At age 17, before my high school graduation ceremony, I got a job with a construction company run by two hard-XXX red neck brothers. The crew would meet up at 5 am and make the drive to cape cod where we framed condominiums.

Every Friday, the boss would point to a load of lumber and tell me to load it on the truck. Didn't think nothing about it and did as I was told. Now these two guys were always talking about a camp they had up in Maine, and all the hell raising and drinking that went on up there. Eventually they invited me to go up with them for some R&R. When we arrived there I commented about the fine looking cottage they had built. Thats when I realized it had been built with all the lumber they were stealing.......and I was loading on the truck!

Sure thing, not sure when as I have not had much free time lately at all
Would love to see the boat

For accuracy and good fitting crown moulding joints, I make a block of wood that represents the wall and ceiling coverage...then mark the wall, ceiling and miter saw so that the moulding is cut and then nailed at the same angle. Without these marks you are just guessing. In this case I'm installing crown moulding on a fireplace mantle that I am building.

Great illustration of how to make repetitive cuts of the correct spring angle. Many DIYers assume the spring angle is 45 degrees. It is not, normally.
I also make idiot blocks of miter cuts and mark them for left inside, right inside, left outside and right outside. This helps me avoid errors in setting up the saw and cutting the wrong end of the stock, which can be costly. Also helps avoiding cutting upside down.

It is worth noting that I back cut the inside joints whenever possible.

I have been a craftsman for 30 years, mostly working with glass, but also in metal, wood and occasionally composites and I have to say... crown molding Was the most frustrating project I have ever worked on. That’s where I learned the saying “putty and paint makes it what it ain’t”.
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Nebe....i love doing crown moulding....its one of my favorite jobs and ive installed miles of it...mostly by myself ...very simple really and if you try the technique i showed, i think you would see much better results. As far as installing it in large rooms solo....i have found methods that make it a cinch.
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Simple mantel for gas fireplace will all be painted white. I like working with poplar....tile guys will do 6" border.

Do you lap those or just stick them in?

I do similar with crown around a room. First I make up short lengths of a examples of inside corner and an outside corner if there are any. I use those to pencil mark the ceiling and walls. Then when nailing a piece going into a corner just hold back with the last couple nails so the cope piece fits perfect, then get the last 2 nails nailed. Of course sometimes you have to cram a putty knife in the joint for a while til glues sets up. There are so many tricks I can't even describe them all as I am sure it just comes second nature to you too Bob.

Nice looking mantle!

Bruce...excellent tip in there about leaving out the last few nails of the first piece so that the coped end can control and improve the fit of the joint. I do that .....there are ways of doing things that we are sometimes taught by others....and other times it is born out of trial and error.:smash:

That's right Ross very rare for spring angle to be 45. I am fluent with Autocad and at the millwork shop I worked for I drew custom moulding profiles. Once the drawing was perfect it was downloaded to a cnc machine to cut a pattern, from there the hardboard template was used to cut the profile on the steel knives used in the moulding cutter head.
We could...in an eight hour shift go from drawing board to producing hundreds of feet of custom crown moulding in any wood species required.
The moulding cutter head has three steel knives, after grinding the knives to the correct profile with a special machine using the template...they must be weighed on a digital scale, and tweaked until they all weigh exactly the same, before being installed into the cutterhead.

We had a job doing the finish work on the renovation of a very old historic building. I was sent to inspect the existing trim we would have to match. I was amazed because there were moulding profiles i had never seen before...really odd shapes. I cut small samples off the existing trim, went back to my cad program and kept drawing and printing until I got a perfect match. Those knife profiles were a one off and never used again.

Boss says he wants a PVC lantern post for every house in the 54 lot subdivision. We are only just starting so I'll do six at a time. In that second picture it looks like porch roof columns for my shop, they just happen to be the same height by coincidence. Walpole woodworking sells something similar for around $1,200.

Nice Posts! Is there a pressure treated 4x4 in the middle?



Here is a shot of a set of stairs I did this summer in maple. It was a lot of work going from carpeted stairs that were closed in, the left wall was opened up and an LVL put in.

And here is a set of stairs I helped out with. My friend made almost all the pieces shown including the wall panels. Very complex foyer and a ton of money, but it looks killer.

Beautiful work Bruce! Looks like you made the newel posts yourself?
I like the metal balusters too.....those pitch shoes did get slid up against the railing and tightened with a set screw...I assume:o

Yeah the lantern posts are hollow...they will slide down and over a pressure treated post that is dug into the ground and set in concrete.... with room for a wire.

Thanks, no those maple newels and the one narrow one upstairs(not in the shot) were bought by the homeowner, I don't like the radius on the raised panel look to them, done with router obviously and looks good to them but cheap to me. and yes those shoes will be brought up, he was still polyurethaning.

v-fold method for long miter joints with pvc

Use to do that with step flashing on opposite side for corner boards,, the more you push the tighter the joint....
I almost miss working.... ;-)

I am looking forward to retiring in three years.......I will miss working...because that is all I have done for the last forty five years.

Also hoping that the pain in my shoulders, elbows, wrists, hands and fingers won't force me into retiring sooner. I could find other work that doesn't involve using my hands but I wont be happy about it.