Tricks of the Trade

The thought of emptying my dust collector’s plastic bag used to make me cringe. Many times I’d go through my entire repertoire of colorful language two or three times, and that darn bag still [...]

To Get the most from my limited shop space, I built a two-sided “mobile tool wall” to park in front of my overhead garage door. The wall is just basic carpentry construction, with a 3/4″ [...]

Carrying plywood by yourself is a pain. This caddy allows you to roll it around instead. Just clamp this caddy to the board’s edge, tip the sheet down onto the wheels and off you go.

Plastic bins are excellent for storing hardware and other small items. After purchasing all the types and sizes of bins I needed, including some complete cabinets, I made this shelf unit to [...]

I often use my shop vacuum for dust collection on hand-held power tools. Two things annoy me about most vacs, though. First, they’re really noisy. Second, when the vac gets full—and that can [...]

I bought a keyless chuck for convenience, but I found it hard to tighten and loosen by hand. The knurling on the chuck wasn’t very deep, so my hand just slipped. I often resorted to using a pair [...]

Cutting small parts on a miter saw doesn’t have to be scary or dangerous. I’ve adopted a method that keeps your fingers well away from the blade and prevents the piece you’re cutting from zinging [...]

I added a pair of powerful handled magnets [buy on Amazon] to my shop-made featherboard. They fit snugly into two notches and hold the featherboard absolutely rigid. The magnets enable me to [...]

I made a clamping device for my bench that can quickly snug up a board just by swinging a lever. The lever has a cam that pushes a sliding stop tight against the board. I made all the parts from [...]

Here’s a faster way to clean out your router table or cabinet saw if it’s hooked up to a central dust collection system. Instead of sweeping it out, or dragging over the vac, just remove the [...]

I made this jig for cutting patterns on the band saw. It works especially well on woods where the line is difficult to see, or if your near eyesight is starting to deteriorate. Simply attach the [...]

I find myself needing a lot of small circles for use on wooden toys. When I cut those disks out with a circle-cutting jig on the band saw, the edge is a little too rough, so I’ve made a fixture [...]