Brian has brought us another NSY FREE TOOL review (now closed for new entrants). this link for more information on the NSY editorial policy about reviews. And without further ado, Brian's review. --dan
The Good: Makes the drill/countersink/drive chore much faster and easier. Top notch quality.
The Bad: Small possibility of marring work if not careful.
The Bottom Line: If there's a large batch of screw holes in your future, you want one. Definately beats a 2nd drill/driver.
NSY RATING: Four thumbs up (4/5) (Four and a half thumbs seemed like bad mojo).
The Full Deal:
I recently built a new pantry with roll out shelves for my sister. The biggest part of this project was building up the drawer boxes that form the roll out shelves. Since my sister lives about an hour away and doesn't own a table saw I had to mill the drawer stock ahead of time and cut it to length on site with portable tools. I elected to build the boxes with both biscuits and screws in each corner. This left me with 40 screws to drill, counter sink, and drive, and carpel tunnel from switching bits so often. Since then I've been thinking of picking up a second cordless drill to have around for these situations. In the course of shopping the web I came across the Jack Rabbit Deluxe Set which looked tailor made to my problem.
When I contacted the good people at Jack Rabbit Tool not only were they happy to provide an review sample they also provided a set to be given away to a lucky NSY reader. They even took the time to send me a very friendly email to apologize for taking a few days to respond - like I said, good people.
When the sets arrived in the mail I was immediately struck by the quality machining on the parts. I felt like someone took pride in the quality of the tool, not just how cheaply they could make it. The magnetizer was so well made that I spend a minute or two just turning it over in my hand and generally fondling it. Some good thought also went into how the tool is used. For example, the case leaves room for the last used bit and counter sink to remain installed and ready to go instead of having to disassemble everything to store it.
The tool itself is wonderfully simple to use. Set up consists of placing the driver bit (Phillips and square drive are included) in your drill, sliding the magnetizer over the bit, and then sliding the drill and counter sink unit onto the driver bit. Then you simply drill till you hit the depth collar, slide the drill unit off and drive the screw. It's great - the switch from drill to drive and back takes less than a second and is done with two fingers while the drill remains ready in your other hand. I had no trouble holding a few screws in the palm of my hand while switching.
The drill and counter sink unit consists of four pieces that you set up to match your project. The drill bit is held by a combination counter sink and collet that screws into the drill unit. For those of you not familiar with the idea of a collet, it works by squeezing in on the drill bit as it is screwed into the drill unit - similar to the chuck on your drill but simpler and more accurate. Collets are used by most large machinery to hold spinning cutters. This has two big advantages:
1) The set can use a standard twist drill bit that is easily removed for replacement or sharpening and can be found at any local hardware store.
2) Assuming the collet is well made, which these are, the drill bit is perfectly centered every time.
The collet is tightened with two wrenches that are provided with the set. The final piece is a squeezing collar depth stop that is used to set the depth of the counter sink. Once again the depth stop is a step up from the ordinary. The squeezing action gives a much better grip on the counter sink than the cheaper set-screw type that is usually seen. However, while beautiful, the shape of the depth stop was the source of my only negative experience. The shape of the surface that contacts the wood has a slight contour to it resulting in a relatively small contact area when it reaches the wood. If your not careful it's easy to leave a slight crescent shaped depression in the surface of the wood. Nothing that would destroy a piece, but could require some sanding to eliminate.
Not only good people but a truly excellent tool. The fit and finish are superior, I experienced no wobble in the drill bit or counter sink, the connection with the driver bit and drill unit felt solid and reliable, and setup is quick and easy. This is one of those tools that inspires confidence because it just feels right.
Hmmm... there goes the reason for a second drill. Guess I'll have to think up a new excuse to buy another tool...
Brian Todoroff
Contributing Editor, Nothing Severed Yet
www.nothingseveredyet.com
In my earlier post on Behlen's Rockhard Table Top Varnish, I talked about a finishing schedule of mineral oil, shellac, then varnish. HOLD THAT THOUGHT! Here's the problem: the first coat of varnish doesn't adhere properly to the shellac if you do it the way I described.
I sanded back down to wood, and found that you can fix it with three simple steps:
1) Skip the mineral oil, or use a hardening oil (like boiled linseed oil) instead--residual liquid mineral oil reduces the surface tension of the varnish and can cause it to flow out improperly, leaving an uneven surface
2) Scuff the shellac lightly with sandpaper before applying the varnish, to promote adhesion
3) Don't thin the first coat of varnish if it's going over shellac, since the wood is already sealed by the shellac
Or you could just skip the whole shellac thing and follow the instructions on the can, instead of being difficult like me.
In the words of Michael Dresdner: Fabulous finishers frequently finish firewood first.
As you may have gathered, I am not a fabulous finisher. But the Rockhard is a pretty fabulous finish.
One of our regular contributors, Kevin, plunked down his own hard-earned dollars for a Ridgid mini shop vac. Sounds like he got a good deal. If you're in the market, don't miss this review at american woodworker either, which came to pretty much the same conclusion. --dan
When I go to the grocery store I'm often tempted to buy the off brands.
I could buy Tide for $14, but the Albertsons house brand is pretty tempting at $7. Sometimes I've found a good deal, sometimes you get what you pay for. When it comes to shopvacs, I've heard that Fein reigns king but at $300... but I thought I'd look around for an Albertsons brand.
After perusing online articles I went to the Depot and kicked some shopvac tires. To make a long story short, I came with a Rigid 4 gallon wet dry vac and the hope that my $70 purchase would be
everything I wanted. What I wanted was a shop vac that was quiet, small, cheap and filtered fine dust.
The test scenario: Finishing my built-in bookshelves in my living room. I hooked the vac to my orbital sander and slapped on some 220 grit. An hour later here's the verdict.
Cheap - Check ($70 is cheap for a shopvac).
Small - Check Plus.
Quiet - Check minus. It's not quiet but you can talk over it. The sander was
louder than the vac. I used earplugs but that was more for the sander than the
vac. (Compare this to my last vac, it sounded like a fighter jet)
Filters fine dust - Check plus. My hardwood floors will show even the smallest dust
and they were are almost spotless.
Other notes: So it's small, so what? My girlfriend has assured me that size doesn't matter. It's portable and doesn't need much storage space. (It even comes with a wall mount). Disadvantages, none really. I've always needed to empty my shopvac when the filter gets clogged, not when the vac gets full. Since the filter is a standard size the vac still has to be emptied at the same frequency. I've had to clean the filter twice but the vac itself has never come close to filling up.
The hose is 1 7/8 " diameter. Somebody should get fired for this. Seriously, fired. There are standard hose sizes for shop vacs and Rigid comes up with a new one? No, that's not even true, Rigid still uses the standard sizes on all their vacs except for on this one. So far it hasn't been a problem for me, though. My sander is a Rigid and the hose fit. For vacuuming up loose stuff the hose size doesn't matter but sometime soon this will bite me. They don't even provide an adapter.
The hoses are *Great* (other than their non standard size). You get a long hose (12ft?) and shorter hose (8ft). The short hose is amazing. It's sooo flexible, like a slinky. It stretches, it bends... it's wonderful.
So, overall I'm happy. Rigid's 'professional' line of shopvacs as a whole looks good. I wouldn't say this one is better than other shopvacs except for it's size. Overall, it's cheap, small, and it holds it's own in all other categories.
By popular request*, I decided to add an email subscription to Nothing Severed Yet. You can use this to get the latest NSY articles sent directly to your inbox, bypassing that pesky "web" thing completely. It's sort of like when the boss in Dilbert has his secretary print out his emails, except that I take lousy dictation. In any case, it's really, really easy. On the left side of the main NSY screen you'll see something that says "Subscribe". Type your email in the box and click "submit".
That's it.
I tested it and it's really that simple. You'll get an email explaining to you how to unsubscribe; I tested that too, since it seems like I unsubscribe to things more often than I subscribe to them. Unsubscribing was just as easy. The whole service is run by the good folks at Bloglet, a small Nigerian company that has lots of experience managing email lists. Ha ha, just kidding, they're good guys and won't send you anything at all beyond the lunatic ramblings of all your friends at NSY. Which you'll receive whenever we post them, which is about twice a week.
UPDATE: I switched the service from Bloglet to Feedblitz, since Bloglet was being flakey as all getout. You shouldn't see much change, except the email format will change a bit.
Of course, if you've got one of them newfangled RSS readers, you can point it at the NSY RSS feed (more on that here) and keep up to speed that way. Whatever floats your boat.
Try a NSY email subscription. You'll thank me for it**.
* Somebody asked.
** If you're that guy who asked.
Aw heck, I'm going to make it REALLY easy for you. Just put your email address here, and click the "subscribe" button:
A few days ago, Dave Wright left some valuable notes on the Sawstop safety enhanced saw. In the process of talking to him, I realized that he was the author of the greatest chisel review I've ever read. In fact, it was the article that had the greatest impact on me when I wrote this piece about chisel shopping. It's so good, in fact, that I wanted all my readers to have a gander at it too, so he gave me permission to reprint it here.
Click here to read David Wright's excellent wrapup of high-end chisels (it's a 43k PDF).
As a postscript, Dave notes:
"It might be worth noting that opinions formed when writing that article have generally been proven true over extended use as well. I use all the chisels, but my "go to" ones are the Two Cherries, Stanley 750, and one that wasn't in the review - Harris Tool. The Sorby and Henry Taylor still dull quickly though it's easy to put a nice edge on them."
Brian found a hell of a deal! --dan
Just ran across a great deal on a Sjoberg workbench from Woodworker's Source. So, of course, the second thing I did was rush over to share it with our wonderful readers. (First thing I did was to make sure I got mine at this price.)
Turns out they've got a special purchase deal going on a 21" x 49" (54" with tail vise) bench with two wide vises. It appears to be the same Sjoberg DUO sold at Rockler for $499 before you even ship it. From Brian: It turns out that it is not the DUO but the JPB-4, which is still a great bench that runs $500+. The vises are fixed it the front left and the right end of the bench and not moveable. I'm very pleased with mine. I've been shopping for a small bench for my shop for awhile now and at $299 including shipping this is the best deal I've seen. No that wasn't a typo the $299 gets it shipped to your door!! I asked them to hold it at the terminal since I've come to belive that most of the abuse occurs getting it from the terminal to your house.
So if your looking for a bench, run - don't walk - over to Woodworker's Source and be sure to let them know that Nothing Severed Yet sent you.
Dave Wright put up an excellent comment to my earlier article about the SawStop table saw. Regular readers would probably miss it, so I'm giving it an entry of its own. It looks like the cabinet saw is hot stuff--I'm now curious how the cheap-looking contractor saw compares.
--dan
Dan,
Just now, taking a late lunch, I did a web search for "sawstop review" and came across your page. I've had one of these saws since about when you posted the "SawStop?" piece. You might be interested to know that real reviews by regular woodworkers who paid their own money are starting to trickle in. Below are a couple. I wrote the second one.
http://www.just4fun.org/woodworking/tool_reviews/sawstop/
http://www.woodcentral.com/cgi-bin/readarticle.pl?dir=reviews&file=articles_484.shtml
Only time will tell how SawStop, their invention, and their saws fare in the marketplace. Judging by the saw alone they should do well. It's expensive, but you'll pay about the same to get the Eddie Bauer version of an SUV instead of the regular one. For most people it's just a matter of priorities.
Take Care,
Dave
Darn it, I completely forgot to tell you all about the winner of the apron from the NSY Free Tool Review. Richard S, in Williamsport, TN, was the lucky winner. He got the apron a few weeks ago and, presumably, has not been had any flying splinters poke holes in his abdomen since then. Plus, he's got a handy place to hold his tape measure.
One additional note: many manufacturers have been reluctant to part with a tool for giveaways, so it may be a bit before we get to do another "free tool" review. I'll keep fighting the good fight for you, though!
My walnut dining room table needs a little tinge of red. I've been mulling over how I'm going to do that for a while, and per my usual habit, I'm going to share my thoughts and findings with you.
Stains are basically dilute paint. Dyes actually soak into the fibers, so they don't mask the grain as much as stains do.
While considering dyes, I looked at some dye samples on Maple. Wow. Maple dyes beautifully. I've had some lousy experiences staining it--I'll never try that again.
There are two types of dyes: water-soluble and alcohol-soluble. Water-soluble are more lightfast; alcohol-soluble will fade more after years in the sun. However, putting any finish that involves water on a surface will cause the grain to swell, hence the popularity of alcohol dyes.
"NGR" (non-grain-raising) dyes are water-based dyes that have been mixed with a chemical to make them dissolve in alcohol anyway. So you get the best of both worlds. Unfortunately, I can't find them locally, so I'm just going to use a water-based dye and deal with the raised grain (getting into how to do that is a bit too much for this article to handle).
You can dilute the heck out of dye, and then apply coats of it until it reaches the right color concentration. You can also wash dye out of the wood if you use too much by adding solvent. Another way dye is superior to stain. I'm using a very, very light wash of red. 1/4 tsp to 2 cups distilled water (warmed in the microwave to speed dissolution), to be exact.
In theory, you can make any dye color with red, yellow, blue, and black. In practice, it's a heck of a lot easier to start with a color that's close to what you want, and tweak with the primary colors if needed.
And finally:
This may seem obvious (it sure does in retrospect), but put your water-based dye on first, BEFORE you put on the mineral oil. Oops.