SHOW US YOUR TOOL: MEET A CARPENTER
Time for another installment of our ‘Show Us Your Tool’ interview series. This month we dropped in on a Simonds Homes project to interview Troy Tydell, a self-employed carpenter based in Melbourne. Read on below for his thoughts about nail guns, building new house frames and finding satisfaction on the job.
“We build new house frames. Every week it’s a new job. We do one to two frames a week, all across the north of Melbourne.”
“We used to do lock-up fix too but lugging around tools to do every different job is hard. As it is, I’ve got a big trailer full of tools, so we just do framing at the moment.”
“We wouldn’t be able to do this job without the nail guns. It’d be like the old days, banging everything in by hand. The nail gun cuts time on everything.”
“My old man was a cabinet-maker. He built us cubbyhouses when we were kids, and we always wanted to have a go on the hammer and give it a crack. So I got a passion for woodwork and did cabinetmaking through high school, and when I left I thought I’d do carpentry.”
“It’s about 10 years since I started my apprenticeship, and I’ve been working on my own, as a boss, for about four years now. I just love working with timber and wood.”
“This is a battery-operated nail gun, so it has a gas cartridge inside it. It’s simple to use, and very effective. You can skew-nail with it, anything you want. It makes a world of difference. If we didn’t have this, we’d probably be here for a month.”
“The worst part of my job is the bad weather. I’m self-employed, so I’m also paying my apprentice, Brayden, an hourly wage and I can’t pay him to just sit in the car while it’s belting down rain! Then you get the really hot days where the heat is just unbearable. But working outside is great: you see a lot of different scenery while you work.”
“The best part of my job is the satisfaction of standing back and looking at what I’ve achieved, what I’ve built. The house isn’t finished, obviously, but my part is.”
Legend. Thanks Troy!
Are you working towards building your own carpentry business? For info on our workplace-based training options for the CPC30220 Certificate III in Carpentry, or to find out more about our Certificate IV and Diploma courses in Building and Construction, drop us an enquiry via the links above or give the guys a call on 1300 LEGEND.