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One of the first things that many people notice when advancing the blade of a Preston/Record style shoulder plane (today’s Clifton and Lie Nielsen planes are based on that design) is a scratching [...]

A few years ago, my friend Cambell Albritton gifted me with a small Clifton #410 shoulder plane that he no longer needed. The plane was still in its original box but unfortunately developed a few [...]

After 50 years of woodworking, I’ve got a confession to make. I enjoy fixing up an old machine or rearranging my shop more than woodworking itself. A few years ago a friend gave me an old [...]

Bringing an old hand plane back to life is simple to do, and will yield a top-not tool. When I build a project, I use a variety of “fancy” tools (readers’ words, not mine). Lie-Nielsen, [...]

If someone walked up to me and told me I wasn’t a very smart man, I’d have a hard time arguing with them. There are often times when I do something knowing full-well that the outcome isn’t going [...]

Some years back, when the company I worked for relocated out of state, I lost my job. While hunting for a new position and feeling a bit down, I visited a shop that sold used woodworking [...]

Moby Dick, the Great White Planer The newspaper advertisement was brief: “PLANER, 24″, $450. Call.” My friend Charles Poth and I had been looking for just such a machine. We found the [...]

Last week I showed how to source and install a missing swivel pad over the ball of a clamp’s screw. That kind of pad only works in a ball and socket situation, so what can we do with clamps that [...]

I recently was gifted a few old bar clamps from a fellow member who belongs to our local FreeCycle group. FreeCycle.org is an internet-based group that promotes the free exchange of items and [...]

Finding and restoring vintage shop machinery. Editor’s note: This article originally appeared in the October 2016 issue of Popular Woodworking You pick up an old handplane at the local flea [...]

One of the most unusual names in the lumberjack’s catalog of tools is a peavey. Named after Joseph Peavey this tool is a hooked and spiked lever used for manipulating logs, roll them over,  pivot [...]

Years ago, I made a corner cupboard from black walnut. I thought the wood was magnificent, but a can of rusty cut nails I used in building it proved to be far more important, taking me on an [...]