woodworking tools

A Piece of History (Sort of)

I went up north for a quick summer weekend and did something I don’t usually do: peruse the antique shops. This was pretty fruitful, honestly. I found a boarded chest made from 12″ x 7/8″ clear pine which will clean up very nicely. It’s about 24x14x14. It was last used as a toy chest (I know from the several Battleship peg pieces inside it) but it has some signs of old tills. More on that another time.

I also found a nice Disston D7 (I think) hand saw, crosscut. The plate is arrow straight with no kinks that I can see. Even the nib is intact. The only defect (aside from a heavy black patina on the blade that comes from being stored in barn-like conditions) is a small chip off the top horn of the tote. Easily fixed (or, honestly, just sanded smooth and left alone). I’ll do a quick restoration post on that one too in the future.

But the best find (in my opinion) was a wooden jack plane in remarkable condition. It’s stamped with “New York Tool Co.” (which my cursory research showed was a brand used by the Auburn Tool Co in the late second half of the 19th century). It’s 16 inches long and seems to be a No. 12. I didn’t even argue with the sticker price at the antique shop (which was $25).

One tiny check on the toe of the plane.

The strike button on the front of the plane is pristine and there is no mushrooming to speak of on the iron (mushrooming happens from consistent use of a metal hammer or mallet to adjust the depth and lateral adjustment of the iron). There are also no mallet dents on the heel of the plane; just a few shallow checks away from the sole.

It’s honestly a bit silly how nice this thing is.

The tote is fully in tact, with just a couple of knicks showing lighter wood below which are probably just from being in a box bumping into other antique store fare (and not from use). The tote itself is a bit wobbly and just need regluing after 130 years. In fact, the only meaningful patina on the entire plane is on the back of the tote (where the palm of the user would be). If I had mineral spirits and denatured alcohol with me on the trip, I probably could have freshened it up to like new.

That could easily just be grime sticking to the exposed end grain and not patina from use.

The mouth is still tight. Not tight for a jack plane, mind you; tight for any wooden plane. The front of the mouth is crisp and 90 degrees to the sides of the sole. The back of the mouth (behind the iron) is a little chipped but that seems pretty common on wooden soled planes where the bed comes to such a fragile point. A couple swipes with a fine cut file will clean it right up. I’m not even sure the sole has ever been flattened, but it didn’t take much to true it with a fore plane. And there are no splits on the cheeks around the wedge.

Seriously. Look at that crisp mouth on a 130 year old wooden jack plane.

The iron looks pretty much fresh to me; I don’t think it’s ever been reground. There were no shavings caught between the iron and the chip breaker when I pulled the two apart; just a little flaky orange rust. Other than being sharpened a bit out of square, and some camming on the cap iron screw, you’d be hard pressed to prove this thing ever actually saw any real use. There aren’t even any of the usual paint splatters or other stains from being near a workbench.

Those Victorian era prisoners sure knew how to make ’em!

All in all, I have a hard time believing that someone made even a part time living with this tool. It’s just too pristine. It’s possible there was a hobbyist in the late 19th century, perhaps an attorney or accountant, who took pride in the upkeep of his tools, even though he rarely put them to heavy use. But that seems a bit too romantic and hits a bit too close to home.

In any event, it will have a good home with me. Even with occasional use (I’m not giving up my metal planes any time soon), this beauty will probably see more action with me that it did in its youth.

Quite a find, if I do say so myself.

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So I Herd U Liek Mudkipz

It’s no secret that I like me a sliding tray in a toolbox. See here. Or here. A pull out tray that covers the whole well is well and good if that’s your thing. I have a vintage craftsman metal toolbox that’s built that way. But I find it gets in the way on the bench.

As shown by the links above, I’ve made a few traveling toolboxes in my day. Any tool storage solution should be customized to tools it will hold, of course. Though much trial and error, I’ve settled on the perfect size (using 5/8″ pine for the case) being roughly 22″ long x 11″ wide x 9″ high. This gives plenty of room in the well for a No. 6 Stanley (my preferred “single” plane), a saw till for a small panel saw (the BTC hardware store saw is shown below, but any small hardpoint saw will fit too) and combination square, a short sweep hand brace and bits, and an eggbeater drill, plus a hammer and a sharpening stone. If the chest were taller, I’d probably add a tool rack to the back wall of the well.

And some other odds and ends.

But a No. 6 is only about 5 1/4″ high, and even a panel saw in its till is less than 6″. What do do with the other 3+” of well space? A sliding tray, of course, that slides front to back and holds everything else I’ll need.

3″ is too deep for a single tray of this size. Nothing you’re carrying You’d waste a ton of space. And 3″ of height is probably enough for two tiers of sliding trays (bottom probably being 1 1/2″ deep (so 1 3/4″ with the bottom)). I’ve certainly done that before in the blue toolbox.

But I thought it would be fun this time to add the second tray inside the first. So I first whipped up a single deep tray with 1/2″ pine in the usual style (1/4″ oak bottom with grain running parallel to the length of the tray, nailed onto the tray) that was about 5″ wide. I also divided off a dedicated chisel compartment, since there will be lots of piling into the rest of the tray.

The divider also let me use up some shorter oak scraps for the inner runners.

To size the inside tray, I found the tallest items that would sit in the bottom of the tray tray (which was either the stock of my marking gauge or my sharpening guide) and sized some thin oak runners to that height, plus 1/8″ (see picture above). Those got glued in to the long sides of the tray. I then knocked together another tray in 3/8″ pine that was pretty much exactly half the length tray and tall enough to fill the remaining depth of the large tray (taking into account the 1/4″ oak tray bottom). The grain of the tray bottom runs perpendicular to the length of the tray this time.

It overlaps the chisel compartment a bit but doesn’t get in the way.

I’ve found the inside tray acts as a bit of a gyroscope when this thing is on the move. The toolbox easily fits in the back seat of the car and I’ve noticed the tray whips around less than if it were a single tray. Perhaps the inner tray shifts a bit on the x axis and takes away some of the y axis momentum (inertia?) of the larger tray. Who knows?

The auger bit seems to have migrated out of the well.

If you need a how-to on making and fitting sliding trays in a tool chest, I highly recommend the Christopher Schwarz 2015 Popular Woodworking article on a Traveling Toolchest (a medium chest that is still big enough for a hobbyist woodworker’s set of tools). Go to the “Interior” section of the article.

This setup works so well, I also added a sliding inner tray to the drawer on my hanging tool cabinet in the shop. More on that later, but a sneak preview below.

No gyroscopic action needed here.

I hope everyone gets some workshop time on the holiday weekend.

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Tiny Workbench

I had in my mind a singular vision. A mini workbench, surrounded by a tray, that sat upon an office desk.  Like those perpetual motion clacking ball desk toys.  But where one could plane small sticks of wood with a block plane in meditative rhythm.  The small curls falling gently into a rimmed collection tray to keep things neat.

I could have sworn such a thing existed. Maybe it was advertised in an old Popular Woodworking issue. It might have been Fine Woodworking or WOOD. But it eluded me.

So I made a prototype. And it turned out great!

As I saw it in my mind.

The bench itself is roughly 1:8 scale. The slab is 12 inches long and 3 inches wide.  1/2 inch thickness would have been to scale, but I bumped it up to 7/8 for stiffness. The wing, which functions as both a tool shelf and a shooting board, is about 1 inch wide and 1/4 inch thick. The planing stop is 1/2 inch square. For those who care, the entire setup is 19 x 7 x 3.

About the footprint of a large gaming keyboard.

Let’s talk materials for a moment. This is just a prototype, so I used some tight grain Spruce framing lumber from up north. In Vermont, where my parents have a house, you can get stuff that has birdseye pattern and blue streaks but still arrow straight grain. It’s beautiful and a joy to work with.

This stock was a bit more plain, but I think still looks good. The only non-Spruce materials in the piece are the planing stop (red oak) and the base of the tray (1/2 inch birch plywood).

Spruce is rather rigid and dimensionally stable, so a good choice for this.

The workbench legs are 1 1/2 inch x 4 inch x 1 inch posts that are rabbeted (cross grain) into the slab top. The oak planing stop is also rabbeted in. The planing stop actually hides some nails reinforcing the joint between the slab and the front legs. The tool shelf is just brad nailed down to the legs.

To attach the bench to the collection tray, the legs are glued and screwed from the underside of the plywood. The tray itself is banded in 1/2 inch spruce just butt jointed around and glued and nailed on. I stuck on some nonskid furniture pads to the underside so it won’t slide around.

Top view with some blanks.

There is admittedly a practical purpose to this piece. There is a step down on the window sill in my office at work. The larger pots overhang the stepdown and it’s unstable without a spacer that’s level with the main sill and fully support the pot. Each spacer needs to be somewhere between 1/2 and 11/16 but the height varies. This will allow me to fine tune some pine 1 x 3/4 spacers on site.

A full size, modern block plane is probably a bit much for this setup. Perhaps I’ll clean up a slightly smaller vintage block plane from the user pile. We’ll see.

When I make a nicer version in mahogany or walnut, I may do a Basic Projects writeup. But for now, the prototype is rather serviceable.

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Bridle Joints on the Hollow Chisel Mortiser

Back during the prime of the pandemic (early 2021), I took the plunge and bought a benchtop hollow chisel mortiser (an “HCM”). At the time, the Powermatic Benchtop Mortiser was on backorder from Southern Tool (who are really great to work with [not a sponsor]). I’ve always hated boring and chopping mortises by hand. I’m totally totally fine with cutting tenons with hand tools. It’s just the donkey work of mortises that I would love to avoid. And my HCM allows me to do so.

So when it came time to cut some large bridle joints for my new forever workbench (I mean it this time!), I couldn’t help but wonder if I could do it on the HCM. I consider myself to be pretty good at following a line with a panel saw and have cut plenty of large bridle joints that way. But bridle joints are just “open” mortise and tenon joints, after all. So cutting bridles on the HCM should be easy enough with just a little planning. It’s not really intended for this purpose, but it works just fine.

First of all, it really helps if all of your leg blanks are S4S and the same dimensions, within a few shavings at least. That way, you can flip the blank in all directions and use the same fence setting for centering the mortise. It’s not fatal if things aren’t exact, as long as you use a consistent reference edge for the matching legs. But it will slow things down if you need to reset the fence after every flip end over end.

Second, leave your leg blank overlong, so there is some meat to support the temporarily enclosed mortise without blowing out. For wood species that split easily, such as Red Oak, you should probably leave a full inch. These legs are poplar, so 1/2″ was fine.

Thirdly, size your mortise to be no more than 4x (or just under 4x, ideally) the size of the bit you plan to use.

That is a broken auger from another hollow chisel mortiser bit that I use to scoop out waste.

I start by defining the walls of the mortise. Assuming the mortise is centered on the leg, cut about halfway through on a full pass, flip end over end, and cut the rest of the way from the other side. Then, you can spin the leg 180 degrees and repeat the two passes. After four total passes, you have the mortise defined as shown above. Repeat for the other 3 legs until the walls of the mortise are all defined.

Now, reset the fence so you are removing half of the material remaining in the middle part of the mortise. If you’ve sized the bridle joint correctly (i.e., no more than 4x the size of your HCM bit), you only need to reset the fence this once. Remove the material only at the base of the mortise with four plunge cuts, flipping the work as before. The base of the mortise will now be fully established. No need to worry about removing the rest of the waste on the HCM, as you’re about to see.

Like so.

Finally, saw off the extra length on the leg (I use my miter chop saw for big cuts like this, but hand saws are fine too). BAM! You’ve got an open mortise. You may have a small strip of waste holding the inner chunk on. Just snap it off and you’re good.

The waste falls out in two pieces.

If needed, a wide chisel or a medium cut file makes quick work of smoothing any unevenness on the inside of the open mortise. But if your HCM is well set up, this may not be an issue.

Some quick paring work on the walls and the base and this will be joinery ready.

Is this the most efficient way to cut bridle joints? No, not at all. Either a table saw or a band saw works faster and probably better. But I’m still learning to set up my little band saw and I wasn’t confident the cheek cuts wouldn’t wander horribly. Plus I already had the HCM set up for mortising in the lower stretchers so it was quick to move over to this operation.

While it may be a single purpose tool, I believe the HCM is the second most time saving stationary tool for the hand tool woodworker (right after the thickness planer). It’s far quieter than a router or simply chopping the mortise with chisel and mallet, and produces more predictable results. It’s faster than boring and paring out a mortise (whether with a drill press, a hand drill or a brace) and makes only the same amount of mess. All of which makes it ideal for small space woodworking.

To be clear, you don’t need a hollow chisel mortiser as a hand tool woodworker. But if I have a batch of mortises to knock out, odds are that’s where you’ll find me.

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Apartment Woodworking: Year 10 Retrospective (Part 2)

For several years, the floor of my workshop has been the OSB top of DriCore tongue and groove subfloor squares. DriCore is a modern miracle (not a sponsor, just to be clear) and going from working on the bare concrete of the basement to a fully insulated, slightly cushioned wood floor was nothing short of staggering. Not to mention eliminating the risk of a falling chisel needing a full regrind by landing edge down to the concrete. I’ve recently added some tongue and groove laminate on top of the DriCore which, even though it’s darker in color, it has actually brightened the room (I assume because the albedo of the shiner floor is higher than the OSB of the DriCore squares).

That lonely Veritas jointer plane on the back wall.

Since adding the laminate floor, I’ve been working off my 98″ Nicholson workbench, made of hard maple. This bench has by far the best leg vise I’ve ever made. It works smoothly, doesn’t bind and the foot operated cog gets real momentum because of the heft (8/4 white oak). It’s still too big for the space, and honestly could use another 2″ of benchtop depth (being a hair under 22″). But it’s the only bench currently in the room. My last buddy to buy a house needs a better workbench than the one I made him pre-pandemic. So I’m giving him my proper Moravian knockdown bench. And with my outdoor workbench neatly stacked in the garage, I’ve got room (and time) to make another full size workbench. But more on that later.

Blue skies and green grass are only a month or two away.

I like the vise on the maple Nicholson when cutting tenons. Unlike a pinboard variety, the cog and screw parallel guide easily adjusts between holding the tenon board widthwise to cut the tenon shoulders and cheeks and holding the mortise board lengthwise to chop and pare out the mortise. Although, in fairness, I’ve been using a hollow chisel mortiser more and more these days to do the mortise chopping.

All those tenons are currently for a new sharpening station. Essentially a trestle table about the size of a sawhorse (and, quite frankly, patterned off a Krenov-style sawhorse). The frame is made of scrap Douglas Fir 2×4 leftover from the lumber rack build and the top will be Spruce offcuts from a planting table built up in Vermont. When it’s done, it will also have a drawer for saw sharpening gear. I might even use full extension, metal drawer glides that can open from either side.

Haven’t decided yet whether to angle the ends of the feet like Krenov did.

I had missed having a dedicated sharpening station that stashes in the corner. When I was working on the green Moravian, the maple Nicholson was pushed up against the wall and the sharpening station was all the way at the end. Besides having to squeeze in between my tool chest and whatever I was working on, the rest if the workbench top got super cluttered all the time. This new station will hold everything it needs to without any extra room to accumulate detritus. It will also be more accessible.

Just look in the background. What a mess. Also, a good shot of the leg vise cog mechanism.

After I finish the sharpening station, the next thing is to take down the lumber rack on the right wall. It barely stores any lumber and just collects clutter (seeing a theme here?). I’ll move whatever lumber (mostly reclaimed red pine) is on it to the new lumber rack (by, unironically, hanging the racks on the back side of the lumber rack posts). That will free up more than a foot of usable floor space (and force me to organize the other crap on the racks currently).

That’s all for now. Will share some pictures when the sharpening station is finished.

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Efficient Fettling

Before the new year, I essentially finished the carcass on a new, streamlined traveling tool chest. I had made a low profile Dutch Tool Chest fairly recently that, unfortunately, didn’t quite work out for its intended purpose. Long story short, I miscalculated the size of the lower compartment and nothing quite fits without effort. Another inch or so and it would be fine. It’s also a bit wider than it needs to be.

So that means it’s time to make another one!

Lee Valley strap hinges are great quality but they are never quite straight.

This isn’t a post about the new chest itself, but here are some quick details: 9/16″ Eastern White Pine carcass; 3/4″ EWP tongue and groove back boards; Southern Yellow Pine lock, battens and catches; Tremont Nail cut nails throughout. Overall size 24″ x 23″ x 12″. Lower compartment is 9″ high.

As I was making the lid (always the worst part of any tool chest build), I decided to start painting the case. Then, after three coats of paint, I dry fit the lid and discovered the top of the well is rather twisted. The front right corner was about 3/32″ higher than it should have been, so the lid rocked pretty badly. If you’ve never had to level the top of a Dutch Tool Chest after assembly, know that you can’t just continuously plane the top edge like you would with a traditional square box where it’s all edge grain. If you’re not careful, you’ll ram into the end grain of the side board and risk spelching the case side. And it’s awkward.

Instead, whenever I need to level a cross grain corner joint, I start with a chisel. Mark the depth with a gauge and chop, bevel down, until you scallop out enough of the end grain where the two boards meet to give clearance to your plane bed. You can now plane down the the long grain of the front board to depth without slamming into the end grain of the side board. Then, just take down the hump in the end grain of side board until it’s straight and flush with the new corner height. Once everything is about there, one long continuous pass starting from the far front corner and ending at the near back corner finishes it off.

I took a tiny bit off the far back corner as well.

Moral of the story: check for twist before you apply three coats of paint. Or, better yet, before you attach the front board at all.

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A Love Letter to Impact Drivers

I made a comment on a recent post about how I ever managed to live without an impact driver for almost a decade of woodworking. I’d like to expound on that a bit more.

As folks may know, I build a lot of workbenches. I haven’t actually built one for myself in a while. I’ll find a design that seems intellectual stimulating, build it, and then gift it to a friend or family member. So whenever I’m at the lumber yard, if there is a particularly wide and clear slab of 12/4 or 16/4 lumber (typically ash, poplar, douglas fir, or red oak), I can’t usually help myself. The pile of slabs was becoming a problem, so I made a full size lumber rack. Not one of those wall hangers (Bora, you’re great, but I am constantly worried my entire wall is going to tumble down). A proper, free standing, rolling cart.

Do you like my “The English Woodworker” style saw horses in front?

There are probably 250 star drive construction screws of either 2 1/2″ (65 mm) or 3 1/2″ (90mm) screws in the entire assembly. As much as I’d love to say I drove each with a brace and bit, I in fact used an impact driver. It’s just so useful and effective (if a bit loud; I wear foam earplugs for work like this). To put it in perspective, I wore out not one but two (!) of the included star drive bits in the boxes of screws. I know these aren’t of the highest quality, but still.

I used a lot of what I learned from the television easel project in making this project. That is, the lumber rack is a series of posts set into a foot that is offset from center based on the calculated center of gravity when loaded with lumber. With a 24 inch foot and 13″ or so of shelf, I calculated that the post should be centered at roughly 8″ from the back of the foot.

So each post of the lumber rack was comprised of the following, all 2×4 framing lumber, glued and screwed together (a la Naked Woodworker workbench) after drilling clearance holes for the screws.

  • One vertical beam at 72″ high (part of this is a tenon that laps into a dado in the foot)
  • Four shelf spacers of 15″ high (although the top one is cut to length)
  • Three shelf bars at 16″ long
  • One foot beam at 24″ long
  • Two foot spacers, on at 6″ long (back) and one at 14.5″ long (front) [these create the dado around the vertical beam tenon)
I made four posts, but one of them was like 1/2″ off every single shelf height so I scrapped it.

With the posts made, it was time for the base. I started by joining the two end posts with an 84″ long beam, and added a 27″ long end cap on both (creating an enclosed mortise for the tenon on the vertical beam, rather than just a lap joint). Then I added spacers between the ends and the middle post (to form dadoes) and tied everything together with an 87″ long cap beam on top. The back cap beam also created a convenient catch for storing a few things vertically, leaning against the posts.

First cap beam installed as shown above.

After adding a long rail to plumb up and tie together the tops of the posts (with spacers to make more dadoes), it was time to add some bearers beneath the post feet. These, made of 2×6 (instead of 2×4), would both (a) further support and secure the posts and (b) give a wide surface (away from the joinery screws) to attach some heavy duty casters.

Nice detail of the end assemblies here.

The last step (aside from knocking down the rough corners with an orbital sander) was to add a diagonal brace to each post, reinforcing the base of each post. I’m not 100% sure these were needed, as the posts were each secure and restrained by (w) a tenon that lapped into each foot assembly, (x) cap beams front and back on top of the foot, (y) a bearer below where the casters attach, and (z) a shitload of glue and screws on the general base assembly. But they make me feel better and this thing will have about half a ton of lumber at the outset. It was either this or add some rachet straps, which looked ugly(ier) to me.

Diagonal braces seen here.

I am sure (because I checked) there are plans out there for prettier lumber racks. And I absolutely could have spent 10x the time and 2x the money mortising 4×4 posts and drawboring everything. I wish I could say otherwise, but other than a combination square and a marking knife for some more precise cuts, I did not use a single traditional hand tool on this entire project.

But when you need a giant lumber rack, and you’ve got handy a chop saw, an impact driver, some 2×4’s, and a giant box of screws, you do what you have to. I even think I learned a thing or two in the making.

And, most importantly, I can at least walk around in my basement again.

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New Year 2023 – Remake a Hand Saw

Another year on the Gregorian calendar has passed and I’m back in the workshop. As I always say, “ABCD – Always be Carpen them Diems!” And today, like every other New Year’s Day, is no different.

My first project of the year is making a panel saw from “scratch”. Those quotes are doing some pretty heavy lifting, as the plate is taken from a 26″ vintage Simonds 10 TPI crosscut hand saw. I’m not in the mood to cut new teeth today. The plate is in very good shape but the handle was a mess. Clearly an aftermarket job, the slot for the saw plate was at like 10 degrees to the handle and it made for terrible hang.

So first I made a new tote. There are a ton of good tutorials on the yutubs about this, so I’m not going to offer any real pointers here. However, a small oscillating spindle sander (I have the handheld one from Wen, which seems to be a knockoff of the Triton model) makes the job a lot quicker. I don’t have a band saw, so bringing the outline of the tote into flat on the OSS (instead of by hand with rasps and files) is a godsend. Especially on quartersawn hard maple.

Once the outside was shaped, I took my cues from the BTC Hardware Store Saw and busted out the trim router with a chamfer bit. Once the hard arrises are sanded down, it’s just as comfortable as full rounds. Plus, the intersection of the chamfers made a cool lamb’s tongue-like feature at the bottom of the tote, without having to do an actual lamb’s tongue.

I used the Blackburn Tools handle pattern and stayed pretty true to the overall shape.

When I make the next hand saw tote, if I use this pattern again, I will lighten the chamfer along the front (seen left, where it meets the saw plate). That heavy chamfer, as cool as it looks, nearly overlapped with the top saw nut and left a fragile edge that will probably break off soon.

Next I had to modify the plate to fit the tote. That vertical dotted line on the pattern to the right of the saw nuts shows where the plate seats into the tote. Problem is, the sourced plate did not have a straight line at the heel. That means it’s angle grinder time. I just use a scrap of plywood as a fence (learned that one from Pask Makes) and go to town. I also nibbed off the corner at the heel.

I am aware the guard is off. This operation doesn’t work with the guard on.

The angle grinder leaves the plate rather work hardened at this point. Files still work, but you really have to draw file to get down to fresh steel. I pop it in the saw vise and use the same jig for jointing the teeth. It’s important this be straight and true so it seats nicely in the tote.

You can see the reshaped heel, before a bit of rounding.

I didn’t get pictures of it, but I next cut the slot in the tote for the plate. You can freehand this (like the guy who last owned the saw did), but three is a better way. Just clamp to a flat surface (like a benchtop) another panel saw with a thinner plate and a fine set to the bench with a spacer underneath that centers the cut. Then draw the tote, flat against the bench and cut the slot as deep as you can. You can then finish the cut by hand in the vise, as the portion of the slot you already cut will guide the saw the rest of the way. Lee Valley has an excellent guide on this. If the slot is slightly off center (mine was by about 1/32″), just plane down the thicker side.

Now it’s time for drilling holes.

Now came the part I was dreading. When re-handling panel saws in the past, I used the existing handle as a pattern and located the saw nuts exact where they had been on the previous tote. For this, I was starting fresh and that meant drilling new holes in the plate. The spring steel plate. With a cheap benchtop drill press.

I had previously drilled 1/16″ pilot holes through the tote and bored the initial recesses for the saw nuts. So I started by clamping assembled saw onto the drill press table and locating the 1/16″ holes, which I then drilled through the plate. I then set the handle aside, recentered the drill press on each pilot hole in the plate, and clamped down the plate to the drill press table. You do not want a spinning hand saw plane. Then I just worked my way up from 1/16″ to 7/32″ incrementally until there were three 7/32″ holes in the plate. In truth, I cooked about four 7/32″ drill bits. It’s just too much for my little drill press to handle. But they were cheap drill bits (scavenged from various box store sets).

All that was left to finish the tote was drilling out the saw nut holes (9/32″ for the slotted nuts and 1/4″ for the medallion and bolts) and tweaking the depth of the recesses. I think I set the recesses in a little deep, but it works. Some boiled linseed oil really makes the quartersawn holographics of the hard maple pop.

Medallion side.
Nut side.

I still need to hack off some of the toe to get the plate itself down to about 19″ of tooth line. That, in my experience, makes the plate stiff enough to not need a half back or magnetic guide for basic joinery. Plus it gets rid of that kink that always develops about 5-6″ from the toe of every 26″ hand saw. And, of course, that will allow it to fit in the toolbox.

The hang of the saw is a bit toe heavy, which makes me think it should be a medium rip (8-10 TPI). I find that useful for crosscutting wider, thicker stock on the saw bench and still able to rip efficiently at the vise. A saw like that is a workhorse for my travel toolbox. Once the BLO dries, it’s time to carpe some more diems and reshape the teeth.

But, for now, Happy New Year and I hope you find some time in the shop soon. Thanks for being a reader and stay tuned for some new and exciting things this year.

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Apartment Woodworking: Year 10 Retrospective (Part 1)

I recently celebrated my 10th woodworking anniversary. About this time in 2012, I got sick of paying for furniture that didn’t quite match my sensibilities and took matters into my own hands. I’ve probably covered this before, but growing up, we were a New Yankee Workshop household (not a Woodwright’s Shop) household. So when I decided to get back into woodworking as an adult, I went first for some power tools. A home center run with my father resulted in 12″ chop saw, a plunge router kit, a cordless handheld tool bundle, and a boatload of wood screws (plus one hard point saw and one chisel). Those tools alone got me through a bed (that was reclaimed into the base frame for my bar), a desk (that was reclaimed into the base frame for my regular outdoor workbench), and a console table (reclaimed into god knows what).

But I quickly gravitated toward working primarily without power. Not just because it’s loud and dusty using a plunge router in your foyer, no matter how great your shop vac. But also because it’s meditative to me. Now I am sure there are some folks who Zen out with the random orbit sander. But not I. My happy place is a No. 6 or No. 7 hand plane and a stack of rough sawn lumber to S4S.

My other happy place.

Sure, I still have that same chop saw and cordless circular saw. And I regularly use them, along with a hollow chisel mortiser and a thickness planer. I even bought an impact driver a couple months back and can’t believe how I’ve lived without one for all these years. But the fact is, nowadays my power tools support my hand work; not the other way around.

Although I joke that I am an artist, I will never make anything that ends up in a museum. I’m not a savant at anything woodworking related (although I consider myself well above average at hand cut dovetails). I have a day job, that keeps me very busy. And in these 10 years, I’ve devoted enough time to the craft to have picked up a thing or two. And I’d like to share that collected wisdom with the world.

This will be a multi-part series. I’m not sure how many installments there will be, and I certainly expect I won’t make it straight through without deviating to regular posts. I have literally no sponsors.

Getting Started in Woodworking

If you’re here, it may be because you’ve searched “Woodworking in an Apartment” or “Small Space Woodworking” and took a flyer. If so, welcome. I’m James and I have very strong opinions on literally everything.

If you think you might want to get into hand tool woodworking with a limited tool kit and limited space, there are better resources than me. You should go to YouTube and check out Paul Sellers and Richard Maguire. Paul and Richard are giants to me. Paul’s 10 part workbench video came out a few months before I started woodworking (although I didn’t discover Paul until 2014, after 2 years of fapping about with power tools). Paul is like a combination of Mr. Rogers and Bob Ross.

Richard started posting a year into my woodworking career. Paul’s website, Common Woodworking, didn’t exist when I needed it most. Richard’s site, The English Woodworker, has long form content (both paid an unpaid) that cannot be beat. Richard is at the same time exceedingly practical and esoteric. Trust me; you’ll see.

So check their stuff out and maybe come back here if you want more of those very strong opinions of mine. If you’re open to using more substantial power tools, the Woodworkers’ Guild of America and the Wood Whisperers Guild are both good resources.

Beginner Woodworker Hand Tools

People have written entire books on this question. I have my own thoughts, sure. My only piece of real input is to buy a few tools of good quality, rather than a bunch of tools of crappy quality. But if you want my 10 year retrospective take on the absolute core tool kit, here it is.

  • Hardpoint panel saw from the home center (Home Depot has DeWalt; Lowes has Craftsman; I have used both)
  • 1/2″ (and maybe 1″ too) Lee Valley bevel edge chisel (the ones with the clear handle; they work both for fine work and mortising)
  • No. 5 Stanley Bailey pattern Hand Plane (Patrick Leach at http://www.supertool.com/ can get you a good worker that won’t take much to restore; sign up for his monthly tool list so you can build your kit with good vintage stuff if you want to go forward)
  • Stanley 10-049 folding utility knife (Paul Sellers swears by this knife and so do I; get it from Amazon)
  • Thorex double face mallet (both Paul Sellers and Richard Maguire use one and so do I; get it from Amazon)
  • 12′ tape measure (the Starrett “exact” one is pretty great, and cheap, from Amazon)
  • 12″ combination square (I use a Starrett, but Lee Valley sells a 12″ in a set with a 6″; they are pretty accurate for the price)
  • Taytools double sided diamond plate sharpening stone (these are pretty good for the price, Amazon available, but also get a sharpening stone holder from powertec or peachtree and some 3 in 1 oil)
  • Vise type honing guide for plane and chisel sharpening (I like the eclipse-style one you can get from Lee Valley, but make sure to make a stop block system for repeatable angles)
  • Cordless drill driver (let’s face it, you probably have one already)

And that’s it. Don’t forget the glue and the mechanical pencil.

You can probably get away with a speed square from the home center instead of a combination square.

Workbenches

I currently work on a Moravian-style knock down workbench based on Will Myers’ excellent video series. And Christopher Schwarz of Lost Art Press is the modern authority on workbenches of all styles. His Ingenious Mechanicks book changed my life.

But for my money, I would check out either The Naked Woodworker workbench, which can be built with just dimensional framing lumber from the home center and the tool kit described above. Or check out Rex Krueger on YouTube and his “Joiners Workbench“, which is similar but arguably easier to build with the same kit.

Or just find a thick plank and make that Grandpa Amu low workbench, which I love.

I’ve built a few of those Chinese-style low benches, two of which are shown in this one picture.

I’m going to stop it there for now. I could otherwise go on forever.

Btw, I’m not on twitter anymore. I have a strict “no social media owned by delusional man child” policy (I’ve been off facebook for several years for the same reason and never had an instagram).

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Incremental Advancement

I am by no means an innovator. Folks have had small shops in the past and they will have them in the future. I invent nothing, as the saying goes. But because I am a hobbyist woodworker who strives for a manageable tool kit within a finite shop space, I don’t always have the exact tool I need at hand.

Take, for instance, the timber framed saw horses I’m making as a gift for a new homeowner (and close friend who will inevitably ask me for help on home improvement projects). I’m using the Richard Maguire design (he calls them saw donkeys, lol). Which means beefy tenons with drawbore pegs to keep everything cinched under the extra strain of having no lower stretcher.

Like so.

The most important part of a drawbore is ensuring the peg can pass cleanly through the joint, flexing but not plowing or crushing as it’s pounded through the offset holes. That’s why it’s important to observe the three finer points of successful drawboring: (i) don’t use too extreme of an offset on the tenon hole, (ii) use a longer taper on the front of the peg, and (iii) ease the entrance to the hole on the tenon. The fourth point (in my experience) is to wax your pegs, but some folks like to glue their drawbored pegs in. I don’t.

When doing smaller drawbores for furniture, I have a couple of machinist alignment pins that work great as drawbore pins where 5/16″ and 3/8″ pegs are used. You assemble the joint, insert the drawbore pin, and the taper of the drawbore pin draws the joint to full closer and also reams (really compresses, but still) the entrance of the hole on the tenon (thus fulfilling finer point (iii) above and illustrating the purpose of finer point (ii) above).

For these sawhorses, though, the pegs are 5/8″, and I’m not even sure they make a machinist alignment pin for that size. So, instead, I use a countersink bit to ease the start of the holes in the tenon. This is functionally the same as properly using a drawbore pin.

I almost always use a hollow chisel mortiser for these big mortises, but the tenons are cut by hand.

In fairness, I do use 5/8″ pegs for a lot of workbench and workbench-adjacent building. So maybe I would be justified owning an appropriately sized drawbore pin. But drawbore pins are single purpose tools. My countersink bit, however, has many uses across the full gamut of my woodworking. And I’m not sure a drawbore pin of the right size would have much effect on the oak, ash and maple that I use in my workbench building activities. So I will continue to use my countersink bit. And I could probably take the drawbore pins out of my toolkit entirely.

I learned all of the above finer points of drawboring through trial and [lots of] error. I’ve had pegs fail to flex through the offset hole, split down the middle and blow out the back of the board with the mortise (and in doing so fail to cinch the joint together). I’ve had pegs fail to flex through the offset hole and snap (making the usual solution, to drive a new peg all the way through the joint, unavailable because the peg didn’t clear the offset hole cleanly). And I’ve had pegs that made it through the offset hole and still do both of the same.

But if there was one of the rules that each situation could have been fixed by, it’s probably finer point (iii): easing the entrance to the holes in the tenon. And when all it takes is a countersink bit, that’s a pretty efficient solution.

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