This is Why Working with Timber is Hard

Indexado: 2026-05-22

[00:00:03]Guess which is the sapwood.

[00:00:06]Ding ding ding ding.

[00:00:24]Scott Brown here. The last couple of weeks have been a bit hectic. I've been full-time on the bathroom. Last week I didn't post a video, but I've been filming myself this whole time. The tile's been here getting stuff done.

[00:00:34]We've had the plumbers here. It's been all go and the bathroom is looking really nice. So, here is the last couple of weeks of action condensed into this exciting episode.

[00:00:56]Hey, Brad. Oh. Oh, I'm so sorry. I am so sorry. Are you okay?

[00:01:02]>> Yeah. Yeah.

[00:01:03]>> I am so sorry.

[00:01:04]>> No, I just You know how you get in there?

[00:01:07]>> Totally. I was just going to say like um are these for when you moonlight at the circus?

[00:01:14]>> Every Jess and Jess work day.

[00:01:17]>> Starts with the obligatory garden tour.

[00:01:23]>> Cool.

[00:01:25]You go. I actually kind of wish the bedroom was this color.

[00:01:28]>> Yeah, >> it's not too late. So, this color is called Pohutu Geyser. And this paint is sponsored by Dulux, who have been sponsoring us for paint for the last 4 years.

[00:01:39]>> Yeah, >> thank you, Dulux. Another reason that Dulux is great, other than just providing the paint for free, has also been how encouraging they have been of our bold paint choices >> and the technical support that they've given us. because we wanted this dark color for the ceiling and the bathroom is it wash and wear products which are good for wet spaces. They only come in light bases. There's some like chemistry reason why. And so then because we wanted the dark color, they gave us the technical advice of you need to go with a semig gloss. So that's why we're painting the ceiling semig gloss because it's a wet room. So their technical support plus their encouragement of like bold colors has been really nice.

[00:02:16]>> Yeah, they're always really complimentary of the photos that we send them. They're probably just so relieved that somebody's finally using their fun colors.

[00:02:23]>> Yeah.

[00:02:24]>> Yeah. We've got this whole range.

[00:02:26]>> Yeah.

[00:02:26]>> And I intend to use all of it.

[00:02:28]>> And all you want is white and gray and black. Come on.

[00:02:41]>> Yeah.

[00:02:43]>> Whoa.

[00:02:45]The song about catchiness.

[00:02:47]>> No, I'm not. It's not the But I I knew that was going to feel that way. I knew it was going to feel like the ceiling was lower.

[00:02:55]>> All right.

[00:02:55]>> We're so lucky to have Jess as a friend.

[00:02:58]By the way, Jess isn't like this isn't Jess's job. You're I mean, what are you radiographer, massage therapist, award-winning cyclist, painter? What else do you want to add to your repertoire, to your CV?

[00:03:10]>> You're a polyman.

[00:03:11]>> A what?

[00:03:12]>> A polyman. Someone who's good at multiple things.

[00:03:14]>> I'm vegan.

[00:03:18]So, while Jess gets the paint on that ceiling, I'm going to get ready to glaze this bathroom window. I just need to do some minor adjustments of it, get it sealed up, and then we can put the glass in it.

[00:03:45]If you're wondering how I did that, got my router with a fence. And this is just one of those little pointy triangle shamfer bits. And I've poked it out of the base about 2 or 3 mil. That is all the way around the edge of my window sash. And that does two things. Number one, it's a weather groove. If it rains and water gets to this point, it can bead in and track into the inside of the house, right? The weather groove gives the water somewhere to stop and then it rolls down the window and out. The other thing, we're going to paint one side of the sash and oil the other side. The inside's going to be oiled, the other side is going to be painted. And the weather groove gives a nice clear line where the two surfaces can meet. Now, with that said, we need to get some paint on the outside of this window.

[00:04:43]Look at that.

[00:04:45]So, this is your underlay board.

[00:04:50]Tyler's here. And the Tyler isn't called Tyler. That's just what we do. We call them by their trade. I remember when we were doing a bathroom project years ago on the channel. I walked into the bathroom and the Tyler was laying all the tiles and I was like, "You're right, Tyler. How's it going?" And everyone in the comments thought his name was Tyler and he was a Tyler. Like, what are the chances? But, uh, no, that's what we do.

[00:05:13]We call them by their trade here.

[00:05:19]So, he's in there now. So, the first thing he does is he primes the plywood flooring. That dries relatively quickly.

[00:05:25]And then he cuts all his baseboards to size so it fits in that room. Now, the baseboards we're using, I've mentioned it before, they're a rigid foam and they have cement layers on either side of it, reinforced with like fiberglass or something. And the idea is that you can adhere to both sides of that foam. And that does two things. That gives you an underlay for your tiles. That's your tile underlay. But it's also an insulation. A little one, you know, it's only 6 mil thick, but it's insulation.

[00:05:54]It's extra bit of insulation. And then when he goes to put the under floor heating in that bathroom, the heat isn't lost through the floor. It radiates up because it's insulated below it. I, on the other hand, been busy with this. Got a couple of coats on that. Just need one more. But in the meantime, I've got another little job to do.

[00:06:23]>> Okay. So, what I have to do here before tomorrow when the plumber arrives is have a little wall for him to mount the water filter system to. Originally, he was just going to bolt it to the house, but screwing into weatherboards and it's pretty surprising how much water gets through any penetration in the weatherboard. So, I want to minimize that. And the way I'm doing that is bolting two poles and creating a little board that he can mount all the stuff to. And then I'll create some sort of rain shelter on it later. Nice and separate from the weatherboards. And now I've got a big gap under here. And that's what this mortar that I've been hanging on to for 2 years is for All right, I can get out of your way now.

[00:07:37]>> Perfect.

[00:07:38]>> Thank you.

[00:07:48]So that's all it is. Just a big toilet roll inside of a bucket.

[00:07:55]And then what? These are different thicknesses.

[00:07:57]>> Yeah, different microns.

[00:07:58]>> Different microns, right? For different things. And we got three of them. So each filter does something different.

[00:08:05]Water goes up through there, passes through them all, and then comes out there and then into the house.

[00:08:12]Look at that.

[00:08:14]That's your leveling compound.

[00:08:28]>> Smells like a toxic apple.

[00:08:31]>> I'm always amazed by your ability to specify the exact taste or smell of things.

[00:08:36]>> I'm very clever.

[00:08:37]>> You're very smart.

[00:08:40]All right. So, that's got two coats in the shower now and one coat on the main floor area.

[00:08:56]Finally, after two coats of Osmo Poly X White 3040 on the inside, the internal side of the window, and a few coats of paint for the outside, we're ready to glaze it. Oh my god, this is the silicon we use for the glazing. All right, moment of truth. I hope it fits.

[00:09:19]I did a test fit the other day. It fits.

[00:09:23]Oh my god, so much silicon squeezing out the Heat. Heat.

[00:10:08]That is beautiful.

[00:10:12]So, to keep all the fumes out of the house, I've been keeping this bathroom boarded up. And me and the Tyler have been entering the bathroom via the window. But now that the window's on, the plywood comes off. Beautiful.

[00:10:32]Look at all that light coming in.

[00:10:33]>> You're filming?

[00:10:34]>> I am.

[00:10:35]>> Oh, okay.

[00:10:38]I think it looks marvelous. My dad was like, "That window, it's architectural."

[00:10:45]Scotty, he's right. He Yeah, I think it looks fab.

[00:10:49]>> Well, we can credit our architect for coming.

[00:10:52]>> We can. Well, funnily enough, it was our architect who came up with the architectural window. Um I'm glad that we're doing a warm color in here, though, cuz um the blue you're like, "Wo, it's very cold."

[00:11:03]>> It'll be nice to have a warm.

[00:11:05]>> All right, so now I just need to put a timber jam around this window.

[00:11:26]So half the battle with this Remu is just picking good stuff cuz I selected pretty carefully when I picked all the stuff up and I got more than I needed cuz I knew that as soon as you mill it, you see everything. You see all the surprises and in our case we've got massive knots. We've got nail holes from when these used to be joists or rafters.

[00:11:47]Remu has a lot of variation in the color. The more into the middle of the tree you go, the darker it gets. And we want to go lighter cuz that will contrast nicely with the tiles. But the problem with the lighter timber is that's the softest timber. That's the sapwood. And nothing illustrates that better than the two pieces that I have quarantining in my van.

[00:12:11]Guess which is the sapwood.

[00:12:13]Ding ding ding ding ding. Correct. the stuff that the bora found. The bora is a type of woodworm that gets into the softer parts of timber here in New Zealand. I mean, how perfectly illustrated is this? The bora ate everything it could up to the point where the wood got too hard. So, we are running a risk by leaning toward the lighter timbers. We're just going to have to make sure we oil it both sides, keep it dry because once it gets wet, the soft timber is very prone to this bora. But isn't it beautiful?

[00:12:54]So, we had a council inspection again this morning and I actually had nothing to do with the inspection because it was a waterproofing inspection. So, Alex, our Tyler, he took care of it and it passed. What the council were looking at is all the waterproofing he did on the floor and on the walls of the shower area. And because it passed, Alex is in there now putting the tiles on the floor. And I think it's looking amazing already. What do you think of it, Jess?

[00:13:21]>> I am not sorry.

[00:13:21]>> What do you think of the tiles?

[00:13:22]>> Oh, I love it. It looks so good. The the blue of the waterproofing is uh was definitely not my vibe.

[00:13:32]>> Delicious butter with a bit of banana loaf underneath it.

[00:13:54]So, I've done a complete glue up with no glue.

[00:13:59]There's no glue in there. This is just a dry run just cuz I get stressed out when I do glue ups. So, I just want to make sure that everything's in line and it all looks good. Now, my hope is that I can do it all over again. You just tell me how it was laid out in case I forget.

[00:14:14]Okay. Before I start slathering glue everywhere, you can see the biscuit joint here. So, that takes the biscuit there and the other half is in there. And yes, it does help with the glue. It allows more surface area for glue. But the main reason is for the alignment. Keeping the top aligned correctly is easier.

[00:14:56]Does it look the same?

[00:14:58]I actually put some quite calm, relaxed classical music on to calm my nerves. It looks great, doesn't it? We'll find out tomorrow.

[00:15:23]Heat. Heat.

[00:15:54]Look what it's doing to my beautiful Japanese plane. All that waxy, oily, resiny remu.

[00:16:03]Remu All right, that's a relief we got in here.

[00:16:29]>> That brush is gone.

[00:16:30]>> Yeah. Just has to be perfect.

[00:16:32]>> Yeah.

[00:16:34]Otherwise, you'll be looking at a fever.

[00:16:44]You okay again?

[00:16:54]Boom. Nice and straight. Look at that laser.

[00:17:14]Check this out. That there is the point where the grain changes. Like you look at this board, right? It looks like one long board and the grain's all going one way. But here, if you look closely, it goes like this. Whoop! Smooth, smooth, smooth, smooth, smooth, smooth.

[00:17:33]Hear the change.

[00:17:35]And if you look ever so closely, look, it starts to pick it up.

[00:17:43]Now over here, it starts to get better.

[00:17:45]And that's because I changed the direction.

[00:17:51]So this is what I've been having to do for this remoon.

[00:18:00]That's what we have to do. And you'll also notice I kind of messed up the color of it, the epoxy. See, it's quite I used the brown, but I didn't use enough. So, it's quite pale.

[00:18:12]But it's Remove. It's recycled.

[00:18:16]And hey, I can't get everything perfect.

[00:18:18]So, I'm just going to live with it.

[00:18:20]I think it's going to look good. I just flipped it over. And now you can see it on the other side of the knot. See that grain change here?

[00:18:30]diving down. And that's diving down.

[00:18:34]>> I think your challenge here, sweetie, is that you have a perfectionist trying to work with an imperfect material.

[00:18:41]>> I think you're doing a great job.

[00:18:42]>> Thanks.

[00:18:43]>> We have accepted like we were talking about this last night, right? How cool it is that this well was once a tree that was cut down. That's not cool. But then became a building for however many years. Maybe it was a beam. Maybe it was a stud. Now it's been remilled, turning into like a window reveal or benchtop in our bathroom. Like >> I think we're quite romantic in that regard. Like that story adds a lot of value for us. Is do you think that's fair to say?

[00:19:08]>> Yeah. I mean definitely part of this jam. One of these pieces is was a stud in our house.

[00:19:14]>> In our house even? Oh, okay. So like I think I think that's that's cool. That to me is beauty and I love the story.

[00:19:21]Right. And so the cost of that is imperfection is nail holes is getting maybe the epoxy um filler color a bit wrong. But I I think that's part of the beauty in the story.

[00:19:31]>> So I love it. I know you're struggling.

[00:19:33]I know. I know you you're like I can see it, >> but you're doing great. I got to go. I love you. Bye. Yeah. You too.

[00:19:52]One glue that I love to use, I probably mentioned in this video already, is Gorilla Grip 1h hour cure.

[00:20:00]Not sponsored. We bought this.

[00:20:02]>> I bought four trees yesterday.

[00:20:03]>> Thanks for that.

[00:20:04]>> You're welcome.

[00:20:05]>> I got this idea from my friend John at Nelson Builders. Uh cuz the joinery guys that he works with, they use this for everything. They laminate everything.

[00:20:13]So, it's a construction adhesive, but it's like invisible once it's set and it doesn't really make a mess. Well, you can make a mess with all glue, but dries hard. So, if it spills out of the join, you just scrape it off. Snaps right off, which is very handy. So, with that in mind, let's go for it. And you might have noticed that I've opened the window sash, and that is because this stuff expands.

[00:20:42]And if it expands too much, it could catch the window sash if the window sash is up against it. That's exactly what happened to me uh when I was building the window.

[00:20:51]>> Why is it called 1 hour? Cuz when I was buying it, I noticed it was like 30 minute 10 minute 3 hours.

[00:20:56]>> That's how long it takes to dry.

[00:20:57]>> Why do you prefer the 1 hour over the 10 minute?

[00:21:00]>> Uh cuz 10 minutes is 1 hour is stressful enough. 10 minutes is just chaos.

[00:21:05]>> So why not 3 hours?

[00:21:06]>> Um cuz we also It's also handy having something that goes off pretty quick.

[00:21:11]cuz Alex is going to be using this timber >> uh to get his tiles up against something, >> right?

[00:21:18]>> Stop his tiles rolling around.

[00:21:20]>> So, 1 hour is a sweet spot, >> I think. So, >> maybe 1 and 1/2 hours would really be the sweet spot.

[00:21:27]>> Get on it, gorilla.

[00:21:28]>> I'm not a complete mad lad. I am going to put a nail in cuz I don't want this rolling around.

[00:21:47]Did you make those?

[00:21:48]>> Yeah.

[00:21:48]>> To be the same width as the window.

[00:21:50]>> Yeah.

[00:21:52]>> Wow.

[00:21:52]>> No, it's it's it's funny cuz you're a perfectionist, but it's actually quite smart.

[00:21:56]>> Yeah. Well, I thought maybe I could do it with the clamps, but then I also thought the clamps might struggle. I didn't want to like be in a position where the glue is drying and I'm running out of air trying to >> Yeah.

[00:22:08]>> prepare a bit.

[00:22:08]>> So you just custom made pieces to work as clamps.

[00:22:12]>> Yeah.

[00:22:12]>> Smart.

[00:22:13]>> You can tile after that.

[00:22:16]Clamps everywhere and there's actually not much squeeze out yet. I think this is good. I'm happy.

[00:22:24]>> It looks cool.

[00:22:26]>> Oh yeah. You like it?

[00:22:27]>> Don't you?

[00:22:28]>> I love it.

[00:22:29]>> Yeah. Beautiful timber. I mean, look at that. Look at that. grain.

[00:22:33]>> Yeah, it's pretty cool.

[00:22:35]>> That's beautiful.

[00:22:36]>> Okay, we're good.

[00:22:39]Walk away.

[00:23:07]If you're wondering how I did the top and the bottom, this is how. Put the glue on that top one now. And I've got my zip wall props.

[00:23:17]And I've got a big bottle of water pushing down that one.

[00:23:28]Stop it.

[00:23:47]Christmas.