Workshop made grinding tool rest.
Often the tool rests on grinders are inadequate for the job, some alternative is required. If most of your grinding is around the standard angle of 25 degrees its a fairly simple job to make a good rigid rest in the workshop.
Jig for Routing the Waste Between Dovetail Pins.
If you have a number of dovetail joints to cut, in a set of drawers for a kitchen perhaps, hand cutting can become tedious.
This jig helps with the job of removing the waste between the pins.
How to Plane Timber to Dimension Safely and Efficiently on a Planer/Thicknesser .
This was originally planned as a handout for my students but I thought it may also useful as an article, as many people are unsure about safety efficient working practices when they first use the planer thicknesser. The toolbar has options to zoom and download the PDF. If you like what you’ve read or know […]
A beginners guide to router bits.
An introduction to the various router cutters available with some tips on care and maintenance.
Review of Hammer A3-31 Silent Power planer thicknesser.
In a previous article I reviewed the standard A3-31, I have now upgraded this to the Silent Power version. In this article I assess the performance of the new spiral cutter block from Felder/Hammer.
Router table accessories
In a previous video I described how to make a router table and fence this article shows how to make some holding and safety accessories. My table and fence do not have channeling to hold accessories , but this is not a problem if you use the system I use here.
How to get a clean cut with the router.
There are various factors that can affect the quality of cut from a router, both hand held and in the router table. It often quite frustrating to find that whatever you do the cut is never as good as you would like. Hopefully this article will give a few pointers.
Cutting small dovetails on the band saw.
In another article I described a jig to cut very large dovetails on the band saw. However the band saw is also useful when you have a lot of smaller dovetails to cut perhaps for a batch of drawers.
In this short article I describe a time saving technique for doing this.
The Campaign for slow dovetails – How to Cut Lap Dovetails
This second article in my “Campaign for Slow Dovetails” series deals with cutting lap dovetails.
It’s developed from the handout for my Basic skills part III course which teaches both through and lap dovetails.
Restoration of Georgian Marquetry side table.
Although most of my work is making contemporary furniture and teaching I occasionally do some restoration. I thought I would share with you the work I did recently on this fine Georgian ripple sycamore and satinwood marquetry side table. The emphasis was on “conservation rather than restoration” as it would have been a pity to […]
How to cut BIG dovetails on the band saw.
Cutting dovetails in large section timber is tricky, it’s very difficult to cut accurately over such large areas,so, much as I love hand cut dovetails sometimes you have to resort to the machine.
My favourite machine for this is the band saw. In this article I show how to make and use a jig for cutting band saw dovetails.
The Campaign for Slow Dovetails.
In this article I will show how to cut and fit nice snug dovetails, the emphasis being on the quality of the joint rather than speed.
