Solid Oak Flooring on Concrete

Lecia M body repair

I had a heart stopping moment when I dropped my M4 on a concrete floor. It was a short drop and I was mostly worried about the lens.  At first it appeared that there was nothing wrong with the camera.  There was no visible damage at all!  I continued to finish the roll of film that was in the camera. But when I went to remove the finished roll the film cartridge could not clear the camera body.  My Leica M4 body got a small flat spot on its round end. The end that holds the film cartridge. The dent was slight but it was enough to keep the film cartridge from being able to exit the camera. An old photo.net article talked about the same problem. One of the recommendations was to make a wooden die and press the dent out. So I gave it a try and it worked great.

Vertical Book Case

Vertical Book Cases are very popular today.  I see a lot of them and they are all very clever in their design. The inspiration for my book case was from a display that I noticed in a retail space.  The building had awkwardly located concrete pillar which a designer turned into a vertical display. The materials for the display was one inch oak shelves and quarter inch steel plate.

My materials are 1 foot wide pieces of one inch thick oak stair tread material. These pieces of scrap material are from using four foot oak treads in a three foot stair well.  I know it does not sound like a smart use of material but its the result of shopping at warehouse outlets.  To complete the project 12 gauge steel was used to hold the treads.  The tall narrow heavy bookcase is not stable and would kill a small animal if it fell over.  Like a stair case the treads are stepped back and the case leans on the wall for stability.  Its not a great design but I was able to utilize scrap material to build something useful. I would have liked to use thicker steel but the resulting weigh scared me off.