Just Blogging

David Savage asked:




Under my bench right now I can see three bench planes. There is a long one, a medium length and a short one. The long plane is used for truing edges and dead flat surfaces, the medium sized one is an everyday bench plane and the short one is used for smoothing finished carcasses and final truing up of surfaces. A Number 6 is for a reasonably well built male is the standard everyday plane, quite frequently referred to as a Jack plane.

If you are a strong dude then you may go for Number 7, or if you are relatively light of frame a Number 5 or 5 1/2. The number is the indication usually of the length of the plane, though some planes are slightly narrower than others, so start with this plane and just get that one plane to start off with. Later on you can add in a Number 7 or Number 8 plane for a long jointing plane for jointing edges and flattening dead flat surfaces, and you can later on add a smoothing plane, a Number 4 or 4 1/2 plane.

Don’t buy either of these unless you have to. Start off somewhere in the middle. We’ve seen many students buying hundreds of planes over the years and it’s come clear to us that the Lie Neilson brand and the Clifton brand are the two ones to go for. Veritas have made some interesting new planes however their bench planes have given a couple of our guys problems with flatness and with the adjustment mechanism. When they get this sorted and I am sure we will we will start recommending them.

We have had students who have had problems with the Clifton planes not being as flat as their own specification demands but we are assured by the manufacturers that those problems have now been overcome. However I think if I were buying a plane right now I would be buying a Lie Neilson plane. They are the most expensive available but they have been reliably flat which is the essential quality that you are looking for in a plane and the machining of the blades and back irons have been acceptable. I would however change the blade to a high carbon forged steel blade from Clifton. The Victor blade fits real easy.

In our sharpening workshop we have a large granite surface plate usually used by engineers.We bought this when we had to argue with some tool suppliers that their planes were not as flat as they said. This surface is flat within a measured number of microns and has a Warrantee signed by an inspector to prove it. Lee Neilson and Clifton have been the most reliable suppliers though we have had planes of both returned as being outside their own specification. “Tom will be upset”, she said, I really dont care, my student was even more upset having spent lots of money and lots of time with a tool that was not to specification. You can buy less expensive planes but you will spend an awful lot of time faffing around with flatness and making the blade sit securely within the mechanism of the plane.

Dont waste your time. Buy a decent plane and learn how to use it properly.

York Pitch

When buying bench planes you need to understand what is normal and what is “York” pitch. The overall cutting angle that the blade is set to the sole of the plane is usually 45degrees. This is standard and fine. The front plane below is at standard pitch. Look at the smoother plane behind it this has a slightly higher pitch at about 50 degrees. this is York pitch and is usefull for finishing difficult grained timber such as cherry. You can buy a different “frog” the block of steel that the blade sits on to give you “York” pitch.

Low Angle Bench Planes

NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH LOW ANGLE BLOCK PLANES. We’ve recently had a spate of these low angle bench planes in our workshops. Again these are Lie Neilson and Veritas planes and we can recommend these only partially. The attraction of these planes is that the blade is set at a very low angle with support to the cutting edge quite near that cutting edge. These blade have the bevel facing up and do not have a back iron making the planes more simple in construction. These planes are giving exceptionally high quality finish to the timber even on very figured timber. They are however not a replacement for a general bench plane. The adjustment of these planes are very critical. They need setting up once and leaving alone, so we would only recommend one of these planes as an addition to your armoury. Maybe bought after a few months on the job. In that case the favourite in the workshop seems to be a Number 6 or a Number 7 low angle plane, again manufactured by Lie Neilson though Veritas are also good and recommended.

Eric Griffin asked:




This is one of my favorite power tools and that was one of the reasons we did a power tool review on the Milwaukee Sawzall. I truly love everything about this and can not find one item to complain about. The Milwaukee Sawzall is a power tool used to destroy, so it is even more important to build a good quality tool as more accidents happen during tear down. The body is put through more stress and is harder on the body, which causes fatigue.

First impressions when picking up the Milwaukee Sawzall power tool is “Solid”. It has some good weight to it which helps in this type of application, 8.9 lbs, so its not too heavy. The rubber grips feel nice in your hands which means your hands will stay in place and not slide around. The variable speed control is on the lower part of the “D” handle which is nice because your not going to accidentally change speeds. Another item we noticed from the start was the balance of the tool. The balance of this tool was perfect. Some weight in the front which will help the tool cut, while the back was each to move around. The Quick-Lok feature is one of the best ideas to come along in a long time. Since this tool is used to destroy, chances are you will ruin the power cord. Instead of having to open the tool up to change the power cord, you can just disconnect it and put a new power cord on. I don’t know how many cords I have ruined over the years, then my tool will sit on the side line until I get time to change the cord. Not with this tool, just plug and go.

We ran this tool through a number of test including, cutting 4×4, railroad ties, a lot of black pipe, plaster walls and more. We tried to get the tool to bog down by trying to wedge the tool blade, use an old blade, putting dust in the motor and more. We could not get this tool to stop or even bog down. Yes you can tell the difference between a sharp blade and dull blade, but that doesn’t have to do with the tool. We thought we could get the tool to slow down with the railroad tie because it is wood covered in Creosote and has a steel s bar in the middle of the tie. We did rip through a couple blades, but partly because we tried a wood blade for the metal because when you get to the middle of a tie, you are cutting metal and wood. We ended up ripping through the center with a metal blade and a small amount of orbital action. Another nice feature is you can adjust how much orbital action you want. The collar that holds the blade is also an awesome feature. With all we put this tool through, the blade never slipped out. We even put the blade in a vice and used a pulley system to try and rip the blade out. We ended up lifting the work bench up in the air. So we had two guys sit on the table and still couldn’t get the blade to budge. After all this when we did take the blade out, I tough it might be hard to get out, but nope, just a simple turn and it came right out like it was supposed to. All in all we could not get this power tool to bog down at all, we did rip through a lot of blades, but that’s about it.

After using the tool for a long time, our arms felt fine. We were not fitful due to balance or vibrations. Again this is one of the biggest keys to a tool of this type.

Over all our power tool review of the Milwaukee Sawzall is extremely impressed at this incredible power tool. This is a must own for anyone who plans on buying a reciprocating saw. There are a lot of other great manufactures out there, but the Milwaukee Sawzall truly has some very nice unique features.

Pro’s
Where to start. I love everything about this tool. The Quick-Lok, the blade system, the balance, the feel.

Con’s
I really can not think of any negatives to this tool. If I want to get picky, I guess the only con I can find is they should include some more blades.

Professional Power Tool Guide Rating
Value -
We believe the value for this tool is incredible, one of the best values around. When you compare what this reciprocating saw has compared to the competition, this is hands down one of the best tools. Milwaukee unique Quick-Lok and blade lock make this tool even a better value compared to its counter parts.

Performance -
The performance of the Milwaukee Sawzall is incredible. This is only an 11 amp which is more than enough power, I could only image the 13 amp. We tried to bind the tool to get the motor to stop and couldn’t do it. If you are not holding on tight, it will probably come out of your hand before you can get the motor to shut down.

Ease of Use -
The Milwaukee Sawzall is extremely easy to use. The variable speed and orbital action are easy to reach and adjust. The blade lock is also easy to use and figure out. There are not tight parts that get stuck or need a lot of muscle to use.

Features -
The Milwaukee Sawzall has all the important features from a slow to extremely fast variable speed action. The orbital is truly orbital, where some reciprocating saws will only orbital a little bit, the Milwaukee has enough action to make a difference for cutting wood.

Balance -
This tool really takes two hand to use and has a very nice balance. Did have any arm or body tiredness due to the tool. The workers front hand is perfect for holding the tool while the back hand is easily used for adjusting angles.

Feel -
This is an extremely solid power tool. When you pick the tool up in your hands you can feel it right from the start. Cutting wood, metal or anything else, the low vibrations (Compared to other reciprocating saws) it a lot easier in your hands.

Overall -
This is a must own power tool for anyone. If you are a professional or home user, I wouldn’t consider any other reciprocating saw. The Milwaukee Sawzall is hands down the best reciprocating saw we have used. When this tool was designed they though about everything from making the cord easy to change to the quick change blade system that truly locks the blade in place. I could go on and on about how much I love this power tool. If you all ready own it, you understand me. If you don’t own this tool, once you try, you will se why I love this power tool and used this as our first power tool review.

Eric Griffin asked:




Bosch makes some of the best power tools in the world and the Bosch Bulldog Rotary Hammer is a perfect example. Right out of the box, the first item we noticed was the case and the big Bosch logo. When opening the case, we noticed a lot of room, more than enough to carry bits, chisels and screws.This is a nice feature. We know it’s only a case, but the extra room for peripheral tool parts saves trips back out to the truck.

After picking up the tool, the first feature we noticed was the weight. The Bosch Bulldog rotary hammer was very light and weighs in at 6.25 lbs. I was a little surprised, I thought it would weight more. The Bosch was very easy to handle as the balance between your front hand and rear hand is nice. On the front of the tool, you can change back and fourth to drill, hammer or rotary hammer with a well placed dial. The handle is a “D” handle, meaning it gives a user more control when using it over your head or on the ground. The “D: handle is a very nice feature because control is important when using this type of power tool. The only downside to a D handle is sometimes its harder to get into tight spots, but that’s not a bad trade off! We really like the SDS system. The bit locks into place by pulling back the chuck and dropping it in. The SDS system is nice if you are using a variety of different bits or chisels. The down side to an SDS system is that the bits tend to be a little more expensive, but we think they are well worth the extra cost.

We ran the Bosch Rotary Hammer through some tests. We used a chisel to break up some brick and drilled holes for Tapcons. We performed some other tests, but these were the main two tests we wanted to monitor.

The first test was using a chisel to break up some brick that was laid in a cement walkway. Again with the SDS bit system, the chisel locked right into place with no hassles. We set the dial to Hammer and went to town. The D handle was very nice as we could control the Bosch hammer very easily. We busted up about half the walk way rather quickly (18 minutes) and we didn’t feel a lot of strain on our backs. The tool ran rather cool as we didn’t feel a lot of heat produced from the Bosch Rotary Hammer. After we were half done, we tried another Rotary Hammer (Different brand name that we will put into another review). This one didn’t have a D handle and we could tell from the start this made a big difference. When we finished the last part of the walkway, we were a little more tired for two reasons. (By the way, it took us 26 minutes to finish the second half). First, we were a little more tired partly due to the absence of the D handle. Second was the power transfer. On the Bosch we couldn’t tell how much power it was transferring to the work, but after using another manufacture for the last half, we could really see that the Bosch was transferring more of the power to the chisel instead of back into the power tool. Over all the Bosch was a great tool for this job. Great balance, but the best discovery was how much power it transferred to the work instead of your body.

The next test was to put anchors into concrete walls. For this we used the Condrive 1000 Tapcon system. This was a no- brainer. The Bosch Bulldog Rotary hammer knocked this out without breaking a sweat. Again, when we did it on the ceiling, wall or floor, it was very easy to control. As long as you match the bit to the right screw, you could fly through this without stripping a *****. Once you set the depth on the Bulldog, it was no problem.The only minor obstacle we ran into was the screws. When we used the tapcon screws, we could really get them to bit and hold with no problem. The off brand screws wouldn’t always hold or the heads broke rather easily, but this is more due to the ***** or human error, not the Bosch Bulldog.

We ran a couple more tests to rate durability, but we had a hard time getting this tool to run hot. It runs very cool. Over all this is a great Rotary Hammer. So if you are looking at getting a Rotary Hammer, definitely take a look at the Bosch Bulldog.

Pro’s
D Handle, good transfer of power, SDS system, great power

Con’s
It depends on what you are using this hammer for. If you are looking to get into tight areas, its not bad with the D handle, but could prevent some movement.

Professional Power Tool Guide Rating

Value
You get a lot of power and a lot of tool for the price. This was a test on the 7/8″, for a little more money you can get the 1″ SDS which might be better.

Performance
The are no questions about the performance. It Does everything you want. More than enough power.

Ease of Use
As with most of Bosch power tools, this is very easy to handle and also has great balance.

Features
With the Hammer, Drill or Rotary hammer, there are more than enough ways to get the job done. The trigger is very easy to hold to get the right speed.

Balance
This tool has good balance. The forward part of the power tool has a good balance by itself. With the D handle you can easily control your work. You will end up getting tired because of the ability to keep on working with a well balanced tool.

Feel
This is an extremely solid power tool. When you pick this rotary hammer up, you can feel the balance. It doesn’t seem cheap. Just one of those good power tools to hold in your hand.

Overall
Overall we are giving this a “5 Blade” The Bosch rotary Hammer has great balance, lots of power and the SDS system makes it easy to change bits on the go. The case has more than enough room to store bits and screws, which is a nice feature.