Making Shaker Doors Using a Router

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Making cabinet doors is easy, fun and cost effective. With wood you can purchase at any hardware or lumber store, anyone can make beautiful and functional doors in no time. The only tool you need is a decent quality router and router table, and router bits. The wood we used for these demos is just 3/4” pine that was cut to 2” widths. It is important that thickness and width of the door components is constant, otherwise you will find uneven edges on you doors that will require sanding to make even again.

After you have cut your raw wood, that is the wood for the rails and styles you will need to cut those pieces to their proper length. The length for the stiles is easy, that is simply the length of the door that you will be making. This is because the stiles are ALWAYS the full vertical length of the doors.

Cutting the rails, (the horizontal components of the door) can be a bit trickier, that is why we like to use 2” for the width of stiles and rails (plus it just looks good). The rails when they are finished will need to have tongues cut into each end to fit into the groves of the stiles and this is where knowing woodworking math is a help.

Router Table Basics

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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. 

Making Vinyl Album Cover Picture Frames

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Using Wood Scrapers

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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.