durable plane iron marking method is handy for bevel-up planes

I have a small collection of plane irons that swap between three bevel up planes, as needed. I really like this approach because it makes it easy to get the right cutting angle in any situation. But this also means keeping track of which iron gets sharpened at which angle. I was using a so-called permanent marker in this capacity for a while, but they aren't what I would call permanent on a shiny steel surface that comes in contact with oil and water regularly.

Marked plane blade with wooden stylus. The large number has just been done with bluing fluid. The small, half-faded number is from a "permanent" marker.

So, I landed on the idea of using bluing fluid. The procedure is pretty simple, but there are a couple of easy ways to screw it up that I have learned how to avoid. Here's the procedure:

Marking my box full of blades takes only a few minutes.

1. Get some liquid bluing fluid.
2. Clean the plane blade thoroughly in the area you want to mark. You can polish up with an abrasive if you want to be sure it's clean.
3. Make a stylus by sharpening a stick of wood. Cut off the very tip so it has a little width, matching the line you want to make.
4. Write with the stylus. You'll need to dip it in the bluing fluid often. Avoid the temptation to soak the whole stick. I understand it's nasty stuff and not something i would choose to get on my skin, plus you don't want o make a puddle where you are trying to write. The fluid goes on clear, and turns the surface nearly black in about 3 seconds. Be patient and careful, because this won't erase without an abrasive.
5. Clean the fluid by dousing in water. You don't want to wipe off the bluing fluid with a rag, because you'll most likely end up with a smudge instead of numerals. I like to take it over my sink, start the water on high, and then put the blade under the tap in one fluid motion. That way the fluid is long gone before it has a chance to discolor the surrounding area.
6. Prevent rust by thoroughly drying the blade and applying oil or another rust preventative as you normally would.

My box of blades would be excessive for one plane, but it serves these 3 nicely. I often pop a high-angle blade in the jointer to avoid tearout and save the smoother some work. The jack plane is my primary shooting plane, so it often holds something with a low angle.

Still here

I haven't posted much in a while because life has gotten in the way of both woodworking and blogging. Hopefully things will be back to normal soon. In the mean time, here is some evidence that I'm still here, still alive, and still able to cut up bits of wood when necessary:

These wooden riser blocks were the key ingredient in an alternate storage spot for my motorcycle top box.

I might use this box for portable tools, since it mounts to a thing with wheels.

hanging bikes and reclaimed mahogany

This weekend I helped a friend make some hangers for french cleats we recently put up in his garage.

French cleats holding bikes and garden implements.

By the way, one big hook at the right height makes a pretty effective way to store a bike.

Sawing plywood on ikea sawhorses, as part of an effort to suss out any big gaps in my friend's small tool collection.

I also scored some mahogany (I think) from a shoddy hutch type thing sitting in his garage from the previous owner. Thanks Kevin!

...at least I think it's mahogany. Whatever it is, it's nice medium hardness with roey grain.

I stripped some of the ugly brown stain of the reclaimed boards, just enough to preview it's beauty. It will be fun to see what I can turn it into.

planer stand

I recently aqcuired a new planer and built a rolling stand for it. Here's how it turned out:

Unfolded and empty

Folded and full, including storage and wedges

The planer is a DW735, which now has a Shelix head in it. I've got some more photos showing the details. of the stand and the setup, and how I got there.

I got plywood and some clear riftsawn construction lumber from the local home center.

With the planer set up on another surface, the parts were milled to size.

Here's the basic planer stand. the casters are on plywood triangles that are not easy to see. I hid many of the screws.

I eventually installed the Shelix head. Here you can see the reflection of the little carbide blades. I am  very satisfied.

The Shelix head is a little smaller, apparently. Masking tape to the rescue.

Here's a dowel notched to hold the folding tables up.

Shelf in two sections. This should make it easy to remove, sweep, etc.

Concerning the disadvantages of storing finishes in glass jars

water-based dye, polyurethane, and grain alcohol

(Glass in my foot not shown)

I'm really enjoying flat concrete

The concrete repairs went really well. I watched a professional do it while I puttered around the shop and built a paper towel holder for french cleats. I was impressed with how it could be thin and runny enough to level itself out, but also thick enough to stop at a certain point before flowing downhill under the mats in the other part of the basement.

Here's a pretty boring picture of a nice smooth flat floor. But I'm excited about it.

 Once the floor was dry I started taking full advantage of it. I wheeled my tool chest into a perfect working position. I cleared off half my sharpening station and put a shiny new planer on it, then wheeled it and a shop vac to the new section to start making a mobile planer stand (but that's another post).

Stuff with wheels shows the floor repair's reason for being.

The other benefit I noticed is that I now feel like sweeping. I think I'm doing it about once every 2 hours I'm down there, and that's several orders of magnitude more often than before.

I am definitely not going to cover the whole floor with squishy mats again. Wheeling and sweeping are just too nice to mess up. If I need to reduce leg fatigue I'll put a localized mat in front of my workbench or double up on insoles.

I crammed 3 more saws in my toolchest

Unpacked.

I found/made  a few more spots for saws. I made spots for a fretsaw and a veneer saw in my saw till, and put my bow saw in the small remaining gap. All this needs to be removed when the tool chest is in use. The saw till already comes out, and I was able to hang the bow saw on one of the chest handles to keep it handy and out of the way.

Packed in the tool chest.

These grooves hold the fretsaw in place

magnets hold the veneer saw in place

Quick tip: clamps help transport lumber

I discovered that if you have a roof-rack, you can affix boards to it very quickly using a [quick] clamp. This saves time fooling with straps & rope. Just make sure it's tight and won't wiggle.

Taking a couple of french cleats over to a friend's house for installation (on his car). We just saved 5 minutes we can use to decipher concrete anchors at the local home center.

You might still want to use one strap as a safety. Make your own decision on this. I'm not guaranteeing it's safe in every case and you must take responsibility for your own decisions--but this has worked well for me on a half dozen occasions.

More things you can hang on french cleats

I have been having fun mounting all sorts of things on french cleats. Here are a few ideas for inspiration:

adjustable laptop desk. The angle can be adjusted for comfort with the chain links, while the height is adjusted with the cleats on the wall.

laptop desk, folded. This is made of scraps: thin
hardwood faced plywood, aromatic cedar, and hardware.

First aid kit. Because of french cleats, this can come off the wall in a hurry when it counts.

Some pegs I already had.

Just a shelf.

drills/drivers, and clamps. This is made of 2"x4"s, spaced to fit what I have.

Two worlds collide!

Pegboard. I have some stuff that still works well on pegboard.
With two screws and blocks, I have a place to put it.

circular saw. This hanger is made of glue and OSB

Tool Chest!

I declare this thing done. 

I have been working on this tool chest for a while, years even. Oddly, I think I never mentioned it on here. I had a mental picture of lots of detailed posts showing every step of the way, and I never got around to it. I don't think I would want to read all that same stuff for the nth time anyway. Maybe I'll post some interesting mistakes later, but enough about that. It's done now, I'm going to tell you about it, and maybe it will inspire some future action. Deal? OK.

My tool chest is based on "The Anarchist's Tool Chest", an excellent book/theory from Chris Schwarz. If you find yourself reading this, you will probably enjoy reading that book. It's about how to spend your time doing what's rewarding, how to select implements for doing so, and how to arrange for those implements to wind up in a big box. Oh, and it's mostly about woodworking as opposed to, say, anarchy.

What I really like about the book (and the Schwarz's writing in general), is that he lays out the principles he's following instead of encouraging you to slavishly copy the details. The first rule (not technically a rule) of the ATC is that you're supposed to disobey Chris Schwarz, and I did plenty of that.

My chest is scaled down from the canonical one to fit my tools (a basic ATC principle), and to try to be more space-efficient (my own stubborn inclination). I've also added & changed features where it made sense to me, while trying to stick with the overarching purpose and principles of the chest outlined in the book. For the rest of this post, I'm going to assume you have read it, or are at least familiar with the idea of the ATC--that way I can focus on what's different in my version. If you don't know the background, spend a few minutes with a search engine. This idea has made the rounds of other woodworking blogs several times over by now. Or buy the book, it's your choice. (This is a good time to point out that I'm not affiliated with Lost Art Press or anybody else who sells woodworking stuff).

I am incapable of painting over this surface.

The first thing you might notice is that my tool chest is not painted black. Why not? I do like it's modest good looks and the way it contrasts with the woodgrain outside, but I just can't bring myself to do it. I got into the hobby partly because I like the way wood grain looks, especially when it's been planed. I used this project to build a lot of basic experience. Milling lumber by hand, dovetailing, grain matching, proportional design, drawbore joints just to name a few. I'm proud of how it came out, and I like looking at it in all it's woodiness. This is purely personal taste, not advice for anybody else. (This is also testament that nobody should be afraid of cutting dovetails by hand. These were almost my first, and the repairs came out great!)

The longest saw you see on top determined the size of the chest below.

What do I mean about scaling the chest to my tools? Well, my tools take up a little less space than what's in the book. First off, I don't have molding planes. I like to design and build objects that don't look ornamented, so molding doesn't seem necessary. At the outset, I decided that I can always change my mind and put some in a separate box (maybe in the japanese tool chest style). Second, I prefer panel saws to full-size hand saws--Mostly because I can't accidentally knock them into the concrete floor when sawing on sawbenches. Lastly, I got into woodworking to build guitars. A lot of the specialized tools for that are pretty small. So, following the principles of ATC, I sized the chest to my longest tools, my panel saws. The depth and height of the original are based on what's comfortable for the human body to reach. Following that principle and looking at my tools, the inside dimensions ended up at 28"(L) x 16.5" (D) x 18.5 (H). That's probably about half the typical volume, but I am going to use all of it. This also means I can pick the thing up myself (note to self: take some weight out first so you don't break your back - planes are heavy).

Chest on legs. The offset allows them to fold next to their counterparts.

Wheels engage when the legs don't.

I also elected to put my chest up on legs. Well, sometimes. The legs fold and get held closed by a toggle. When closed, brass casters are in position to roll the chest around. I find the chest comfortable to use at either height, but especially when it's ~16" off the floor. Lately I've been rolling it around a lot while I reorganize my shop.

I also did the lid differently. I think the groove-in-groove thing is neat, but I really wanted a top that is one flat surface in case I want to use the chest as a sawbench in a pinch. I didn't want to sacrifice the thickness of the panel, so I made the frame even thicker (It came from a few clear sections of 2x4). I even veneered the inside of the panel, just so it would definitely be thick & strong enough for some abuse. I know it's only another 1/40 of an inch, but the stiffness goes up with the cube of the thickness, so it definitely matters.

I elected to attach the lid with brass piano hinge, screwed straight into the back. Some people think it's ugly, but that's only, like, your opinion, man. Come to think of it, there seems to be a lot of anti-shiny-brass sentiment out there, certainly at odds with my all-shiny-brass hardware. That's ok. This brass will look old when it gets old. But I want it to look young while it is young too. The idea of artificially speeding up the process just bothers me somehow. Again, this is my taste, not advice.

Oh, and no lock. If I ever feel I need one, I'll install a nice looking hasp, and use a padlock that offers some real security. But I doubt I will.

Whoops, there's supposed to be more stuff.

Still reading? Awesome. A little surprising. Let's talk about what's inside my tool chest.

Organized chaos.

The bottom is pretty much like the canonical ATC (CATC?), except missing the saw till and the area for molding planes. There will be no molding planes, and I'll explain later about the saws. What I'm saying is that the bottom is wide open. I've got it filled mostly with planes, and a couple other things too large and awkward to go anywhere else. I find it quite acceptable to have a drawknife, brace, and mallet piled in with the planes. I set them down gently, they don't move around much because of the plane totes, and they are surprisingly not much in the way.

The chisels don't seem to interfere with the planes. That rack is also a nice place for a little flush-cut saw.

I also decided early on that a chisel rack was required. I tried tool rolls, but they take up too much space on the bench and get dusty. I find I only like it for carving tools, which I don't use all that often, and tend to use as a set. My chisel rack is fairly traditional, except for the way I made it. It's a glued-up wood sandwich, with a 1/2" gap in the middle, and a 1/4" gap in the back (towards the wall). I only glued in the dividers I needed in the 1/2" gap--so pretty much just for the set of bench chisels on the right. I can always glue in more later as I figure out exactly what else goes in there, and the wide open gap works fine for most things. The 1/4" gap right against the wall is good for a small carpenter's square, and maybe other things later. The whole thing can unscrew and come out of the chest in one piece If I change my mind about it later. It actually sits on the till rails.

Tills at rest.

Tills at work. This keeps the small tools handy.

The sliding tills I made are pretty standard stuff, except for the width. If I had made them small enough to spread out completely, they would have been only 5" wide. Instead I made them 8". I can see two whole ones, or fractions of all 3. Or I can set the top one on the bench and spread the other two out. Like every engineering decision, it's a compromise. But I need the space. I also omitted the traditional pull rings in favor of simple centered pull holes. This is for a few reasons: I don't think they justify their own weight, holes don't bang into things, and a centered hole naturally leads you to pull the till where it won't bind. Mine don't bind anyway, but who knows how that might change with wear? These were fun to build. A few quick dovetails in pine, and some small nails, and then you've got that most precious of all commodities--more space.

One set of saws, with luggage in front.

What about saws? I stuck them in that extra space next to the tills. It always bothered me to waste it and let the tills slide around in transport. So I made a saw rack (till?) that rides on the lower till-rail. The idea is that it's the first thing that comes out of the tool chest for use, right before and much like the bench planes. I put all the saws with crosscut teeth facing one way, and those with rip teeth facing the other. It's a straightforward set of western saws, plus two Japanese saws that have earned their space by getting me out of a lot of jams (a big-box-store ryoba, and an azebiki). I made this rack to be the same height as the bottom two tills, so the top till can slide right over it. This is handy if I want a screwdriver or something from the second till without getting into a whole woodworking session.

OK, maybe I have a problem letting space go unused.

I even found some more space in the saw till. I made two simple little trays to slide into grooves at the end. They hold pencils, crayons, chalk, and some saw lubricants. All things that I am happy to have out at the bench right away, or at least near the saws.

Loaded up, ready position.

The top till is still free to move with saws in place.

I wish I had a name for this... "self-locating chain recess"?
"gouging one's work because there's no better option"?

What else? There are a couple of details that revealed themselves to me as I went. I made some smooth notches in the front wall of the top till so the brass chains don't scar the lid. This wouldn't be necessary if I had left some vertical space, but I wanted to use every cubic inch. Shaping them was guess-and-check until they slid in on their own every time.

I also made till-dividers that are easy to reconfgure. I used some scraps of fir that were 1/8" and 3/8" thick. The thin piece is the divider, and the thick piece is a wedge that encloses the end of the divider, preventing itself from buckling and falling off. Unfortunately it's hard to photograph clearly, but it's easy to do with a 1/8" chisel if you get the concept. Just make the angles match and don't tap it too hard.

These are easy to make and encourage grouping by category

OK, that about covers what I built. But, why?

In the end, it's a box where I put things.

That's a hard question with too many answers. If you want all of them, just go read the book already (The Anarchist's Tool Chest by Chris Schwarz). But I'll give you the one that's most relevant to me: organizational discipline.

I'm not naturally a neat person. Just ask my wife, my parents, or any of my college room-mates (sorry again). I do strive to improve, though, and the ATC has changed the way I think (for the better). The ATC has laid out a challenge to fit a complete working set of tools inside a box with finite dimensions. For me, that is an engaging, fulfilling exercise from what would otherwise be boring and neglected.  I've got craigslist ads up right now with tools that are decent enough, but I don't really need. I have got another pile that I'm thinking about getting rid of, knowing that whatever I keep might push something else out of the tool chest. And I stopped buying tools just because I felt the urge to buy something that I might need. I never would have done this without reading ATC. 

This gives me space, money, and time back. This makes me happy.

It makes the house neater, which makes my wife happy. And that makes me happy.

Now, I shall dream of sugarplums and getting on a plane for Handworks tomorrow night.