December Tinkering Time

I was back to tinkering in the studio this week. Earlier this year, I made board with a threaded nut to attach to my tripod. I was hoping for a good flat surface, easily attached to the tripod where I could tape pastel papers while painting. At that time, I could only find up to a 12" square piece of wood. I constructed it so that the front was flat and smooth with no holes from the threaded nut. Because I don't own a table saw, it wasn't an option to cut a piece from a larger board.

I never used it much because it was kinda small. I needed something bigger. One of the artist/designers of one of my new outdoor painting boxes just offered something similar to what I wanted! The issue for me was that it was $85, made of aluminum, and heavy at over 5 pounds. It was really big at 18x24" - a bit too big for me!

I'd been looking for a way to make my own without asking someone to cut a board the size I preferred. Finally I decided that I just needed to attach something on the board I'd already made. I bought one of the primed masonite painting panels (less than $5 using a coupon!) at the art store for the surface. I chose the 16x20" size. Now I needed a way to attach it without putting holes in it!

I also wanted it to be easily taken off , not permanently attached. I headed to the hardware superstore to look for ideas and found the perfect molding to use - "panel cap". I also bought some LocTight Go 2 Glue to attach the wood to the back of the board.  In all, this new addition was less than $10 - Saved $75 from the aluminum version! My version is just over 3 pounds, included the original wood.

Below is the finished project.

Sliding it into the new "rails"

I put a piece of square dowel as a "stop" (this is really shown upside down here, the stop will be on the bottom when mounted in the tripod)

Stop at bottom (although the rail is snug enough to hold the board from slipping, I would expect over time it will become looser, so felt I'd need the stop.)

Above is the original intent - to have the working pastel surface on the left (I am left handed), and the photo of my scheme taped on the right.

I also added some square dowels along the front bottom and sides, to serve as a stop/shelf that may be useful in both vertical and horizontal orientation. This would be good when painting on boards instead of taped down paper.

Another successful tinkering project!