Bruce Campbell lives and works in Coquitlam, BC. He began woodturning in 1979 and spent about 15 years learning the technical aspects of the craft. Today, turning has grown from his hobby to his profession. He approaches his art by first learning and practicing physical techniques and then working to understand how those techniques are applied to classical designs. Once he has confidence with a the formal design he looks for ways to alter or combine it to create new and interesting pieces.
His work includes gallery items (bowls, boxes, vessels and sculptures), craft items that are available through shops and fairs and architectural work such as furniture parts, staircase spindles, etc.
Bruce's current interest is merging media. He uses paint, pyrography and texturing to enhance pieces and is combining precious metals and clay into his finished works. He also enjoys demonstrating, teaching new turners, and mentoring those who wish to improve their skills.
To read the full article on Bruce Campbell and see images of his projects, click "read more" below for the full article
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Many people consider routers "scary tools", this is probably because they can spin at such a high rate of speed, but truthfully, routers are among the safer tools in the workshop. Not that they should be taken for granted, ANY tool can do serious harm even a router. The thing that I like most about routers is they can be used to make entire projects. If the only tool you have is a router, you can make many projects with only a router.If you are new to routing, you will soon discover that the most of the things that you can do with a router involve using a router table. Routers with tables are useful too, but having a router table opens a whole new world of projects and woodworking elements.
If you are about to invest in a router, make sure you choose a good brand name like Porter Cable, Freud, Milwaukee, DeWalt or similar. If you are also investing in a router table do NOT purchase an inexpensive table based on price. You will soon find out that your money was wasted and now you still need to go out and purchase decent table. Most bench top tables are not worth bringing home, although there are exceptions, even some of the floor standing models are sketchy, so take your time and buy a decent table.
For some of the basics on using a router table, please see our video, then read on ....
In hundreds of garage sales, thrift shops, basements and store rooms around the country are sitting ... tens of thousands of older vinyl records. Vintage artifacts from the 50s, 60s, and 70s and many of them with some astoundingly wonderful art work. This project will bring out those old albums and give them a new life and decor in your home. The design of these frames makes them easy to change album covers, no need for clips or nails to hold the albums in the frame, a simple, innovative slot system designed by the maker allows easy changing of album covers. The wood used for this project was western or broad leaf maple (somewhat softer than the hard or eastern maple) but you could also use many other woods. We found cedar and pine to be a bit soft for this project. The beauty of this project is that it uses standard 3/4" material.
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Watch the video, then click below to read more details on how these frames are made.
I'm not sure that there has a single kind of tool which has been more popular at a particular time, then the oscillating tool is today. The real reason behind this, is the proven fact that the majority of these tools have all come out about the same time. Rockwell , unlike Bosch and Dremel, is comparatively unknown, but has a couple of things that are helping them out. One being the idolization of their JawHorse which I've seen debated in a number of tool related notice boards, another is their infomercials. Which is also the way the Fein MultiMaster was first sold. The Rockwell SoniCrafter is right up there with the dearer Fein MultiMaster re power. The MultiMaster is listed as having 250 watts, and the SoniCrafter is listed as having 2.3 amps. We multiply the amp times the volts to get the watts. 2.3 amps x 120 volts = 276 watts. This is the top output, so I'm going to call them even at 250 watts.
I'm always amazed in this world of high technology and all it's whizz bangs, that someone ... somewhere never forgets about the simple things in life. The small things that often frustrate us to death but that we never seem to overcome. Enter the new "Bench Cookies from Rockler. These are simple little discs with non skid material applied that not only allows them to stand off the workbench, thus giving the worker some room underneath the project ... these little things stick like crazy, even when grit and sawdust tries to confound them.
At first I wondered how many times I would really need to lift my work piece off the workbech top, but I soon discovered that was not the real issue, the real issue was all the stuff that always seemed to accumulate under my work piece, like nails, screws, bits of wood, tools, pencils ... the list goes on and and on. The real problem with thes is that in some cases I don't want the back to get scratched and marred, I want it to be clean, which doesn happen when a screw rolls under and all of a sudden your piece now has a dint or scratch in it.
I also like the fact that I can use them for painting and staining, simply by moving them in from the side of the piece. To me, the that is the best part of these accessories, when you want to paint, stain or varnish all sides of a piece, when it is small it often moves around on you ... but not with these little items. If I only used them for finishing they would be worth EVERY PENNY.
For many woodworkers today, scapers are a bit of a mystery. Many of us have heard other woodworkers extoling the virtures of scrapers and how wonderful they are. Well, we decided that it was high time to spend some time on scrapers and explain how and where to use them ... and most of all how to keep them sharp. I can tell you the absolute most useless tool you will ever have in your workshop is a dull scaper. On the flip ... a sharp scraper is irreplaceable.
Before sandpaper became popular, scapers were the item that woodworkers used to put a fine finish on their woodworking projects. In fact, scrapers were so useful and popular that there were people who circulated the woodworking shops with the sole purpose of sharpening scrapers for woodworkers. Because of the sound they made when sharpening scrapers they were called "clickers".
As it turns out, scapers are a VERY useful tool in finishing wood, and in many cases, especially with highly figured woods, particularly those with open grain, sandpaper can actually supress that three dimensional aspect of highly figured wood ... but scrapers can restore the look.
Click the Read More button to see more about scrapers.
OK, Now that you know how to cut picture frame material and make the angle cuts, now you need to put it all together. Glueing up smaller picture frames can be done with somehting a simple as black electical tape wrapped around the picture frame afer glue-up. The pressure of the tape will keep the corners together long enough to allow the frame to become ridgid. Larger picture frames are another story ... the black electrical tape trick doesn't work so well.
In this case it is better to have some sort of a picture framing glue-up jig. The one shown in the video can be made quite easily, the plans are easy to find on the Internet and it doesn't take long to put it together. As usual ... there are some tricks. I decided to offset the centre block so it makes it easier to use, AND I added wingnuts to the ready bar so that the whole jig can be tighted up around the frame quickly and easily ... you don't want to fussing around too much glues like Titebond lll, it will start harding up on you (especially in warm weather) in minutes.
Now that you know how to make picture frames, wouldn't it be nice to be able to make your own picture frame material ... simply and easily ... on your own table saw? The process of making picture frame material, also called molding can be as complex as you want to make it ... or you can make it simple. The molding I like to make are simple and when viewed in a cross section look like and "L" shape. They are easy to put together and look great.
I also ad splines in all for corners to add strength and an extra detail to the frames. I try to choose a contrasting wood so that the splines stand out somewhat from the frame molding.
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It's important to remember that the face sides of your picture frame metial will need to be almost finished before you peform your final cuts. There is no easy way to run "L" shaped material through a planer and even funning it through a jointer will be tricky. All that should need to be done after the final cuts is to sand the face sides and begin the final 45 degree cuts as shown in the assembly video.
Have you ever been asked to make a picture frame? I'll be you replied, "Oh sure" and went promptly into your shop to create this mastepiece ... then discovered it's not as easy as it sounds to make perfect picture frames.
Now you can make your own picture frames, simply and with unbelievable accuracy with a few simple tools, and save yourself hundreds of dollars in custom framing costs.
The problems with making picture frames comes with four - fourty five degree corners. If each one is off by only one degree, then in total that will be off by four degrees. The other problem comes when you try to correct the final angle and re-cut it. When you do this you are actually making that frame side slighly smaller ... which creates another problem. Now you have one frame side that is slightly shorter than the other and it will never come together nicely now.
Well we have solved your picture frame making problems with a simple, new and innovative way of making your own picture frames in your home work shop
Bruce Campbell lives and works in Coquitlam, BC. He began woodturning in 1979 and spent about 15 years learning the technical aspects of the craft. Today, turning has grown from his hobby to his profession. He approaches his art by first learning and practicing physical techniques and then working to understand how those techniques are applied to classical designs. Once he has confidence with a the formal design he looks for ways to alter or combine it to create new and interesting pieces. 
In hundreds of garage sales, thrift shops, basements and store rooms around the country are sitting ... tens of thousands of older vinyl records. Vintage artifacts from the 50s, 60s, and 70s and many of them with some astoundingly wonderful art work. This project will bring out those old albums and give them a new life and decor in your home. The design of these frames makes them easy to change album covers, no need for clips or nails to hold the albums in the frame, a simple, innovative slot system designed by the maker allows easy changing of album covers. The wood used for this project was western or broad leaf maple (somewhat softer than the hard or eastern maple) but you could also use many other woods. We found cedar and pine to be a bit soft for this project. The beauty of this project is that it uses standard 3/4" material.
I'm not sure that there has a single kind of tool which has been more popular at a particular time, then the 
