Woodworking

The book I read to research this post was Woodworking for Dummies by Jeff Strong which is an excellent book which I bought from kindle. I'll tell you something funny when I bought this ebook only 1 person had rated the book & he had given it 1 star & the only conclusion I can come to is it must be someone who isn't really interested in woodwork believe me I'm tempted to copy & paste this article onto that site in the reviews. There's 2 major types of wood softwood & hardwood & softwood has a springy quality & isn't necessarily any weaker than hardwood. Poplar is cheap & a good wood for doing many projects. Many of the traditional hardwoods particularly walnut & mahogany don't necessarily come from sustainable forests are difficult to source & are expensive. Softwoods tend to come from sustainable forests. A good softwood which is also quite cheap is douglas fir. Oak is a popular hardwood but red oak doesn't handle the wet very well because the wood is open.

A waterstone is best for sharpening chisels you need to apply water but they are now quite reasonably priced. Oilstone needs oil & is cheaper but the oil messes up your overalls. A lot of workshops have a table saw which are quite reasonably priced. A cabinet saw which is the same as a table saw but has legs & a cover all around tends to be expensive for what you get. A popular tool is the bandsaw the band part of the word refers to the belt that drives the saw. A 6 inch joiner is usually sufficient, an 8 inch one is double the price although it maybe necessary if you do alot of fencing. A biscuit joiner makes an incision & then inserts a piece of wood called a biscuit into the joint. You may need a special vacuum cleaner as the dust is bad for your lungs. Often people use a normal vacuum with a special attachment. You should never remove the guard off equipment the only possible exception being if you have bought a special guard to replace it with.