Traditional Workbench Rediscovered
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A Magazine Committed to Finding the Better Way to Build Filled With Good Craftsmanship, the Best Techniques and No Ads Traditional Workbench Rediscovered 19th-Century Design Outworks Most Wimpy Modern Benches Flush-Cut Saws: Meet The $22 Tool that Rips the Competition Better & Simpler Hand-Tool Rack Pumpkin Pine Finish: Chemistry Adds 100 Years in a Day Bore Better: Become a Human Drill Press woodworking-magazine.com ■ AUTUMN 2007 “The only really good place to buy lumber is at a store where the lumber has already been cut and attached together in the form of furniture, finished and put inside boxes.” Contents — Dave Barry, columnist and author 1 On the Level 36 Be a Better Borer Is wood a precious natural resource that we Drilling accurate holes freehand is should treat like gold, or is it something a skill worth learning. Our simple even more important for the exercises will show you how to woodworker? bore accurate and true with an electric drill or a brace and bit. 2 Letters Questions, comments and wisdom 42 Pumpkin Pine from readers, experts and our staff. You don’t have to wait 100 years for your pine to develop a beautiful amber glow. How about 5 Shortcuts one day and three off-the-shelf products? Tricks and tips that will make your woodworking simpler and more accurate. 44 End Grain: Caught in the Act 8 Holtzapffel Workbench Following the rules of woodworking can some- We revive a 19th-century bench that was times box you into a corner. We discuss how designed just for cabinetmakers. This unique we go about bending or breaking the rules and simple bench blends the best features from every day in our shop. German, French and English designs. HOLTZAPFFEL BENCH: PAGE 8 24 Wall-hung Tool Racks Toolboxes, chest and cabinets are ideal for stor- ing your tools during transport, but they aren’t convenient for the workshop. The classic solu- tion is to build a simple rack above the bench. After experimenting in our shop, we found the best dimensions to create a simple rack that holds a wide array of tools. 27 Glossary DISCOVER FLUSH-CUT SAW TECHNIQUES: PAGE 32 Our illustrated guide to some of the unfamiliar terminology you’ll encounter in this issue. 28 Flush-cutting Saws Is there a difference between a flush-cutting saw that costs $15 and one that costs $94? We tested seven and found significant (and surpris- ing) differences among these no-set saws. 32 Discover Flush-cut Saw Techniques Whatever you do, don’t use your flush-cutting saw the way that the woodworking catalogs show you. You’ll end up with a bent blade. Here’s the right way to use these saws so they cut pegs and tenons flush without marring WALL-HUNG TOOL RACKS: PAGE 24 your work surface. PUMPKIN PINE: PAGE 42 On the Level Autumn 2007 woodworking-magazine.com Editorial Offices 513-531-2690 Publisher & Group Editorial Director ■ Steve Shanesy ext. 1238, [email protected] Why I Waste Wood Editor ■ Christopher Schwarz ext. 1407, [email protected] Art Director ■ Linda Watts ext. 1396, [email protected] No one told my eldest daughter that it would cherry trees in an hour to last me more than 100 Senior Editor ■ Robert W. Lang be difficult to make clothing by hand and by eye lifetimes of building furniture. ext. 1327, [email protected] – without a pattern, a machine or even a lesson. It was that trip that changed my view of the Senior Editor ■ Glen D. Huey And perhaps because no one told Maddy that raw material we work with. Before that moment, ext. 1293, [email protected] it would be hard, it wasn’t. During the last three I would squeeze every single part of a project out Managing Editor ■ Megan Fitzpatrick ext. 1348, [email protected] years she has made more than a hundred gar- of the fewest number of rough boards, even if that Illustrator ■ Matt Bantly ments for her stuffed animals, from jogging suits meant compromising the design or aesthetics. I Photographer ■ Al Parrish to sequined disco pants to chain mail. She works would allow myself to use a board with a less- entirely by instinct. Never measuring. Just cut- than-ideal grain pattern in a face frame or door F+W PUBLICATIONS INC. David H. Steward ■ Chairman & CEO ting, stitching and improving. stile or stretcher. This, I argued to myself, was John Speridakos ■ COO/CFO Now, every parent will tell you that their child being a good steward of the forest. Barbara Schmitz ■ VP, Manufacturing is remarkable, but I don’t think that’s the case Now I see things differently. I get only one John Lerner ■ Executive VP, Interactive Media here. I don’t think Maddy is a stitching savant. I chance to make each project. And the fate of Eric Svenson ■ Group Publisher, Interactive Media think that she simply is acting on an impulse and that project – kicked to the curb or cherished F+W PUBLICATIONS INC. without fear of failure. by my grandchildren – depends on the choices MAGAZINE GROUP It would be easy (read: lazy) for me to now end I make today with regard to its design, grain, Colin Ungaro ■ President Sara DeCarlo ■ VP, Consumer Marketing this column with that same advice about wood- joints and finish. Tom Wiandt ■ Business Planning Director working: Don’t be afraid; just get to it. But I know I don’t throw away tons of wood, but I’m not Sara Dumford ■ Conference Director that the fear of failure can be crippling. afraid to plow through lots of it to find the right Linda Engel ■ Circulation Director For example, last board. I’m not afraid to Susan Rose ■ Newsstand Director week I taught Maddy make a lot of test cuts PRODUCTION how to pump gasoline. to get a tight joint. And Production Manager ■ Vicki Whitford Learning that common “Don’t fear slow, only fear stop.” I’m not afraid to make Production Coordinator ■ Katherine Seal task was so stressful — Chinese saying a lot of sample boards Newsstand Distribution: Curtis Circulation Co., 730 River Road, New Milford, NJ 07646 that by the end of the to get the right finish. lesson, her hands were My leftover pieces end Back issues are available. For pricing information or to order, call 800-258-0929, visit our web site at woodworking-magazine.com or trembling a bit as she yanked the receipt from up as interior parts for a future project, as kin- send check or money order to : Woodworking Magazine Back Issues, the pump. At firstI was bemused by her trepida- dling or as compost at the dump. So here’s my F+W Publications Products, 700 E. State St., Iola, WI 54990. Please specify Woodworking Magazine and month. tion. But then I realized the difference between confession: I now throw away more wood than pumping gas and pushing a sewing needle. It was I ever did before. the raw material. But here’s how I rationalize that choice: The Maddy has a lifetime supply of cloth in our more wood I go through, the better my end result basement, thanks to the women in my life who is. And wood is a renewable resource. We can buy it for her. And when she needs more sequined get it almost anywhere, even rescuing it from the Highly Recommended fabric to make a disco jacket and floppy hat to city dump if we so desire. Furthermore, wood is I’m often asked to recommend a book for peo- match the pants, it will cost her a dollar or two inexpensive when compared to the hours of labor ple who want to learn hand tools. Here’s my for a supply that will last many years. invested in any piece of fine workmanship. best recommendation: Robert Wearing’s “The Now consider gasoline: It’s precious, poi- All this makes me bristle when I see compa- Essential Woodworker.” It covers basic hand sonous and explosive. So here’s my real point: nies hawking virgin plastic products under the skills better than any I think that wood is a lot more like cloth than it guise of “saving a tree.” Where do they think other book. And it is like gasoline. plastic comes from? It comes from petroleum. shows you how to This statement might be hard for some of us to So consider this: We can (and should) always put them to use swallow at first.I t was for me. I’m a conservation- plant more trees (or make more sequined cloth). to build a basic ist at heart, and saving the trees always seemed Compressing dinosaur poop for a million years, cabinet, table and like a good idea when I was growing up. however, is another matter. WM drawer. You can But home woodworkers aren’t really the source find it used for $10 of the problem when you talk about deforesta- to $20. tion, which I know is a critical problem in some — Christopher places on the globe. Several years ago I toured the Schwarz hardwood forests of Pennsylvania with a group of Christopher Schwarz journalists and watched loggers cut down enough Editor woodworking-magazine.com ■ 1 Letters ILLUSTRATIONS BY HAYES SHANESY A Forecast for Successful Fuming plan on putting the vise screw 9" from the top of Truck Restoration Finish Advice the bench like you did. So, how much higher do My nephew and I are constructing some quar- you think I could place the parallel guide and still I am restoring a 1957 GMC truck.