Archives

I’m a child of the Cold War. I remember the drills in elementary school where we curled up under our desks in the event of a nuclear attack (to kiss our butts goodbye I suppose). One of my [...]

My grandfather’s workbench had an adhesive rule stuck to its front edge, which was extremely useful when woodworking. You could check part dimensions without pulling out a tape measure or [...]

If you want to sell something to a woodworker, the easy way is to start by selling him on the idea that he can’t possibly do it himself. If you can accomplish that, then you have someone [...]

When I attended the 20th anniversary of Lie-Nielsen Toolworks, John Economaki of Bridge City Tools was at the next table. When Thomas Lie-Nielsen called out Bridge City as one of the other [...]

When I first learned about the so-called Golden Mean or Golden Section I was enthralled by the concept. I actually remember the moment. I was in the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., [...]

With every project there is always some tool that deserves an Academy Award-style acceptance speech. “In building this chest of drawers I’d like to thank my mom for birthing me, Hanes [...]

Really, I have enough clamps , a couple dozen , to do just about anything. If I can’t clamp it, I can always use pinch dogs, drawboring or some other dodge to get the job done. But I [...]

In the shop, my mechanical pencil is as important as my eyeglasses. I use a mechanical pencil with a 0.5mm lead to darken in my knife lines when cutting dovetails, tenons or other joinery. I like [...]

I feel like a dirty English tool dealer this morning. But I’m OK with that. Recently I purchased a bunch of brass-bound folding rules to give to co-workers and friends. Most of these were [...]

My grandfather’s folding rule reads from right to left, while my tape measure reads from left to right. I never thought much about it, though I always did like using my folding rule when [...]

Last week Roy Underhill took me to the back room of his new school in Pittsboro, N.C. “Is this the office?” I asked. “No,” Roy said with a wicked grin. “This is [...]

I’ve had a vintage panel gauge for many years, and I’ve hated every minute of our relationship. The beam flops around in the head, no matter how Conan you go on the thumbscrew. And so [...]