Date: 26th November 2011

Date: 26th November 2011
Saturday Session
• Started working on my own project (screw organizing tray). I have been prompted to do this in past weeks
• Took photos of other members working on a range of community projects that had been brought to the shed. Green Island Play Center tables, garden trolley, planter boxes. Discussed these projects with them
• Xmas Do discussions and reminders
• Visitor from Alexandra Men’s Shed
• Smoko Elton John reviews
• Cleaning up after smoko tidying benches and clearing out wood shavings. Discussed cleaning roles with shed members and historical approaches to shed cleanliness
• Put my project in a safe place for next week.
• Discussed P latest woodworking project. Plan to bring him in some Oak next week from under my house.
Started working on my own project (screw organizing tray). I have been prompted to do this in past weeks by a number of the members. This was a project I thought would be helpful at home in my own shed, one of those things I’d been meaning to get around to. I’d brought all the materials from home as I’d done with previous project. I’m still unsure about how the sheds materials are used for individual projects. I worked on my project independently stopping at times to talk with the other shed members.
N was working on planter boxes, this was an ongoing project for an upcoming heritage rose conference. N was particularly enthusiastic about the planter boxes been used instead of cheap conference bags. The are to be used to collect materials and can then be taken home to use in potting sheds. Given they were to be reused in the future N wants to be very particular about the workmanship. Ha is planning to work outside of the shed hours on this project. He and J will access the shed as key holders.
P told me about a project he was working on at home, a shelving unit for his beer steins. He is a joiner and wanted to make this shelving unit out of oak. E was having some difficulties sourcing the wood and had started stripping back old bed heads. I told him I had a oak plank at home I’d bring in for him as it would be put to good use. It was also a way of saying thanks for helping me with the chisels the previous week.
I took photos of other members working on a range of community projects that had been brought to the shed. Ed P and L were completing kids picnic tables and saw horses for the Green Island Play Center. This was a request that had come after the delivery of the workbench they had made the previous week. Ed had brought in a template/example he had from one of his children’s friends. There was a good deal of consideration given to the materials and whether to add any extra bracing. Ed was very please at the cost of materials as the timber had been on special.
At smoko the group talked about the Elton John concert the night before. After a number of members heard I’d gone they were interested in hearing how the stadium worked rather than hoe Elton John performed. One member noted that the only thing wrong with Elton John is he’s a big poof.
I reminded everyone about the Xmas event. Numbers are starting to firm up for this. I told me they had about 30 coming.
We had a visitor from the ‘Alexandra Men’s Shed’ for the first part of the morning. He caught up with I and from what I heard they discussed the management of the shed including insurance, security, council consents. I had a chance to formally meet with him after smoko and discuss progress on their shed. We talked about the following
• B the representative has been the main driving force behind the Alex shed after initial support form Phil Bradshaw. Other members have assisted but he stated he didn’t know if he would have taken on the project if he knew how much work it would be or how frustrating it would become.

• The length the project has been going. The Alex shed has been an ongoing project for the past four years. They have a good deal of community supporting the area and early on had a building provided for them at minimal cost, this however needed to be located to a suitable site. There have been a number of issues with gaining a site as well as consent. The council had offered sections but there had been complaints upon notification. Currently they are investigating sharing a site with the BMX/Cycle club where there building could be located and used by the BMX/Cycle club in return for the space and use of their existing toilet and plumbing facilities. This would not only meet the needs of both groups but would also take care of consents for plumbing and gray water (a previous barrier and cost)
• The shed has secured funding from local groups and the lotteries foundation and has this money ear marked for renovation of the building.
• The shed has members and have already undertaken small community projects
• They are actively talking to the Blossom festival about working together on the production and storage of festival floats. There was a degree of enthusiasm about this working out in the long term future.
• B was not at all opposed to the creation of a national shed association as a way of sharing ideas especially around help with organizational matters (insurance, consents, project advertisement etc). He did not see this as a treat accepting it as a community of assistance rather than a authority to impose rules on the shed.
• B was interested about my project and I gave him my contact details if he wanted copies of my article searches or materials.
After our discussion it was 11.30. I didn’t feel I had enough time to finish my project so decided to clean up some of the machinery and benches. It didn’t look like this had been done for a while. D suggested I use the industrial vacuum cleaner after I started with brush and shovel. I managed to clean most of the benches as well as emptying out the ripsaw and compound mitre saw. My efforts were appreciated by a number of the other members. D and N gave me a hand with the rip saw clean out. During my tidy up I had an interesting discussion with J about historical approaches to shed cleanliness where as a n apprentice he said they rarely swept up the floor as the wood shavings helped collect the split oil and dirt. I am unsure if there are protocols for shed cleaning it appears there is a general rule about cleaning up after oneself.
I put my project in a safe place under the bench for next week.
Left shed 12.20 most members also leaving then.