Thursday, May 14, 2009

Cheap And Simple Waterstone Pond

Since buying my Norton waterstones I have been looking to buy or build some type of pond. Building a pond from wood just seemed like a lot more work than it should be and the ones you can buy seemed awfully expensive. After looking around for a while I finally come across something that seemed idea. I was a $6 9x13 cake pan tote. All I had to do was make a wooden bed to put the stones on while sharpening. I took a scrap piece of oak and simple
cut notches in the bottom to match the lip of the container. Now all you need is some way to clamp the stones in place so they don't move. A few pieces of scrap later and I had a simple wedge clamping system. The dowel you see in the pond is a simple mop for wetting/cleaning the stones. It is simply a dowel with pieces of cloth attached the end with a screw. Seems to work pretty good. One other final note. If you plan on keeping water in the container for any period of time I would add a drop of bleach to prevent any plant life. The container comes with a handy lid to keep sawdust out and water in. Great for keeping those stones ready to go at a moments notice.

Most of the time when you try and take the easy route you come out with the short end of the stick. This is an exception. A simple solution that most anyone can do in an hour.

1 comment:

Andrew said...

Smart, useful, thanks! Never thought of a cake container. Might not need those fancy stone holders I purchased.

Wondering how well the lid traps the water during transport (say from one part of the house to another).