Bought

I decided to buy the Shop Fox bandsaw I was talking about. I am satisfied with the deal. I am sure I could have gotten the seller to take less, but I was pretty sure his business was in trouble, and I didn’t want to be a complete bastard. It turned out I was right. When I got there, he had a bunch of other stuff he was trying to sell, including a gorgeous Powermatic 66. I tried to hook him up with the crew at Sawmill Creek. It’s really disturbing, hearing how businesses like his are tanking. In a country where people live on credit and count on steady income (and where they don’t save and invest), times like these are very, very hard on a lot of people. I pray for better times, but the signs point toward something else.

In case any of you need the information, it is possible to put a Shop Fox 19″ bandsaw in a Ford Explorer. We took the table off, and in it went. Four guys loaded it. One person can hold up the heavy end, although I don’t recommend it.

Sadly, one person unloaded it. And as Dean Vernon Wormer said, that foot is me. I slid it out until the base was on the grass, and then I tilted it upright. I managed to get my handtruck under it, and the rest is history. Which is what I nearly was at several points during the move. A cop who was driving by saw me floundering (second Animal House reference in one post) in the garage, and hollered to see if I needed help, but by then all I really needed to do was set the saw down, so I told him I was okay.

Here’s the crappy phone photo:

I would guess it weighs about 315 without the table and fence (manual says 367 total), so it’s a scary but not terrifying load to move.

I think this was the right buy. The other saw was much cooler and cheaper, but it won’t do what this one will do. I have read that this saw won’t take really thin blades, but it is my understanding that you can fix that by getting some aftermarket parts.

It’s still wired for 220, but it has a stupid plug that will have to be replaced. I may add one or two more 220 sockets just so I won’t have to run around switching plugs when I work. I suppose I should leave it fixed for 220, since it draws 20 amps and is likely to blow my breaker. If I put this on my big 220 circuit, I could actually run the bandsaw and table saw at the same time. Not that there would be any point.

I finally feel like I have some tools. When the drill press arrives, my life will be bearable. It’s hard to think of anything really vital and big that I’ll need after that. AND DON’T HELP ME THINK OF ANYTHING. Enablers.

This should be pretty sweet. Band saws do lots of stuff other saws can’t do, and there are things other saws can do, which bandsaws do easier.

I decided to go with the single-word spelling, “bandsaw.” Google shows it’s the most popular spelling, and it’s easier to type.

I’ll need some blades. I think the one that came with it is 3/4″, and I can’t even guess at the teeth. I believe I want something small, like 1/4″, so I won’t be limited as much when it comes to turning corners. I also need a miter gauge. Dang it. I also need a good one for the table saw.

There was a very nice workbench down there, just sitting by the road. I wish I needed one. I’ll bet this is a good area to forage for scrap.

I think I’ll go strip down and see if I ruptured anything.

Craigslist is Unforgiving

Things are not looking good, RE the Craigslist Rockwell band saw. I called the seller because he had not gotten back to me, and he said some sleazy character was on his way to look at the saw. If this thing is in good shape, only an idiot would refuse to pay $165 for it.

This is what I get for being polite. I probably called the owner earlier, but he forgot to call me back.

Sounds like a nice old guy. His name is Charlie, he’s an EE, and he has a pacemaker. These are among the biographical details I learned while chatting with him.

The guy with the Shop Fox is down to $850, which is actually not a bad price for a $1250 saw. Not great, but acceptable. I could get most of it back on resale.

Charlie said he would call me if the nefarious slimeweed who butted in front of me doesn’t take the saw.

Don’t Forget Her

I should have posted this yesterday.

Leah Friedman had her aortic valve replaced on Wednesday morning. She is now on life support; Mish Weiss says this is normal, but things are not going as well as hoped.

Please continue praying for her recovery.

My Cheapness Gene is Screaming Audibly

Okay, tool people, I have a new one for you.

Some guy just put a 14″ Rockwell 28-200 band saw on Craigslist for $165. I have read up on it, and it is supposedly a very good saw, and you can put a riser on it to resaw big stuff. He says it cuts metal, but I have no idea what he means. This is a wood saw; apparently you can put a transmission and different motor in it to cut metal, but I haven’t called this guy to find out if he has done that.

I feel pretty sure I can get the 19″ Shop Fox I mentioned for $800. It seems likely that the guy who is selling it is having some problems. He is about to move, and he complains that business is too slow to support the big tools he owns. But money is money; $165 is certainly better than $800, and I can almost certainly get my cash back out of the Rockwell, whereas I would probably lose a couple hundred if I had to unload the Shop Fox.

What would you do?

I Have Dadoed

I spent like an hour and a half playing with my tools tonight, and here is the result:

That is a planing sled. You put crooked lumber on it, use the triangular pieces of wood to adjust it, and run it through a thickness planer. For thin wood, this works like a jointer, except that you have to finish the edges with another tool, like a table saw or router.

The idea comes from a woodworker named Keith Rust. I used his plans, which you can find somewhere at Taunton.com. His sled was different. He used plywood, because he happened to have it on hand, and his sled was five feet long, because the sheet of plywood he used happened to be that long. I had MDF, so that’s what I used. And because I had no flat wood to use between the sheets of MDF, I had to buy some oak. But the idea is the same.

Look at all the stuff I did! The first time I worked on this, I ripped two sheets of MDF on my table saw, and I used various drills and drivers to put everything together, along with my unbelievably cool Irwin clamps. Today, I did everything you see on top of the MDF.

I only used two cutting tools: the table saw, and the 10″ miter saw. And with them, I made 1″ square supports from a scrap two-by-four, eight quarter-inch dadoes in the supports, and eight 1/4″ wedges cut at 15 degrees.

The table saw is fantastic. I can see why woodworkers like Kelly Mehler and Doug Stowe like it so much. It’s as big as a house, and it has a 5-horsepower motor, but you can easily do work with tolerances of much less than a millimeter! And there’s very little setup. You just fire it up and go. And unlike a router, it’s trustworthy and cooperative. Routers like to bite your work and shift around. They’re a lot harder to use well.

I started by making the supports. I ripped a two-by-four down to one inch in height, and then I peeled two one-inch strips out of it. Then I had to figure out how to make the dadoes. I finally decided to rip a piece of long scrap at 15 degrees, rest it on a miter gauge, clamp other scrap to it, and use the result as a sled. Those Irwin clamps are perfect for this purpose. They’re strong, but they’re so small you can put three of them on a gadget like this without worrying that they’ll be in the way of the saw.

I clamped a stop block on the sled, made initial cuts, put a 1/8″ thick piece of aluminum against the sled’s stop block, and ran the supports through again. This gave me two 1/8″ cuts in each support, joining to form a 1/4″ dado which crossed through the supports at just the right angle.

I had no 1/4″ thick lumber, so I sawed a two-by-four down until it was narrow enough to resaw, and I ripped two 1/4″ sheets off of it. Then I cut them in two, stacked them, and cut wedges from the stacks using the miter saw. I was able to cut four wedges at a time. Keith Rust used a band saw and a jig, but I have no band saw.

The rest of the job is trivial, to steal a phrase from math and physics. I have to screw in some hooks, add grippy stuff to the wedges and supports, and cut very simple dadoes in the supports. I forgot to cut those tonight. I could pop them out on the router in a hurry. I also have to add some adjustable screws to hold the wedges in place.

Man, what a sense of satisfaction I feel. I lacked the tools you would ordinarily use to do the things I did, but part of the beauty of woodworking is using the innate versatility of your saws and drills and routers to overcome challenges like those. And the whole point of making this thing is to enable me to use one tool to do the work of another. I’ll be making straight stock with a thickness planer.

This was a good day, all around. My sister called just to thank me for cooking, and she said it was the best birthday she could remember. She said I should market my cheesecake. I reminded her that in a way, I already had. It’s in a book, after all.

I have my eye on a band saw, but it’s too big. Some guy on Craigslist is apparently dissolving his business; he has a bunch of tools for sale. One is a big Shop Fox 19″ saw. What I really want is a 16″ or 17″ saw, and I’d love to get my hands on a Walker Turner. But if a bigger saw comes along, and it’s cheap and local, why not get it? The floor area it will take up is about the same, and it will be more versatile and last longer.

I think a band saw will round out my wood tools very well. There are a lot of little things that are hard to cut safely on a table saw or miter saw.

Dust collection doesn’t seem to be as much of a problem as I thought. As long as I’m willing to wear a mask and drag the shop-vac around, I don’t make an unmanageable mess, and I don’t breathe in much crap. Maybe I don’t need a cyclone. Maybe a regular old dust collector with a very long hose will work, as long as the motor is big enough to overcome the resistance from the hose.

Tomorrow I fully expect to prepare a piece of wood to be made into a box. I am not willing to blow a lot of money, so I may use scrap spruce or go get a piece of cedar at Home Depot. As always, you will be informed of all the fascinating developments.

Versatility is Now Relatively Cheap

I am just starting to understand how wonderful a variable frequency drive (VFD) is.

While I was reading up on band saws, I noticed that Grizzly made a fairly inexpensive saw that cut both wood and metal. Naturally, I had to check into it. It turns out they take plain old wood band saws and add 3-phase motors and VFDs to them. That’s it. That’s the whole secret.

This is interesting, because while I was shopping around, it occurred to me that I might be underbuying by getting a saw that wouldn’t cut metal. I have plenty of metal-cutting technology, but it seems to me that there are some things a bandsaw could do that other types of tools can’t. Imagine cutting a lap joint into a bar of metal. I have no idea why you would want to do this, but you might. You’d need a bandsaw or a milling machine.

It seems to me that a metal-cutting bandsaw could function as a crude mill for some operations. That would be a nice capability to have.

It occurs to me that if I get a big ol’ wood band saw, the worst-case scenario for metal is that I might have to find a used motor and VFD later. That would sure beat forking out for a new saw and selling the old one.

Isn’t technology interesting? And I wonder if VFDs will drive the price of used metal-cutting saws down, too.

As for my earlier idea, about buying a bench drill press and adding a column, the wisdom of the approach seems to depend on the model. For a Delta, it’s cheap. For a Powermatic, a new column can cost something like a thousand dollars. Why? Search me. Maybe they’re made of gold.

My Brilliant New Plan

Here’s an interesting question.

I have noticed that used bench drill presses sell much cheaper than floor models. The same drill press, I mean, except the column is half as tall. But replacement columns are cheap. You can get one for between fifty and a hundred bucks.

SO…why not buy a bench drill press, save money on the buy and shipping, and then slap a new column on it?

I found an old Delta bench press online cheap, with a 1 HP motor. And NOBODY seems to want it.

Once Again, Bacon Comes Through

I have highly useful information.

A while back, I spotted a bag of Roegelein bacon scraps at Gordon Food Service. Naturally, I pounced. This is wonderful bacon. But it was getting old, and I hadn’t finished it. So I put it in a Pyrex dish to render the grease out of it. I got it started in the microwave, and then I baked it, covered, at 175-250. Mostly 175. At then end, it was dark brown and slightly crunchy, with kind of a glazed appearance. I realized…this is the perfect crust for my barbecue beans! Next time I make them, I’ll put about half an inch of this stuff on top before I bake it.

It’s really good.

Mere Mortals are Undeserving

My sister’s birthday is this week, and tonight my father and I planned to take her out to eat. Problem: my dad had a couple of skin cancers burned off, and he does not consider himself presentable while they’re healing.

SO…

Champagne chicken and strawberry cheesecake. I just bought the stuff. Florida berries are in season, so they’re good and they’re cheap.

Don’t you wish it was your birthday? We’ll be hogging down chicken and fettuccine and Champagne, with garlic bread made from a sourdough baguette. Then comes the cheesecake. Too much.

In other news, I have gotten some drill press info. I located a Buffalo #18 press, which at this point is my absolute favorite kind. It looks very nice, and it has the lamp, which usually gets lost. It’s 3-phase, which means I have to spring for a VFD, but I planned to do that anyway, so I could bypass the belts and get a good low speed.

Tool people: what do you think is a fair price for one of these things? Shipping will run me a little over $300. If I could get it here for $550, I wouldn’t feel violated. On the other hand, if it was local, I would hope to do considerably better.

Tools are Everywhere

I learned something interesting this week.

A while back, I located a used machinery dealer who had a bunch of drill presses on hand. He got them from the public schools. Someone asked me which dealer I was talking about. The name is A.M. Metalmaq.

They wanted $850 for the cheapest press. This is a stupid buy. I saw a brand new one for something like $1250. A used one should not cost more than half of that.

I rooted around on the web, and I found out that there are a lot of used machines out there, at auction. There are a number of government and government-connected sites that sell these things. You can get a nice Powermatic 1150 for maybe $250. You have to find someone to skid it and ship it, but that costs less than $400, so in the end, it’s worth the time and aggravation. And then there is IRSauctions.com.

I also learned that Miami-Dade County (I cannot believe we put “Miami” in the name to help South Americans realize where we were) has a store where it unloads surplus items. This may well be where the drill presses I found came from. I plan to run up there and see what they have. I’m sure every Cuban in Miami has been there already; they love a bargain, and ten minutes after one Cuban finds something good, the rest know all about it. But not too many people want big drill presses. And who knows what else they have?

I located a really nice Buffalo #18. They want $450, which is high for a machine that routinely turns up for $250, but it seems like a wonderful platform for a 3-phase motor and VFD.

Last night I went to Practicalmachinist.com to get advice on an Ebay drill press. It’s in Amelia Island, and the ad says it’s a Buffalo Forge Model 29. I’m fairly sure there is no such thing. It looks like a Model 18. But I can’t get the seller to answer any questions. It amazes me how lazy people are, in this bad economy. Nobody at Practicalmachinist had any input, but I did notice Jdunmyer over there!

Unfortunately, I got to reading about machining. That was a mistake. I managed to get machining out of my system a year or two ago, and last night I found myself looking at small mills and lathes again.

Fortunately, I was saved by the photos of people’s machining projects. It appears that almost nobody does anything with machine tools except for making models of engines. I’m sure this is lots of fun, but what if you don’t want to make engines? I thought machine tools would be fun for a more general purpose. I figured I could use them to make stuff I designed, but since almost nobody else does that, I assume it must be difficult.

Once again, I checked out local machining courses, and they do not exist. I can drive to the next county five times a week in the morning–for 14 months–but other than that, there is nothing out there.

So I think I can put machine tools out of my mind for a while. Although I did create a Smartflix account, just in case.

The disease never goes away completely. It just goes into remission.

Tool Quest Resembles Archaeology

I am fed up with the drill press scene. There are lots of bargains out there, but nothing quite fits the bill. I want a 6″ stroke, a low speed near 250 RPM, and a tough adjustable head casting that will last forever. Nothing out there fits the description.

Since I got wise to the VFD revolution, it has occurred to me that the best thing may be to MAKE a drill press. I could find myself some kind of old drill press that has a 6″ stroke and a split head, and I could put a new motor in it with a VFD. Problem solved, and it should be cheaper than buying a ready-to-use press that isn’t really right for me. But how do you get your hands on a US-made drill press that fits that description?

Some dude has a Powermatic 1200 head for sale on Ebay. Three hundred and something dollars. I wonder if it might be a good buy. Not sure how I’d compensate for the lack of a stand and table.

The Powermatic table is nothing to write home about; losing it is not a sacrifice. I’d want a woodworking table, which I would probably make for myself. I don’t know what people who have woodworking tables do, when they want to drill metal. I suppose sometimes they don’t have to change anything. Maybe woodworking drill press tables are supposed to attach to existing metalworking tables.

Another possibility: someone in Pasco County is selling a Buffalo #18 drill press. This is a cool piece of old iron with a 6″ stroke and four speeds. Might be the optimal candidate for a VFD.

Hmm…

Plus More “Coincidences”

I just had a treat which I could not have predicted last week: Turkish coffee. I used to drink it in Israel. They sold it in little funny cans with coffee beans on the label. It’s just coffee ground to a very fine powder. I don’t know if it’s finer than espresso, but it’s pretty fine. The Israelis simply dumped it in hot water, stirred, and drank. That’s what I did today. I don’t think that’s the correct way to do it, but I wasn’t looking for the correct way. I was looking for the past.

It’s not the world’s finest coffee. It’s a hundred times better than instant, but a good cup of espresso or American coffee would be better. But it’s fast and easy, and it reminds me of Israel. I wonder if I can find the Israeli brand on the web.

I have Googled. My best guess was that the brand name was “Elite.” That’s what I seemed to remember. And look what I found!

Click to visit The Jerusalem Gift Shop!

Man, this is an odd coincidence. Funny how those happen to me all the time these days. I feel a little woozy thinking about it.

Check this place out. I know about as much about it as you do, but it appears to be run by Christians in Israel. They have a newsletter about Israel, and all sorts of items from Israel, including this pendant (hope they don’t mind me stealing the picture):

That is fascinating. When my sister and I began communicating again, it was because of Christianity, and almost as soon as we started, she brought me a book by Perry Stone (The Meal That Heals) and a home communion kit with that symbol on it. According to Stone, that symbol is very old, and it was used by early Christians. I suppose there are many Jews who would be horrified by it, but anyway, there it is. You can click the link and buy that pendant.

We are part of prophecy; no doubt about it. The growing interdependence of Christians and observant Jews is a wonder to behold. We help Israel with its physical needs, and the Jews bless us with spiritual enlightenment. Just as Isaiah predicted.

I had no idea I would end up writing about this. I planned to write about coffee.

Check that site out. Wonderful stuff.

More

In case it’s not obvious, in the symbol above, which is referred to as the “Grafted In” symbol, the Magen David is formed by the base of the menorah and the tail of the ichthus. Nothing extra is added.

More Quasi-Woodworking

Here is amazing news. I have a planer sled.

Sort of.

I read about these things a while back. The idea is, you make a platform with a flat bottom, and you make it narrow enough to go through a planer. You put your crooked wood on the platform and adjust it so it won’t rock, and then you plane it. Presto, instant jointer. It gives you one flat, straight side. Then you can flop it over and do the other side. At that point, you have a board that is both flat and straight, and you only used one machine. The edges will still be weird, but you can fix that with a table saw jig, which I have not yet built. Or you can use a router.

I had two sheets of MDF I bought by mistake, so I used those for the top and bottom. You sandwich something very straight between two sheets of flat wood or whatever, and this gives you a platform that won’t bend and give you bad results. I guess most people use plywood, but like I said, I had MDF lying around.

That part was easy. I ripped them on the table saw, easy as pie Then I had problems. The purpose of this jig is to help you make straight, flat stuff, but you really need straight, flat stuff to make it. And I didn’t have any. I tried to make some from two-by-sixes on the table saw; it worked before. This time the results were no good; you need one straight edge to use as a reference, and I didn’t have one. I tried making a straight edge with the router, and the end result was that I learned it’s possible to use a router on aluminum. I gouged big depressions in the drywall square I used as a template.

Off to Home Depot I went, to buy eight feet of red oak. Sometimes you just have to admit you’re beat.

When I got it all put together, I had a 49″ by 12″ sled, 1 3/4″ tall. I used both screws and glue to hold it together, and I sunk the screws below the level of the MDF to keep them away from the planer. I checked it with my brand new, non-gouged drywall square (shut up), and it’s so flat I can’t find any deflection in it.

I still have to put the other features on it, like a cleat in front to keep the planer from pulling wood off the sled. But that stuff is small potatoes compared to building the sled body.

I can’t tell you how great it is to have that huge flat surface to work on. I mean the table saw extension. No more stooping to put stuff on the garage floor. No more piling stuff on the workbench. I have room to burn.

Eventually I’ll get the other parts put on, and then we’ll see if it does anything.

I had no desire to buy a big table saw. I had no use for 64″ rails. But look how this thing has worked out. It’s a blast.

I’m a little bummed out by the drill press news. The dealer with the used Powermatics wants $850 for a belt-change press. I can get one in 110V, which is good, but I would still have to get a VFD to go down to 200 RPM.

It’s amazing how hard it is to buy a drill press that is adequate. Virtually any cabinet table saw would suit me perfectly. There are tons of great routers. There are lots of good compressors. But every drill press has a major deficiency, it seems like.

I was considering making a motor cover for my saw. A lot of woodworkers use plywood, but I think the best option is sheet metal. Of course, that would make it absolutely necessary for me to buy a PRESS BRAKE.

It never ends.

Help Leah

Leah Friedman is fhaving an aortic valve replaced! Seems like her troubles never stop.

Prayers solicited.

You Would Never Guess I Made This Myself

Russ was asking for a photo of the table saw with its new extension. Don’t laugh. Here it comes.

Actually, it looks better in the photo, because it’s hard to make out the defects in the surface of the old desk.

The supports look bent, but I think that’s a trick of perspective. I hope. I better go look.

Anyway, that’s it.