Tool control

Tags

old tools, woodworking tools

Posting new items for sale on my website ‘handtools for sale’ page, I am struck by the irony of using today’s hi-tech methods to nourish a more fundamental human need: the impulse to make something directly, by hand.The moulding planes, hollows and rounds, rabbet planes, and other items that represented the leading edge of our tool technology a hundred or two hundred years ago are still capable of fulfilling the same purpose, namely to create something individual, well, and lasting, without the nagging feeling that if the power (to say the least) goes out, all will not belost.

I love these old tools because they connect me to to a feeling of accomplishment and — dare I say it? — control, that is all too frequently missing from the experience of sitting down at the computer and wondering if pressing the wrong key will erase everything.

Advertisement

Patience rewarded

Finally finished the latest project — a new kitchen counter. What satisfaction! Given that it’s winter time and I can’t work outside and must remain super neat at all times (since my shop is so small), this was an exercise in discipline: no room or time to rush anything. But boy, did it pay off! Very few missteps, nothing that needed to be repeated, and at the end of the day, everything fit!

Just goes to show: more haste, less speed — or as in this case, less speed, quicker (and better) results.

Old versus New

It often strikes me as ironic that I employ the latest technology to further my addiction to a mostly traditional craft: that I need a high-powered computer and cell phones and video cameras to be able to saw wood by hand and carve a shell with a chisel lacking any hint of motor or computer chip. It may be a comfort to know that when the power goes down — as it does frequently here in the northeast winter — I can continue to work, rather than finding myself dead in the water like so many of my totally power-dependent friends, but I remain grateful for new advances. The secret is to enjoy the best of both worlds by keeping an open mind to what may be good about both the old AND the new.

Something new again

January 1st — still at it: the first dovetails of the year get cut (three widths of a 7ft long wall-hung cabinet) and astonishingly a new challenge: I can’t stand the cabinet on end to lay out the pins from the tails, just not tall enough, and anyway there’s not enough height in my shop to stand on a ladder. So we learn how to cut things on the diagonal. It’s one of the things I like about woodworking, especially the bits I do by hand: no matter how much you learn or how many times you do something there is always a new challenge. And people complain about the constant learning curve involved in keeping up with constantly updated computer programs!