In addition to our recent vendor additions so you can find the best price on the tools you need, we have also launched a Power Tool Personal Shopping Service for contractors with large orders or shopping lists, and organizations that buy with POs. TOOLCRIB.com will find you the lowest prices on power tools by cross checking with multiple vendors and using our volume buying clout.

Call 1 (888) 4TOOLCRIB to Place Your Tool Order
Our number is easy to remember so you can place your order by phone whenever you need us. If there is something you are looking for and can’t find it on the website, dont have time to get online or just don’t want to look for it, give us a call at 1 (888) 4TOOLCRIB and we’ll find it for you.

Call And We’ll Find You The Best Deal: 1 (888) 4TOOLCRIB
Great deals on power tools are a phone call away with ToolCrib.com’s new order by phone service. Give us a call at 1 (888) 4TOOLCRIB and we’ll find you the lowest prices on tools from top sellers in the industry like Home Depot, Tool King, Northern Tool, Rockler and Amazon.

This easy to remember phone number is a great way to order tools quickly and economically, and a wonderful service for folks who can’t find what they’re looking for on the site! Place your order by phone today: 1 (888) 4TOOLCRIB.

Don’t forget to tell your friends and colleagues about it!

We’ve been hard at work on our ToolCrib.com Catalog, aiming to ship it at the end of the summer of ‘07. Unfortunately we hit some technical snags that got us rethinking the whole catalog concept.

In Leu Of A Catalog, We Have Added Some Great Features And Services
We decided it was more important to put our time and resources into adding more vendors to our online store to insure we have the lowest prices for you. You can now buy from Home Depot, Tool King, Northern Tool, Rockler, and Amazon.com, so you are sure to get the lowest prices and best selection at one site, ToolCrib.com.

We also launched a Power Tool Personal Shopping Service for contractors with large orders or shopping lists, and organizations that buy with POs. ToolCrib.com will find you the lowest prices on power tools by cross checking with multiple vendors and using our volume buying clout.

If You Really Want a Catalog…
Send an email to GFrench@ToolCrib.com to tell us why you miss the catalog so much, and we will try to fine tune the catalog concept to your needs. In the mean time we highly recommend a subscription to our twice a month email newsletter, which offers LOW prices on tools plus buying guides, tool comparisons and shop tips to keep you safe and productive.

We also recommend catalogs from both of these fine retailers:

Northern Tool and Equipment Catalog

Rockler Catalog:

First Name: Last Name: Address Line 1: Address Line 2: City: State: ZipCode: Country: United States Other countries… E-mail: I’d like to receive the free “Log-On” e-mail newsletter.

Instead Of A Catalog: Call Us: 1 (888) 4TOOLCRIB
Great deals on power tools are a phone call away with ToolCrib.com’s new order by phone service. Give us a call at 1 (888) 4TOOLCRIB and we’ll find you the lowest prices on tools from top sellers in the industry like Home Depot, Tool King, Northern Tool, Rockler and Amazon.

This easy to remember phone number is a great way to order tools quickly and economically, and a wonderful service for folks who can’t find what they’re looking for on the site! Place your order by phone today: 1 (888) 4TOOLCRIB.

Is it possible to be 100% satisfied with any of your power tools? Rich Engelhardt of SawmillCreek thinks so, and asked his fellow forum members to chime in on tools that “worked out exactly as planned or better than planned.” This thread is such a rich resource for woodworkers that we decided it deserved to be worked over a little for the betterment of the ToolCrib community.

The thread has over 91 comments so you can imagine there’s quite a list of perfect tools.

This quote, from Creeker Al Willits, sums up why this thread is important: “Actually [I] have a lot of tools I’m happy with, but its taken years to get there.” It can take a lifetime to find those perfect tools. We hope that this write up of the thread helps you find power tools that you love.

Scroll to the bottom for a link to the SawmillCreek thread and other resources.
(more…)

A recent post from the Rockler blog got me thinking about that wonderful jig that saves fingers. That’s right, I’m talking about the Featherboard!

The post, Using Featherboards, introduces new woodworkers to the concept, and offers old timers a chance to dig in a little deeper with Rockler’s special kits. In Rockler’s words, a featherboard “helps hold the stock up tight against the surface of tool or fence while you run it through.”

Also, “a featherboard can be positioned closer to the action than human finger should ever venture, applying pressure where it is most effective and least likely to be overcome by vibration.”
http://www.rockler.com/blog/index.cfm?CommentID=237

I poked around a little to dig up some more info on featherboards. Here are a few how-to’s I found:
Make Your Own Featherboards (my favorite - probably the most thorough guide - good pics too…)

How to make a featherboard (clear and concise!)

How to make a Featherboard (has excellent pictures for reference)

While researching for the Best Router for Router Table Under $300 I spent a little time in an Australian woodworking forum, where I came across who appears to be the Australian Wood Whisperer.

Click Here to visit Stu’s Shed for videos and other woodworking resources! >>

The Wood Whisperer, if you don’t know, is Marc Spagnuolo, a furniture maker and videographer from Phoenix, Arizona. His online woodworking video series and blog have a wide audience and he’s a regular topic in the ToolCrib blog.

His Australian counterpart, Stu, lives in Melbourne, Australia and has been into woodworking for about five years. He teaches for the Triton Woodworkers Club and takes his instructional approach into video for woodworkers around the world.

In -Episode 09 Router Bit Review Compression Bit-, Stu reviews a router bit that’s best suited for working with veneered woods as it reduces tear out with its dual spirals.

Watch Stu’s Router Bit Review and then check out his site for more woodworking videos!

I found this “Which router for table?” thread over at FamilyWoodworking.org, an awesome forum with super-helpful woodworkers.

Here’s the crux of the question:
“What I want is a ~3 hp router, with soft start and variable speed; table top adjustment; easy, above-the-table, bit changing; and a mouth opening that will accept up to a 3-1/2″ panel raising bit. Price is always a criteria, but $300 or so is not out of the question.”

He also asked in general what people had and what they liked/disliked about them. I went through and tallied the responses from the Family, and here’s what they said:

Milwaukee 5625: 3
3 1/4 hp Triton router: 1
2 1/4 hp Triton router: 1
Porter Cable 7538: 1
Porter Cable 7537: 1
Porter Cable 690: 1

Tritons seemed to get a lot of backing, and this observation from Jesse Cloud is telling: “I think Matt’s on the right track with the Triton. I haven’t used it myself, but lots of the folks on the Festool forum get a Triton for their table. If Festool fanatics are going for the Triton over Festool, then it must be darned good.”

Frank Pellow (yes the woodworker who documented his wood shop build) is a Festool fan who uses Triton: “I am one of those Festool fans, who uses the Triton 2.25 in my router table. I love my Festool 1400 router for hand-held work, but the Triton certainly beats any of the Festool routers in a table.”

Check out Which router for table? at FamilyWoodworking.org.

In my research for this post I also turned up a “best router for router table” thread at an Australian woodworking forum. This thread is from 2003 so it might be a little dusty:

Triton: 2
Dewalt 625E: 1
Hitachi M12V: 1

see: What router and router table from the Australian woodworking forum

Also see from the same Australian forum: What is the Best Router???

According to Marc Spagnuolo, more widely known in woodworking circles as The Wood Whisperer, he’s been busy with custom commissions and hasn’t been able to shoot as many videos as usual.

Well, he’s come to the end of his long line of customer projects and is putting new video editing software and a new camera to work in what he’s calling “Season Two” of the Wood Whisperer series.

This 30 minute video starts with a hilarious explanation of the mysterious powers of the dovetail jig over the opposite sex and then Marc goes into the who, what, how and why of dovetail jigs.

As Marc puts it, “this particular episode is a glimpse into the world of machine-cut through dovetails.”

Go enjoy Episode 27- When Dovetails Cry now!

There is an appropriate joint for each and every project in woodworking, and there’s a different opinion of which joint is appropriate in every woodworker. That said, a recent thread in the SawMill Creek woodworking forum caught my attention in which a woodworker asked whether the Creekers thought pocket holes or dados would build him a better router table.

Here’s the part of his question that got my interest: “Do any of you use PHJ and would you use it in an application like this? Why or why not? What about the advantages of dados over the PHJ? Or is just a matter of preference?”

Keep in mind that he’s building a router table for his shop and not an heirloom monument bomb shelter

Here are the results as near as I could figure:

Pocket Hole Joints: 7
Dado Joints: 5

And here are some quotes I found telling from the Creekers:

“For your router table i’d opt for dadoes. A router table doesn’t need to support much weight but it does have the racking/twisting forces associated with routing operations and the dadoes will be stronger in that regard.”
Brian Hale

“I have just about stopped cutting dados for simple cabinet construction. Pocket hole screws are easy to do and they are plenty strong enough. Why do more work for no additional benefit?”
Art Mann

“For this project (the shelves, top, and bottom at least). I would dado the shelves, and bottom, rabbett the top, and screw and glue. I would screw from the face side into the dado joint.”
Mike Cutler

If you’re new to woodworking and curious about the philosophies behind the various joints then I highly advise you read Pocket Hole Joinery vs Dados in Sawmill Creek.

I really enjoy face offs, especially in the world of woodworking Here’s a face off that showed up in WoodNet in which a member asked the following question: “Freud Fusion vs WWII? Prices about the same - Amazon 20% off each, $50 in Amazon bucks burning a hole in my pocket - What should I do?”

I waded out onto the battle field and counted up the “votes” for each blade… Note that a Freud representative actually joined the fray, though only to answer questions about his blades not to bash Forrest

34 responses later (most comments were not actual votes) I tallied the following:

Forrest WWII: 6
Freud Fusion: 4

I would call this far from conclusive, but if you’re considering dropping upwards of 60-75 on a table saw blade you should definitely read through the post. It’s going to give you an idea of how you can best spend your money.

Check out: Freud Fusion vs WWII? in the WoodNet forum

For some balance I’d also suggest you read Saw Blades from TheWoodshop.20m.com. In it the author states (for those WWII fanatics out there :

“The primary advantage of the Forrest blade is in its sharpening. Most sharpening services do their final grind/hone at 400 grit. For cabinet making, you really want your blade sharpened and honed to 600 grit. Several sharpening services (Forrest and Ridge to name two) sharpen/hone to 600 grit. As a test, I sent my Systematic blade to Forrest for sharpening and it cut as well as the WWII.”

The subject of table saw alignment comes up over and over again in forums because it’s a constant for every table saw user. Good, regular table saw alignment is crucial for proper table saw safety too, which is another reason I decided to write this post.

The title’s inspired by a forum post I found over on SawMill Creek by Mr. Howard Acheson (I used our woodworking forum search). He teaches woodworking and offers some great advice for folks seeking superior table saw accuracy (within .001 - .002) using only a 5 cent brass screw.

Here’s an excerpt from Mr. Acheson’s post (I added the numbers), followed by a link to his entire write up, followed by a TON of table saw alignment resources for you:
(more…)