Fireplace Screen

This is a fireplace screen that I designed and built for my friends Melanie and Dave's new house. This was a long project because I work slow and I'd never done anything like this before. I kept having to stop and find solutions to problems I didn't even know existed until I ran into them.




Here is the money shot. Below you'll find a description and more pictures than you ever wanted to see of this thing being built.




Here it is with it's doors open. I designed it with the thought that if I kept the upper edge straight and made the bottom curved I would get an interesting surface out of the screen, which happened for the most part. I originally conceived of something a little more wiggly where the doors come together instead of a straight line but the screen material would have had to have been much more flexible and the hexagon pattern was well loved by all so we decided that this was the best thing to do.

The doors fit very snugly into the frame, so much so that they won't stay all the way closed unless you hole them closed somehow. While I thought this was a problem at first I realized that it was actually going to work out well. Either you have doors that want to stay closed and you need a way to open them, or you have doors that want to be open and you need to find a way to keep them closed. Since my doors wanted very much to be a little bit open all I had to do was make a simple latch at the top of the firescreen to hold them closed. This enabled me to skip handles or other opening devices entirely and maintain a clean, smooth surface on the piece. Just pull on the little latch and the doors pop open by themselves enough to get your fingers in and open them the rest of the way. Thankfully the doors stay cool enough to allow this to work without burnt fingers.




The entire screen is made of 1/2" steel angle iron and 3/8" square steel tubing. The bottom part of the frame is the first bend I had to make. It was bent by hand using the vice to secure it.




Here is the base of the frame being welded to the vertical pieces. Originally I had intended to have the vertical pieces twist, which would allow for no gap at the connection point. The vertical pieces of the doors would twist to match but I realized that the hinges would be off center from each other if the frame twisted making the door unable to open.




After giving up on the fun twisting idea, I patched the gap by welding some scrap metal to the joint. This is looking at frame from the bottom.




With the frame completed, it was time to start bending what would become the bottom of the doors. This piece was bent by hand in the vice just like the bottom of the frame. It took a while to get the bends to match but it turned out well.




Now the outside borders of the door were complete. The next step is putting in the upright sections where the doors will join in the center.




Here is the frame with the outside borders of the doors nested inside of it.




In order to get the vertical sections in the center of the door I had to figure out exactly where to cut the door piece in two. Finding center on the top was easy but the bottom required a T-square on the center point of the top that was extended down by some more measury stuff.




Saw saw saw saw saw...




After the cut was made to separate the door the two vertical pieces were cut and fitted to the doors while they were in the frame to make sure they would remain the right shape and size.




At this point I got the first look at the interesting shapes the firescreen makes when the doors are open. Going with the straight top and curved bottom worked out well and I was glad I didn't go the WDCH wiggle route. Unfortunately once the hexagon mesh was put on the effect wasn't quite as striking, but no mesh, no fire prevention goodness.




Here are the doors complete with the mesh brazed on. The screen is finished except for hinges and whatever handles will be attached. Originally my thought was that the mesh would be riveted on. When it came time to do it however I thought about the little bumps that would be all over the place and decided that silver brazing the mesh all the way around the perimeter would give the door the clean look I wanted it to have. It was a lot of work and the screen is fairly delicate so I came pretty close to melting it in a couple places but in the end it was the best way to do it.




The first hinge is being fit to the door. One of the problems I ran into was how to attach the hinge to the door when the door frame was buried beneath the screen. I thought about this a lot but ultimately it didn't need much thought because there was only one thing I could do. I sliced a little hole through the screen just big enough to pass the hinge though. The screen is still enough so that it kept it's shape just fine. Here I have the hinge held in place with a clamp and a piece of the 1/2" angle iron attached to create the correct space for the frame when the doors are attached to the frame.




A close up of the hinge welded in place and how it is passing through the screen. There are two hinges on each door.




Here is one of the doors with both hinges welded on. This one is ready to be attached to the frame.




Here's the setup for welding the door to the frame. I had to clamp the doors together and to the frame in the top center because the fit was very tight and they kept wanting to pop open. I needed the doors to be held in place just like they would be when closed later so the hinges would be welded on in the correct position.




I'm not sure why I decided to weld the hinges on to both the door and the frame. If they wear out they are going to be a pain to replace. The hinges have removable pins at least so the doors can be separated from the frame if need be. I think I didn't rivet them because access to the hinge attach point was very limited due to the screen being in place so I just had to sneak the TIG welder in as best I could.