Building A Paulk Smart Bench

 For years I've looked at building a Paulk style workbench. He has a few different designs and I always thought they looked well thought out and ideal for the types of carpentry I do. 

And for years I've kept working off a couple of trestles with some cls on. It's been fine, it means I can cut into the timber, replace them every 6 months or so but they don't stay very flat and it doesn't give me a great worksurface. 

Basin Table

Lovely commission this week to make a small table for a basin to sit on in a bathroom. 

The work is to be painted so decided on tulip wood to make the table. Such a lovely easy wood to work with and also great because it takes a painted finish so well. 

Making 4 Panel 1950's Doors

I'm managing to find a bit of time to work on the extension at the moment, One thing I wanted to do was to make some doors for the up stairs. 

Now it would be far easier to buy off the shelf ones but I decided that I'd like to have some 1950's door to match the age of the house. I'm not a purest when it comes to these sort of things but I've always liked these utilitarian style of door. Making them myself means they won't cost much money but take a bit of time! 

 I ordered the joinery time on the phone, a little pile like this is enough to make six doors and a few other bits and bobs.

Hanging Doors With A Circular Saw

Although I'm ever the traditionalist I do like to try new methods of doing things and seeing what works well. I'm sure the traditional carpenters of "old" would have tried new things if it made their job easier and better.

 So yesterday I had a try at hanging two pairs of door using my festool circular saw and no plane (except to remove any saw marks at the end).

Ever since I brought this plunge saw/guide rail combo I've been thinking that it would be easy to hang certain types of doors with it. In practise I'd go as far as to say it was a brilliant way to hang the doors.

 First of all it's a good clean way to trim the tops and bottoms of the doors so they fit in the hole. Then it also worked really well to get the doors square in the opening, normally this can involve a fair bit of planing if something is out of square. All I had to do here was set the guide rail up and within a few minutes the door was cut perfectly straight.

As these were pairs of doors they needed quite a heavy leading edge, again this was easy done with the saw, just set it on the angle and zipped along the guide rail in a few passes, giving me a perfect leading edge down the length of the door.

Four doors hung!

I'm not sure how many doors I've hung over the years but these are the first ones I've done completely with a circular saw. Although the method would only work for certain types of doors, its a good and accurate way of fitting doors and I'll be trying it again in the future.

Anyone else done it this way?

New Kit - Festool Plunge Saw TS55REQ

As stated many time on this blog, I'm somewhat of a tool snob.

I spend everyday working with my tools and I like to use the best.

I've been looking at buying a new circular saw for sometime now and I wanted one that would follow a guide rail for straight cuts when I'm building built-in units out of MDF or ply.

 I kept looking at all the different ones on the market and although I'm normally a Makita man I decided it was time to move up to the next level and buy a brand I've wanted to try for ages - Festool.
Anyone I've ever spoke to about these tools raves about them so I thought I'd suffer the cost and try it.


New saw - not for normal site work

I decide to go all out and bought the saw complete with two guide rails and the auto start midi extractor, which will be great on things like my mitre saw and sander as well as the circular saw.

 

Hopefully these tools will be a bit of an investment. The extractor should mean I breath in less dust during the day and make it easier to clean up when I'm working in someones house. The circular saw should make building things like fitted cupboards and wardrobes easier, faster and more accurate.

I'm looking forward to putting these through their paces! Anyone else have any experience using Festool kit?