What I love about handtools

[harry strasil]

wine + whine can result in cussing, screaming, bleeding, missing digits, stitches and ruined bloody lumber.

[James Mittlefehldt]

I don't drink wine while working in the shop either, well not much. I find my accuracy tends to go down somewhat, but I do have the radio or cd player on when I am there.

[Bob Oehler]

Boy that picture says it all. It's a wonderful world

Bob O.

[Marcus Ward]

Marcus,
Would you share your fuming process with us when the time comes. It seems like the way to go with white oak in my mind.
Thanks,
John

John, here is my fuming method. First make sure you have all the squeeze-out off of the workpiece and it's ready for finishing because once it's fumed you're not going to be sanding or scraping. Then I put the piece in a tent made from plastic and seal it up with duct tape. I let my wife do this, she's better at it. I slide a large ceramic bowl full of ammonia inside and ignore it for 2 - 3 days. When it comes out it'll be a greyish silver and look very blah - until you put finish on it, then it's like magic and it looks awesome. Let it outgas for a day or so before messing with it because ammonia will still be coming out of the wood. That's it. Easy Peasy Japaneasy. Before I started all this I did some test pieces of oak and walnut to see the effect. Walnut gets very dark, almost like ebony. 24 hours is minimum, 2 days is my personal minimum. 3 days might even be better but I'm impatient. A heated room or garage is best because the ammonia evaporates into the air better at higher temps. Watch out, it's corrosive to certain metals although I haven't had any problems with it.

Here is a pic of my fuming arrangement. You can see the white ceramic bowl inside.

[Dave Lindgren]

I had a friend in the wine business in northern calif. he remembered the days when the journeyman cooper would arrive at his father's winery, and set up to repair barrels, kegs, vats etc. They would have redwood vats up to 4,000 gallons to repair. The cooper would set up beneath the big old oak tree in the winery courtyard with his shave bench, jointer and a small table for his tools. Then he would place an empty pitcher and a glass on the table. The pitcher was kept full by the winery until the cooper was finished with the work at hand.

I always wanted to be a cooper

[Don Dorn]

It wasn't even a year or so ago that my woodworking buddies knew me as one who looked at hand tool people as purists who simply liked to make shavings and didn't actually build anything. In fact, as a shop gift, they placed an extention cord on the back of a plane and gave it to me - which I proudly displayed.

Fast forward and they are not letting me live down the fact that I'm making a slow adaption to hand tools. Once I figured out how to properly sharpen chisels, I see them more than a small axe. I started handcutting dovetails (only time I ever used the marking gauge) and now have breathed new life into planes and scrapers I never used. I've added a couple of planes and now have bought a #80 Stanley cabinet scraper (don't have it yet).

I still use my power tools but now believe the best way is to use the right tool for the job, regardless of how it's powered. Guess I'm coming along, little by little.

[Don C Peterson]

I still use my power tools but now believe the best way is to use the right tool for the job, regardless of how it's powered. Guess I'm coming along, little by little.

Agreed. I use what gets the job done, but when the hand tool is even close to being as efficient as the power tool, I choose the hand tool. I have recently discovered the joy of using properly tuned hand saws. My wife asked me why I use the hand saws so much now. My reply was that it is fun and there is just something about cutting a nearly perfect line with a 100 year old tool that I rehabilitated and sharpened with my own two hands... Plus, I don't have to kick the kids out of the shop while I turn on the table saw, and don't have to deal with the dust.

Although I flatten stock with hand planes, I use the heck out of my Dewalt planer; dimensioning stock with hand planes is too much like work for me! My favorite power tool is my Walker Turner 16" band saw. It's as quiet as using hand saws.

[Wilbur Pan]

I love my Walker-Turner 16" bandsaw as well*. But hand tools are great.

It is true that powered tools will give you a speed advantage at some point if you have a lot of the same type of operation to do. However, you have to spend time with set up and test cuts with a powered tool, so that for a small number of operations, what time you save with the powered tool in the speed of doing the operation, you lose in the set up.

The set up and test cut process is often not accounted for in thinking about the time needed to finish a woodworking process. As a result, I think that the number of repeat operations where powered tools actually give you an advantage is much higher than what most people think.

*One of only three powered tools in my shop, unless you want to count the dust collector and air cleaner.

[Bill Brehme]

Marcus, is that a #1 or #2 smoother?

Cuz if thats a #4, that would have to be one HUGE glass of wine!!!

[John Shuk]

Thanks for the info on the ammonia treatment.
The way you describe it seems very safe and doable.
Is the ammonia you use just regular household strength ?

[Marcus Ward]

Yeah I just get it at the hardware store, it's the kind you'd use for cleaning. I think it's about 3$ per gallon. I've read you can't fume properly with household strength ammonia but that's not true, it just takes longer. No sweat! I clean the shop while it's fuming. Don't pour the ammonia into the container until you're ready to seal up the tent because it's eye-wateringly nasty. I will post pics of the chair after it comes out of the tent and before I shellac it so you can get an idea of the effect.

[Greg Cole]

Marcus,
Nice chair! I can't wait to see it finished and placed in it's room.

What I love about hand tools:
#1) the silky smooth finish left from a Neandered surface. Honestly I dove into the Neander realm to simply get away from the monotony sanding & stepping up through the grits.... beer (sorry not a wine or whiney guy ) makes many mundane things less mundane in many instances NOT sanding.
#2) I find the solitude of the workshop sometimes "calling" for me to grab a tool that has gone basically unchanged for MANY years. Then again the residents of the house aren't keen on me firing up the pig tailed horsepower on weekend mornings either (I'm an early bird to say the least ). But I do have a penchant for my pony powered tools too....
#3) Once you truly learn sharpening, you'll like your handtools ALOT more.

Greg

[Bill Brehme]

Marcus, is that a #1 or #2 smoother?

Cuz if thats a #4, that would have to be one HUGE glass of wine!!!

[Marcus Ward]

Hey Bill - that's a #4 and yes, it's a HUGE glass of wine! Half a bottle per glass.

[Bill Brehme]

MY MAN!

Excess is best.