There is not a lot to report this week. I have been priming the plywood discs that make up the base, floor, and ceiling of the carousel. Most of the discs are primed, with the exception of the top of the ceiling layer. I have not yet determined how the top of the carousel will be decorated so I am holding off on that piece.
The only other disc that looks anything other than painted solid white is the layer that the animals will be on. The center of this disc has a circular layer that is not painted like the rest. I forgot that I needed to keep that layer clear in the center for now. I painted it on the first coat and had to go back and sand that area to get some of the primer off. I will need to sand a little more but decided that I would do that later.
The reason for keeping the center clear is that the central column will be glued in there. This portion of the central column is mainly decorative. The actual support for the roof will be inside the column. I will blog more about that in another paragraph.
At this point the center circle is larger than the column. I have also accounted for the trim that will be glued around the column. The area is still larger than what I expect the column and trim to occupy, but I wanted to leave plenty of room for gluing. I will have to go back in and paint in the rest of the primer once the column is in place.
This is the central column as it is right now. It is covered by three layers of paper mâché on the inside, and five layers on the outside. It is very strong. It could hold up the ceiling on its own, but I need a wooden piece on the inside that can be screwed into the base and ceiling to keep them rotating as one unit. There will be a separate blog post on that when I get that far.
For now, my plan is to build the trim onto the base of the column. It will be made of cardboard and paper mâché. It will be permanently attached on the base. It needs to be attached with glue and paper mâché before it is primed and painted.
The top will also have trim, but at this time my plan is to attach the trim to the ceiling and just have the column fit into it rather than trying to glue it to the column. That will help when it comes time to put it together and if I should ever need to take it apart again.
Why would I want to take it apart again? Who knows. Maybe the rotating platform fails and needs to be replaced. Or maybe I need to ship it somewhere and it will travel more safely if it is packed as flatly as possible and reassembled elsewhere. If I had to transport it, my main concern would be for the dowels that the animals will be mounted on. They are only a quarter inch (6.35 mm) thick. I am concerned that a mishandled package could give it such a jolt that it could crack the dowels. Maybe I am worrying over nothing, but I would hate to go to all this much work and have something break it. The dowels could be replaced but it would be a lot of work to do that.
Anyway, that is where I left off on working on the project this week. Look for the next blog post on next Monday or Tuesday.
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