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I want to build a bench from Schwarz's book, the English bench. He mentions buying 2x12's and ripping them into the 2x4's needed. I'm very happy to do this, but I don't have a bandsaw or a jointer/planer to make them happy. What do I do? Buy them first? But how do I know this is going to be a hobby I'm going to enjoy before I spend the money?
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Mar 8, 2009 21:24
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That Inca band-saw looked good, but Yorkshire is about as far away as you can get from where I live in England without being Scotland! Nevermind though, it's given me an idea of what to look out for. I have taken your advice, and am thinking about plans and ideas for building a pair of sawhorses. So, thanks again all.
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Mar 15, 2009 23:21
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I've decided that in the climate I can't really afford to buy power tools of a quality that I would want, so I'm going to try the hand tool route. After reading the Collins Woodworking Encyclopaedia, I've come up with the following that I should look into getting 'decent' versions of a few of these (please forgive me for not using the correct names, the book is at home and I'm at work): * Set of chisels (1/4" up to 1") * Ripsaw * Backsaw * Jack plane I've already got, or will require some of these ancilliarys: * Whetstone * Mitre Box * The measuring stick with to transfer/scribe marks (oh god retard) Is that about right?
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Apr 29, 2009 10:17
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PMan_ posted:If you're going to be working exclusively with planes and chisels, you'll need to learn how to properly tune them as well as get a solid sharpening system going, otherwise even the best planes will shortly be useless. Could you point me in the right direction for where to find this out? My Collins book has side-columns of two or three part illustrations showing tasks like sharpening things - but would like to get a second opinion. I feel like a doofus, but why would I need granite, wet/dry AND stones? is that the progression from a totally fubar'ed chisel to a good one? What's the consensus on the japanese tools? They feature pretty prominently in The Book, but I don't know if that's because they're novelties or noteworthy.
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Apr 29, 2009 21:11
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Amazon wishlist here I come. Oh, speaking of which - everything I've read pretty much everywhere says to use a jointer/planer to prepare sawn timber. Is it a case of going at it with a fore plane and hoping, or is there a particular special technique for getting timber nice and square by hand?
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Apr 29, 2009 22:18
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God, just been reading the 'Hand Tool Essentials' by Popular Woodworking and my god - three sets of stones, a diamond plate, and a honing guide is going to set me back $200! Going to be scouring the flea-market/bootfairs as soon as I get a chance for this allegedly venerable Stanley No. 11 - I think for my first rough bits it'll do.
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Apr 30, 2009 22:30
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anaemic, thanks for that - I'll definately look into those stones from Axminster. With regards to the honing guide - I'd never heard of it until reading this book, but the guy says despite the nay-saying it's a good tool to get a primary and secondary bevel without much effort?
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May 1, 2009 14:14
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Idiot question, while I'm watching Mr. Bubinga do his work. With hand tools, how do you get a perfectly square end on a piece of dimensional lumber? I mean, I know the mechanics of a curved plane blade, but I can't figure out how you'd go about doing it while keeping the piece at the exact required length. Crosscut it perfectly the first time?
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May 2, 2009 22:30
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Show and tell! Went to the bootfair today and spent some money - £25/$35 in total and picked up quite a bit.  The marking gauge still has a point, there's only surface rust on a few bits  I missed out on a Stanley #4, but found this baby. I'm encouraged by the fact the same model is in the Popular Woodworking hand tool book, and the handle is worn black.  I also picked up some wooden planes. I've heard these are harder to use than metal planes, but at £1 each I'd feel very silly for not trying. 22", 18" and 6"  This is what the plane blades look like. The lowest one is off that honking big wooden plane and looks to be in the best shape.  Sheffield cast steel? This was off of the smallest wooden plane.  There's no mouth on the largest plane, as you can see. So, Questions!
Cheers,
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May 3, 2009 11:53
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Great guys - thank you both!  I've checked it out and all of the planes have flat soles (according to a straight edge, a spirit level and the back edge of a ripsaw). It turns out the reason there was no gap in the mouth of the largest plane was that I put the bloody blade in upside down. I gave it a quick whirl and despite being set too deep it sliced off a nice slither. I've checked the blade backs as suggested, and apart from a 1/16 nick about 3/4" up from the bevel on the Record blade they're all fine. There is a little surface rust up on the unsmoothed/flattened part of the blade, is it something I should/can clean off? Is there any particular kind of cleaning/oiling/etc. I need to do? I would've thought not but the little rusty patches on a couple of them would indicate otherwise... GEMorris, so that big bastard and the metal plane will be my tools of choice for regular planing jobs, right? If I had rough-sawn timber I'd use the middle wooden fore plane to get it relatively smooth enough for the jointer plane to actually do the business? Or is there an intermediate step between getting rough sawn wood off the truck and the first fore plane run-through? I guess there's nought left to do but buy some stones/sandpaper/whatever and get the blades sorted, and some chisels to round out my set. Then I've got no excuse but to start making things.
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May 3, 2009 21:35
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Thanks again! So after I asked about planing end-grain and such you guys suggested shooting boards. So I was reading up on them and there's just one thing I can't reconcile...  This is the side-on view of a shooting board. The grey piece is some wood I'm planing. The green is the ledge on which the wood sits. As the plane moves towards/away from this viewpoint it planes the grey wood, but doesn't the blade also plane away part or most of the ledge? And if it does, won't it shortly end up cutting at a strange angle (the lighter area?) - or is the squareness of the cut more dependant on the side of the plane resting on the base of the shooting board, than the angle at which it contacts the ledge?
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May 4, 2009 16:47
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Looking to pick up 'the last few bits', the cost of which is rapidly spiralling out of control. What's everyone's opinion on clamps? I can get cheap lightweight Bessey's with a 600mm length for a quarter of the price of a heavy-duty 1250mm Bessey's. I just don't know if I can justify £110 for two clamps, so do I really need them?
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May 6, 2009 10:21
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I've got various lengths of squeeze-trigger quick clamps up to 1' - but two of the projects I'd like to tackle first are a laundry basket and a coffee table, which'll be at least 3' in length and require a correspondingly long parallel clamp, right? That was a great link though, I'll get those instead of the Besseys (1250mm for £55). In regards to chisels, are these going to be OK? http://www.axminster.co.uk/product-Kirschen-Butt-Chisel-Set-480155.htm
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May 6, 2009 12:41
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With the self control of a ten year old with ADD, I've just laid out the cash for: Record Sash Clamps (48") x2 Japanese Small Dozuki Panel Saw - 370mm Lie-Nielsen Cabinet Scraper Set Kirschen Burnisher Axminster Stone Pond with 3 Waterstones Axminster Honing Guide Liberon Shellac Flakes - Blonde Dewaxed 250g Beechwood 4" Carpenter's Mallet Titebond ll Wood Glue Marple 6-chisel set (1/4", 3/8", 1/2", 3/4", 1", 1.1/4") Along with my three planes, Claw hammer, club hammer, keyhole/compass saw, mitre gauge, spirit level, steel rules, square and engineer's square I should have everything I need, right? If not, I'm going to kill myself.
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May 6, 2009 14:40
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£45 for three stones, nagura stone and a pond. Been reading the Handworking Essentials book and the entire sharpening process is covered with waterstones and a honing guide - I figure/d it'd be a good start, and I can find my niche once I've had a chance to get some stuff actually built.
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May 6, 2009 15:46
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too lengthy: see below I found what looks like a relatively easy chest and did a sketchup model of it: 
Southern Heel fucked around with this message at 09:56 on May 8, 2009 |
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May 7, 2009 09:17
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too lengthy: see below
Southern Heel fucked around with this message at 09:55 on May 8, 2009 |
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May 7, 2009 22:19
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^^ The books lied to me, they said it would be 50-100 strokes, not a thousand! Previous posts were over-wordy, my apologies. Concise Edition: - My metal Record plane's whole blade appears to be twisted, is it worth working on it, or just ditch it and get another? - Are curls 0.007in to 0.009in thick OK for a Jack Plane? What roughly should I be aiming for with a fore/smoothing plane? - When designing/choosing a plan for a box, is it easier to create a shell of boards and fixing the corners with dovetails, or a framework and panels/slats? - Is it easy or hard to plane the long edge of boards at an angle about 10 degrees off horizontal? - My parallel clamps have a thin oily coating on the bars, should I clean that off? Southern Heel fucked around with this message at 09:57 on May 8, 2009 |
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May 8, 2009 09:55
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Welp, got some stuff done - I decided to go smaller and am building a small magazine trough for my bathroom (I get alot of reading done, and a mag/book is normally strewn on the floor). It's 16" x 6" x 12" of maple with lap joint corners and dowels, a through tenon supporting the floor and a decorative lip. My original intent was to use 5" planks of 3/4 - unfortunately my lumber yard only had 8' x 6" planks of 4/4, if I wanted to get it milled I'd have to go to the end of the queue, and since it was the crack of dawn on Saturday I decided to just plough ahead. In retrospect it was a bad idea 'cause I had to lug 20 kilos of maple the four miles home on foot! The plug sockets in my workshop didn't work, so whether I wanted to or not I was stuck with hand-tools only for the entire escapade! My first issue was that I've only got a hardpoint DIY saw with about 6 TPI and a gigantic kerf - so it was a little messy cutting the maple up. The back-side of the boards got a little chipped by the cut, too. I realised that I needed to do some end-grain planing, so built a shooting board. That worked pretty great, although I do need to double check it's flatness, as there's an almost imperceptible change in color on the end-grain of the piece I'm flattening after I flip it and plane in the opposite direction. As a result of the above and getting a little impatient, I was a little too hasty in some of the planing passes and ripped out the fibres a few times when I neglected to put a sacrificial bit of wood behind the maple. Superglue, sand and leave? Lastly, I picked up some scraps at the woodyard - one that caught my eye was Sapele: http://www.dustystrings.com/building/harp_woods_sapele.shtml The scrap left was about 3' x 1 1/2" x 2" and rift sawn - my intention is to cut it to 15/16" wide and use it as a lip around the top of the trough. Any suggestions? EDIT: Response to above answers: Thanks, for the help there guys, esp. WhatEvil My plane blade is twisted out of square, so I was thinking that if the back edge of the top of the plane is flat against the frog, the front edge will be buckled and off at an angle, even if it's flat, right? Or by flattening the back of the front edge will that sort itself out? I'm a little confused! When I said curls, I meant the shavings - although when planing the end train I was getting super thin shavings, so I guess it just depends on how I adjust the plane blade. I was hoping for a ballpark figure for the different tasks and blade depths... When I mentioned about the angled long edges as you mentioned, I guess a jig holding a board at the perfect 10 degrees in a shooting/cutting board would do it - but as above decided to go with a square design first! And thanks for the tip about the rust, it was nasty. Southern Heel fucked around with this message at 14:25 on May 11, 2009 |
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May 11, 2009 13:33
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GEMorris posted:Jagtpanther: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/INCA-3PHASE-B...parms=72%3A1688|66%3A2|65%3A12|39%3A1|240%3A1318|301%3A1|293%3A1|294%3A50 Hi mate, Thanks for that link - seems I was too lax in checking the thread and it's slipped away from me! Is there an easy way to get decent 1/2" x 1" strips cut out of a 1 1/2" x 1" plank using only hand tools? A case of just being very careful and cutting with a handsaw down the length?
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May 15, 2009 10:45
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After cutting my boards I've realised a couple of them are cupped - I've been using my shooting board over a workmate (no bench yet) to plane them flat, is there anything I should be particularly aware of? So, I came across my first real roadbloack and I got pissy, threw my plane onto a pile of bin-bags and stormed out of my workshop. Now, a few days later I can see that I was being ridicolous, but I would like some advice. Unfortunately it seems that I've been a bit to overzealous with my strokes and ended up with tearout on one side of my board. There's a knot there, and tearout on one side of the board when I got it (now the other side has a little too). What's the best way to tackle this? Lastly, how often should I be honing my plane's blade?
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May 21, 2009 15:48
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GEMorris, ~I tried emailing you but I'm getting a bounceback every time from your SMTP server - my email address is willayerst at gmail dot com if you'd be able to give me a hand? EDIT: Today was a better day than when I lost my poo poo. I picked it all back up again and gave it another college try. The situation was there was an assload of tearout on one side of the side of my trough (for lack of a better term), and the other side had tearout from the milling process at my lumberyard. Well, I burnished the poo poo out of one of my scrapers and went to work on the less ruined side, and it's passable enough now to act as the back-piece. I have realised that 1/16 extra is a good margin for the final cut before planing, and 1/32 really doesn't give enough leeway to ensure both bits of endgrain are perfectly smooth. I made the mortise for the through-tenons on one of my sides by measuring out then giving my chisels their first workout - I stayed about 1/32 inside the line on these and then used a single-cut bastard file (I got this originally to help service my scrapers) to tidy it all up. My original plan for the above was to use a brace with a brad point bit and then use a keyhole saw to open the hole up, would that have been a better plan? I also did my first glue-up, which was a bit of a travesty initially with the clamps falling all over the place, the pieces being twisted and such - but a bit of bashing with a mallet and some creative swearing and it's glued up great. Despite being rather hit and miss with the burnisher on my scraper, it's working like a champ and I'm extremely pleased with my purchase. Lastly, I spent an hour and a half sharpening my Record plane's blade and finally worked up a mud-like slurry - at this point I blew through two more blades and a chisel in the space of a few minutes. What, why and how? Is this what a nagura stone does? All the best, Southern Heel fucked around with this message at 22:11 on May 25, 2009 |
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May 25, 2009 16:09
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Glorified Scrivener posted:What grit stones and progression are you using? With a new tool I usually start with automotive sandpaper spray glued to a sheet of plate glass for and then work my way up through the stones when I'm sharpening blades. 800 grit japanese waterstone basically, and using a 2000 grit to hone. Books have suggested 220 grit diamond plates first which seems pretty excessive as they're £100+ ! With regards to any admiration - it's kind of a neccessity - despite GEMorris's frequenty awesome ebay finds, there's nothing available that's affordable or within driving distance to get. I think that it's rapidly approaching the time to build my workbench. The Workbench Book suggests European Beech, and buying 2x12's to rip down into the 2x4's required for the work. Am I going to have that much of a disadvantage by using straight constructional lumber? It appears to be 'european redwood' ?
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May 30, 2009 13:42
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Squirt that crap onto a piece of glass?
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Jun 1, 2009 13:17
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^^ Looks awesome, but won't it skid around if you need to apply pressure in any direction but downwards? Can anyone get a consensus on whether construction lumber is good for workbenches too?
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Jun 2, 2009 14:20
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What's the easiest way of trimming a board down accurately? For example, I've got a piece that's 5 1/8" and it needs to be 5". Up until know I've been hitting up the shooting board but it's taking forever. I'm only using hand tools and so far I've only got a keyhole saw and a hardpoint ripsaw.
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Aug 10, 2009 09:25
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With hand tools, is there a quick way to cut 1/8" off the end of a 5x1 plank without going insane from planing the endgrain on a shooting board? to clarify, after the 1/8" is gone it's the correct length, so it needs to be as clean as possible. I ask because I've done it a few times already and I can feel my resolve to complete this project slipping. Southern Heel fucked around with this message at 13:43 on Sep 25, 2009 |
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Sep 25, 2009 13:35
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Jagtpanther posted:With hand tools, is there a quick way to cut 1/8" off the end of a 5x1 plank without going insane from planing the endgrain on a shooting board? to clarify, after the 1/8" is gone it's the correct length, so it needs to be as clean as possible. Nevermind, I ploughed ahead anyway. My wooden jack plane's blade has dulled since last use and I didn't feel like spending hours sharpening it up (see previous posts,  ) - but my metal Record pulled through great, after I remembered to plane at a 45 degree angle. I'm commited to getting my magazine trough finished by the end of this week - it shouldn't be too hard. It's been so long since I've been playing woodshop that I thought I'd refresh myself, and you guys too : The overall size is 16" x 6" 12", the materisls are maple and sapele. The walls are lapped into each other and fixed with dowels, and the floor has through-tenons on either end.
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Sep 27, 2009 12:25
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| # ¿ May 16, 2024 08:04 |
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My first project in 1" cherry was an unmitigated failure (since it was so thick and I was cutting by hand, being slightly off in my cuts made each panel skewed when viewed from above). I want to try again, and my Dad is convincing me to get a whole bunch of cheap construction lumber and use that instead of relatively hard-to-work and expensive hardwood. Is this a good/bad idea? I will be using any pieces in my workshop initially, so more for functionality rather than display initially...
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Feb 9, 2010 22:13
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