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RWW Live: Open Q&A Night

3 comments
7 years ago
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Enter the Lightning Round

OMG thanks so much for everybody who came out and asked questions. That was a lot of fun and as expected there wasn’t nearly enough time to get to all the questions. We talked about a lot of hand tool stuff from sharpening to tongue & groove joinery to smoothing planes and panel saws. I think I probably should do more of these open format sessions because there seem to be many more questions out there.

The Questions You Asked

  • 3:40 A Lumberyard Story
  • 7:08 Square Dovetail Cuts
  • 12:47 Best Bits for Braces
  • 18:30 Using a Combination Plane for T&G joinery
  • 26:44 Where to get Auger Bits & how to sharpen them
  • 33:11 Sharpening narrow chisels without skewing them
  • 44:44 How to cut a T&G joint without a plow plane
  • 49:00 What is the best smoothing plane
  • 51:58 What is a good mallet to use
  • 58:06 Where do you get leather for vises
  • 1:00:00 Whats a good way to get my tools tested and sold
  • 1:02:00 How flat does the sole of your plane need to be
  • 1:04:15 How to sharpen a timber slick
  • 1:06:30 Uses for a Stanley #80
  • 1:09:28 How to know when a saw needs to be sharpened
  • 1:10:30 Panel vs Hand saws
  • 1:15:16 How to correct a saw cutting a curved kerf
  • 1:18:20 How tall is my joinery bench vs my workbench

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Stan P

HI Shannon;
I just wanted to say a big thank you. The reality is that I will most probably never be a pure hand tool woodworker, but I do tend to use more hand tools than I he to. The thank you is for stropping. I was making a case of drawers to go under a simple work bench I had just made. (I’m going to submit the work bench story to Marc’s guild and see if it gets published. ). It’s been almost two years since I hand cut any dovetails and I want to practice on this case of drawers. What a huge difference it made stropping every now and then during cutting the dovetails. I had an old barber’s strap, put some green compound on it and hooked it to a bench dog and anytime it seemed it was harder to chop, I stopped and gave the chisel a few strokes. Thanks.

Ted W.

Shannon,

Oh, I am so glad I watched this! Your comment about committing to a saw cut was spot on for me. I’ve been dissatisfied with my dovetails and the amount of fiddling I had to do to get them to fit acceptably when everyone talks about dovetails that should fit “right from the saw”. I just couldn’t get that to happen. Well, I was practicing tonight watching the placement of my feet and not nibbling but pushing the saw thru the whole cut and my dovetails came out so much crisper and straight. I was letting the saw wander off line because I was being so tentative and not committing to the cut.
Thank you!

/Ted

    Shannon

    This is great to hear Ted. To be fair I still catch myself nibbling from time to time and I have to take a deep breath and commit to the cut. It is amazing what a difference it makes. Glad you benefited from this and keep at it.