Archives

Board-Stretching Joint I bought a planer/molder so I could make my own moldings. My living room required one 28‘.-long molding, but all I had to make it were 12‘. boards. I didn’t [...]

Ordinary paraffin canning wax has dozens of uses in my shop. It’s cheap at a few bucks a pound, available at any grocery store, and easy to cut into small chunks. Unlike candle wax, which often [...]

There’s nothing more annoying than a vacuum hose dragging on the bench when you’re working with a router, sander or other power tool. These big hoses always seem to hang up on workpieces and [...]

Keeping project parts organized and in proper relation to one another while machining and assembling them can be a real challenge, especially if you’re organizing the pieces for attractive grain [...]

I lost the rubber pads that came with my clamps. I liked the way the pads protected the wood, so I decided to make my own. After a couple dips in liquid plastic ($9 at a hardware store), my [...]

A straight mortise-and-tenon joint requires each tenon cheek to be flat, of consistent thickness and parallel to the body of the workpiece. If a cheek is twisted or angled relative to the faces [...]

Sometimes drilling a hole in a finished piece of wood is unavoidable. I keep a pad of sticky notes nearby for this purpose. I put the sticky note roughly over the area where the hole is to go. [...]

Quick Panel-finishing Setup When making frame-and-panel doors, my panels are finished before installing them into their frames. The fact that the edges will be tucked into the frames allows for a [...]

For many years, I set up my dado stack directly on my table saw. So if my test cut was not correct, it required the re- moval of a portion of the set to add or remove shims, or swap …

I used to struggle making Dutchman keys (also known as butterflies) – but I love using them in my furniture. So, I came up with an idea that works well and makes the process completely painless. [...]

If you have an adjustable countersink bit (like the ones from Insty-Bit), you can loosen the set screw and pull the collar off, then flip it around so the flat side is facing the work. Tighten it [...]

There are times when you need to hold a workpiece securely against a dog in the workbench, but don’t want to risk damage to the work from a hard bench dog. Here’s a simple bench dog that will be [...]