This has been a nightmare of a refinishing experience for me. Today I sanded down a table and clearly went too far trying to remove the previous finish, see photo one. I applied a first coat of stain (photo two) and thinking I wanted something darker tried to apply a second coat of an ebony color stain and it applied like paint. It didn’t apply smooth at all and looks like crap. I wish I never tried to darken it and just left it was it was. I am thinking my best bet now is to get a chemical stripper and try to remove as much as what I have done before doing more light sanding and trying to refinish but does this look like a wash? I’m super discouraged with how this went today as I had a beautiful table I butchered. Thanks in advance.

My first dovetails I’ve ever cut. I have a katz moses jig but i wanted to cut my first one totally free hand just to see how far off I’d be. I used the rob cosman method with a shawn shim and his kerf cutting tool. Its a long ways from perfect but I’m satisfied with my first attempt considering I’ve only hand sawed about 2 other cuts in my life lol. Some more practice and i might just be able to call that katz moses jig a waste of money lol. Also realized afterwards that i somehow goofed and didnt flip the shim over so i have a bigger gap on one side of all my tails, and my first fret saw use was tough to get a handle on also. Dipped way low on the right one which was first, less low on the second and got the last one pretty decent finally haha. Oh well it was a fun start to my learning a new joint

Haven't tried a table before this, think it came out just fine

I’m in the “working on the floor” stage in a new house. Being 6’2”, my neck and back don’t like me. I had a go at designing and building a super simple and cheap workbench so I could stand up straight at it. Cost was $100 AUD for timber, castors with foot brakes, and screws. I already had an old cupboard to use for the bench top.

My mom asked me if I can make her a bench she can put in the front yard to add some decor. So of course I obliged! I decided to make it out of redwood instead of regular 2x4s so hopefully it lasts longer since it’ll be exposed to the elements. Plus I love the look of redwood much more than regular 2x4s. I sanded the whole thing to 150 grit and even measured all the screw holes and countersunk them for a cleaner look. I used 316 stainless screws so they shouldn’t rust. Then I finished it with a coat of Cabot Australian Timber Oil, which really brought out that beautiful red color even more. I’m very happy with how it turned out.

Curly walnut and curly maple from irion. Simple glued together. Tried and true linseed oil and beeswax finish. It's tough to see anything but flaws in my own work.

My second major project! Some of you may have seen my folding workbench a few days ago. I’ve spent the past few weeks building this foldable outfeed table, incorporating my compact table saw and a removable/extendable front infeed support, as shown in the photos. Keen to hear your thoughts…

P.S. I’m still developing my skills when it comes to structural joinery, and the darker timber was intentionally used to add some contrast.

Bought a lot of tools during the process. So much fun.

Pretty sure its not supposed to do that, and they assembly instructions were no help. Any ideas where i went wrong? All four casters do the same thing.

My 2-year-old daughter absolutely loves it, which makes all the effort worth it. I had a lot of fun building it and learned quite a bit along the way!

Looking back, I wish I’d gone with smaller poles. These are 70 mm thick, so I had to cut them by hand with a handsaw instead of using my Parkside plunge saw. As a result, the cuts didn’t turn out perfectly square. Lesson learned for next time!
I also tried making pocket holes without a jig, which turned out to be easier than I expected. I think the thickness of the poles gave me a bit more room for error, although I did manage to snap a few drill bits in the process.

I also made a small chalkboard using some leftover wood. Cutting the 45-degree angles with a speed square and jigsaw was a bit of a challenge, so I’m glad caulk exists to hide some of my mistakes! 😅

For future projects, I’ve bought a Metabo MWB 100 MFT table. Hopefully, that’ll make it much easier to get straight and angled cuts, even with my budget-friendly plunge saw and guide rail.

Next up: garage storage shelves with a small workbench. If that project goes well, I might treat myself to a Festool plunge saw and dust extractor. Probably a bit overkill for my needs, but safety is a big priority for me, and Festool’s kickback control is one of the features that appeals to me.

Trees are freshly downed and green but idc. I needed a fun but simple project after the week I've had. I plan on letting it dry for a while and then charring the inside and outside once they've dried enough but had some fresh logs from cleaning up all the downed trees in my neighborhood (I thought it was oak but now idk lol. Someone please tell me) spare me the eye and mask protection comments. I put it on eventually. But if anyone has done this before or just has tips for turning a fresh log into a planter that would be awesome.

legs aren't done. this was very hard to make. this was my first time using any kind of saw and I have never screwed wood together. I had fun making it.

Hi guys, I’ve been building nesting boxes for a while now and usually repurpose wood or buy from the likes of B&Q, but where do you decent quality wood like cedar for example ? Might seem an obvious question but thanks for reading it anyway
Thanks

I posted last week about my first and second attempt.

I want to say that these are my third completed dovetails because I had a few aborted before and in between. I realized the pins were so horrible it wouldn’t work and had to scrap them.

Trying to get used to my smoothing plane… bought it second hand and it’s got some issues…

Thing that helped me this time is not stenciling tail lines. I did use the KM jig. I kept trying to stencil lines on the face of my boards then chisel to get them accurate to the line… it really just messed it up. I marked the end grain for my saw line then just followed the angle. It’s critical the line is perpendicular to the face, but the angle doesn’t matter all that much.

Watching Cosman do them made it click because how he emphasizes the precision you need. Sellers is just supernaturally skilled and makes it look too easy.

I like pull saws for most of my cuts but for the dovetails I used the veritas dovetail saw. I feel that it helps me keep a straighter line compared to my ryoba and dozuki.

I picked these up at a yard sale and was wondering what type of planes these were, and if they were worth putting any kind of effort into fixing up.

I prefer to scribe my lines when woodworking. I find it to be a bit more precise and cutting those fibers makes for cleaner cuts and less blowout.

I wanted a scribe that only had a bevel on one side so I could hold it flat against a ruler or straight edge when scribing lines. So it's a 45 degree included angle and the front face has the bevel but the back of it is flat (sort of like scissors, where the edge is on one face and the other is flat).

I couldn't really find any nice scribes like this to buy so I opted to make one instead.

The blade is a recycled blade from a power hacksaw about 1.8mm thick HSS. I have a good friend of mine who is a hobby machinist cut me a slice of an old blade from his power hacksaw that he then kindly ground in the 45's and the primary bevels for me. It was a little short at about 110mm. Too short to fit comfortably in your hand so it needed extending.

I brought some 2mm brass plate and sanded it down to the same 1.8mm as the blade then sandwiched both between some reclaimed hardwood.

The hardwood on the handle used to be part of a fence that had been around for about 50 years when it was torn down and put out for rubbish a couple of years ago I grabbed when I could and ran it through my thicknesser to get down to whatever good stuff was left underneath all of cracking and rot.

I'm not entirely sure of the species but it is a eucalyptus of some kind, probably a River Red Gum if I had to guess.

I used a bit of 4mm brass for the pins then filed and sanded everything down until the profiles were right.

I opted not to use any stains as I think the natural colour of the wood is quite lovely on it's own I finished with some boiled linseed oil to bring out the depth of the grain and the colour.

I do need to repolish the blade it got a little scuffed while I was sanding the rounded part of the handle near the front.

Just finish this at my friends house!

Hey y’all I poured epoxy over crushed turquoise of varying consistencies for these inlays and now I need to sand it down to get flush with the wood.
Anyone have recommendations for tools/techniques?
I’m hoping to get a nice cross section of the turquoise/epoxy mixture when finished. Would you start with a dremel or belt sander?

I’m concerned about chipping off chunks of turquoise, sanding unevenly, or making the epoxy gummy.

I’m thinking about starting with a dremel to knock down material because it’s quite a bit more proud than the wood as you can see in the first pic. Then transitioning to belt sander, then random orbital/hand sanding for finer grits.
The first picture is before I put more epoxy over top and the second is what all the gaps look like now with more epoxy.

I used real turquoise. The surrounding wood is mesquite. Going to put Odies oil on after everything gets sanded down.

Any suggestions would be appreciated! I’m having a little trouble finding resources on this.

You ever screw up a cut on a piece you've been working on before a month and immediately wonder where the closest ocean is that you can walk into?

Was adding handles to a cutting board that only needed final sanding and oil. Walnut and Maple. Slipped routing the handle and now have to cut off about a 1/4 inch.

But hey at least I have an excuse to but a track saw now.

So I typically use Mohawk M743-1570 Black Epoxy Putty Stick to fill small cracks and voids. It comes as 2oz.

I like it, it’s great to use for small applications because you can slice off very tiny amounts and it keeps so well.

But, I have a knothole that may need every bit of that and more. Should I try to pour epoxy instead? Product recommendation for using maybe 2-3oz? I would want it to match the black color of the other areas where I use the putty, and take a hardwax oil finish the same way. I also am hesitant to introduce a whole new epoxy type into my small shop. I’ve never tried pouring, but seems just too complicated to me, some waste and clean-up, risk of overflow, etc. Just never appealed to me and I don’t typically work with pieces with knot holes like this.

I am a glasses wearer. I’ve tried the safety glasses that go over my glasses, but they’re just very cumbersome.

Goggles or a face shield are options, but I think I’d rather just get Rx safety glasses to keep on while I’m in the shop.

Any suggestions for online retailers that offer a good value?

Thanks!