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Fred Woodall laments:

As everyone knows it is one thing to make a satisfactory repair on a

freshly damaged piece of furniture. It is quit another to correct a bad

repair. Here are four items that arrived yesterday.

My shop sees this quality of work almost daily from all over the country.

Is it just me or have I become a haven for other people's screw ups?

Item #1 - Table Pedestal

Three of the four legs had been broke off and glued back on

crooked with epoxy. One of the legs (still attached) has a ¾"

clearance from the floor. The thin sheet metal was added to the

bottom to keep the leg attached to the base once it broke off again.

Item #2 - Chair

Webbing was added underneath the chair over the old. The nails
used split the wood in several areas on both sides. (Moving company
was charged $140. Invoice description: Repair torn webbing).

Item #3 - Chair leg broken off.

Glued back with epoxy and a ¼" piece of plywood was cut out

and attached to the inside leg from top to bottom. I can not begin

to speculate to what purpose the plywood serves in this attempted
repair. Bondo is everywhere. Here again I have no idea as to why.

Item #4 - Table Pedestal

All four legs broken off. Glued back crooked with white glue. Two

¼" wooden dowels were drilled into each leg from underneath.
Notice how close to the edge each dowel is. The factory support

brace was removed and not put back on.

Fred Woodall
Houston, Texas

John Polgar adds:

I just went to one yesterday, brand new furniture with "white glove delivery
service". hahahaha! There were over 40 different damage points.

Anyway, here's a picture of what the delivery company did to "touch up" a "scratch".

(in my attempt at Mr. Rogers impersonation...)
Ok boys and girls, can you say, El Marko?

John Polgar
Clearwater, FL

Ned Cutler joins in:

Hi All,

I can't resist. I had a customer come to me with 6 upholstered
chairs. The customer asked me if I could tighten the joints of the
chairs that were obviously quite loose. I told them yes, but I
would have to remove the upholstery and springs make the
repairs then have the chairs re-upholstered.

To my shock they said that the chairs had just come back from
the upholsterer and that the upholsterer had charged them from
repairing the joints already.

The sad part is that my initial shock was nothing compared to my
shock of what I found when I removed the upholstery. See
attached pictures.

These chairs were (according to the customer) late 1700 English
walnut, hand carved dining room chairs. To repair the loose
joints the upholstery company instead of cleaning the joints and
re-gluing with hide glue, used a fabric staple gun and stapled from
top to bottom of the joint bridging between the leg and side
pieces. All this action really accomplished was to split the wood
in many places.

I called the customers up and had them come to the shop to view
the massacre. Needless to say they were horrified and ended up
paying me to pull out what must of been 100 staples per chair,
repairing the damage made by the staples, then repairing the
joints and then re-upholstering the chairs.

Ned Cutler
LEJAC Enterprises