I recently went into the shop after a few weeks of not being able to spend as much time in there as I would like, only to discover some rust on my combination square!
So, this video talks about what I think happened, how I fixed it, and what general steps I take to try and prevent rust on my tools.
What do you guys do to prevent rust in your shop? Leave a comment!
Links to the products I mention are below:
The first half of 2015 really didn’t turn out to be much of a great woodworking period for me for various reasons. It hasn’t been until the last couple of months that I’ve been able to get any significant shop time, but now that I have been able to get more shop time, I wanted to get back to the site.
That doesn’t mean I’ve been totally idle though. This past summer, I was able to get what I consider two pretty cool things done that have been on my list for a while.
July – Lie-Nielsen Open House
I was able to take a comp day on the Friday of Lie-Nielsen’s open house this year. I’ve wanted to head up to Maine the last couple of years to see where some of the nicest hand tools are made. (I had to work on Saturday, which made it a somewhat anti-climatic Saturday, but I digress.)
I took what normally would have been a 3 1/2 hour drive, but with a Dunkin’ Donuts large iced coffee with my breakfast on the road, it made for closer to a 4 hour drive with “pit stops”. I arrived, and it was great. We got a tour of the facility from one of the employees – a very nice guy who mentioned he was originally from Plymouth, MA, (a stone’s throw from me) and we got to some small talk of things in this area. They had many folks demonstrating both outdoors under their tent and in their upstairs education workshop. I placed a low angle jack plane on order, and got to meet the man himself, Thomas Lie-Nielsen, who proceeded to apologize a couple of times for not having them in stock that day, but he was sure I’d love it when it came in. It came in the next week, along with an extra toothed blade, and yes, I do love it. It’s an excellent tool that I will continue to find many uses for. Thus far my main use has been as a shooting plane and a small jointing plane for smaller pieces.
August – I Finally Got a Bandsaw!
I’ve had a good bandsaw on my list for a few years now. Every time I got close to being able to pull the trigger, life would throw a bit of a curveball and we’d have to reallocate the funds.
The stars aligned quite nicely for this. I was able to sell a small amount of some stock that had vested at the time Woodcraft was having a nice sale, which also coincided with a Massachusetts sales tax holiday! It was an estimated savings of about $160-$170 between the sale and no sales tax.
So a very nice Laguna 14 Twelve bandsaw now sits in my shop! With the low ceilings in the basement, I had to double check all the measurements before buying to make sure I could fit it in there.
So we’re caught up… mostly. The project on my bench that I’ve resumed is a coffee table. The leg assemblies are mostly together with the exception of some trim pieces. Once that’s done, on to the top, and then finish!
More to come on that…
Unfortunately, various events of late have kept me from getting into the shop as much as I would like. From end of summer and back to school, to giving my dad some extra help as my mother has experienced increasing health issues the last few weeks, I haven’t spent too much time in the shop from mid-August onward.
I did however, get a few hours on a Friday a couple of weeks ago to attend the Lie-Nielsen hand tool event in Manchester, CT. I have to say it was nice getting back into a woodworking setting and mindset. This particular event in Manchester, CT was hosted at the Connecticut Valley School of Woodworking. I’ve been to a few other Lie-Nielsen events, but this one by a good margin was the largest. Lie-Nielsen will often have another vendor or two with them, but there were several at this event: Tico Vogt (premium shooting board maker), Fine Woodworking Magazine, Catherine Kennedy (Tool Engraving), and others who I forget their name, but dealt with molding and wooden hand planes. If you have never been to one of these events, you owe it to yourself to try and get to one. You can test drive any tool they have there, and you get a great feel for what a quality, sharp tool should feel like. Ask a question, and you’ll get a detailed answer and/or a great demonstration.
So here are a few pics:
I had some time off I needed to burn before the end of the year, and was able to take one day to take the hour and a half drive and head down to Mystic, CT October 30 to attend the Lie-Nielsen Tool Event. My goal, being new to woodworking, was to get as much education as I could. I wanted to see what a quality plane should feel like. This show certainly exceeded my expectations.
Deneb Puchalski from Lie-Nielsen was demonstrating how to flatten a rough piece of walnut. He would go through each of his steps in good detail as he prepped the walnut using a scrub plane, then the low angle jack plane with toothed blade, switch out the blades to a standard one, then move on to the #8 jointer, then the #4 1/2 smoother, using techniques using pencil lines to help you see where material was being removed, etc. Once he did the demo, the piece was flipped over and it was our turn to actually do some work! Not only did I get to use the plane, but Deneb was great about providing tips and help us correct mistakes in our technique. Nothing like hands-on experience!
Most of my time was spent at that bench, but I also did have the opportunity to talk with Bob Zajicek from Czeck Edge Hand Tools. Bob gave me a good demo on how to sharpen a card scraper… I have the card scraper, just need a burnisher now…
Some pics I took with my phone (yes, I forgot the regular camera)…
Show was in the building in the background.
Deneb during his demonstration.
The assortment of hand tools.
Our turn…
Some of those shavings are MINE…
Czeck Edge Hand Tools.
