The plan today was to get at least one coat of finish on the funerary box. I got close but no shellac was done today. I got sidelined trying to deal with how to plane something that wasn't working for me. I wandered down going no where street and wasted over an hour without anything to show for it. I quit the shop early and I'll get back to it tomorrow. snug fitI started fitting the plugs in the lid grooves... Read more

I'm finishing up the second of two shoe shelves and after I glued up the undercarriage, I realized I hadn't chopped the mortises for the buttons that would be used to attach the top.There are supposed to be mortises in the inside faces of the upper railsI recall reading once about a "drawer lock chisel" that can help you mortise in tight spaces.  But I don't have one, so it's time to improvise.For the mortises in the short rails, there... Read more

Continuing with the carcase dowel joint, shown above is the reference face of the jig being squared to the inside of the carcase. This is the same reference face of the jig to which the side piece was attached as the jig was screwed into place on the end grain workpiece. (See the photo in […]... Read more

I have iterated on at least 3 different means of hanging my laptop on the monitor tree. Here is the latest arrangement in the prototype form. It still looks kind of like a jumble of wires here but it's very ad-hoc. essentially i've got my laptop sliding into interior groves of a box, with a lot of the wiring plus a supplemental cooling fan hidden underneath. I've learned that laptops are very tempermental with regard to heat dissipation, and bluetooth... Read more

I never thought it possible, but I snapped my Antique Disston saw vice from over tightening it. Cast iron is real crap. I don’t know if I was over tightening it to be honest but… More... Read more

Due to the complexity of maintaining multiple blog sites, I decided to consolidate and only blog at my main site WoodSkills. If you want to follow along on my projects and builds, feel free to subscribe at the following link. You will be notified of new blog posts and I will also include blog post links in my newsletter.https://www.woodskills.comNot long ago, woodworking was considered to be in a downward spiral with diminishing followers and practitioners. Pundits were proclaiming the demise of... Read more

 What I have been doing myself, I keep only the tools I use on the peg board in front of the work and underneath the bench.  If a tool is hanging or in a basket on the pegboard and isn't used, it gets removed and in a cabinet.  Some tools that used to be in cabinets have made their ways back to the pegboard such as the Stanley bullnose plane.  I find it a helpful way for me to determine... Read more

After we started selling pencils designed for woodworking, several customers asked why don’t make a pencil sharpener as well.  Two words: Mobius+Ruppert. These German-made sharpeners are exactly what we would make. They are brass, nicely machined and you can purchase replacement blades so the tool will last a lifetime. And the price is great, from...... Read more

I think many woodworkers underestimate the value of both their hands and the hand tools we use in handwork. Undervaluing our own ability to master handwork to an acceptable level often leads to giving up well before we can experience the wonders of skilled work for ourselves, even when we are likely to be just … Underestimating and udervaluing Read More » Read the full post Underestimating and udervaluing on Paul Sellers' Blog.... Read more

This is a souvenir copper plate that my father bought back in 1975 when we last went on vacation to Bosnia and Hercegovina. I plucked it out of his shed and thought I’d give my… More... Read more

“Is that who I think it is?” I asked Frank as one of the vendors walked by his table.“Yes, it is.” he replied.“I should go over to their table and try out one of their guitars.”“They make double tops” Frank said with some disdain. He continued to play my guitar, I kept quiet and avoided that table all week.Frank then launched into “Muneira”, the finale of Federico Mompou’s Suite Compostelana, his playing was furious and wonderful, I had no problem... Read more

Katherine has cooked up another big batch of Soft Wax 2.0, a safe and beautiful finish that I use on all my chairs and much of my casework. It is available for sale in her etsy store. Katherine makes the wax in our machine room using a waterless process and then packages it in durable...... Read more

This post is part of a blog series revealing the table of contents of upcoming Issue Eleven. As is our custom, we’ll be discussing one article per weekday in order to give you a taste of what is come.  The subscription window which includes Issue Eleven is open now. To get Issue Eleven when it ships early October, you can sign up for a subscription here.  If you aren’t sure about your subscription status, you can reach out to Grace at [email protected] Keep in mind... Read more

If you find your workspace overwhelmed with clutter to the point where you really can’t work in it, then you don’t just have a storage-space problem. The clutter is telling you something about yourself, and it’s probably something you don’t … Continue reading →... Read more

The “building” phase of a box is somewhat uneventful – cut a few rebates, level the cheeks, apply a bit of glue and nail things together, all the while praying that your initial saw cuts were square. To curtail that excitement for perhaps a while longer, I cut “boot-jacks” in the sides and shaped the […]... Read more