It’s a fact of life… Everything eventually wears out. Bruce Kieffer found a great $2 “fix” for worn out table saw arbor threads. It’s a super simple solution that saves a lot of cash and repair work.
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Money-Saving DIY Festool Domino Tenons
Reduce the cost of using a Festool Domino by making your own tenons. It’s easy, and you’ll be surprised by how the savings can add up over the years. Here’s the how-to recipe, along with a list of benefits of DIY Dominoes.
Rare Earth Magnet Chisel Rack
Problem. I have a real mess in my chisel storage drawer. Good chisels bounce around far too much, and I have to protect every chisel edge otherwise they get banged and dinged. Idea. Will a pair of rare earth magnets hold a chisel rack? Will the setup work for all the different size of chisels… Read more »
Table Top Fracture Repair
Much of the work I do utilizes beautiful, live-edge hardwood slabs like this 34” wide piece of Red Oak. Because my sources are often different, I rarely know how long the wood has been drying, what the conditions were, and if the wood will move much when I get it back to my shop. I… Read more »
Sign Your Work
Sign Your Work A few years ago I reworked a set of candle sticks for the local Masonic Lodge, stripping off the many layers of old paint and exposing the fine details. As I handled the hollow candle sticks I could hear something rattling around inside one of them. I finally pried off the bottom… Read more »
Fix a Misplaced Mortise
Oops. When using loose tenons on a recent project I cut the mortise on the wrong face of a board. Has this happened to you? Don’t panic. We can make that mortise nearly invisible with a Dutchman, a woodworking wood for a plug. Why is it called a Dutchman? I don’t know…just because. Using the… Read more »
A Bright Idea for Photographing Your Work
In an effort to better document my work (and possibly move into sales), I’ve begun to focus on my photography skills. One major need is light, preferably diffuse and bright-white. After checking my options online, I decided that cheap clamp lights sold in big-box stores were a better idea. Only thing is, they cast harsh… Read more »
Get a Grip – On Your Clamp Handles
Bar clamps provide many advantages over other types of clamps, so I use them a lot in my shop. One downside to their design, however, is they can be difficult to grip as you tighten or loosen them. I noticed that some of the newer designs have addressed this by applying some rubber material to… Read more »
Drill a Hole Without a Center Point
I made a quick fix the other day I thought I’d share with you. I needed to make a 5/8″ wide stopped dado with a round end. I didn’t have a 5/8″ router bit, so I planned to make the round ends with a Forstner bit, and the length of the dado by taking multiple… Read more »
Hooking Up Your Tools for Better Dust Collection
Where the proverbial “rubber meets the road” in dust collection is where the ductwork ties into the tool to extract dust while the tool is in operation. In my opinion most tool manufacturers treat dust collection as an afterthought, and do not design the tools to provide adequate removal of dust and debris. To put… Read more »
