Nick Projects

I’ve been meaning to make my own dry erase board for a while.  I like using white boards for laying out websites, making todo lists and things like that.  My goal was to make something that was functional but also something that looked nice.  I decided that when I used large white boards I found myself sectioning off areas for different projects.  Iwould line off one area to make a todo list, another for a site and then another for a different site.  I thought it would be a good idea if the board was just sectioned for me.  I sort of modeled my sections off of 11 x 17 paper.  I have 4  11 x 18 sections and the section in the middle is 18 x 16.  Each section has two pieces of panel board on it and the original magnetic / dry erase surface is behind that,  so I have 3 layers if I need them.   The other cool thing about this white board is that I can move the sections and take them to different areas of my home.  I can grab a panel from the center and go work in my living room or kitchen if I need to.

Construction Process:

My first draft started with joining 2 pieces of pine board in the garage to give me a nice looking surface that was about 2ft by 6ft.  I only decided to join pine because I had some,  I would recommend starting with a nice piece of plywood.  It will save time and money.  After the join was completed I decided to stain the pine to give it a darker color.

After reading several posts on lifehacker about magnetic paint and dry erase paint I decided this would be the way to go.

Magnetic Primer:

Rustoleum makes a magnetic primer available from Home Depot for about $20 per pint.  When you pick up the can you realize that their is a ton of metal in it because the can is really heavy.  You then have to mix this metalish tar from the bottom into the paint solution to get something about the consistency of hot tar.  All this was ok,   but when I put the tar on my board it wound up adding quite a bit of texture to the surface.  This is really not optimal for dry erase boards.  I tried to sand down the texture to get a smoother surface but the other problem is that you need a pretty thick coat of this primer built up before you get any magnetic surface.  The instructions on the can say you need at least 3 coats before it will work.  I wound up putting on 4 or 5.  The other thing you find once you are finished with this is that you don’t get a strong magnetic surface,  the strength is about like sticking a refrigerator magnet to your fridge through a legal pad;  it will hold the magnet in place, but not much else.

Dry erase Paint:

Dry erase paint is actually pretty cool,  also about $20 at home depot.  With Dry Erase paint you need to work quickly.  The paint is like a 2 part epoxy,  once mixed you get around 2 hours of useful paint.  The paint also advises that you use 3 coats for a good surface.  My project didn’t require all of the paint to get done,  so I painted the inside of a few doors in the garage.  These surfaces turned out great,  my magnetic primered board…. less great.

Plan B:

The resulting surface would have worked for a board that was lightly used,  the surface allows for writing and erasing fairly well,  but it would have become pretty crappy pretty quickly.  The smooth doors in the garage will be good for quite a while.  Instead of throwing away my work so far,  I decided to buy panel board to use as a dry erase surface.

Panel Board:

Panel board is dirt cheap $11 for a 4ft by 8ft sheet,  and makes an excellent dry erase surface.  I cut out sections of panel board to match the areas I painted on originally. Then I cut some dowel to use as hangers.  If you skip all of the misc painting steps and just stain a piece of cabinet grade plywood this white board could probably be produced for under $60 (depending on the plywood)

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I’ve been reading freakanomics.  One of the stories is about a gentleman who decided to sell bagels by dropping them off and asking people to put the appropriate dollar amount into a box.  This simple business yielded volumes of information about people’s trustworthiness, ethics, and job satisfaction.  I believe the bagel barometer should be used by any company that is concerned about its employees morale or job satisfaction.  Here’s how the experiment should go down:

Management sends out a memo saying that to improve the workplace environment they will have bagles delivered to the office every morning.  The cost for bagles is $1 leave a collection tin next to the bagles.

Each day tally up how many bagles were taken vs how many bagles were paid for.

At the end of each week or every other week send out a scathing email chastizing people for not paying for their bagles.  The email needs to be firm but not overly harsh.  You don’t want to scare people simply make it kown that the bagles are not free and that people are expected to pay for them.  This is to prevent the rule from becoming a guidline and eventually a joke.

What to watch for:  Obviously management should be watching for any dips in the payment rate for bagles.  This change should be tracked and refferenced to any business activities that would disgruntle employees.  If there are layoffs or if hours suddenly change the bagle theft rate should be an indicator of how employees actually feel about whats going on.  If there are no changes in the work environment that would cause employee dissatisfaction this is an indicator of a problem cropping up in employee moralle.  A disgruntled employee is more likely to steal from their employer in small ways before quitting or doing more damage.

In addition to being a relatively low cost experiment the bagle consultant has the positive advantage of making an office a better place.  Who wouldn’t be more happy working in an office where fresh bagles were brought in each morning.   This is a win win.

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