaint the undercarriage.  That got done before the last wheel was completely done.  It looks very nice.

I also applied some super glue to the places on the wheels where I used putty.  The putty is so thin filling in the areas where the bamboo was splintered, I felt that it could use more help sticking to the wood so it does not flake out.  Later today I'll finish sanding all the wheels, reboring the axle holes, and cleaning off any loose paint so I can repaint them.  As soon as the wheels are done and on the undercarriage, I'll post a photo so you can see the difference in appearance.  It will be striking, I guarantee it.

Last night, my neighbor planed down the piece of oak I bought to make a new floorboard for the wagon.  The thickness is just about 3/16 of an inch.  Thank goodnes he's a hobby woodworker and has a lot of toys in his workshop that I drool over.  I traded some beer for his work....standard bartering pay for all us guys in the neigborhood.  After all the painting is done, I'll begin on cutting the oak to fit.  Not only are the sides of the wagon compartment slanted, but the compartment is not perfectly square.  So cutting it to fit will involve a lot of sanding, planing, and trimming by hand to get a good fit.  I bought a large piece of wood so I can make at least 8 if I had to in order to get it right.

Speaking of powertools, so far, the only powertools I've used are my neighbor's planer, my Dremmel for the nylon brush to remove flaking paint, and my cordless drill to clean out the holes in the wheel hubs (after soaking and drying, the holes were a snug fit on the axles).  Everything else has been by hand.  I will use my table saw to cut the floorboard piece and my orbital sander to smooth it out after the planing, but fitting it will be done by hand with a miniature plane, scalpel, and sandpaper.  The wood pieces are so small and old, doing things by hand as much as possible will save me the headache of breaking something.  I also have more control doing it by hand.

My cousin agreed to let me replace the screw eyelets used to connect the harness/yoke pieces together.  The original ones were fairly rusty, and with a refinished wagon, it would look out of place.  I was able to find the exact size eyelets at my local hardware store.  I am not going to polish the brass screw heads, though.  I'll buff them a bit, but I like the patina they've developed over time and they make a nice compliment to the aluminum trim, which has dulled over time because of the aluminum oxide that developed on the surface.  Again, I'll buff the aluminum a bit with the Dremmel and the buffing tool, but I don't want them to be shiney.  Thankfully  the eyelets I bought have a dull zinc plating on them, so it should all match up well and not look out of place. 

Fixed the Uprights

I found what the problem was with the broken upright.  The four uprights fit into channels cut into the outside of the wagon compartment.  The right rear upright was set too close to the wagon compartment putting pressure on the dowel end of the upright when assembled.  Also, the channel had a crown in it halfway from the top to the bottom that made the upright rock from top to bottom.  So when the whole thing was tightened down, the top of the upright pulled in, the crown in the channel then forced the bottom out, which was already under stress from the tight fit of the compartment....and snap!

I was able to drill holes into the upright and the undercarriage by hand.  I glued the spliced repair in place using a small maple dowel.  I also took a chisel and removed the crown in the channel and slightly sanded the inside of the upright to make a better fit.  The front upright was just reglued back into place.

That handled, I put the first coat of Testor's Enamel Dark Red 1104 on the undercarriage.  It will require one, maybe two more coats. 

The wheels are progressing.  The third wheel is apart.  It had a severe split down the center of the bamboo, which is now reglued.  The bamboo strip is pre-forming in the retaining ring overnight so I can begin reassembling it tomorrow.

First Serious Setback

While the wheels are in various stages of reconstruction, I decided to partially disassemble the wagon from it's undercarriage.  The undercarriage was painted red along with the attached stepup.  I thought I'd get a jump start on painting this evening.  My cousin's wagon is assembled identically to mine.  There are individually bent aluminum braces that are held on with brass screws.  It's a tight fit to loosen the screws, but with care and a set of jeweler's screwdrivers, it can be done. The wagon compartment slides down through angled wooden uprights at each of the four corners of the undercarriage.

I slipped off the first set of screws on the braces from the uprights.  I also removed the splash boards over the wheels.  Even tough these are notched to allow the uprights to slide through, the splashboards are very thin and to avoid breaking them, I removed them and placed them in sealed bags, labeled with their position.  Everything I removed got "bagged and tagged" to make sure it all goes back in the same spot, including the screws.  The braces are held to the undercarriage with brass screws as well, but because of the curvature of the aluminum braces, it's hard to get in even with a jeweler's screwdriver.

One of the uprights fell off the undercarriage before I got much futher.  I didn't hear a crack, but the peg portion of the upright was still in the undercarriage as the upright fell to the floor.  Most of the break surface looks old and darker in color.  There is a small amount of fresh wood showing at the center of the break, so it looks like it mostly broke a while ago from age and I just finished the job by disturbing it.  As you can see from the photo, the broken upright is the right rear.

In addition to that, the front right upright is loose in it's receiving hole.  That will have to be glued in place as well before I go any further.  I am not making accusations, but since both the broken and loose uprights are on the same side, it's possible that somewhere along the way, it was bumped from that side.  It is old, the pieces small, and therefore, fragile.  Or, more likely, it's coincidental.  In any case, I am heartbroken and worried.  It requires serious work and I don't want to damage it irreparably.

Because the broken upright is angled, but the peg is perpendicular to the undercarriage, it may be difficult to repair.  I am considering boring a small hole through the center of the peg and into the upright to insert an "inner peg" to join the two.  Glue will then hold it in place as well as secure the two broken surfaces to each other.  But I am going to take a lot of time to figure out the best way to approach this.  So repainting the undercarriage will have to be put on hold.  No more work on anything but the wheels so it gives me time to think this repair job through.

Original Construction History

While I'm working on the remaining wheels, I thought I'd share a few things I learned about how Grandpa made his pieces.  Grandpa was meticulous and he must have been VERY patient.  But he did make mistakes.  In taking apart one of the wheels, I noticed that he must have repositioned the spokes at times as he assembled it.  A couple of the spokes have two tiny holes instead of one to accept the pins that hold the bamboo rim onto the spoke.  I've had to be careful to reuse the right hole!  The holes are so small (<1/16th in diameter) and the spokes are so thin that he had to have drilled the holes by hand.  Otherwise, a powertool would have split the pieces instantly.

Early in my parents marriage, my grandfather was already making his wagons, sleighs, and houses.  My mother recalls that he originally did everything with hand tools....no power tools, even for cutting.  It wasn't until my father bought a band saw that Grandpa started using it for cutting strips of wood.  The hubs of the wheels are shaped.  At first glance, it looks like they were cut on a lathe, but I do not recall there being a lathe in the house when I was growing up.  What I do recall is Grandpa whittling a lot.  I looked more closely at the wheel hubs and I suspect that he made or bought the round stock and whittled the patterns into the hubs.  There is just the hint of irregularity in the shape to suggest this.  It is possible that he had a hand powered lathe or made a jig to cut the design into the round stock.

Speaking of whittling, each spoke is unique.  The shape and irregular roundness again suggests he whittled these pieces.  I do recall as a young child, Grandpa whittling on the front porch.  He kept making these things that looked like large toothpicks.  I wonder if they weren't spokes?  Grandpa made many pocket knives too, and he used them for his whittling.  Many of these pocket knives are housed in brass or aluminum cases, and only the blade is steel.  So his talent extended from wood to metal, but clearly, his medium was wood.  My Dad was a tool and die maker, and his skills with metal were extrordinary.  But Dad's woodworking skills extended to "it's good enough, and you can use putty."  Metal working is beyond me, but I did inherit some of Grandpa's woodworking skills.  Maybe it skips generations, because our son is taking up welding and metal fabrication, but wood is not his thing. 

Because his pieces are hand tooled, not everything fits snugly.  I can see small gaps where the seat meets the slanted sides of the wagon.  I have decided that I will not try to rework these pieces for a better fit unless absolutely necessary.  First, it's a "keeping it original" thing.  Seconly, I don't want to risk damaging it or screwing it up.

Well, that's all for now.  I have one wheel soaking and one being glued together to attend to.

One Wheel Restored

It's been an interesting couple of days.  After soaking and disassembling the first wheel, I placed the bamboo used for the outter wheel into a retaining ring with a stainless steel slip shim to reshape it.  After soaking, the bamboo had relaxed so much, it looked like a giant "U".  I inserted a small flat metal piece at the splice to ease the ends of the splice a little flatter so that when I finished reassembling, they would be round and not come to a point like a teardrop.

I dry fit the hub and spokes into the bamboo ring, but soaking has swelled the oak enough so that the bamboo would not close completely around the spokes.  The spokes were dried in an oven at 175F twice for an hour each about 8 hours apart, and they were left to cool in the closed oven so the wood didn't contract rapidly.  After that, the dry fit was perfect.

I began gluing the pins back into the spokes to hold the bamboo ring onto them, starting with the two spokes opposite from the splice.  An aluminum insert was made to hold the bamboo flat against the jig I made to receive the wheel.  After the assembly was in place, I placed a flower pot ontop as a weight to hold the bamboo completely flat against the jig.  After the first two pins were secured, I began to ease the bamboo into place over the remaining spokes, moving in pairs towards the splice, until I got to the splice itself.

Unfortunately, I discovered a split in the last spoke to be glued as I was ready to apply the glue.  I was checking the dry fit of the peg when it opened up.  The split was repaired and I moved on to the last pin and the biscuit splice.  Below is the completely restored wheel.  All missing splinters were filled with wood putty and sanded smooth.  Now I can move on to the next three wheels.  So I will be working on them and not posting for a while unless something unique shows up.

I Knew It Was Going Too Well

I was surprised by how smoothly things were moving along on the first wheel.  Resisting the tempation to rush it took some doing.  That's how well it had gone so far.  Thank goodness I was working slowly!  I was reassembling the wheel (I'll get into that in a later post with pics) when I noticed one of the spokes was split.  I was gluing the last two pins into place and as I eased the pin in for a dry fit, the split showed itself.  I finished what I had already started and placed it back into the retaining ring, then glued the split shut.

I'll have to go back and drill out the hole a little, then insert the last pin and finally the joining biscuit tomorrow after the glue on the rest of it sets for 24hrs.  Still, I'm happy with the outcome so far.

Disassembling The Wheels

I decided to work on one wheel at a time.  I could tell from the way the wheels were coming apart that Grandpa used a spline or homemade biscuit joint for the outer portion of the wheel.  I also knew that the spokes were held in place by very tiny pins of wood. 

In our family, rightly or wrongly, it seems we had a "thing" for putting rubber bands around the outside of the wheels of these wagons.  My wagon had them when I first brought it home from my Mom & Dad's house where it resided for many years.  My cousin's wagon also had them on the wheels, too.  The unfortunate part of that is that with age, the natural rubber first becomes sticky, and then it becomes brittle, adhering to the wood. 

Before anything, I scraped the brittle rubber off with an Exacto knife, being careful not to gouge the wood.  As I removed the rubber and paint, I noticed that while the whole wagon and the hub and spokes of the wheel are oak, the rim of the wheel was bamboo!  Lucky me, that makes soaking the bamboo to reshape it into a circle much easier.  I also noticed some missing splinters from the bamboo.  Very tiny and very thin.  These are mostly around the holes my grandfather drilled into the bamboo.  This is typical when drilling through bamboo.  I gently scraped out the wood putty too.

Next I soaked the whole wheel for several hours to loosen the glue.  I put register marks on the spokes, rim, and spline so I make sure I get the orientation back correctly when I reassemble it.  It loosened faster than I expected.  I was able to remove the pins, spline, and remaining glue easily.  But soaking swelled the spokes so I cannot immediately reglue everything in place.  I have to let the spoke and hub shrink back to normal by drying out.  The bamboo will remain soaking to further soften it before final reshaping.  I figure in a few days, I may be able to try a dry fit to see how it looks.  So no posts until then

Getting Started

Well, this is my first post.  I'm attempting to refurbish my grandfather's wagon that my oldest cousin now has.  I have one as well, and in the future, I'll post pics of the sleigh and of the house (replica) he also built.  For now, I'm posting pics of my progress on refurbishing the wagon. I am using both my cousin's and my wagons as a means to figure out how Grandpa made them.  The wheel's on my cousin's wagon have come apart due to age.  This will be the first and hardest thing to repair.  I will also need to make a new bottom for the wagon, fix or make a new harness for the horse, and fashion a new retaining pin from aluminum for one of the wheels.  After that is complete, I will repaint the wheels and trim as well as put a coat of lacquer on the bare wood.  For now, I'll show some side-by-side pics of both wagons.

Both are made of white oak.  Mine originally had been lacquered by our grandfather and the wood was left a natural tone.  When I refinished my wagon, the color did not change and this is how it always looked when I was growing up.  My cousin's appears to be stained a walnut tone, but it was not ever lacquered.   Both have the red and yellow trim that were a signature of my grandfather's work. I believe my cousin's wagon is the first one built.  The wheels on it are slightly larger than on mine, an the backboard is more ornate than mine.  There are slight variations between the two if you look closely.  These were definitely hand-made.