Video: Glue up a Panel

Many beginners make gluing up panels a lot harder than it should be. They add biscuits or splines for alignment, which can also cause some mis-alignment if you aren’t careful with your machines [...]

Report Card: 6 Months Without a Chop Saw

When I reorganized my shop last Spring, I sold a lot of stuff. I sold so much stuff that I was afraid that I was cutting into the bone. I sold my routers. My router table. My sliding compound [...]

My Chisel Handles are Older Than Yours

Exotic woods don’t blow my skirt/kilt/skort up much. In small doses they can look beautiful, but for the most part I find them oily, difficult to work and far too wild looking for full-size [...]

A Look at H.O. Studley’s Blades

When I inspect an antique tool – especially one that hasn’t been messed with much – I always take a look at the cutting edge. How was it sharpened? What is the shape of the edge? Did they do any [...]

The Adjustable-height Tool Chest

The adjustable-height outfeed table – done. An adjustable-height bench – check, done. The adjustable-height miter-saw stand – done and done. And now, the adjustable-height tool chest. Tool [...]

How I Glue Chair Mortises

This is a stupid trick. In fact, I’m sure you have a better way to do this. But I don’t. This week I glued up a couple Welsh stick chairs – each had 12 spindles and 28 through-mortises that must [...]

Konrad Sauer Reinvents the Panel Plane

Whether you love them or hate them, the English form of the infill plane has remained almost unchanged since it was invented in the 19th century. An infill plane is a metal shell that is stuffed [...]

A Visit to a Lee Valley Store

For most Americans, Lee Valley Tools is a catalog filled with objects of lust for the workshop. For Canadians, this lust also comes in the format of a retail store. And yes, this is worse. Lee [...]

WIA 2011: Where to Eat in Cincinnati

Food is one of my constant obsessions – right behind woodworking. So whenever people visit our fair city, I am prone to force some restaurant recommendations upon them. Hence, this blog entry for [...]