I have finally had a chance to finish reading the Christmas gift I received from my sister. I was excited when I opened this set of books "Tage Frid Teaches Woodworking: Special Limited Edition with DVD Profile," produced by Taunton Press.
There are three books and a DVD in the set:
"Book 1 - Joinery"
"Book 2 - Shaping, Veneering, Finishing"
"Book 3 - Furnituremaking" [sic]
"DVD - Tage Frid, A Fine Woodworking DVD Profile"
This is an introduction video for a new series I will be putting together on handplanes. The PHW Sharpening Series will continue on ad infinitum, as there are always new tools to sharpen and new ways to sharpen them (especially if I get another two or three jobs to support my habit...wait...what? I can quit anytime I want!). The in-depth handplane videos that will follow this introduction will cover a wide swath of information. Just a few of the videos I am planning include:
Detailed instruction on individual planes, to include several specialty planes
Fettling (tuning up) and cleaning new planes
Restoring planes, including re-japanning and making minor repairs
Making totes and knobs
Japanese style planes
Powered planing methods
Shooting boards
Making a wooden bodied and an infill handplane
Making a metal bodied handplane
I will try my best to give focus to these videos in order fill them with relevant information without making them ridiculously long and un-watchable, so... I guess that means I'll have to start with the next one? Wish me luck.
Love was not an original tenant of the feast of St. Valentine until Chaucer wrote about birds unexpectedly mating on "Seynt Volantynys Day" in (or around) 1382. In fact, nothing is really even known about St. Valentine including which martyr he actually was (there were apparently many named Valentine). Due to some miserable experiences on previous such holidays, I have never been much of a Valentine's Day celebrator (fortunately for me, neither is my wife). I decided that this year I would give new meaning to this vastly overrated "holiday."
Love is still part of my New Order of St Valentine's Day or N.O.S.V.D. (okay, so the name needs some work), but this isn't the sappy cartoon hearts, gross chalk candy and creepy naked cherub love that surrounds Valentine's Day now. The concept behind N.O.S.V.D. is the love for hand made objects and the tools used to make them.
I was recently reading an article in the February issue of Scientific American about the impracticality of a cheeseburger. The article's author, Mr. David Wogan, sites a blog entry by Mr. Waldo Jaquith in which he attempted to make a cheeseburger from scratch. Apparently, what he found was that not only were the ingredients harvested or slaughtered at different times of the year, but that it was extremely expensive to produce each ingredient from raw materials (including growing the delicious veggie toppings). This got me thinking about the "ingredients" or materials we as woodworkers often use in our projects.
Because I have a lot of sharpening information scattered throughout this blog, and a lot more on the way, I figured it was about time to consolidate it all into something loosely resembling a reference page. I titled it "Sharpening" because I couldn't come up with something witty and hilarious without losing my intent of serious content. I have a link to the "Sharpening" page now on the right hand side of the home page. The idea is to have this reference page evolve as the information it contains does. It will also become a template for similar reference pages for many other individual hand tools, power tools, and the techniques involved with both. Please feel free to leave comments or email me if there is something else you'd like to see or even if you'd just like to leave some feedback. As always, thanks for reading!
They are planning the first in Pasadena, California on October 12-14 and the second in Cincinnati, Ohio/Kentucky (it's at the Northern Kentucky Convention Center) on November 2-4. Personally, I think two conferences, one on either side of the country (roughly), is a great idea which may end up reaching a larger audience in the long run. I wonder, though, if this will reduce the community gathering aspect and sharing between the different styles, practices and views of woodworking across the country? Left Coast woodworking design and styles are often rather different than some here on the Right Coast and this conference seems like one of the larger opportunities for a lot of those ideas to get exchanged and discussed.
I will definitely be attending one or the other this year (my wife has signed my permission slip) and I'll provide photos, videos and hopefully post an interview or two on the blog after I return home from the conference. Cue dream sequence music... maybe the committee will have some sort of collective awakening and have a conference in Baltimore or DC in 2013!
For a long time I have used a protractor, a small piece of wood and a marker to find angles on my chisels. Well, the protractor, which I have had since elementary school, finally bit the dust (both literally and figuratively on my shop floor). I thought about making some blocks of wood with varying fixed angles cut into them to measure the angles on my blades, but these wear over time, are of varying precision, and eat up space on a shelf.
When I was looking for the Veritas Grinder Jig, I found several different styles of "angle finders" on the market. Most of them were just fixed angles that you slide the blade into to approximate its angle. These work well and are very simple to use, but I wanted something I could use to measure an exact angle like my protractor, you know, for those times when 33 degrees works differently than 35 degrees. This is why I decided to spend slightly more and get this Pinnacle Angle Gauge.
The gauge works, effectively and simply. It is very accurate and is a high quality build. I am very happy with it so far, and recommend it if you are in need of something similar.
Anodized Aluminum Angle Gauge 15-45 Degrees
Just Slide The Bevel In Against The Measuring Arm
It Rests The Gauge On The Bevel
Move It Accordingly To Also Measure Microbevels
