Tool: Ultimate Coping Saw Manufacturer: Blue Spruce Toolworks Price: $325 Coping saws are a bit of a divisive subject among woodworkers. Some folks swear that their $3 coping saw from the hardware store has never let them down and the other camp has tried to engineer the tool to perfection. The Blue Spruce Ultimate Coping…

Tool: M18 FUEL Brushless Chain Saw Manufacturer: Milwaukee Tool Street Price: $400 with 12 Ah battery and charger I made the switch to battery-powered chainsaws for my tree service work in 2011 when pro-duty models first became available, and I never looked back. Battery power has replaced 2-stroke fuel on my jobs for all but…

When WoodRiver announced its new socket chisels, I was very intrigued. Price-wise, these chisels fall into the intermediate range – $35-$45 for an individual chisel (depending on size). I picked up a 1⁄2“ chisel and a 3⁄4“ chisel to put through the paces. The chisels are ground from 100 CR-V steel and tempered to a…

When Erik Florip of Florip Toolworks announced that he would be offering a premium dovetail saw for $85, he immediately had my attention. At that price point, these saws are positioned well below other premiums saws, and just slightly above some very popular budget alternatives. This saw comes standard with a 16ppi rip filed 9″…

I’m a fan of having my tools out and at hand in the workshop. It’s easy enough to mount the saws to the wall, whip up a chisel rack and tuck the planes on a shelf, but the small items rarely have a good spot to sit – so they end up on every horizontal…

A while ago I blogged about a Breast Drill that I bought on eBay and restored. I also mentioned that it is hard to find a good quality drills with concealed gears on the market today. After I wrote the blog I found a supplier of drills who held (and still does) a few tools…

by Megan Fitzpatrick page 14 We love the original wooden-handled Bessey K Body clamps. But they became unavailable in 2008 when Bessey released the Revo clamps, which had a larger clamping surface (of about 30 percent) than the K Bodies and a soft-grip handle that allowed for easier and more comfortable tightening – but we…

Tool: M18 FUEL Brushless Chain Saw Manufacturer: Milwaukee Tool Street Price: $400 with 12 Ah battery and charger I made the switch to battery-powered chainsaws for my tree service work in 2011 when pro-duty models first became available, and I never looked back. Battery power has replaced 2-stroke fuel on my jobs for all but…

When Erik Florip of Florip Toolworks announced that he would be offering a premium dovetail saw for $85, he immediately had my attention. At that price point, these saws are positioned well below other premiums saws, and just slightly above some very popular budget alternatives. This saw comes standard with a 16ppi rip filed 9″…

Your next cordless power tool could very likely include Bluetooth. The communication protocol has been pushed hard in the consumer tech world for years. So why is the power tool industry adopting Bluetooth? Flexibility. Makita’s cordless track saw and cordless vacuum both integrate its AWS Bluetooth technology to talk to each other. That means, when…

I’m a fan of having my tools out and at hand in the workshop. It’s easy enough to mount the saws to the wall, whip up a chisel rack and tuck the planes on a shelf, but the small items rarely have a good spot to sit – so they end up on every horizontal…

The Shaper Origin looks like a router but acts like a CNC. Up to now, CNCs were large, heavy, complicated tools that take up a lot of space in a shop. The Shaper Origin is something quite different. It’s a hand-held, easy-to-use CNC that you take to your work instead of the other way around….