Not having a real project to complete during my vacation prior to the 2007 holidays, I decided to play around making some tools. These were fun to make and great use of shop scraps. They are also a good way to practice hand tool skills.
This first picture is of a shop made try square and marking gauge. These were made from maple and birch offcuts from the scrap pile. The designs for these came from two separate "Arts & Mysteries" columns from Popular Woodworking magazine.
This next picture is a taper reamer (for reaming bored mortises to receive tapered round tenons) and a panel gauge (a large version of a marking gauge for large panels). The reamer is a design from John Alexander's Green Woodworking web page ans is made from bubinga with a removable oak handle and blade made from a scrap damaged hand saw blade. I don't have a lathe so there was a lot of spokeshave work involved here. The Panel gauge has a beam of oak and a head of mahogany with a pin made from a broken drill bit.
This final picture is of a wooden smooth plane, spoke shave, travisher and small wooden mallet for adjusting wooden planes. The smooth plane is made from purpleheart with a mahogany wedge. The spokeshave and travisher are made from bubinga with shop made blades made from O1 tool steel and machine screws and brass nuts from the home center. The plane adjusting mallet is made from purpleheart and oak. For anyone considering working purpleheart with hand tools...DON'T. This stuff is HARD. It was like working stone. I've never had to re-grind my tools so often working with any other wood. Think I'll stick to the domestic stuff in the future
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