Having managed to wrestle my workshop into some kind of semi-usable order (although it still doesn't have any electricity except what I can feed it by dangling an extension lead out the kitchen window) I finally got on to building this little oak foot-rest my friend Helen asked for months and months ago.It's a simple little thing, but it has shown me a couple of things.
First, I could really do with a bandsaw. I have a scroll-saw, but it really doesn't cut it (badoom-tssshh!) when it comes to hefty chunks of oak. I cut the curves on the ends of this with a coping saw, and while that's workable, and craftsmen used to do it all the time back in Ye Olden Days, I really do prefer to let machines do all the hard work wherever possible. Alas, decent bandsaws are quite expensive, but even a crappy little baby hobbyist saw would be better than nothing.
In a similar vein, a disc sander would be a boon. A disc and bobbin sander would be even better. I've jury-rigged my belt sander on to its side to act as a stop-gap, but it's not entirely suitable; it's still a lot better than sanding down raggedy coping-saw cuts by hand though.
The deficiencies of my crappy little Ryobi table saw have been brought into sharp, glaring focus. It really is a piece of shit. Fortunately, for this job I could mostly get away with using my Makita sliding drop-saw, which is very nice indeed.
Most of all, I NEED to make more space. I can only make use of about a third of the garage I'm working in; the remainder is full of crap. Pointless crap for the most part that could be thrown away without a qualm.
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