|
Creating a wood working shop |
|
|
|
|
Written by jema
|
|
Page 2 of 2
BenchsawThese vary throughout the world; notably saws in the UK will almost always come with a blade guard for safety. As you can see here, there is no guard, as it has been removed. A blade without a guard is much more versatile.
This saw cost £35.00, and with the ever plummeting cost of power tools, you may be able to get an even better deal. Despite the price is is very effective. You can connect a workshop vacuum cleaner to the back, to keep the dust down,
When looking to buy your own saw it is worth noting the main limitation of this one.
As you can see the parallel guide is only good for 20cm. This is a serious limitation, and the one I come up against most often when working and wishing for more space/tools.
In our small work shop, we do not have the sheer range of equipment and must learn to make do.
Hence in the picture below, we see the addition of a cut out placed over the bench saw, with the height simply adjusted by slivers of wood. With this we can cut to a set depth for jointing work. It may well be crude, but it is effective.
Circular saw
If you are working with sheets of wood, then unless you have a far bigger bench saw that I do, you will find certain cuts are too big for the space in your work shop, unless you use a circular saw to do the cutting.
Circular saws, with a half decent saw, will cut fairly straight with practice. But why run the risk? Clamping a long straight piece of wood to your sheet to act as a guide takes seconds.
Jig saw
The humble jig saw avaiiable for under £20 will always have its uses. If you need to cut any shape out of a sheet other than a simple rectangle, one cut will need to be done with a jig saw.
Biscuit jointer
As this list of tools is going roughly in priority order, it may seem odd to place a tool some people may never have heard of so near the top of the list.
But for creating a quick solid wood joint, without the benefits of being a master wood worker, or having access to sophisticated joint cutters, a biscuit joint is a great way to do things.
You can do biscuit joints without a specialised tool, but at £45, the benefit of a tool designed for the task cannot be overstated.
Power planerUnder £24 for a Ferm power planer, that will do a marvelous job of levelling those little errors. No workshop should be without one.
RouterThe router is used for grooving, beveling edges and all sorts of other tasks.
Since it requires more skill to use than all the other tools, the quality of this tool and the use of a router table are important considerations. I am using a Ferm 1050w router purchased for £36, and of all my tools, this is the one I wonder most about the need to buy on quality rather than price.
Mitre saw
A Mitre saw is undoubtably one of the "sexier" bits of workshop kit.
I certainly enjoy the ease of use, when I use it. But you may find this is not as often as you anticipate. I'd consider this an ultimately optional powertool. But with a 10" blade Ferm model at less than £50, it is a handy thing all the same.
Scroll sawFor awkward shapes, available for as little as £35. Mine is a second hand model.
Again an optional addition to your workshop.
Where to buy the toolsThere are quite a few places on the net these days where you can get a very good deal on tools. I use Screwfix who have a good reputation for service and next day delivery. They also stock the Ferm brand of tools which are remarkable value for money.
You will also find Screwfix invaluable for bulk packs of screws (not surprisingly), nails, and all manner of accessories. It makes serious sense to get a few of their variety packs of screws of all sizes. They are very cheap and having the right size screw/nail to hand avoids the temptation of using something wrong simply to avoid a trip to the DIY store.
ConclusionsTotting up all the tools above and I come to a total of less than £300, and by no means all the tools are compulsory. I have built four sets of furniture since creating my workshop. Using MDF the raw materials have not been expensive. I have undoubtably saved money, but more to the point, aside from enjoying building my own, the items I have built are build to the exact dimensions I wanted.
|
