Mike92

I have been a spare time wood worker for over a decade now. I started buying second hand cheap tools. Many of these were made cheaply (does not matter in which country they were manufactured) and I ended up buying better. This not only decreased frustration but decreased the amount of wood I had for weekend fires with my neighbors. In the last few years I have started using hand tools. I have found many older Stanley planes that with a little work are fine workers and for the amount I use them are perfect. I also own a LN and sveral Lee Valley tools. Yes you pay for the quality but it is worth it. I also found that when shopping on the net for old Stanley stuff that was not complete rust you were looking at paying nearly as much for what you could buy a Lee Valley tool for. Why not go new?

On a completely different note, due to my employment, I have taken a closer look at manufacturing practices. I have seen reports on Chinese manufacturing that in those industries where nickel-cadmium batteries were produced there was a very high cost to the workers (premature death) due to heavy metal poisoning. My choice to buy from other manufacturers is due to human cost and not quality.