STL333: A bigger jointer won’t fix it
Vic, Anissa, and Ben discuss jointing very long boards, woodworking with younglings, hand-tool dust clean up, and their all-time favorite tools of this week.Jointing VERY long boards
From John:
Here’s a question for the show. How would you go about flattening very long (100+ inches in length) by hand?
I’m pretty good at getting boards about 4 ft long flat, but these longer boards are giving me fits. I just can’t seem to get the twist out. The darn things don’t even fully fit on my workbench. These are for a fairly substantial tabletop, so I’m trying to get things as flat as possible before glue up to minimize work that needs to be done afterwards when the top will be very difficult to move around.
The strategy that seems to be working best is to work in short, overlapping 18-24inch sections. I was wondering if anyone had any tips and tricks (short of shelling out for a long bed jointer) to get the job done.
Is it safe to teach kids woodworking?
From JReed:
There are several of your regular guests that teach on a regular basis. I have a niece begging me to take her twelve year old son under my wing and teach him some woodworking. I taught one adult Comm. Ed. class years ago and was less than inspired, they all just wanted to use the school shop for their own projects. My shop is a one man shop, I don’t borrow tools, I don’t have much bench space and I don’t allow friends to use the shop, ( they ask only once, I must good at diplomacy, they are still friends). I worry about the safety of a twelve year old, He is a really good young man, but everything in my shop can draw blood!
I don’t know how to respond to my niece’s request, I am a firm believer in passing on any knowledge or expertise one might have to the next generation. I haven’t said yes or no yet, I wouldn’t know where to start. Any ideas, thoughts or experiences from your group of experts would be greatly appreciated.
Controlling dust in a hand-tool shop
From Bob:
Is there a good way to provide dust control in a hand tool shop? I’ve moved all my power equipment to a separate building and only use hand tools in the main shop connected to my house. But I’m amazed how much dust I still generate. It doesn’t seem practical to attempt point-of-use suction like you might use with power tools, besides, that would defeat one of the allures of hand tool use, the peace and quiet of no machines running. Any thoughts would be appreciated.
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Comments
Another approach to John’s question about flattening long twisted boards prior to glue up. In boatbuilding we’re sometimes faced with timbers much longer, I have had some success using winding sticks to gauge where the timber is high, and then using a handheld power planer to remove those high spots before finishing the flattening with a fore plane and jointer plane. With one side flat, I use a planer to get the stock flat and with parallel faces. When I glue up these pieces I use dowels to keep them aligned, this makes the final flattening easier. I’m doing a desktop now that is 84” long and 30” and had this same problem, and its turning out well.
I carry a plastic vernier caliper with me when I go to the hardware store, they are cheap enough that I keep a set in the glove box of each car and on each work bench.
The cheap ones are not all that accurate, but more than good enough for measuring nuts, bolts and screws. Great for quick measurements of drill bits and screw shanks for drilling pilot holes.
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