Worth Reading: Matt Bickford's New Blog
If you are curious about or struggle with moulding planes, planemaker M.S. Bickford has recently launched a new blog that will open your eyes: Musings from Big Pink. Using SketchUp drawings and [...]
Nice Saw. And it Always Will Be
A few weeks ago I was reading through “The Rule Book,” an amazing piece of scholarship on measuring tools by Jane Rees and Mark Rees. A few of the minty, minty old rules in the book [...]
Use the No. 95 Trimming Plane Upright?
I’ve always held the No. 95 edge-trimming plane like a block plane. The lever cap faces up to the sky. The fence of the No. 95 is then vertical. So I was surprised to see a little tip in …
Help the Jeske Family (and Yourself)
If you’ve ever met Dave Jeske at Blue Spruce Toolworks, then you don’t have to read the next sentence. You already know he is one of the nicest, most honest and talented toolmakers [...]
Larry Williams and Don McConnell form Old Street Tool, Planemakers
Tomorrow, Clark & Williams, which has been in business since 1996, will relaunch as a newly incorporated business called Old Street Tool, with Larry Williams and Don McConnell as the owners [...]
About the Prices of Miter Boxes
Since Ron Herman’s excellent story on miter boxes appeared in the November 2010 issue of Popular Woodworking Magazine, the price of these tools has gone through the roof, according to some [...]
Bob's New (Old) Favorite Tools of 2010
My favorite tools for 2010 are a couple of vintage Stanley planes, a No. 5 and a No. 3. There isn’t anything special about either one, except for recent history. My son gave me the No. 5 for [...]
Falling Off the Wagon in Style
Those of you who follow my personal woodworking blog know that I have been selling off a lot of my excess tools and upgrading my shop at home. Since August, I’ve sold more than 100 tools [...]
Do You Sharpen Too Much?
When I teach people to sharpen I notice a bad habit that many of them have: They think that rubbing the tool against a stone is sharpening. The more they rub, the sharper it gets, no? Well, no. I [...]
New Stanley 62: Better, But Not Yet Perfect
It looks like the folks in New Britain, Conn., want to get things right. After Stanley’s first generation of the No. 62 low-angle jack plane had some problems, including a fatal bed error [...]
Quick Update on the Stanley Chisels
Stanley’s Sweetheart socket chisels should be for sale in the United States in about six to eight weeks, according to a company product manager. The chisels are in the final testing stages [...]
Rehandling a Chisel
For the last week or so I’ve been researching the science of smacking the snot out of things. I’ve been reading lecture notes from a Harvard course on “fracture [...]
