Hello,

as you may see I'm not a handy guy.. I tried making a small window
bench with 2x4's. I attached them together using just nails but I did
not use wood glue. I totally forgot about it..

will the nails eventually pop-out ? the bench is not finished yet but
the wood are attched.. is sturdy now but I don't know if there is a
way to fix this or just leave it like that and learn from the
experience...

suggestion please...

TIA,
CZ

Cesar Zapata wrote:
Hello,

as you may see I'm not a handy guy.. I tried making a small window
bench with 2x4's. I attached them together using just nails but I did
not use wood glue. I totally forgot about it..

will the nails eventually pop-out ? the bench is not finished yet but
the wood are attched.. is sturdy now but I don't know if there is a
way to fix this or just leave it like that and learn from the
experience...

suggestion please...

TIA,
CZ
Leave it as is. If you built it well it will probably last for years
without glue. I recall when I was a boy we had a porch swing my father
built. He used only nails, mostly because that was all that was available
at the time. That would have been in the 1930s and it lasted up into the 50s
at least. Maybe into the 60s, I left about that time and don't know for
sure when it finally went out completely. I do know with 4 kids it got
a lot of use.

Bill

"Cesar Zapata" wrote in message
...
Hello,

as you may see I'm not a handy guy.. I tried making a small window
bench with 2x4's. I attached them together using just nails but I did
not use wood glue. I totally forgot about it..

will the nails eventually pop-out ? the bench is not finished yet but
the wood are attched.. is sturdy now but I don't know if there is a
way to fix this or just leave it like that and learn from the
experience...

suggestion please...

TIA,
CZ

I agree with Bill. If it isn't broken, don't fix it. If there's a weak
spot you may be able to use a 90* bracket to strengthen that joint. I too
witnessed many projects that my father built with nails that lasted for many
years. In other words, don't sweat it until you need to!

Cesar Zapata wrote:
Hello,

as you may see I'm not a handy guy.. I tried making a small window
bench with 2x4's. I attached them together using just nails but I did
not use wood glue. I totally forgot about it..

will the nails eventually pop-out ? the bench is not finished yet but
the wood are attched.. is sturdy now but I don't know if there is a
way to fix this or just leave it like that and learn from the
experience...

suggestion please...

No real disagreement w/ others who say well enough...just a couple of
other comments.

Unless you prepared surfaces to mate better than a store-bought 2x4
stud, the quality of the glue joint probably wouldn't be sufficient to
last very long, anyway. And, of course, depending on which way pieces
are joined, glue on end grain is of no bonding strength, anyway.

How long and how well it holds up will depend mostly on whether the
design is such that it has sufficient supporting material in the right
places to take the loads applied, whatever they will be, in a direction
that isn't parallel to the direction the nails run--that is, if there's
a load that tends to twist a piece downward and the nails that hold that
piece are in line w/ that force, it will tend over time to pull them
out. If the force is perpendicular to that direction, then they take
the force laterally. Also, of course, it assumes you used nails of
sufficient size and in sufficient quantity. A screw or two in
judicious locations might be of some value...

--

Cesar Zapata wrote:
Hello,

as you may see I'm not a handy guy.. I tried making a small window
bench with 2x4's. I attached them together using just nails but I did
not use wood glue. I totally forgot about it..

will the nails eventually pop-out ? the bench is not finished yet but
the wood are attched.. is sturdy now but I don't know if there is a
way to fix this or just leave it like that and learn from the
experience...

suggestion please...

Some would suggest you dismantle your home and reconstruct it using glue...

On 6/1/2008 6:15 AM Cesar Zapata spake thus:

as you may see I'm not a handy guy.. I tried making a small window
bench with 2x4's. I attached them together using just nails but I did
not use wood glue. I totally forgot about it..

will the nails eventually pop-out ? the bench is not finished yet but
the wood are attched.. is sturdy now but I don't know if there is a
way to fix this or just leave it like that and learn from the
experience...

suggestion please...

Kinda hard to advise you since you gave no details on the bench (size
and other construction details) but yes, in general, furniture nailed
together will eventually loosen (I assume people will be sitting on this?).

You might be able to stiffen it up by adding other connectors between
the wood members. The ugly and kinda stupid way would be to use things
like metal angle brackets screwed in. You could also drill and glue in
wood dowels.

Or start over with a different design altogether ...


--
The best argument against democracy is a five-minute
conversation with the average voter.

- Attributed to Winston Churchill

thanks for the advice everybody.. I'm new at building but that is the
way you learn... I guess.


thanks guys...

On 6/1/2008 3:35 PM Cesar Zapata spake thus:

thanks for the advice everybody.. I'm new at building but that is the
way you learn... I guess.

Yep; the way you learn is, you guessed it: by making mistakes.
(Hopefully not the same mistake twice.)


--
The best argument against democracy is a five-minute
conversation with the average voter.

- Attributed to Winston Churchill

David Nebenzahl wrote in news:484325fb$0$4937
:

On 6/1/2008 3:35 PM Cesar Zapata spake thus:

thanks for the advice everybody.. I'm new at building but that is the
way you learn... I guess.

Yep; the way you learn is, you guessed it: by making mistakes.
(Hopefully not the same mistake twice.)




Learning from your own mistakes is experience. Learning from other people's
mistakes is wisdom...

On Sun, 1 Jun 2008 06:15:08 -0700 (PDT), Cesar Zapata
wrote:

Hello,

as you may see I'm not a handy guy.. I tried making a small window
bench with 2x4's. I attached them together using just nails but I did
not use wood glue. I totally forgot about it..

will the nails eventually pop-out ? the bench is not finished yet but
the wood are attched.. is sturdy now but I don't know if there is a
way to fix this or just leave it like that and learn from the
experience...

suggestion please...

I don't know if this applies to your situation.

Nails will pull out. Usually I guess the top piece of wood bends away
from the bottom and pulls out the nail.

One way to prevent this is by putting in two nails where you might
have used only one, one leaning in one direction and the other leaning
in the other direction. Each one keeps the two pieces of wood from
moving with regard to the other.

Since you already have one nail in probably perpendicular to the wood,
you could still put a second nail in at an angle. Make sure you
still hit the second piece of wood.

Or maybe you could wait until it started to come apart, learn how long
that took, and then put in the additional nails at the proper places.




TIA,
CZ