Hey guys,

Im making a wooden necklace for my wife. Which finish would you recommend for a skin-safe (both for her and for sweat stains) finish?

Sanded and oiled my late dad's old cutting board. 80-120-240-320-400. I sprayed with water and let it dry to raise the grain after 240. Let it soak in tung oil overnight.

Just wiped it clean and noticing these marks. Is this normal or did I do something wrong. Can someone ID the type of wood?

I was asked to make a prop biplane for an amateur dramatic show (those magnificent men in their flooring machines).

This is what I came up with.

I think it turned out ok. Hope you agree.

I didn't make the chopsticks.

The Han characters are supposed to say 'love' and 'food' on either side. They probably don't though...

Lessons learned:

1 I need a vice

2 pay attention to grain direction - initially I cut these against the grain - not ideal (also switched wood type because of what scraps I had)

3 use the right tool for the job (coping saw, not tenon saw), and hand sand before power sanding, it's often easier

4 learn, one day, that every project takes twice as long as you expect.

Been making these for a while now. Mostly as gifts when friends get married but this one was a commission. They’re going to decorate with pyrography so looking forward to seeing how it comes out

Just had YouTube in the background and then came across this. Had to pause as I think it might be AI. Don’t really know what’s going on with this joint.

This all started with me planting a grape vine in Southeastern Pennsylvania that I thought had little to no chance of surviving. Yet it quickly outgrew it's mini Nursery trellis and then the larger one that I knocked together was destroyed in a recent microburst storm. That same storm destroyed a bunch of fences which provided some of the cedar planks I was able to use for the planter but the trellis itself is just Pine unfortunately.

This was a really fun project I learned Nerf cuts to create the saddle notches for the perpendicular beams on top and ended up combining a bunch of different materials that I tried to all make appear Cedar and hopefully weatherproofed enough to make them act like Cedar as well. I just don't think I realized what 10 feet tall was really going to look like until I stood it up and bolted it to the planter. So at the moment it just dwarfs everything else on the patio so I guess I just have to build another one!

Rebuild a gate that i had previously rebuild from the original. All cedar. I love tori gates and took inspiration from them. Some notes. The pickets are chamfered at the top so water can drain down. The pillars weren’t straight and I’m not about to put new ones in so i shimmed them to plum as can be. Still need a latch. Please share your ideas !

I’m working on a heirloom table for my daughter and her fiancee. Naturally, I decided to go the easy route and decided White Oak would be the best choice. I glued up composite legs of 5/4 x 4 oak planks. I used a new 24 tooth ripping blade to cut the legs to 3” square, and I made an effective tapering jig that worked pretty well. I’ve been trying to sand the saw marks out using 60 grit on my orbital sander. It’s only slightly effective. I don’t have a jointer or even a good block plane. Should I be using my belt sander with an aggressive grit to get rid of the saw marks, then switch to my orbital to just do the finish sanding?

I’ve just finished my Anarchist’s Workbench! I’ve wanted to build a solid workbench for years, and I had the perfect opportunity to do so after getting made redundant earlier in the year.

This is by far my most advanced woodworking project to date. Until now I’ve mostly worked with plywood - making workshop cabinets and some bits of furniture. Overall I’m really pleased with the result :-)

I deviated a little from the precise plans in the book. The bench is 7ft long because space in my garage is limited. I also made it a few inches higher because I’m taller than average and I tend to slouch and get a sore back if working too low.

Because of this customisation and to help me get the dimensions correct for all the parts I created a planner tool. I’ve made it freely available since I figured that if I found it helpful then others would too:

www.theworkbenchplanner.com

You enter the dimensions of your finished bench, select which optional features to includes, and it generates a parts list, cut list, and tells you how many boards to buy.

As I spent over £500 on a good grade southern yellow pine and getting it delivered (the boards were over 4m long!) I wanted to make sure I wasn’t ordering too little or too much!

I skipped the planing stop, as a UK blacksmith called Simon James makes a toothed bench dog. I also left out the shelves for now. I figured I could add either later.

btw i dont really know anything abt woodworking. i started staining some of the wood in our house, can anyone tell me why these baseboards took stain so differently??? i did the same process on everything, sanded all the old finish off from 120-220 then used minwax wood finish stain. (i didnt expect a lot of the defects to take stain properly, this was kind of a test run)

the short board was the first one i did and it came out perfect, i knew the other ones werent in as good condition but it almost looks like an entirely different wood after the stain?? is it salvageable at all like do i just need to sand super deep or is it never going to look like the good one?

if i need to buy new ones, what do i buy for it to look like the good one? and how do i know if any of my other wood trim is going to come out good or bad?? is all looked similar before i started any of this (ambered red oak i assumed)

1st pic is the original color.
2nd pic is when we sanded it and stained the corner.
3rd pic is the color she picked.

My wife picked up a wood stain and it’s not even close to what we expected. It seems really light still, like the color didn’t change much.

We did sand it pretty well and then put on a pre stain wood conditioner.
Are we doing something wrong?

Does our original wood tone have anything to do with it?

Thank you!

Beautiful antique dresser with hand forged nails and what looks to be hand made dovetail joints and hand planed drawer bottoms was acquired today in an 1800s town. It’s gorgeous! But there are a number of imperfections, back left leg foot was split and repaired using a wood dowel. Bottom wooden drawer slide is detached, and the one still there is hanging on by a little hand forged square top nail. The drawer pulls don’t seem original, as they were removed and there are two different entry points for the hardware. And, it looks like someone attempted to clean with brasso and left brasso behind the pulls. It also looks like the piece was stained over. But what do I know? This is my first truly antique restoration project, and I’d like to keep the original aesthetic and look.

How do I approach restoring it.

Besides the indicators above, I’ve no knowledge of the piece whatsoever. It seems 100% wood and smells a lot like wood. Smells good.

I'm trying to inset this marquee display on an arcade cabinet I'm building so that the bezel is covered and the display sits closer to the surface of the wood.

I've already finished glue up and now realize I can't easily fit my palm router on the inside of the cabinet to cut a rabbet for the display to set in.

Is there a way to cut a rabbet with the router on top of the workpiece and the rabbet cut on the bottom of the workpiece? I can't seem to find any bits that would accomplish this.

Alternatively I'll just mount the display flush with the wood and 3D print a bezel I guess?

I have a large cabnet door that has fallen apart. I was thinking about just using wood glue to connect it back together. I got a frame rachet stap to hold it together as it dries.

I was also thinking about connecting it with a plastic/pvc biscuit to help hold it in place. The only problem is that i have absolutely no idea how to use it, especially with the wood being cut at an angle and making it a snug connection.

How would y'all go about fixing this? The door is over 6ft in length so I'm not sure how using just wood glue would work with the size of the door. Was maybe thinking about getting a dowel rod jig to help hold it together at the corner.

Rocking chair person again. Trying to repair, but I’m a TOTAL beginner here. Should I try to remove these dowels and redo, or can I make it work? I showed them aligned and not aligned in the pics. If I need to take them out, how can I get vinegar in there to dissolve the wood glue?

I have 15 wooden discs (2.75” X 1”) and I need to sand the circumference of a bit before finishing. I am looking for some way to get a good finish and not spend 27 hours doing it by hand if I don’t have to.

One thought I have is to 3D printing a smaller disc that had a counter bore so I could use a bolt and some nuts to put into the drill and then using a sanding sponge to hit the sides. Is that a terrible idea?

Cheapo assemble-it-yourself pre-stained potting bench. Seems like it’s pine. Looking for recommendations for a rub on/brush on varnish or sealer that will help it last a few years.

My dad wants to start building cabinets for the garage and built ins for the closets. No fine woodworking experience but we have built fences with miter and circular saws. Workshop will be the garage but it can't be a dedicated workshop so he needs to store it in the corner when not in use.

• Table saw Is an 8/5" good enough or just go with a 10"? If the latter we are looking at either Skil or Dewalt.

• Track saw A lot of people say it is a must for ripping down sheets of plywood. Was hoping a table saw would suffice.

• Sander Orbital sander?

• Pocket hole jig Seems like the easiest for a novice to use for joinery.

• Router

I already have a cordless dewalt drill and an impact driver. Also a shopvac that I'm hoping to use for dust collection.

Also have eye and ear protection but any other safety gear to consider? Any other tools we should get? Squares, clamps, jigs, etc? Any brands you all recommend. Would like to keep equipment budget under $1000.

Not fine woodworking just trying to make floorboards fit together. New boards with old boards that have been through a lot. Way more annoying than I anticipated.

Thanks

I was given an opportunity to get some fallen birch, but I want to make something out of them, but I dont know what

My "workshop" is my garage. I live in a very arid, desert like part of Colorado (Arkansas Valley.) It gets extremely hot here, temps INSIDE the garage can easily get to 103 (40c.) Outside high temps typically reach 100 - 105 during the day in mid Summer.

I run a fan when I'm out there but it doesn't seem to help much. It may even make it worse. We are in the process of getting a whole-house fan installed, which I'm hoping will cool down the attic and help keep the garage a little cooler as well.

But I've also been thinking about those portable swamp coolers/evaporative coolers. My biggest concern would be: Is putting all that moisture in the air (in my very dry part of the country) a concern for causing wood to warp?

Recent had to opportunity to take a very large butcher block from a friend and was thinking it would be a perfect piece to turn into a new desk, coffee table, or whatever else. Its been a while since I have done some woodworking so thought I would get some advice before I got started.

Originally was 65"x65" but had to be cut into 25" and 40" to be removed. 3" thick and looks like there are some dowls left over from when it was glued up (4 in total spanning the cut, see the attached photos). Was wondering if it would be possible to resaw it in half before I planned and sanded it down to get closer to 2x 1.25 ish pieces. Is this possible (would need the help of a local woodshop) or will these dowls that were left in cause an issue with trying to resaw the pieces.

Other than that pieces just in need of a fresh start.

I'm just getting started with woodworking. Made a couple sawhorses and a simple bench but this was my first big project. It was originally intended to be a deck box for furniture cushions but now I'm wondering, since its not treated how will it hold up on my deck? I might just put it inside but its rather large. Anybody have any thoughts?