While turning wooden pens, students in my woodshop classes kept wearing out the points on the live centers of our mini lathes. The points fit into the hollowed end of the pen mandrel. If the mandrel isn’t clamped tight enough between the lathe’s head and tailstock, it spins on the point and wears it out….

Small logs from a local downed tree are a great windfall of free lumber for small projects. They’re easy to saw into boards on the band saw once you have established a couple flat reference surfaces for safe feeding. I use a simple L-shaped carrier jig screwed together from scrap plywood to make the initial…

I like to buy used electric motors for powering various tools around the shop. I also use them to mount grinding wheels, wire brushes and buffing wheels. I typically outfit the motors with toggle switches because they’re light and small. However, as unobtrusive as they are, I would occasionally catch my sleeve on a switch,…

I always sign my work, now that I’ve figured out an easy and permanent way to do it: I use an engraver. But not just any engraver—it has to have an adjustable stroke (the distance the tip moves in and out). Set the stroke to maximum. An engraver works just like a pencil, but some…

Filling knots with colored epoxy usually works quite well, but sometimes the void is in a spot that’s difficult to fill, like the edge of a board. Here’s how to do it. First, apply some paste wax to a piece of melamine so the epoxy won’t adhere to it. Clamp the melamine to the workpiece,…

Before the advent of magnetic-based LED lights, many of us used flexible gooseneck lamps with an incandescent bulb as auxiliary lights on our drill presses and band saws. These lamps were usually screwed or clamped onto the machine. I acquired a Craftsman lamp many years ago, but there were many other brands and styles available….

Mice used to rule my shop. They got into everything! That all changed when someone told me that fresh mint repels mice. Mint grows wild in one corner of my yard (it’s a perennial and comes back each year), so every couple weeks, I pick a handful and spread it around my floor. Now my…

Chamfering an edge with a block plane is often easier, faster and safer than using a router or tablesaw—particularly on a small part. I do it so often that I’ve dedicated one of my planes for the job. To modify your plane, make two 3/16″ thick hardwood sides, two 3/8″ thick chamfering guides and shims…

How do you know if the table on your drill press is square? Not more-or-less square, but precisely square? I’ve adopted an old machinist’s trick, using a very simple jig. To make it, you’ll need a hardwood arm, two 5/16″ carriage bolts that are 2″-3″ long, four nuts and four washers. First, make the arm….

Here’s a simple way to sharpen chisels using a 3″ sanding drum mounted in an oscillating spindle sander or a drill press. Cut a squared-up 2×4 the length of the sander’s table. Cut a 2″ deep by 1/2″ wide slot at 45° near the 2×4’s center. Clamp the 2×4 to your sander’s table.  Place the…

Dust is a real problem when you can’t use a router table’s fence and its dustport. Here’s a clever way to suck up that dust using your shop vacuum’s nozzle.

My lathe came with a lamp, but the lathe’s manual has this weird warning: “Position the work lamp so that wood chips do not accumulate inside the lamp shade and pose a fire hazard.” Now, where in the world could the lamp go? When I turn, chips fly everywhere! It occurred to me that metal…