Saturday, October 29, 2011

Goodbye JET Jointer

Last weekend I said goodbye to my JET 6" jointer watching it go down the driveway in the back of it's new owners truck. Though I considered my woodworking habits to be "blended" I found that I still relied on the power tools more than I liked and with the encouragement of others, I have decided to make turn around the corner to going unplugged.

The table saw is next, it is listed for sale, that leaves me with a Dewalt 13" planer, a Delta 14" band saw, a Delta dust collector, Rikon lathe, and a Ryobi drill press. The planer would be next, I think I will keep the band saw, lathe, and the drill press for work outside the shop.  

I have an almost full arsenal of saws, sharp, and ready, a nice selection of hand planes collected over the years, also sharp and ready.

 I will be selling some of the planes that are duplicates.

It was strange watching that jointer leave the shop, I used it off an on probably for the last 8 years or so, but it is being replaced with a very nice 30" wooden jointer plane,  and since I have been doing a lot of the work lately with hand tools, the conversion doesn't seem as scary as I thought. The tables you see in the post below were made using hand cut mortise and tenons, the tops and shelves fiished with hand planes, and the inner drawer supports cut by hand.

So off I go taking one step closer to the quiet, and safer, side of working wood, perhaps making less dust and mess, feeling more connected to the work, and enjoying it a lot more in this phase of the journey.

5 comments:

  1. ...and you get lots more room in the shop for "more stuff!"

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  2. Bob, thanks for stopping by...more space is nice, more stuff would be in the form of a little bigger lumber stash

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  3. Selling my tablesaw was the best thing I have done as far as shop set up goes. I have a small shop so the tablesaw dominated it, not just the foot print but the infeed/outfeed area. I was then able to reorganize and I swear it seemed like my shop got 3 time bigger, and oh so much more comfy.

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  4. Thanks for the comment, the next post will be about the table saw going away along with my workbench. I have plans for the Benchcrafted Shaker Bench and that will be built in my new home in Northern Kentucky.

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