c/carpenters

24

scott.olivia•3d ago

Am I the only one who thinks Japanese pull saws are overrated?

Been using western saws for 15 years. Last week I borrowed a buddy's Japanese pull saw for a dovetail joint. Everyone online raves about them. But I found it awkward. The cut was clean but the grip felt wrong and I had to relearn my stroke. Found a study from Fine Woodworking magazine #287 that said 68% of carpenters prefer western saws for dado cuts. Am I missing something or do others feel the same?

16

robinp89•4d ago

Finally got a dado stack to stop chattering after 3 setups today

Spent all morning messing with shims and arbor washers in my shop in Denver, and turns out the blade was just slightly warped from a drop last summer. Anyone else ever fight a setup for way too long only to find it's just a bent blade?

25

paige166•4d ago

Hit 10,000 board feet of hardwood this year and it snuck up on me

I keep a little tally in my shop notebook of how much lumber I go through each year. This morning I added up my numbers for the year so far and I was at 10,342 board feet. That number surprised me because I don't feel like I've been working that much harder than past years. Most of it is white oak and cherry for custom cabinets and furniture jobs around Nashville. I guess between a few big kitchen remodels and a library shelving project I burned through way more than I realized. Has anyone else tracked their annual lumber usage and gotten a shock from the total?

28

wright.leo•6d ago

Always been a nail gun guy but a trim carpenter in Phoenix changed my mind about hand nailing

I was hanging casing on a door last week and the guy next to me was hand nailing everything. I figured he was just old school and slow. But he showed me how he pre-drills and uses a punch set and the finish is way cleaner than my 18 gauge could ever do. No filler needed on most joints. Has anyone else tried switching back to hand nails for trim work?

21

evan_davis•10d ago

Still using a tape measure for everything after 12 years, digital measuring tools feel like a waste of money

Last week on a job in Cleveland I watched a guy spend 3 minutes calibrating a laser measure while I had the same cut marked with my old Stanley tape in under 10 seconds, has anyone else found those gadgets slow things down instead of helping?

8

the_jake•11d ago

The difference in a staircase after 3 years of wear is crazy

I refinished a red oak staircase back in 2020 for a client in Portland. They used a water-based poly, and I told them to be careful with heavy traffic because it wouldn't hold up like oil-based. I stopped by last week to fix a cabinet for them, and the treads on the bottom three steps are completely worn through to bare wood. The rest of the stairs still look great. Has anyone else seen water-based finishes fail way faster than the can claims?

11

iris_schmidt•11d ago

I finally learned the hard way not to cheap out on measuring tapes

Bought a $5 tape measure from a hardware store in Gulfport last month and it was off by a full 1/8 inch over 6 feet. Didn't catch it until I'd already cut 12 pieces of crown molding for a job. Had to re-cut everything and lost about 3 hours of work and 40 bucks in material. The cheap tape just had this flimsy hook that bent after a few uses. Anyone else have a tape measure fail on them like that?

21

lucast81•14d ago

Spent 6 hours trimming out a single window because of bad miter cuts

Honestly, I was trying to trim out a double hung window in my own house last Saturday. I thought I could knock it out in an hour but my miters kept coming out gapped by like an 8th of an inch. After cutting 12 pieces of crown and throwing 8 of them in the scrap pile, I finally realized my saw needed a degree adjustment. Took me another 2 hours to dial it in and recut everything. Has anyone else wasted a whole afternoon chasing a saw that was barely off?

6

young.michael•17d ago

Cleaned my chisels with vinegar and ruined three of them

Was at a hardware store last Tuesday and an old timer told me to soak my dirty chisels in vinegar overnight to remove rust. Tried it on three old Stanley chisels I picked up at a flea market. Woke up the next morning and the vinegar had pitted the blades so bad they're basically scrap now. Lesson learned - anyone know a safe way to clean rust off without damaging the steel?

5

the_viola•17d ago

Vent: When my miter saw kicked back and I almost lost a finger

I was building a deck out in Austin last month, cutting some pressure-treated 2x6s on a humid Tuesday afternoon. My miter saw grabbed the board wrong and threw it back at me, nearly catching my hand... I was lucky I had on a good pair of gloves. After that, I stopped and checked my saw's fence alignment, which turned out to be off by about 1/8 of an inch. I spent the next hour fixing that and adding a zero-clearance insert instead of just pushing through the rest of the cuts. Has anyone else dealt with a saw suddenly going rogue like that? What did you check first?

27

wright.leo•19d ago

That old wooden door frame I fixed last month reminded me of how much has changed

I was working on a 1920s house in Portland last month, replacing a rotted door frame. Thirty years ago when I started, we'd just cut a new piece of pine and plane it down to match by hand. Took all afternoon. Now I can order a custom composite jamb online and have it here in two days, perfect fit. The older guys I learned from would probably call me lazy, but honestly, I've got three jobs lined up this week and no time to waste. Anyone else feel like the trade's gotten faster but lost some of the craft?

21

jake747•20d ago

PSA: Spent 4 hours on a miter joint that should have taken 20 minutes

Was building a custom picture frame for a client in Austin. Simple 45 degree miter joints, right? Except my miter saw was off by 1.2 degrees and I didnt check it. Kept getting gaps no matter how I adjusted. Finally broke out the digital angle finder and found the issue. Felt like a total idiot but hey, lesson learned. Anyone else had a tool mess with their head like this?

2

fiona_carr26•21d ago

Can we talk about spending $400 on a track saw setup

I dropped $400 on a cordless track saw last spring thinking it would speed up my panel cuts. Honestly, for most jobs my circular saw with a straight edge gets the same result in the same time. Has anyone else found these just aren't worth the hype unless you're doing real high end work?

14

holly709•22d ago

Tried a Japanese pull saw on my last trim job and it totally changed my cuts

I do mostly finish work around here in Nashville. Last week I had to run baseboard in a 1920s bungalow and the corners were all over the place. My buddy loaned me his Ryoba saw instead of using my usual miter box. I thought it'd be slow and awkward but man, the kerf is so thin I barely had to sand anything. The cuts came out way cleaner than my power miter saw for inside corners. Now I'm wondering if I should switch over for all my trim work. Anybody else use these for stuff like crown molding or is it just for small projects?

13

shane_bell•23d ago

Chose a hammer drill over an impact driver for my last deck project. Should have done it years ago.

Been using an impact driver for deck screws for like a decade. Last week I had to replace 3 joists on a 20 year old deck in Frederick. Those old pressure treated boards were like concrete. Impact driver just kept caming out and stripping. Swapped to my buddy's hammer drill with a hex adapter and it sank everything smooth. Only cost me $60 for the adapter kit. Anyone else make the same switch and never look back?

6

cameron_hernandez69•25d ago

My drill chuck gave out mid-screw on a deck job last Tuesday

I was driving the last few screws on a client's deck in Portland when the chuck started slipping bad. Had to stop, borrow a neighbor's drill to finish, and now I'm shopping for a replacement. Has anyone else had a chuck fail suddenly like that?

28

kai_chen2•25d ago

That "measure twice cut once" rule is missing a step

I keep seeing guys on job sites measure twice and then just go for it without thinking about the kerf. You know, the width of the saw blade? I had to redo a whole set of cabinet doors last spring because I measured twice with a tape, but my circular saw ate up an extra 1/8 inch on every single cut. That mistake cost me about $80 in plywood and a full Saturday afternoon. If you're using a table saw or even a handsaw, that tiny line of wood dust is real material that just disappears. I always mark my cut line and then account for which side of the line the blade goes on now. Has anyone else had this bite them on a big project?

24

the_sean•27d ago

I don't get the hype about Festool track saws after using one for a week

I borrowed my buddy's Festool TS 55 for a kitchen job last month over in Akron. Everyone online acts like it will change your life and cut perfectly every time. But honestly, after using it for five days straight, I still prefer my old Makita with a homemade guide. The Festool dust collection is good, I'll give it that, but the setup felt finicky and the plunge mechanism stuck twice on me. I also didn't like that the splinter guard wore down after just two plywood sheets. For $650, I expected something that felt more solid, not like a toy you have to baby. Am I missing something or has anyone else felt the same way after trying one out?

4

walker.julia•28d ago

That $300 'vintage' hand plane was a complete money pit

I picked up a Stanley No. 4 from an antique shop in Portland thinking it was a steal. Turns out the sole was warped, the chip breaker was cracked, and it took me four hours of lapping and filing before I realized I couldn't fix the rust pits near the mouth. Has anyone else fallen for the idea that 'they don't make them like they used to' and ended up losing cash on a clunker?

20

singh.harper•28d ago

That before-and-after of my first staircase redo versus last week's job looks like two different people built them

First one I did in 2019 took me three days and had gaps you could fit a nickel through, but last week I knocked out a full set of oak treads in six hours with zero gaps, mostly because I finally stopped rushing and actually measured each tread twice before cutting - anyone else see a huge jump in quality after a few years in the trade?

4

abby_cooper•28d ago

Old timer told me to always clamp my glue-ups for double the time the bottle says...

I rushed a table leg glue-up after just 30 minutes last month and now I'm staring at a joint that's already wiggling loose, so has anyone else learned the hard way that those glue manufacturers are way too optimistic about cure times?

32

williamw75•1mo ago

TIL the hard way that cheap glue guns can ruin a crown molding job

I spent 4 hours last Saturday fighting with a $12 glue gun from the hardware store trying to tack up some crown molding pieces. The trigger kept jamming and the glue would drip everywhere but where I needed it. Eventually swapped to a $40 one with variable temp and finished the whole room in 45 minutes. Anyone else run into crap tools that cost you way more time than they saved?

1

sean_barnes24•1mo ago

I finally wrecked a molding profile after 12 years of never doing it

Last Wednesday I was trimming out a bedroom in a 1920s house over in Medford. Old plaster walls, nothing square, the usual headache. I had this beautiful poplar baseboard with a detail cut on top that took me an hour to set up on the router table. Got in a rush because the homeowner was poking around asking when I'd be done, and I grabbed the wrong coping saw blade out of my pouch. Cut right through the top detail on a 6 foot piece. That's about 40 bucks of material and 2 hours of setup time gone in one second. I stood there staring at it for a solid minute before I even moved. Told the guy I'd need another day and he gave me a look like I was trying to scam him. Have any of you had a moment like that where you just knew you should have walked away and taken a break but didn't?

16

the_brian•1mo ago

Just realized I've been screwing up my crown molding joints for 12 years

I was trimming out a buddy's basement in Denver last week and he watched me cut a few pieces on the saw. He goes "why are you cutting those upside down and backwards?" I told him that's how I always did it. Then he showed me how to hold the piece flat against the fence like you're supposed to. Felt like a total idiot. All those wasted cuts and caulk over the years. Anyone else learn a basic trick way later than they should have?

9

the_eric•1mo ago

Used a laser level on a kitchen cabinet job last Tuesday and it saved me 2 hours

I was marking 12 upper cabinet heights in a row and the bubble level was driving me nuts, so I finally broke out the laser I bought at Home Depot. Has anyone else found themselves fighting old habits when a simple tool wouldve made the day way easier?