Extreme Makeover: Wind Chime Edition

My neighbors needed their wind chime repaired and I really needed a project to work on (If I’m not creating, building or fixing something these days, I get out of sorts). So, I stole my neighbors’ wind chime while they were out of town. It had rotted and was broken into many pieces from being out in the elements for who knows how many years. My main challenge was cutting the perfect circles for the “head” and the “chime tube striker”. I went to the big home improvement stores and couldn’t find 7-inch and 3-inch diameter circles, so I decided to teach myself how to cut perfect circles from wood. After fabricating a jig for my router, I had the perfect circles that I needed. After routing the edges of the circles and some sanding, I think they turned out nice.

By employing some Bohemian geometry, I drilled holes for the chord to hang the chimes, the clanger and to suspend the entire wind chime. Then I cut out the wind catcher.

After some staining and generous coats of polyurethane, my neighbors will have a good-as-new wind chime that hopefully they’ll enjoy for many years to come. And, most importantly, I am proud to have had the opportunity to use the term “tube striker.”

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