227 days ago
by Blake |
14 comments »
I remember visiting the old Salz Tannery in Santa Cruz when I was a kid. I would go for school field trips, or just to pick out leather scraps for a belt to go with a buckle I whittled at Scout Camp, etc.
Anyway the old Tannery is now a thing of the past but I recently found out about a tiny leather store in town and I have been stopping by to buy leather for various projects, jigs, etc. And I just thought I would share one of my favorite and most simple uses for leather:
A blade-changi...
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248 days ago
by Peter O |
1 comment »
Workshop SafetyI can’t overstate the importance of workshop safety. Don’t wear loose clothing, jewelry, or hair. Your tools come with guards for a reason – use them! If you aren’t sure the action you are about to take is safe, then assume it isn’t and figure out a better way to do it. Keep your work area clean, especially underfoot. If you are using a tool – power tool or hand tool – wear eye protection. The best protection against injury is your brain – it m...
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250 days ago
by Peter O |
11 comments »
The story is told that after the Great Fire of 1666, the architect Sir Christopher Wren was commissioned to rebuild St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. Upon the completion of this huge undertaking, Queen Anne reviewed the work and is said to have declared that it was, “Awful, amusing, and wholly artificial.” Wren was quite pleased to receive such a compliment from the Queen! The English language has a sneaky way of changing over time, and a lot of woodworking definitions have changed or ...
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250 days ago
by Peter O |
4 comments »
I grew up on a ranch, a place where you have to be able to do just about everything yourself. Plumber, mechanic, veterinarian, heavy equipment operator, you name it. Having been raised that way, I can’t stand to pay anyone for anything I think I can do myself – my wife would say that is why nothing gets done around here! I make a lot of my own jigs and fixtures. Some of them only get used once, some of them are used so much they almost never get put away. Either way, they are tools ...
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256 days ago
by mot |
20 comments »
I’ve been fiddling with wooden hinges, and can’t get good dowel stock. Epecially dowel stock that matches the species of wood I’m working with. I gleaned this jig from another Rob Cosman video.
I took a 2” piece of walnut from the scrap pile. I drilled a 1/4” (0.247” actually) hole in it close to one face. I took a few passes through the drum sander to just show the hole cut. I chamfered one end to accept the workpiece stock. I clamped an old plane...
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260 days ago
by Betsy |
8 comments »
Ok – I’ve made the short fence and have used it tonight to make my slats for my adirondack chairs. I have mixed feelings about the jig. In one sense it feels safe to use it. However, I can see that it has some potential dangers of its own.
When I use my original fence and a push stick, I follow through with the cut all the way past the blade and I push the board off the table top and lift my hand straight up in one smooth motion after the cut is finished.
I found that with t...
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275 days ago
by Sgt_Lobo |
8 comments »
Alright, I’m ready to do some real woodwork now. I finally finished my last two table saw jigs. This time I made a miter sled and a key slot jig (spline jig?). I will make more jigs/sleds as I need them, but I think that the three I’ve made recently should be a good start with my new TS. So, heres a couple of pictures, and as always comments and suggestions are welcome (I came here to learn).
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277 days ago
by Sgt_Lobo |
9 comments »
Well, if you all have been following my blogs, you’d know that I recently purchased a new table saw. Being that this is my first table saw, I want to ensure that I am using it as efficiently and as safely as possible. So after doing a good bit of research I decided to make a few jigs to improve my accuracy with my new saw. The first jig I made today is the crosscut sled. Shortly I will be making a miter sled and a jig for cutting key slots on boxes. So without further adieu, here i...
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284 days ago
by Betsy |
11 comments »
ok – I’ve built my router table jig and have the materials milled and ready to go. Now I see the problem with my jig. I can’t see what I’m doing from behind. These pictures will tell the story. (And no I’m not stick thin but you can’t take a picture of yourself.
My eyes really are better looking than this—- but this is eye level
This shows the line of sight. The jig is up next to the router bit – as you can see – I CAN’T see wh...
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285 days ago
by Betsy |
2 comments »
Ok – so I said that I was going to pick a project from one of my favorite books and then post my progress on line. So here we go. I’ve chosen as my first project a box from Doug Stowe’s book – Basic Box Making – A sliding top Pencil box. The first thing I decided about this project was that I wanted to cut the fingers on the router and not the table saw. The reasoning for this is that the two ends are very short and to hold the end against the fence I would eithe...
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