Stories of family, creativity, and diverse distractions.

Category: Shop Projects Page 1 of 5

Making stuff from wood, metal or plastic.

Let’s Make a Half Hitch Tool

When you tie your own flies you make a lot of knots. You need to keep the fly materials and thread from coming unwound from the hook and the most appropriate knot for the job is the half-hitch. But fishing flies are tiny, and you need to place the knots in exactly the right place as you tie the fly. It’s really hard to tie a tiny knot with your fingers and place it precisely. You need a half hitch tool. Let’s make one!

Fix Rotary Cutters with a 3D Printer?

Rotary cutters are used to cut fabric and paper. They are especially popular for quilters. I use one regularly. We recently got a message that several rotary cutters used in a charity quilting group were missing a piece. Walt was able to use one of my cutters to create a 3D printed version to replace the missing parts.

Making a special drying rack

For the last few years, Walt and I have been using waxed cloth wrappers for our sandwiches instead of plastic bags. It’s a small way to reduce our waste, but drying them proved a bit challenging. Here’s the solution we came up with.

Angling for Perfection With A Dovetail Cutter

I have written several prior articles about milling cutters, and today it’s time for another. We’re going to look at a specialized cutter for making dovetails. Once again, the person who named these didn’t waste much time on the task. They’re called dovetail cutters.

Making Curves the Easy Way – Corner Rounding End Mills

I’ve written before about end mills, but so far all we’ve discussed are the straight ones, for cutting square corners. Those are real workhorses, and I use them most of the time. But once in a while I need to make a curved shape. What then? Corner rounding end mills, that’s what!

A Little Straight Talk About Straight End Mills

Last week I wrote a brief introduction to end mills. Big shout-out to the one person who read it! Today I’d like to further test everyone’s patience and go into it a bit further. We’ll start by talking about straight end mills, which are by far the most common.

Spinning Blades Of Death! An Intro To End Mills

Awhile back I made a post about my milling machine. In that post I promised to talk further about end mills and other milling cutters. Well, today’s that dreaded your lucky day!

A Milling Machine Is Never Run Of The Mill

In this post I talked briefly about my milling machine. It’s one of the most important tools in my machine shop. Today let’s explore it a little further.

Let’s Make an Ultralight Lid

A while back I found a really light titanium bowl, and I intended to use it as an ultralight cooking pot for solo backpacking. But it didn’t come with a lid, and you really need one to cook efficiently. So the project went to the back burner, so to speak, and I used the pot I already had. But today we’re going to finish the build.

It Ain’t No Vice to Have a Big Vise!

It’s all very well to have a file, or a hacksaw. If you can’t hold the work tight you really won’t get much done. That’s where a vise comes in. Let’s chat about them for a minute, shall we?

Page 1 of 5

Powered by WordPress & Theme by Anders Norén