Paint work has cured now and the final pieces are fairly ready to receive the assemblies. Although floor got some stains. I learned from a hardware store owner that these stains can be gotten rid of with some thinner. So that is another post fabrication task on the list.
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| Painted and set to receive assemblies |
So it was the time for next step. Putting the wood-shavings-wool into the sides.
Now it was quite a hunt to find the wood-shavings-wool...wait a second! Let us give a better name to this 'wood-shavings-wool'. How about just Shavings? Okay then, Shavings it is.
It was quite a hunt to look for Shavings because the roadside vendors are only interested in fitting a small cooler with Shavings and earn seasonal profit. I needed some 3-4 Kgs of it for the cooler and selling that much in bulk by a roadside vendor would be a loss to him because he can manage like 3 small home coolers with that much.
After being unable to convince any of the roadside vendors for a bargain. I assigned the task to my younger brother who arranged the same while I was away at the office from a wholesale market. So I had work to do in the weekend.
Fitting that unruly mass of intertwined wooden laces into those seemed to be a difficult task but I had planned something for it during my earlier brainstorming.
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| 3 Kg of Shavings tied up |
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| The green stuff is what I was talking about. It is mostly used as garden fencing. |
I had measured the dimensions before purchasing and that saved me a lot of wastage. First step was to cut an edge to make it straight. That was easy with the new cutter I purchased.
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| 7, 8 Cut 'em straight. |
Once you have a straight edge, it is easy to proceed with the measurements and further cuts.
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| The plan. Just three perfect sized rectangles are needed |
The cutter helped a lot and cut like butter through this plastic. Every other option (scissors, knife, handcraft knife, wire cutter, pliers etc) seem to be more inconvenient than this tool.
Lesson: Invest in a nice tool for excellent results
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| I am more than happy to have purchased this tool. It just caught my eye at one of the shops where I bought sanding wheel for Grinder |
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| The plan. |
and here is the result. Three meshes for three sides.
Then came laying of the Shavings in cooler's side grills. This takes more of an artistic touch of your hand rather than just follow a recipe. The Shavings vary in density, toughness and are very unruly when dry. To make it more manageable I soaked it as I spread it on the grill.
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| Soak well before use |
Then spread it on the steel frame and untangled with my fingers and rearranged it using movements of fingers as if I was fluffing up a pillow before sleeping.
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| 2 min into the it |
The aim was to obtain a consistent depth that will be around half an inch when I put slight pressure on it. So loose Shavings if 2-3 inch of thickness will be down to approx 1 inch when we tie them up with that green plastic mesh.
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| Around 5 minutes |
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| 10 minutes and done |
Next came the process of tying up the Shavings by sandwiching them between the Cooler's frame and the green Mesh. That was done using simple iron wire that is available at all hardware stores. This wire is commonly used to tie up reinforcements in concrete construction and is order-able by Kilos. 250 gm was enough for me.
I cut this wire into pieces and made approx 3 inch long 'V's from it:
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| Tying the Shavings |
Because shavings are wet as I work on them, they will settle in shape of a nice even pad when they go dry.
Sometimes breeze blew through wet Shavings while I was working on it. It cooled it down, gifting me with small cool blows in hot Sunday balcony as a reward for hard work and as a glimpse of what is about to come when all will be put together. :-)
Use standard pliers to twist the wire. Can be done by hand as well. I tied it at multiple places around 5-7 inches apart.
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| These custom ties are inserted from outer side and twisted at the inside for safety |
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| More tightening and shortening |
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And the result:
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| Outer side of the grill |
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| Inside of the grill with Shavings sandwiched between. |
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| Does that qualify as photographic art? :-) |
So that is a partially ready cooler with Shavings added to all three sides. The whole procedure took something like 2-3 hours and is far better than what we get in the market. More Shavings, better management and uniformly spread.
Next post will cover the water supply. I went a bit geeky on this one but it was fun as well. Stay tuned and please provide feedback.
Good night!
