Love working with ply because it's so predictable. Edge banding is such a satisfying process.
I've got a love/hate with plywood. It's predictable, but can also wind up with nasty tear out. The times I've edge banded, I haven't been super happy with the results, but I probably just need practice. Probably also need to work on my technique when working with it, and possible get a better saw blade too. I've had some luck with the various tear out avoidance tricks, but some (like the blue tape thing) never seem to work. I might also just be getting crappy plywood.
This morning, I was hoping I'd just need to cut the last batch of grooves, then glue everything up, and it'd be pretty quick. It was not quick, and I spent an hour and a half making mistakes and fixing mistakes. Here's a list of the things I screwed up!
1. When I cut the first groove, I set up on the wrong side of the line. I was clever and marked a scribble to tell me which side of the line to cut on. I wasn't clever in that I wound up lining up the cut at the back end of the line, while the scribble was on the front. I'd planned for at least two or three extra slots anyway, so decided I didn't care enough to recut the whole piece, and made sure the rest of the slots went in the right place.
2. Realized that I cut that second batch of grooves in the far right piece, when I should've cut them in the center divider. That also meant that my screwup with the first groove didn't matter anyway.
3. Got the grooves cut again, and in the correct piece, and dry fit everything again. Then found out that I'd mis-measured where the groove holding that center divider needed to be, and the space between the left side and center divider was too far to hold the things it was supposed to. Luckily, there was enough room in both pieces to get the dado in the right spot.
4. Got my depth setting on the dado re-cuts too shallow, and had to go back and re-cut them 1/8" deeper.
After all that screwing around, everything actually did fit together really nicely. Got glue on all the joints and shot some finish nails in to hold it while the glue set.
Good thing I don't care about looks on this, because that's a lot of extra slots. Hopefully I'll be able to finish it off tomorrow.
I got the rest of the pieces cut for the sanding station thing, and put the cleats on.
It works! Though you can see in the back where I'm not super good at aiming my nail gun. I also slapped together the shop towel holder next to it, because I'm tired of constantly misplacing the towel roll.
I also raided the hardwood store yesterday and grabbed a bunch of different stuff so I can start trying different species. The two longest pieces are sapele and sipo, and holy crap will they look amazing when a finish goes on.
What are people's thoughts on live-edge furniture?
I view it as a fad. In 20 years, people will view it like shag carpet or popcorn ceilings: "What were they thinking?"
I like it in certain cases, but it's probably being over-used right now. There's probably less angst about live edge stuff than there is about epoxy river tables. Some folks in the internet woodworking sphere hate those things and yell at anyone who makes them. Usually the people making them respond with "hate them all you want, these things are making me bank, so I'll keep selling them as long as people keep buying them." I actually kind of dig river tables, but I don't think it's exactly a timeless design.
I kind of suspect that live edge and epoxy stuff started out as a way to try and use parts of the tree that were considered waste. Mills would've cut out and tossed the outsides of the logs, all the crotch sections, and split slabs because there wasn't much to do with them. Suddenly, all those parts are super desirable.
What are people's thoughts on live-edge furniture?
I view it as a fad. In 20 years, people will view it like shag carpet or popcorn ceilings: "What were they thinking?"
Without a good amount of context around it, I think it's misplaced. For me live edge in a log home or similarly themed area works, and will always work. It can also be used to bring the outdoors into other spaces, such as a contemporary space with a glass wall where the outdoors can lend it some context.
Quintin_Stone wrote:What are people's thoughts on live-edge furniture?
I view it as a fad. In 20 years, people will view it like shag carpet or popcorn ceilings: "What were they thinking?"
Without a good amount of context around it, I think it's misplaced. For me live edge in a log home or similarly themed area works, and will always work. It can also be used to bring the outdoors into other spaces, such as a contemporary space with a glass wall where the outdoors can lend it some context.
Caveat: anyone can make something work if they work it just so, so the below is generalizations.
RE: River Tables I'm a fan of it in theory, but not so much in practice. I think the ones done in anything that doesn't look like water is more timeless; the blue looks a bit cheesy and already dates itself a bit. Even if I think it's pretty on insta, I don't know if I'd use it in a room design.
RE: Live-Edge furniture in general - A live-edge endtable, hallway bench, or something small is okay. For larger features like a dining table, it can really help counter the coldness of a white, mechanical, modern interior aesthetic for a high-end home dining area, restaurant, lobby, or nightclub. I feel it often reads as kinda "extra" in a normal household that already derives it's organic or warm elements elsewhere.
Oops, got a new toy. I'd just given up on finding a craigslist deal on one of these, and resigned myself to paying full price. The next day, one popped up for a little over half price, and I jumped on it.
The first time I tried it, I made some newbie mistakes. First, I tried running some finished hickory flooring through, thinking I could plane off the finish. You're not supposed to do that because it gums up the blades. I also think I was running some boards through against the grain, which you shouldn't because it produces tearout. Today, I swapped out to the second brand new blades it came with, and it worked much better.
This thing has a big blower on it to kick out the chips, and without something to catch them, hoo boy does it make a massive mess. Good thing I have a filter bag coming in tomorrow.
I also made a hundred blocks for my 4yo to practice math with (he's super into Number Blocks). Nice and simple, but oh man, is sanding them a PITA. I'm 60% through and I really don't wanna keep going.
We cleaned up a lot of the garage so hopefully I can .... oh right, this weekend we're going to the beach. So many in a couple of weeks I can work on that table saw sled. And maybe some infeed/outfeed tables.
That looks awesome Chaz. It's on my list after the table saw 
I really need to build a crosscut sled and an outfeed table. I've got some melamine pieces hanging around that I think I could use as a base of the sled, but keep spinning around on putting t-track or something on the fence, or routing a slot, or not worrying about it. I like the idea of being able to have a slotted stop block or hold down. And whatever I wind up doing is probably the same thing I'll do for the miter saw stand I want to build.
Oh, and I also need to build a mobile stand for this planer cuz this thing's definitely too big to haul around.
The surface finish the planer produces is really nice, and definitely makes me want to find a hand smoothing plane to use for finish surfacing instead of sanding.
The complicating factor for my feed tables is that they'll need to be collapsible to be able to fit in my garage.
Same here. It'll either be something that I attach to the back of the saw that I can fold down when I'm not using it, or just something freestanding with folding legs. The real trick is that if it's going right up against the back of the saw and isn't permanently attached, I'll have to figure out how to account for the miter slots.
And almost have a miter saw stand. Just need to attach the top and the casters. After that, I'll be building a couple side tables that will also be able to be used for an outfeed table for my table saw.
Oops, I bought more tools.
A few weekends ago, I found out about a little used tool shop about 45 minutes south of me, so I swung by. He had a Jet 6" jointer with extended beds in really nice condition for $300. That's about what those have been going for lately, and this was in better shape than a lot I was seeing, so I picked it up. He also had a 1hp dust collector for $120, which I also grabbed.
Unfortunately, when I looked up the price of a new set of knives for the jointer, it turns out that because they use this fancy method to adjust the knives, a new set costs about $90, while most jointer knives are around $25. That basically means that it makes more sense to get a helical cutter for the jointer than the planer, since the jointer's helical is around $300 vs $90 knives, while the planer's is $400 with $50 knives. Oh well.
The jointer didn't come with a mobile base, so I had to get one of those, and getting that set up was a mild pain. Once I got the jointer on it and started wheeling it around, I discovered that the way I'd mounted the wheels, which I thought would work better, didn't work better. So now I need to pull it all apart and rearrange the wheels.
Then, on Friday, I found a listing for exactly the dust collector I'd been planning to get, with exactly the canister filter I would've added on, and a chip separator, a bunch of extra hose and fittings, and a remote control. All that stuff together would've probably cost around $600, but the guy only wanted $250, so I picked that up. Now I've got an extra dust collector that I'm trying to re-sell.
I really need to build a cart for the planer. I've spent so much time the last two weeks cleaning and setting up the jointer that I haven't actually worked on any projects. At least today I got the first pieces of a project cut and milled. Having a remote control for the dust collector is pretty awesome.
I made a bench for our front porch.
Turned out exactly how I wanted. Great for sitting in the morning and drinking coffee or in the evening and having a beer. Just need to stain and seal it. Made from 3 2x6x8s and 2 2x4x8s generic white fir.
I made a bench for our front porch.
Turned out exactly how I wanted. Great for sitting in the morning and drinking coffee or in the evening and having a beer. Just need to stain and seal it. Made from 3 2x6x8s and 2 2x4x8s generic white fir.
Nice!!! Looks great.
Very nice! I like it.
Chaz, those are some awesome scores!
I've been really happy with scoring deals on tools. It took a while, but it definitely paid off. My major ticket items:
Table saw - $200
Planer - $350
Jointer - $300
Dust collector - $250
It's pretty funny that the table saw wound up being the cheapest thing. I'm still low-key looking for a drill press, and band saw, but those are way down the list. I'm also fighting the urge to hunt down some hand planes and chisels to clean up and use. Those would definitely be useful, but finding them, cleaning them up, and learning to sharpen will all be a time suck, so I'm probably going to resist and focus on actually building stuff for a bit.
Awesome prices for good looking tools!
I finally got tired of hauling the planer around (because it's dense like a star). I had some time after I got clamps on another project, so I knocked together a basic cart. Materials include some scrap plywood I had lying around, four 5" casters I picked up at the ReStore, and about $783 worth of 2x4s. I still need to bolt it down.
Only thing I'm not sure of is that none of the casters lock. It might be fine, since you don't really push anything through the planer when you're using it, but I might wind up swapping one or two out for locking casters. I also need to get a bungee cord to hold up the in/outfeed tables. The tables fold up, but the dust chute keeps the outfeed one from staying up. It's kind of dumb.
Why lock the wheels anyway? I like the idea of putting the outfeed against a wall and watching the planer push itself across the floor with the wood it's working on! 
I made a bench! This is the second "real" project in Steve Ramsey's Weekend Woodworker course. My wife wanted a place for shoes under it, so I added the shoe rack shelf.
This was the first project I've done since getting my planer and jointer, so I used those. The wood I'd picked up a while ago was surfaced pine from Home Depot, so it was mostly flat, but not totally. Unfortunately, since it was already surfaced, it started out at 3/4" thick, which was theoretically the final thickness. After milling it flat, it wound up thinner than I really wanted, but not thin enough to worry about. Plus, I was able to use the strips I ripped off them to make the shoe rack.
The real pain was finishing it. It'll be outside, so I was using an exterior spar urethane, brushed on. What I quickly learned was that all those slats that look neat also mean a lot of gaps that are a huge pain to sand and get the finish into. The areas created by the spacers under the seat were especially annoying. I wound up putting on a really thick first coat and just covering those areas the best I could.
The second coat was also fairly thick, and was a lot of covering spots I'd missed, and trying to even out drips that I missed cleaning up. Lots of edges meant that any time I brushed near them, I probably created a drip on one of the faces. I cleaned those up as best I could, then did a really thin third coat on any surfaces that you'd see, and pretty much ignoring those inside gaps that you wouldn't see. Buffed it out when it dried, and I think it came out pretty good.
Lessons learned!
1. Only put the glue on one surface. For whatever reason, I was putting it on both, and I got a lot of squeeze out, which meant a lot of annoying cleanup, especially in all those little gaps and spaces.
2. Making sanding sticks out of scrap or paint stirrers and spray adhesive is amazing.
3. Figure out assembly and clamping strategy first. When I went to make the shoe rack, I'd already put together the bench. I tried assembling the rack by gluing the runners first, then the slats. Problem was that I didn't have a way to hold the slats in position as I went, because there were too many to clamp individually, and I couldn't get my finish nailer in there to shoot a nail to hold them. Then I accidentally knocked the whole thing off because I put too much weight on the glue joints before they'd fully cured, and had to reassemble it anyway. This time, I assembled it off the bench, nailed the slats, and then glued the whole thing on the bench. I should've done that the first time, clamped the slats with no nails, then put it on the bench. What I really should've done was cut grooves in the bench legs for the runners and in the runners for the slats. That would've made assembly easier and given me stronger joints.
4. I should've made my own wiping poly by thinning the poly 50/50 with mineral spirits, and wiped it on. Would've been way easier to get it in all those little spaces. Plus...
5. Drying time is way longer when it's humid. It took a good 48 hours for each coat to dry, longer for the first thick ones. If I'd used a thinned mixture, I would've needed more coats, but each would've been thinner, so would've dried faster.
Nice!
Looks great! Nice job.
I have a woodworking question, or at least woodworking-adjacent? I'm building a guitar from a kit, which means I got a body and a neck and all the hardware, but I have to finish it all. Both the body and neck are covered in a light sealer to start. The instructions I have advise that the body (basswood) and neck (maple, except the rosewood fingerboard which I am taping up and leaving alone throughout this) should be sanded first with 180 grit, then 240 grit, then 320 grit sandpaper, using a sanding block. A few possibly stupid questions to ask you more experienced folks:
--I went to Lowes to get my sandpaper and sanding block and other such supplies, but they didn't have any 240 grit sandpaper, 220 was the closest. Because 220 and 240 don't seem especially far apart and because I'll be following it up with 320 anyway, my instinct is that it's fine to just get and use 220 instead of 240 for these purposes. Is that reasonable?
--Both for sanding and for the spray finishing I will be applying to the body, I'm advised to use a respirator while doing these projects outdoors or in an otherwise ventilated area. I'm planning to do them either in my open garage with a fan running or on my back porch. The only respirator in stock at Lowes was $50, which was more than I wanted to spend. For obvious reasons, though, I now have plenty of N-95 masks. Will an N-95 suffice for these purposes, or would one of those respirator masks with the valves and such afford me some additional protection from particles in sanding or painting that I would be stupid to cheap out on? It looked like the masks were labeled as N-95 too, so maybe it's actually more or less the same stuff, but I wasn't sure if those respirators that had info about sanding and painting on the label included some protection your regular N-95 mask used for germ protection didn't.
--Similarly, if I'm hand sanding a bunch of wood, should I be wearing eye protection? Most of the instructions mention this somewhere, but I feel like most of the videos I've seen of guitar builds, they do all the hand sanding without goggles. Is eye protection for hand sanding optional or required?
Thanks!
220 should be totally fine replacing 240. The one that actually matters as far as final finish goes is the highest grit you use, because sanding up through grits is basically just the higher grit removing the scratches from the grit before it. The only difference using 220 will make is that you might have to work (super slightly not really any) harder with the 320 to get to your final finish because the scratches will be a little deeper. But honestly, I almost never go higher than 220, so you'll be fine.
Definitely wear a mask when sanding. It produces exactly the kind of super fine dust that you don't want to be breathing in. An N95 mask will do fine, just make sure the seal is good. If you're going to be doing a lot of this stuff, then maybe consider a respirator with swappable filters so you can use it with finishes too, but for occasional sanding, probably not worth it. The one I got was about $30 from Amazon, then dust filters are ~$8/pair, and fume cartridges are a little more than that.
Double check to see if whatever finish they have you using requires a ventilator. If it's lacquer, you don't want to be breathing that.
I never bother with eye protection for sanding, especially hand sanding. Eye protection is mostly to protect from chunks getting flung at high speed by machines. Power sanding doesn't make chunks, and hand sanding has neither chunks nor high speed.
The best sanding tip I've found is to scribble light pencil marks on the surface you're sanding. Then sand until the marks are gone, and feel the surface for any rough spots. Then vacuum and tack cloth the surface, scribble again, and use your next grit. Repeat until you're out of grits. It will be super smooth!
2 out of 3 tables now completed on my miter saw station. I want to put plywood on the lower supports to add a shelf as well as possibly try making a drawer in each of the tables.
Looking good on those miter saw tables! I have an almost identical setup for my miter saw.
Thanks! The taller table is the right height to be an outfeed table for the tablesaw and I'll also be able once I get a thickness planer/build a table for it to swap that with the miter saw table.
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