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I’ve belong to two woodworking organizations, the Des Moines Woodworkers Association and the Minnesota Woodworkers Guild, although I’m not an active member of either of them at this time. The Minnesota club has around 700 dues-paying club members and it’s one of the largest in the country. The Des Moines club has been steadily growing for the last several years and its membership is closing in on 400 members, which is amazing considering the population base in central Iowa.

Woodworking clubs promote the craft and encourage members to become involved in their hobby. Joining a club is a great way to meet other woodworkers and depending on how involved you are, it’s a great way to educate yourself, as well as others.

The DMWA activities include such things as tool swap meets, summer tours to places of interest to woodworkers, meetings for like-minded members (turning, scrolling, and small furniture groups are offered by the Des Moines club), and special events like the Festival of Trees, in which members participate in charity fundraising by building and auctioning holiday ornaments.

Of course, the best thing about belonging to a club is having the chance to interact with others who share your interest in the wonderful world of woodworking. I was active with DMWA when they got involved with building flag boxes for the families of victims of the 9/11 attacks. The Des Moines Woodworkers Assoc. teamed up with Woodworkers United for America (WUFA) and other clubs around the country to build over 3000 Memorial Flag Boxes. It was a very rewarding experience.

Here’s a list of active woodworking clubs:

Woodworking Clubs in the U.S. and Canada

Until recently, interest in the SawStop Table Saw mostly centered around how cool the flesh-sensing magic of the safety device was. The SawStop Table Saw works by sensing the electrical capacitance of human flesh to stop a spinning saw blade instantly when the blade senses a drop in voltage. Not exactly magic, but cool nonetheless! Workbench magazine reviewed the saw in its June 2006 issue, and you can see a video of the SawStop in action here.

Now, it seems that a recent ruling in favor of inventor Stephen Gass’ technology by the U.S. Consumer Products Safety Commission will turn the debate into one of economics rather than safety. You can read more about the ruling here.

The problem is, manufacturer’s of woodworking machinery are not embracing the technology. And the ruling has led the U.S. government to agree with the recommendations of the CPSC, that mandatory safety standards for table saws be raised to include the SawStop technology.

That’s where money comes in. According to Charles Murray, technical writer for Design News, woodworking tool manufacturers face the prospect of investing millions of dollars to re-tool existing production lines. And inventor Gass agrees, “… there’s a huge product liability problem for any manufacturer who doesn’t have this. People will ask, ‘Why didn’t you have this on the saw you sold to us?’”

So now thanks to this ruling, and as is often the case when lawyers get involved, it comes down to one thing — money. (By the way, Stephen Gass was a patent attorney and a woodworker, when he came up with the SawStop.) If manufacturers of table saws are faced with adding safety features that will potentially cost them millions, who do you think will pay for it in the end? You guessed it — woodworkers!

I was on “cool stuff” overload by the time I finally made it to the General & General International booth at IWF 2006 in Atlanta. So I have to admit, at first I didn’t pay too much attention to what I feel now is one of the coolest new products for the home woodworker at IWF.

I’m talking about the “Hoverpad,” which will be available soon from General. The Hoverpad is General’s solution to the problems faced by those of us who need to maximize our shop space by moving tools around from time to time. Since I do my woodworking at home in a 380 sq. ft. shop, this little dandy may just be the answer to my prayers.

The Hoverpad moves your heaviest tools around on a cushion of compressed air. It’s made out of a durable plastic with a rubber base that is only about an inch thick. You’ll need a compressor with a capacity of about 100/in. at 5CFM. The inventor, Arra David, came up with the idea and patented it when he realized that he had something good for industry and home shop users alike.

If you’re interested in learning more about the Hoverpad, be sure to check out the video at the Brentwood Machinery & Tools website.

The folks at General couldn’t tell me when the Hoverpad will be available. It will come in two sizes, priced at around $170 and $250. But, the Hoverpad is now available through Brentwood Machinery in Brentwood, New Hamphire. Supplies are limited though. I’ll let you know as soon as I know if the Woodsmith Store will be selling this product.

Note: Sizes and pricing at Brentwood may be different than those quoted by General.

Our friends at The Woodworking Channel are running a poll on their website. It asks what woodworking magazine you read the most. The choices are listed as follows:

American Router
American Woodturner
American Woodworker
Fine Woodworking
Furniture & Cabinetmaking
Popular Woodworking
Wood Magazine
Woodcarving
Woodcraft Magazine
Woodturning
Woodwork
Woodworker’s Journal
and Other

Several of the ones that are listed are specialty magazines (American Router and American Woodturner), focusing on a single aspect of our hobby, such as turning or routing. Three of the magazines — Furniture and Cabinetmaking, Woodturning, and Woodcarving — are published in the UK and may be hard (or expensive) to get here in the US. I didn’t even know they existed until just recently. (And I’ve been subscribing to anywhere from 4 to 10 woodworking magazines since about 1995.)

Woodwork is good magazine that appeals to woodworkers who have an artistic bent, and Woodcraft Magazine, even though it’s only been around for a couple of years, is starting to gain some readers.

The rest of them (American Woodworker, Fine Woodworking, Popular Woodworking, Wood Magazine, and Woodworker’s Journal) are all fine magazines, and I subscribe to all except one.

A few magazines not on the list include Woodshop News, Woodworking and Popular Mechanics. Woodshop News, from Sounding Publications, is a great source of information for consumers, as well as the professional trade. I don’t subscribe, but I always look at it when I’m at the Woodsmith Store in Des Moines. Woodworking, a no-ads limited circulation publication from Popular Woodworking, has started to gain a real foothold with woodworkers interested in hand tools and learning about craftsmanship. Finally, Popular Mechanics has included at least one woodworking article in every issue for many, many years. And every November, they dedicate the entire issue to woodworking. Some of my favorite plans for Arts & Crafts furniture come from PM.

But most odd of all is the absence of any of the woodworking magazines from August Home Publishing. That’s because two of the top four woodworking magazines are Woodsmith and Workbench. According to the last published figures from ABC (Audit Bureau Circulation, 2006)* that I know of, Workbench is number two and Woodsmith is number four. Then there’s ShopNotes. Although its subscription base is smaller than its sister publications, ShopNotes is a one-of-a-kind magazine for woodworkers who are looking at solutions for building shop jigs and storage projects for the shop.

I don’t have the capability to do a poll here, but I’m interested in your comments or feelings. What is your favorite woodworking magazine?

(* According to ABC, Wood Magazine is first in paid subscribers and American Woodworker is #3.)

Scott Phillips, host of the American Homeshop, has been promoting Porter-Cable tools for quite a few years now, so it’s not surprising when he gets excited about a new product. It’s part of the job, right?

Well, after watching him at the Porter-Cable shop (a part of the huge P-C booth at IWF 2006), even I was surprised by the excitement he showed while demonstrating the new Compact Belt Sander (shown at left) from Porter-Cable.

This belt sander has a lot of neat features including removable dust port and auxiliary handle. The small belt size (2-1/2″x14″) and a flush-side sanding feature allow you to do some aggressive sanding in places that it used to be impossible to reach with a standard belt sander.

Although I’m seeing the belt sander in advertisements, the web page says the sander won’t be available until October 2006. This should allow Scott a little time to calm down!

If you were to sit down and try to redesign any tool so that it’s exactly what you’d want as a woodworker, what tool would it be?

Two of the first tools to come to my mind are the drill press and a contractor’s-style table saw. Most drill presses are made for the metalworker first and foremost. Features that a woodworker would find beneficial are an after-thought, if they’re thought of at all. And the contractor’s table saw, with its motor sticking out the back, is the price you paid for an affordable saw that supposedly is light enough to lug around to the job site.

But, a few manufacturer’s are starting to come around to offer tools with wood shop features. I’m talking in particular about the Powermatic® 2800 VS Drill Press, and the Jet® Pro-Shop line of contractor style table saws. I got a quick look at both of these new tools at IWF — 2006 in Atlanta last week, and are they impressive.

The Powermatic 2800 VS Drill Press has so many features that are great for woodworkers it’s hard to list them all. But I’ll try!

* Single handle variable speed adjustment (with a digital readout)
* A 5/8″ keyless chuck
* Twin LED lights
* And, a new dual laser guide system.

These are all welcome features that provide ease of use and accuracy that is rare on a standard drill press.Best of all is the extra-large table (it has dual extension wings to provide additional support for long work pieces). The table also tilts 90° and has a positive stop at 0°. Its large adjustment handle makes lowering and raising the table quick and easy.But that isn’t all, twin T-slot grooves for a miter gauge, hold-downs or shop-made jigs are milled right into the table top and an adjustable split fence with dust collection port is included.Finally, it doesn’t matter if you’re right or left-handed, because the feed handles can be mounted on either side of the drill press. Whew, that’s a lot of great features!

One of the more impressive new tools I saw at IWF is the Jet Pro-Shop Contractor Style Table Saw.

This table saw has a couple of features more commonly found on cabinet (or hybrid) style table saws. First, is the enclosed cabinet with a 4″ dust port for improved dust collection. The stand makes assembly of this saw significantly easier than a regular contractor’s-style table saw.The Pro-Shop saw has a new Pro-Shop fence with extruded aluminum side boards with T-slots and either 30″ or 50″ rails. The saw below is shown with steel wings, but cast iron wings are also available. A large paddle-style switch is also a nice safety feature on this saw. Once again, you can turn to Workbench Magazine for reviews and much more on these new tools and lots of others in future issues.

I grew up watching my Dad in the shop and on the job site, so I was pretty familiar with tools at a young age. I learned how to do just about anything just because I wasn’t afraid to try it and I wasn’t afraid of making mistakes. I had hoped that my seven boys would have picked up on that lesson.  Time will tell.

As my three older boys were growing up, I was traveling alot and didn’t spend much time in the shop. Consequently, they didn’t spend much time in the shop. But yesterday, I was out in my shop just fiddling around with nothing in particular to do. I just needed to “piddle” around. (Does anybody else do that, or am I the only one?)

Anyway, I picked up one of my “eBay special” derelict hand planes and decided to see if I could get it to make some shavings. In walks my 13-year old.  “Whatcha’ doin’, Dad?” ”Oh, just seein’ if I can get this old hand plane to work.” It was an old Stanley Handyman. Not worth much and not really a very good plane, but I enjoy the challenge of getting some use out of it. 

Then a light bulb came on. I handed it to my son and asked him if he wanted to restore it. He lit up. ”Sure!,” he said. So I basically left him alone, knowing that he really couldn’t do any damage to it.

He spent the next several hours polishing and cleaning and sharpening the blade. I helped him get it back together and we tried it out on some mahogany. Well, I’d like to say that it took a wispy thin shaving, but it just chattered across the board. I switched out the thin Stanley blade for one of my Hock replacement blades. Boy, did that make the difference! It’s still not what I would call an everyday user plane, but my son learned some things. Now he’s asking me if I have any other planes he can work on. I think he’s headed down the dangerous slope…

Every Thursday night this fall you can learn from the experts at the Woodsmith Store and Woodsmith, ShopNotes, and Workbench magazines. We’ll walk you through the basics of woodworking, tool techniques, safety, terminology, and everything you need to know to build great projects in your home shop. Reference handouts are provided. All questions are welcome.

Click here for more details including a calendar, seminar topics, and how to sign up!     

I got on the elevator after leaving the IWF show at the Georgia Congress Center last week and overheard this comment: “If I had a hundred thousand dollars, I could build a heckuva woodworking shop.”

Earlier in the day, I overheard a product rep explain to a young lady who was interviewing him for a promo video, “All you need is a table saw and a Kreg jig and you can build any piece of furniture.”

Which explains the two extremes I experienced at this huge woodworking show — you can spend $150 on a pocket hole jig, or you can spend literally thousands on industrial machines and each will bring you to the same destination. Read the rest of this article »