A Vintage Guide to Some Household Repairs and Easy Fixes - Including Restoring Tables and Chairs and Restoring Plaster and Defective Floor Boards

By Anon Anon

This handy little book contains a detailed and concise guide to repairing a variety of household items, including the restoration of tables and chairs, repairing plastering, and fixing and replacing defective floorboards. An easy-to-follow guide, complete with a wealth of detailed and helpful diagrams, this book is perfect for anyone with an interest in learning how to fix things in the house which would otherwise prove costly, and requires little to no previous experience. The chapters of this book include: 'Re-webbing Chair Bottoms', 'Levelling Chairs and Tables', 'Restoring an Old Elm Table', 'Restoring a Deal Chest of Drawers', 'Fixing Picture Rods and Rails', 'Re-Taping and Re-Painting Venetian Blinds', 'Simple Piano Repairs', 'Sewing Machines: Repairs and adjustments', 'Repairing Defective Floor Boards', 'Repairing Plastering', and 'Repairing Leaky Roofs'. We are proud to republish this antiquarian book now complete with a new introduction on making and restoring furniture.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sedgwick Press
• Release date: Mar 22, 2021
• ISBN: 9781528764940

Book preview

Re-webbing Chair Bottoms

Easy-chair.—A common failing in an easy-chair is the giving way of the webbed bottom. A very cheap, chair might collapse after a year’s use, whereas a thoroughly well-made chair might stand for fifteen years or even longer. When a heavy person is in the habit of dropping into a chair, the webbing needs to be made extra strong. Fig. 2 shows a typical failure, and Fig. 3 shows the state of the bottom. Attempts have been made at repairing it by stitching the web and looping the springs with strips of canvas to keep them in place.

The method of repairing this chair is to turn it upside down, resting the front edge of the seat on perhaps a box to keep it level; spread a sheet over the floor to avoid scratching the woodwork. Strip off the old web with a blunt wood chisel and mallet in the manner shown by Fig. 4. It happens that the spring canvas is not broken, so (after brushing out the dust) the top coil of each spring is stitched to the canvas in the same place as the marks show. There are only three springs in this chair, and three stitches to each will be sufficient if done in the way shown by Fig. 5. A bent-point packing needle and thin twine are used. German web was on the chair, and the same quality is to be put on again; but there were only five lengths before, and an extra one had better be put on (see Fig. 6). The springs are shown sticking up through the webbing, but they are easily worked into position. They should be fairly upright, so that the weight will press the coils closer and not to one side, and they are stitched to the web in the same way as to the canvas (see Fig. 7).

Figs. 1 and 2.—Easy-chair After and Before Re-webbing

Fig. 3.—Bottom of Chair to be Re-webbed

Fig. 4.—Stripping old Webbing

Fig. 5.—Springs Stitched to Canvas

Fig. 6.—Stretching Webbing while Tacking

Fig. 7.—Stitching Springs to Webbing

Fig. 8.—Drawing-room Chair before Re-webbing

A cover of canvas or black linen is neatly tacked over as a finish, and to keep out the dust. The seat is now restored to its original shape, the result being shown by Fig. 1.

DRAWING-ROOM CHAIR

Fig. 8 shows another chair with a broken-down webbed bottom, but this requires quite a different treatment from one having springs. This is a good-class chair of uncommon design. The woodwork is of rosewood, tastefully inlaid, and, although it is not constructed on lines calculated for strength, the material is so sound and the joints so well made that the chair is quite rigid and strong. The stuffed work is light in character and is quite in good condition, as is also the crimson velvet with which it is upholstered, but it requires re-gimping, and the stitched seams to be re-corded.

Fig. 9.—New Webbing on Chair

To re-web the bottom, the stuffed seat must be stripped completely off. First the velvet is carefully untacked, and, without lifting it off, the under-cover of calico and the scrim covering the hair stuffing is also untacked. It can then be lifted away altogether to get at the broken canvas and webs for the purpose of stripping them off.

The front and back seat rails are curved, so, in putting on the new webs, begin by tacking to the centre of the front rail. English web is used, five from front to back and four across, the latter not being stretched so tightly as to take out the hollow of the seat (see Fig. 9). A piece of canvas or strong grey linen is then stretched tightly over and tacked on.

Fig. 10.—Upholsterer’s Curved Needle

The stuffed seat, being all hair, is quite in shape and could be replaced, but whilst it is off it is as well to remove the velvet and calico to beat the dust out of the stuffing without breaking it up; afterwards tack it in place exactly as before. The velvet also is beaten and brushed before being replaced.

There are two corded seams on the top edge of the upholstered back; and the seams on the back end of the arms are also corded. The cord, being shabby, is taken off and replaced with new, which is laid in the seams and pins thrust through it into the stuffing to hold it in place whilst being stitched. This can be done with an ordinary sewing needle and strong thread of a colour to match; but an upholstress would use a small circular needle of the kind shown by Fig. 10. When finished, the pins are taken out and the cord should lie straight and firm in the seam, and no stitches should be seen. The front edges of the arms and round the seat are finished with scroll gimp, fixed with fine, coloured gimp pins (see Fig. 11).

Fig. 11.—Drawing-room Chair after Re-webbing

Levelling Chairs and Tables

IN most homes there is a chair or a table that rocks slightly when in use, this defect being caused by inequalities in the heights or lengths of the legs resulting from the use of green timber originally, from faulty construction, from the effects of wear on a stone or brick floor, or from unfair use. Correction of the defect is not a matter of difficulty and ought always to be undertaken. Be it remarked, a three-legged table or stool never rocks—any object can always be supported solidly on three points; and by applying this well-known fact, it will be seen that if only one leg of an uneven chair or table is altered—either shortened or lengthened—the article will stand firm, although the top or seat, as the case may be, may not necessarily be level.

The article of furniture needs to be tested by standing it on a flat surface; and in the case of a chair it can conveniently be stood on a table. It is useless to test the furniture on an uneven floor;