Rough to ready...with handtools.

[JohnMorgan of Lititz]

Hi everyone, bit of a newbie here to the forum and woodworking for that matter.

I started out in the hobby just a couple years ago and had decided i would start w/ handtools. So i've spent the past 2 years acquiring handtools, learning to sharpen, learning to use them properly (via DVD's, books, 1 seminar w/ David Charlesworth @ LN, and just doing it).

I've done a few odd's and ends little projects and milled the wood from rough sawn lumber. I've gotten to the point though where I just want to work wood. I'm ready to buy the power jointer and planer I think. I am a weekend woodworker, so I spend a lot of time milling lumber.

I'm curious how many Neander's out there are still milling by hand or if most have crossed over to the power tool side. BTW, I do have a cabinet saw, so usually i'm flattening, jointing and edge by hand and then ripping to width on the TS. Then thickness by hand (or the dreaded TS resaw operation).

I am certainly not into the whole "Zen of woodworking" thing - I don't feel handtools are better, etc. I'm now more into the "what is the quickest, most efficient way to do it" mentality. Granted, since i lean towards neander, I believe if you learn to use handtools properly, there are many many operations that can be done quicker and more efficiently than power tools...but milling lumber? I'm thinking those power J&P's are pretty nice...

Cheers.

[Greg Cole]

I openly admit to having tailed apprentices in the shop (love that term, thanks Marcus ). I have no interest in 4 squaring 100 bf of material, just not going to spend the time on it when I can take a couple hours with a tailed jointer and planer & table saw. I don't put a price on my time in my shop, but if I buy a truck load of lumber for $2 a bf and spend a month of weekends just prepping stock for a larger project, the price of the lumber isn't as "cheap" as it would have been IMO.
There's going to be a pile of people on one side or the other of the line in the neander sand per say, but you'll find an awful lot in the middle.
As with many other things about this craft, there's no real right nor wrong answer just a bunch of opinions along with alot of "it depends".

[Joe Close]

I'm new as well. I use both, hand tools and power tools. I have a bandsaw for ripping. A table top planner for initial thickness dimensioning. I use handplanes for the rest of the squaring up and smoothing.

[Rob Luter]

I initially surface most of my rough sawn lumber with a lunchbox planer, and joint the edges straight with a table saw. After that I use hand tools to joint the edges for glue ups and smooth the surfaces to remove mill marks. Small pieces of stock (about 18" or less in length) are done with hand tools only. I have a limited amount of time to spend in my basement shop and I'd rather be spending it on joinery than on getting lumber dimensioned.

[JohnMorgan of Lititz]

So even after milling on power J&P, some finish work will need done via a smoother to clean up the surfaces?

I agree, Rob. I would rather be spending time on joinery, which is more fun.

The workbench I'm using is home-built with some real rigging for clamping and holding wood - I had thought maybe if i had a proper tail vice and front vice to hold the wood, it would be easier and less hassle.

I think my minds' made up that i need to just buy the J&P. I've already reasearched my decisions, but a few momentary lapses in reasoning and thought i'd stick it out w/ milling by hand. Back to reality - that's just nuts.

[Chris Padilla]

I like to use electrons for the most part but I'm always looking for an excuse to whip out a handplane when I can...so I often do!

Dimensioning lumber is primarily tails only, however....

[John Keeton]

John, I have very little finishing to do after I plane my stock. Depending on the task at hand, a quick run over with the ROS/handsand lightly, or a scraper. But, for the most part, I do that after the subassembly is made. In other words, I take my planned wood straight to construction in most instances.

[David DeCristoforo]

This is an ancient point of contention. Where the line should be drawn is up to the individual. For example, for me there is no "glory" in ripping boards "by hand". Just ask the guy who spent most of his life as the "bottom man" on a pit saw. It is good to be able to do work like this "by hand" and there is no question that skill in involved. But there can be a fair distance between being able to and wanting to. At the same time, I want to be able to use a hand saw with accuracy when I need to or just want to. I am comforted by the thought that if the power went out, I would not be helpless. The same goes for surfacing. Who wants to hand smooth a couple hundred feet of hard lumber? But it is good to be able to get that fine hand planed surface on a table top.

[Brian Ward]

I mill roughsawn by hand not just because I have no choice (no room for power), but it's also enjoyable. That said, it's not exactly quick. If I wanted something motorized and wanted an aid for this sort of thing, I'd probably consider a bandsaw. The resaw capablity is nice; going the rest of the way with a handplane isn't so much work.

[Robert Rozaieski]

I do it but because I want to. If you don't want to do it or don't like doing it then by all means get the machines. I like doing it. But it doesn't really matter what I like. What matters is what you like to do . However, I don't believe it takes a that much longer to do one off pieces by hand (production runs of identical parts are a different story). But working rough stock by hand is a different process than by machine. The process is what makes the difference.

First, I don't dress all of my stock at once like most folks who use power to do the job would do. I only plane the pieces I need for the step I'm currently working on. If I'm building a case side, I plane the pieces for that side only; if a drawer box, only the drawer sides, front and back; etc.

Second, I don't 4 square most of my stock unless the process requires it. If I'm making a drawer side, I'll 4 square but if I'm making something like a case side that is the result of a 2 board glueup, I'll only plane one face of each board and then match plane the two and glue up. The opposite faces and edges remain in the rough until I'm ready to flatten and finish plane and final dimension the final glued up panel.

I also don't necessarily dimension to 3/4" or 7/8" as is typical with machine work. I dimension to the thickest I can when finishing a panel. Sometimes this is 7/8", sometimes 13/16", sometimes 15/16"; depends on the initial flatness of the stock. I remove the minimum amount necessary to get a flat enough piece and don't concern myself with how thick the board actually is. Sometimes my case sides won't even be the same thickness but this typically isn't a problem since I gauge everything. I'm not making interchangable parts so they don't need to be identical. I do very little measuring so "standard" dimensions don't mean a lot to me.

Working this way is much more effecient when using hand tools and wastes less wood. It doesn't have to take a long time to plane rough stock by hand but you have to think about the process differently. It typically takes me 8-10 minutes to face one side of a board, another 5-10 to match plane a pair. So that works out to about 40-45 minutes or so to glue up a panel (2x10 for facing, 10 for match planing and 10-15 for glueup). I suspect that someone doing it by machine isn't doing it much faster since they typically need to 4 square everything due to the limited capacities of the machines. Plus, I can work 12-14" wide boards just as easily as a 6-8" wide board. Try doing that with a 6" or 8" jointer. Then you still need to flatten the final panel (belt sander, ROS, hand plane?) so I'm not sure that it's that much faster by machine.

Now if you are doing production runs, forget everything I just said. Machines excell at producing multiple identical parts. If you see yourself needing to make multiple identical parts frequently (I'm thinking something like a kitchen full of cabinets) then machines are your best friend. However, I don't do production runs of the same parts so I don't see a lot of benefit to having machines. I had the jointer and lunchbox planer years ago. After I sold them, I really didn't notice a huge difference in stock prep time, but I changed the way I thought about the process and actually did the work.

[JohnMorgan of Lititz]

Thanks for the input, guys. For myself, I think I'm probably going to use a combination of both power and hand tools.

Robert, I think you make an excellent point that if you do things solely by hand, you really need to re-think the process and find all those areas, as you described, to cut your time down. And most certainly, in a production environment, hand milling is almost foolish.

Thanks again, everyone.

[Joe Cunningham]

I've gone from rough to 4S4 by hand. It was a good experience, but I don't think I'll work that way all the time.

Right now for instance I am working on a jewelry box where I bought the rough stock and the lumber yard planed it to 13/16 for me (part of their service). I crosscut by hand with my miter saw, then hand planed to final thickness (5/8), though I wish I had a good bandsaw so I wouldn't have wasted the wood. If I did have a bandsaw, I would have resawn to thickness first, then crosscut.

I then made all the sides 4S4 with my planes. I used a long shooting board to joint one edge, then used a different shooting board to square the ends, using the jointed edge as the reference. Finally I ganged the sides together with a clamp and jointed the other edge, and did the same with the front and backs.

Maybe there is a more efficient way to do it, but that is how I got my stock prep'ed for my most recent project. My planes were in tip-top shape, but my rip saw not so much.

I don't own a power planer or jointer, and really only want a bandsaw and maybe a lunchbox planer.

[Mark Roderick]

Almost everyone uses a combination of hand and power tools. It's all about personal preference and no two people do it alike, except perhaps those who have never learned to use any hand tools (which really is a shame for them).

I joint boards by hand. Then I put the flat side down in my lunchbox planer. I sometimes wish I owned a power jointer, but what the heck.

I usually cut a 90 degree edge on my table saw, but then take a couple of see-through shavings with my jointer plane to get the edge perfect.

I usually do my rough "sanding" with a hand plane, but almost always finish with fine sandpaper, by hand. I actually enjoy sanding by hand, especially at the final stages. I like to feel the wood.

I rip wood on the table saw, and if I need an exact 90 degree crosscut I typically use my radial arms saw. But I was rough-cutting some 8/4 maple into lengths recently and chose to cut them with old hand saws I inherited from my grandfather instead. My son and I did it together, which was fun. For fine work, like a jewelry box, I clean up the RAS crosscut with a hand plane and shooting board.

If you're not trying to make money, it's all about personal satisfaction. I worry about things like speed and productivity at my daytime job.

[Tim Sgrazzutti]

Learning to foursquare stock by hand is a good experience. What you learn from it will make your work with machine tools better and faster. Personally I don't own a powered jointer, and doubt I ever will. They scare the heck out of me, and besides, I find face jointing stock well enough to get through my tailed thicknessing apprentice to be dead easy. Edge jointing is easily accomplished with a straight edge and tailed saw, and refined with a jointer plane.

Unless you have the dough and the space for a jointer, you may want to skip it for a while. My second hand lunchbox thickness planer has definately earned its keep though. Also, beware that powered jointers have their own tuning and technique issues, that can tend to waste a lot of stock.

[Chuck Nickerson]

Of my 20 completed woodworking projects in 2008, six were handtool-only from rough stock, and they weren't the large projects. I do handtool-only when time permits. (Oh, to be retired!)