The Morning Woodworker

Home Sweet (Temporary) Home

Here is my new home for the next year. I will be sharing it with a coworker and his family. I have the master bedroom so I can have some privacy and they can have theirs. My room is average size so I should be able to set up a workbench of some sort to get my wood on. The only problem I see is that we are on the second floor so me pounding away on some chisels might not be welcome. I will have to plan accordingly or just learn to keep the chisels really sharp and press down on them really hard.

There is a detached garage that is available for a pretty hefty monthly fee so there is always that option.  I will probably get that anyway when I go back to AL. to get my motorcycle and tools.

I will post more info and pictures as they become available. Right now I am still in the hotel and will continue to be here until this weekend. I can’t wait to move. Hotels suck.

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Portable Bench… An answer to my prayers?

With my recent job change I have been forced out of my new workshop (or new workshop in progress) due to relocating. That really bummed me out a bit as it was getting close to completion, or at least usable, and I was really looking forward to getting some serious shop time in. On my way out the door, to my new job, I grabbed some hand tools in hopes of continuing my woodworking addiction. The biggest problem that I was facing is where in the hell am I going to set up shop. I know that there are those of you who work out of the tailgate of your truck, on the porch, in the closet, in the yard, ect.

One of the reasons that I have spent so much time and expense converting my garage into a workshop is: I want to be comfortable, damn it! I’ve got AC in there! My wife called me the other day and told me the garage (I call it the shop) is colder than the house! Hell yeah! That’s what I’m talkin’ about. That’s where I want to be. But anyway…

In my hopes of finding a bench to work on I came across this little gem by Blum Tool Company, called the “Bench Horse”. Now when I first saw this thing I thought that there was no way that it could work with those folding legs. It’s got to be too flimsy to do any real work on it. But after watching the video, I am staring to change my mind. The guy is planing on the thing!

I would have liked to seen him do some hand sawing and some chisel work on it but so far it looks pretty good. I am going to write him and see what he has to say about it.

Anyone ever worked with one of these? Please let me know.

Posted in Shop | 1 Comment »

More travel time

I am done with the 2 week training coarse in Tulsa, OK. After a very brief stay in Mobile, just to pick up some stuff and kiss the wife, I am back on the road to Charleston, SC.

I grabbed a very modest selection of hand tools. Hopefully I can continue my woodworking. If not I guess I will have to create a new blog.

I know the blog entries have been very weak. Sorry for that. Been extremely busy. Things should start to settle down in a couple of weeks. By then I hope to have a semi-permanent place to live.

Until then,

Eric

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Living on Tulsa Time

It’s day 4 of 10 for my training in Tulsa, OK. So far it has been pretty basic stuff. Not to say that it isn’t intense at times because it is. Wiring up a brand new aircraft is done with much more precision than what I was used to working in a repair facility. Everything is done to tolerance of the width of a fingernail. Takes a long time, and I guess that is the biggest hurdle for me, slowing down and doing the job with much more precision. I will get used to it.

My future as far as woodworking is still up in the air. Many of you have expressed interest in me setting up a shop in an apartment. The more I think of it, the more I like the idea. To show that you don’t need a big shop to do woodworking. I am still trying to locate a place to live but it is hard to do since I am still about 1300 miles away from my final destination.

Please keep sending comments or suggestion as to what kind of projects I could do, tools to get or anything. I’m far from home… I’m lonely.

Eric

Posted in General | 3 Comments »

Let the training begin!

Sunday 08/15/08 6:27 p.m.

We finally arrived at the hotel in Claremore, OK. and grabbed some grub at a local Mexican restaurant. That was a long 12 1/2 hours. Not the way I wanted to spend Father’s Day. At least I had some company along the way. One of my former co-workers got the same job as I did and rode with me, so that makes it pretty cool. Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures to show because I forgot to bring the cable to the camera to upload to computer. (I also forgot to take any pictures)

Have a group meeting in about 2 hours (8:00). Guess I will meet the rest of the gang. I believe there 15 of us total. Hope there aren’t any moody bitches with issues.

Until next time,

Eric

Posted in General | 3 Comments »

Closing up shop. Temporarily.

In case you haven’t noticed, I haven’t posted anything on woodworking or the building of my shop. It’s not because I have lost interest. That is the furthest from the truth. The truth is, as anyone who has been following me on Twitter would know, I have been trying to get a new job. Well, I just found out yesterday that I got the job (yipee!). The bad news is that it will require me to relocate. This job is not permanent so I will be gone for 6 months to possibly a year and a half, or however long I can milk it out. Why take a temp job? Damn good money, baby! This will give me a chance to set up shop the way I want to when I get back as well.

I would like to continue the blog but without a shop I’m not sure what to do. I thought of just setting up a small area in the new place (apartment) and just using hand tools to make boxes or something. You know to keep the skills building.

What do you guys think? I would really appreciate your input or suggestions on this matter.

Posted in General | 8 Comments »

Wood, Beer and Food!

Before anyone starts sending hate mail, let me explain. I am not talking about woodworking with beer. I am talking about the perfect ending to weekend. (My weekend ends on Monday, IF I get two days off, which in this case I did, woohoo!) I’m talking of cooking with wood… and beer.

While I was perusing the local Lowes Home Impovement store I went through the grill section as I usually do. What caught my eye wasn’t the usual assortment of grills that they had to offer. (Although I was tempted by the shininess of stainless steel.) What caught my attention was a couple of pallets of charcoal that I had not seen before. It was the “Cowboy” brand “Lump” charcoal. In case anybody is not aware, lump charcoal is wood chunks that have been charred into coal. I had been wanting to try this lump style of charcoal for quite some time. While I enjoy grilling as much as any American Male in the South, I never felt that I had a “One Up” on anybody, I had only the Bricket style of charcoal available to me. At least I don’t use gas. Those guys are “posers”. (O.k. send hate mail now). I had heard of this Lump Charcoal on “The Food Network”, I have just never seen it in the stores.

Well since I had bought my two big bags on Saturday, I have grilled tree times this weekend. What a difference! It burns hotter, doesn’t have any chemical taste or smell and just plain cooks better. So if you have never tried this type of charcoal before, you owe yourself a favor to try it. Take that shiny gas grill to the curb and get yourself a charcoal burning grill with cast iron grates and cook yourself up a mess of grub. You will never go back to bricket’s or gas again. I promise.

Oh I almost forgot to tell you that there is much less ash left behind when using this stuff. Like I said, I have grilled tree times and I still don’t have to empty the grill. Awesome!

If you can’t find this charcoal in the store, just do a Google search for “Lump Charcoal”. There are many places that will ship to you.

Posted in General | 4 Comments »

New World or Old School Dovetails?

While I have been busy trying to transform my garage into a workshop, I haven’t been able to do any woodworking whatsoever. Occasionally I will be so desperate to get my “fix”, I will be temped to do some hand cut dovetails. My lack of an appropriate bench usually prevents this from happening. What I mean by appropriate is a bench that does not wobble when you clamp a piece of lumber to it and try sawing or chiseling on it. My “workbench” has been doubling as a scaffold while I refinished the ceiling and unfortunately seen to much stress from me walking all over it.

This got me to thinking. With all of the new fixtures and jigs available on the market from places like Rockler, Woodcraft and even department stores like Sears, who actually takes the time to hand cut dovetails anymore?

Not to long ago I thought the dovetail jigs, especially the adjustable ones did an awesome job of cutting dovetails. I thought why would anyone bother to take the time and frustration to do this by hand when these jigs did the job so fast?

One day I tried practicing these dovetails by hand, just to see how hard it was. It was pretty bad. I posted it online. Check it out. Marc, The Wood Whisperer suggested a DVD by Rob Cosman that showed, in detail, how to cut these little jems with ease and precision. Of coarse this comes with practice.

So my question to you is: Do you find it worth the effort to hand cut your dovetails or do you just grab a jig and let the machines do the work?

Posted in Learning, Tools | 4 Comments »

Storage Solutions

While my shop has been in a total chaos state during the upgrade process I have been trying to decide on a storage system. My initial plan was to make a set of cabinets myself. The reason for this is: to get some experience making cabinets before making the kitchen cabinets and to hopefully save some money making them myself instead of pre-made cabinets.

But… I have been rethinking this logic lately. I am so ready to get my stuff organized that I don’t think I have the patience to make them myself. Also, as far as saving money goes, I’m not sure that I would save that much as I always go overboard with trying to buy the best hardware and accessories for anything that I build. So I have been looking at a couple of options. One of them is a modular system sold at Lowes, made by Coleman. Check it out. Does anyone have an opinion of these? They basically look like the same quality as office furniture that you put together from a box but with heftier hardware. What I do like is that they would be easy to keep clean and they are lockable.

So what do you think? Any suggestions or alternatives?

Posted in Shop | 3 Comments »

Creature Comforts Part Deux

Today the temp outside reached 93 deg. Normally the garage would be a couple of degrees higher due to being closed up all day. When I got home from work today, I was pleasantly surprised to find the temp of the garage to be only 77 deg. This is without the newly installed air conditioner on at all. So now the garage/shop/man cave has officially become the most comfortable room in the house.

This is good and this is bad…

This is good for obvious reasons. This is bad because it means that the rest of the house is inadequately insulated. This makes perfect sense seeing how my electric bill is typically $350 to $400 dollars a month during the hot summer months. The central air conditioner seems to never stop.

So… I guess I will be diverting some of my shop upgrade budget to adding more insulation to the house. Otherwise I will just be pissing away money every month. Money I could be using to purchase tools and, oh yea, WOOD!

Posted in Shop | 3 Comments »