RWW 166 Tenon Layout Shortcuts

I’m always looking for shortcuts in my work. Like many of us I started in a power tool centric shop so many of my working habits are born from there. The more time I spend working entirely by hand the more I discover that there are steps I can skip to speed up my work. It is these shortcuts that I think are the secrets that allowed our forefathers in hand tools to work so fast every day.

This time I’ll demonstrate how I skip precisely dimensioning a board to length. In my power tool days I would have squared off the end of the board and used a gauge referenced off the end grain to lay in the shoulder. Today I skip that part and go right to the shoulder.

Your Turn

What shortcuts to you take in your day to day work? I hope this will be the first of a few videos I do on this subject as there are more shortcuts. I want to hear about yours. Please share your thoughts in the comments below.