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How do you use our woodworking catalog?
One of our woodworking friends recently sent us this video, one woman’s idea on how best to use a woodworking catalog:
So what did you think of that? Personally…I can see that happening to a lot of our woodworking friends! So what do you do with our catalog when you get it in the mail? Do you quickly flip through it? Do you put it in your shop for use at a later date? Do you keep it next to your router table system so it is handy when you need to order some new woodworking router bits? Let us know.
Also, if you want to avoid being hit in the head you can always flip through our online “flipbook” version of the catalog. It’s the closest thing to having the catalog in your hands that you can get online. Click here to see the most recent version.
RTFM: Read That Forgotten Manual
*** This post is courtesy of Tom Iovino of Tom’s Workbench ***
So, I have this band saw. Bought it back in 2004. It’s a pretty standard issue 14 inch model with a ¾ hp motor. It has a nice shiny table. I’ve equipped it with some decent aftermarket band saw blades for resawing and curve cutting, a Kreg precision band saw fence, a brush to get the dust off the bottom wheel and a set of Cool Blocks to replace the standard issue steel blade guides.
Tom had his blades...
...and he had his fence but something still wasn't right
And, yet, even with the loving care I put into the saw, it still didn’t function the way I needed it to. The saw would cut very thin materials well – maybe up to ¾ of an inch – with no bogging or struggle. But, once you got thicker than that, the saw had this maddening habit of slowing to a stop. I would have to stop the saw, back the band saw blade out from the piece and start all over again. It was frustrating and dangerous, and I usually ended up turning to my jigsaw to make cuts that probably should have been easily handled by the band saw.
Eventually, the time came where I had to resaw a 5 inch wide piece of ash. I was dreading this step, because I knew it was going to take at least a half an hour to nibble my way through the board, and I wasn’t going to like the results.
That’s when the idea hit me. Before I waste my time, why not break out the manual and see if there was a way to get the saw to work better?
The biggest challenge was finding the manual in the first place. I looked high and low and eventually found it tucked away in a lower shop cabinet with the rest of the manuals. Apparently, I must have been slipping them in the same area for years, but forgot about them. I must have referred to it, because I did have a page dog-eared over regarding band saw blade tensioning and I had written the blade length (93.5 inches) on the front cover.
Armed with my toolbox, I pulled the saw out from its place of banishment (against the wall) and set to work. I discovered quickly that I need to hook up my dust collection system when I use the saw – there were strata of sawdust layers from previous projects. I vacuumed out the cabinet and flipped to page one of the manual. There were plenty of safety tips there – pretty useful stuff.
How to unpack your saw … we were well past that step.
How to assemble your saw… the saw is where it needed to be, perched on top of the stand. That’s good.
Then, I got to the good stuff – how to set the saw up. OK, the motor mounting instructions were interesting, and everything was still nice and snug.
How to set up the drive belt…. It was properly looped over the drive pulley on the motor and the pulley that connected to the lower wheel. Check.
How to tension the belt … OOOH, that’s where I made my mistake! There were carefully written and illustrated directions on how to get the tension right… and I – in my haste to get the saw up and running – apparently ignored them. My bad…
A few turns of a bolt later, I was set up the way I needed to be. I ran through the rest of the set up instructions – slowly – and saw that the rest of the saw was OK. I reassembled all of the guards and covers, plugged the saw back in and hit the on switch.
The previously wimpy saw was now strong. Beefy. Assertive. The ash board didn’t stand a change. I went edge to edge on this two foot long board – taking my time – in about 40 seconds. All told, even when counting the set up time, the cut took about 15 minutes. What an improvement!
So, the next time your tools aren’t functioning the way they should, do a little sleuthing and find that manual. You just might discover that a little tweak or two can turn the agony of defeat into the thrill of victory!
*** Specials thanks to Tom Iovino, a true Shop Monkey, for this post. He will be providing posts on a monthly basis for Eagle America, check back again soon. ***
Presidents’ Day Sale – Up to $100 Instant Rebates!
Holidays can’t get much more American than Presidents’ Day, which is next Monday 2/21/2011. To celebrate this great day and honor the great Americans who appear on our currency, Eagle America is giving them away! Each Instant Rebate Savings level listed below is inspired by the amount of and people pictured on our U.S. currency. The more you buy, the more of them you save! There isn’t a better time to stock up your woodshop with router bits, table saw blades, pocket hole jigs, measuring tools and woodworking tools and supplies of all shapes and sizes. Here are the Instant Rebate levels, make sure you click over for complete offer details and use the promo code PRES-2011 during checkout. Spread the word!
Win a $1000 Router Accessory Prize Package!
Happy Valentine’s Day! From everyone at Eagle America, we wanted to show you how much we love both YOU and ROUTERS…so we have a giveaway that will knock your socks off. Click here to see the complete prize details. It is free to enter and one lucky winner will make themselves and their woodworking router very, VERY happy. A free router table, a free router bit set and four free router accessories…now THAT is showing you some love. Good luck!
Building A Simple Knife Block
The other day I was at my mother-in-laws house for dinner and she asked me if I could make something for her. I already had several irons in the fire but what was one more.
Before I even knew what it was, I told her “yes” so I was committed to the project, large or small.
She walked over to her kitchen counter and picked up a small knife block and set it on the dining room table in front of me. I looked at it and said, “Is that it?” I was shocked and relieved that I had just been asked to do one of the simplest woodworking projects I had ever seen. She told me she wanted some more to set out on the tables during large family gatherings and parties.
That evening I took her store bought version with me as a sample, even though it was not really necessary.
The next day, I gathered up some wood scraps and cut offs I had sitting around the woodshop and immediately went to work.
The cores of the Knife Blocks are 2” wide, 5” long and 2” thick. I put a full kerf blade in my table saw and set the height of the blade and my fence to the spacing I desired. After a few passes through the table saw, I had 6 slots for the knives. I cut two 1/4” side panels for each block and glued them in place.
After a little sanding and finishing the Knife Blocks were complete. The setup process was so quick and easy; I made about 20 Knife Blocks and plan to pass them out to the rest of the family.
So, if you are looking for a simple project to make your mother-in -law happy, make her a Knife Block for her knives.
Just remember not to start making jokes when she’s putting the knives in it!
Timely Projects
Are you looking for a quick and easy project that you can complete in a weekend?
Do you need to make a gift for someone but have no clue what to make?
Here is your chance to make a one-of-a-kind project or gift that requires only a few tools and can be enjoyable for woodworkers of all skill levels.
What could this project be?
Clock making of course!
Clocks make great gifts and can be as simple or as complicated as you want them to be. With today’s broad selection of movements, hands, faces, and wood species, clock making allows your creativity to shine and show people what you can do.
I started making clocks when I was a child. I would go to the local woodworking supply store with my father or grandfather and inevitably end up in the clock parts section. I was always fascinated by the mechanics of clocks. I can remember getting a simple quartz movement and going home to search through the scrap wood pile to find a leftover piece of unique looking wood. Sometimes I would get lucky and find a nice burled piece.
With just a little cutting, sanding and finishing, I had the perfect backdrop to insert my quartz movement into. Then I would quickly assemble my clock and show it off to the family. I still see many of my simple clock creations to this day when I visit with my family.
So, moral of the story is: Be creative and the next time you need a unique gift or you are looking for a simple and unique project to occupy your time, build a clock. They can be great fun!
Abatron Wood Rebuilder
Dan writes:
Last year I showed you what a wonderful job my Earlex sprayer did on my old porch rocking chairs. Well it was a bad weather season and the lower rockers were starting to rot out on me. What was I to do about that? Well, Abatron’s Wood Restoration Kit came to the rescue!
This two part epoxy system was easy to use and did the trick.
I first cleaned out the rotten wood and mixed the Liquid Wood resins in a rubber mixing bowl and brushed it onto the rotted out runners. While the Liquid Wood was still tacky, I mixed the two parts of the WoodEpox on a piece of glass and using my spatula, I spread it over the rocker and built up a nice base.
A helpful hint was to keep placing my spatula in water which really helped smooth it out.
After a few days of curing and drying, it was sanded, painted and ready for another few years of good use on the old front porch at my house.
But I didn’t stop there.
To protect it and make it slide a little easier, I put a slick strip (400-1158) over the runners.
It was fast, easy and a pleasure to work with. I have lots left over for more “rotten” projects in the future.
New Shaper Cutter Build-A-Sets
We have given you the freedom to create your own Router Bit Build-A-Sets online for over a year now. Today we are proud to announce you can now do the same thing with our Shaper Cutters! So what is a Build-A-Set you ask? Good question, here is how it works:
- They currently are available for Door Construction projects only
- Let’s say you are making a raised panel door with your router
- Due to the number of router bit designs available, it would be almost impossible for us to guess what would look best on your kitchen cabinets
- Now all you have to do is click over to our site and it simply walks you through assembling your own custom router bit set on the fly!
- Not only do you get EXACTLY the bits that you want, but you also save money in the process. What a deal!
Our router bit loving fans have been using this functionality for the last year and our shaper cutter fans were jealous…not anymore! Click over today and give either of them a try.
The Art of a Woodburner
I have a good friend who loves woodburning as a hobby and I was amazed at how wonderfully rendered his pieces were. His name is Dave Hasse and he’s been woodburning for quite a while. Being an art major in college myself, I could appreciate how much attention to detail it took for Dave to get the beautiful results that he does. The wood that the images are rendered on give the pieces that “natural outdoor” feel.
I recently asked Dave permission to put him into our blog and he kindly agreed. I asked him to share a little bit about himself and his hobby. I hope you enjoy Dave’s work as much as i did.
” I was given a woodburning kit somewhere between the age of 8 and 12. I traced outlines of pictures provided in the kit. Later, I did them on my own, using pictures of animals, as I had always enjoyed nature. There were lapses of time when I didn’t burn anything. A few were done in high school, but nothing much until I was in California . I used books and pictures of animals as references, and produced several. I later added commissioned portraits and lettering to the collection. Occasionally I would include color in the form of watercolor or colored pencil.
I’ve been using a basic woodburning tool from a craft store, but discovered that in the future, I’ll have to use a hotter, more advanced tool to burn on a wider variety of wood. I have used basswood so far, which is also recommended for carving. The tool comes with a variety of copper points, but I have mainly used a universal wedge point. The basswood comes in bark-edged planks and slices, or sheets, often used by cabinet makers. The surface is usually clean and knot-free.
The subject is drawn with pencil in detail before burned. Pieces can take ten to twenty hours. A UV coating can be brushed on to complete the piece. Sometimes I’ve brushed on instant coffee beforehand to act as a stain to keep the wood from looking unfinished. As I stated, animals and birds have been preferred subjects. It’s difficult to choose a favorite, but I’ve always liked the one with the crown of thorns, the Cuban tree frog, and the two foxes playing.”
Here are a few samples of Dave’s work…
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