To end the year, my students have been making simple marking gauges. My students learned to create a mortise and use hand planes to fit a tenon in this particular project. Here’s how we did it. 1. Cut a 1″ or 3/4″ square oak strip into 8″ lengths. 2. Cut a 2″ length from a maple stripContinue reading “This Week in the Shop: A Simple Pin Marking Gauge”
Tag Archives: Woodworking
This Week in the Shop: Ceramic 3-D Printing via Shapeways.com
In the late 1800’s and into the early 1900’s, a number of furniture makers, craftsman and artisans reacted against the massive mechanization and industrialization of (their) modern world to create a type of furniture called Arts & Crafts, Craftsman or Mission style furniture. Gustav Stickley in New York, the Roycroft community and others created furniture,Continue reading “This Week in the Shop: Ceramic 3-D Printing via Shapeways.com”
Community Watch: Build a Bench Is Complete!
Of the three or so classes I’ve taught at TX/RX Labs and the twenty to thirty projects I’ve taught at work, the simple bench project remains my favorite. It is an intermediate level project which can be reached by absolute beginners, it’s cheap to build (approximately $15 w/ finish) and it lends itself to multipleContinue reading “Community Watch: Build a Bench Is Complete!”
Community Watch: Build a Bench this Memorial Day Weekend!
Are you in the Houston area? Ever wanted to get started woodworking? Maybe you just enjoy benches as much as I do? Join me for the Wood Workshop at TX/RX Labs on Sat. & Sun. May 25th & 26th (5/25 & 5/26) from 9am-5pm. The Finished Bench I will be walking you through how to buildContinue reading “Community Watch: Build a Bench this Memorial Day Weekend!”
Tool Primer: How To Finish Your Woodworking Project: Sanding
In the next two Tool Primer articles, I will discuss my process for finishing a woodworking project. The finishing process is the difference between a good woodworking project and a heirloom piece of furniture. When I want to really knock a project out of the park, I focus much of my energy on choosing and creating aContinue reading “Tool Primer: How To Finish Your Woodworking Project: Sanding”
Tool Primer: How to Select & Use Jigsaws
Some tools do only one thing well. Some tools do a lot of things well if you know how to use them. The jigsaw (or sabersaw), in my opinion, is unique in the pantheon of modern woodworking tools as it does nearly everything with equal parts of ineptness and frustration. So why keep it around?Continue reading “Tool Primer: How to Select & Use Jigsaws”
This Week in the Shop: The Tool Stand
If you give a woodworker a table saw, he realizes new vistas awakening in his craft. If you give him a table saw, he’d like a sweet router table. If he makes that router table, he’d need a bench to store his other bench-top tools. If he has a stand for his bench-top tools, he’dContinue reading “This Week in the Shop: The Tool Stand”
This Week in the Classroom: Pantographs
My school spends a lot of time, energy and financial resources on project-based learning. In my experience, teachers use project-based learning as a catch-all term for anything from make-it-take-it projects which last twenty minutes to inquiry-driven, rubric-graded, long-term explorations. Calling the former project-based learning is lazy and misdirection. Creating incredible experiences for students with theContinue reading “This Week in the Classroom: Pantographs”
This Week in the Woodshop: Footboard, Pt. 2
Last week, I showed everyone the biggest project sitting on my workbench. This week I completed the footboard just in time for Valentine’s Day. I celebrated its completion by buying my wife a dozen roses, and taking her on not one, but two, dates in one weekend. But I’m back in the doghouse, I mean,Continue reading “This Week in the Woodshop: Footboard, Pt. 2”
Classroom Project: Try Squares
In my Applied Mathematics class, woodshop has put the shop in applied. During a unit on fractions, I asked students to build a number of these try squares, all different shapes and sizes. In order to assess my students ability to read a ruler and calculate fractions, I made all the dimensions wonky. No 8″Continue reading “Classroom Project: Try Squares”
WSC Designs 