Happy to report that I’ve completed my wooden swing after some weeks of finishing and a break in Montreal. The only unforeseen blocker that came up was the realization that I would need to do my annual clean of the deck before I could kick back and truly enjoy the end product. That meant I had another week of work waiting for me outside unless I wanted the reminder each time I sat down.
A lot of the finishing work was sanding the wooden slats to smooth the sitting surface and mask imperfections in the wood and all my little errors along the way. I must have sanded the whole thing 3 or 4 times once it sat assembled in the garage. As it’s often a step I lose interest in, I tried to be very mindful about sanding everything evenly. It was rewarding to see the subtle improvement with each round. In addition to the staining, I also opted for a semi-gloss clear coat finish to help seal the wood from the elements and hopefully extend the life of all bench pieces.
Once it was fully sanded and stained, it came time install the hardware. I was a bit nervous for this work out of everything because I wanted to build something that will support weight for years to come and stand the test of time. The jury will stay out on that one but I’m happy with where things landed and grateful for the opportunity to work with the bench vice.
Because our deck is painted, I try to touch it up at the start of each summer. Before I moved the swing into place, I scraped the surface and power washed everything. All that’s left now is to cut the excess chain.
It’s been quite a journey from start to completion and I had a chance to try a lot of new things in garage. There are some small things I would do differently next time around but that tends to be natural for longer projects where lessons are learned. I feel like a better craftsman overall and have reclaimed project space in the garage for new things.
Up next? I think I’ll work on something more creative and open-ended using the leftover scrap wood from this project.
Comments
2 responses to “A Swing With Perfectionism”
Looks great :)))!
[…] taking on a bigger project in building a wooden swing for our deck, I wanted to work with wood in a completely different style from following a step-by-step plan and […]