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< Home < Extreme Rodmaking < I Built a Bomb in My Basement
I had been coating my first few rods with tung oil or brushed varnish, and just wasn't satisfied (nothing new there, eh?) So I finally decided I'd break down and build a dip tube setup in the basement along the lines of the one Wayne C. uses and describes so well in his book. I went to a friendly plumber and got an 8' piece of leftover 12" PVC, and bought 4" pipe and fittings at the hardware store. I borrowed another friends big hammer drill and bought a Hilti bit to punch a bunch of holes in the slab floor after finding it would cost me $100 to have a concrete sawing company bore the hole. I laid everything out next to an inside wall in the shop, and spent an entire afternoon drilling holes on the perimeter of a 5" circle drawn on the floor. Turns out that they did a good job building my house. 6" slab with welded wire reinforcing. After sweating and cussing I finally finished drilling and and busted out the center of the hole with a sledge and wire cutters. Then I used a piece of PVC tube and the shop vac to make a hole in the sand under my basement floor 5' deep. I set the pipe and poured cement in the bottom to keep bugs and water out of the pipe. Next day I measured and cut the big piece of pipe for the cabinet and put a piano hinge on the door I made, made a top for the cabinet, hung the motor and control for pulling the sections, mounted a dozen cup hooks for hanging sections to dry, and caulked around the bottom and top to seal out dust. This was probably in September or October, I'm guessing. As I stood there admiring my resourcefulness and handiness I heard the clicking and WHOOSH of the gas furnace firing up. Right behind the water heater, next to my new varnishing cabinet! I hadn't built a varnishing cabinet, I'd built a bomb in basement! It took another week to tear down the cabinet (breaking the big 12" piece of pipe in the process) and using a block and tackle fastened to the floor joists to pull the 5" x 5' pipe out of the ground, fill in the hole, patch it and build the cabinet in the corner as far from the gas appliances as possible. It's on and outside wall and takes a while to heat up with halogen shop lights, but at least my house hasn't been on the 11 O'clock news! (Brian Creek)
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