Miniaturist David Brookshaw sent me a photo of a cabinetmaker’s tool chest in 1/12 scale that begs for your “zoom tool.” We’ve been exploring all the tiny tools in the [...]
Reaching underneath my tool rack can be like sticking my hand in a lion’s mouth. All of the dangling edge tools have alternately shaved, nicked and scared the bejeezus out of me over the [...]
Craftsman Frame Pegged half-lap joints are the cabinetmaker’s way to build a beautiful frame. By Jock and Susan Holmen Picture frames are pretty easy to make, except when it comes to [...]
For $250 and half an hour’s worth of simple improvements, you can cut precise mortises all day. Mortising machines first answered the prayers of mortise-cutting woodworkers over 120 years [...]
When stripping a chair or table, place each leg in a coffee can. Any excess stripper drips right in, and when you take off the finish, you can simply push your scraper down the length of the leg. [...]
I use my grinder almost exclusively for beveling my chisels, so I like to keep the tool rest set to produce the 25-degree bevel I prefer. Having to reset the angle after using my diamond wheel [...]
After 37 years of pushing pencils and typing on a keyboard at the office, my grip is not what it used to be. So I found an easy way to get a powerful yet comfortable grip on my clamp …
Recently, a friend asked me to reglue the buckled veneer in a tabletop. The problem was located too far from the edge to clamp with my longest handscrew, so I added wooden fingers to nearly [...]
I love adjustable clamps, but I used to have trouble gripping and tightening the handles, especially at the end of a long day. Glued-on pieces of drawer liner ($5 per roll at most home centers) [...]
Last fall while moving into a new house, I dropped my kitchen table off the back of my pickup truck. The solid oak top suffered a serious crack near one corner. [...]
