Share your craft projects
Make new craft buddies
Ask craft questions
Blog your craft journey
re: Getting Physical
Thank you, George.
It’s a rush, for sure, but what is sobering is coming to a realization just how expensive it is to be a maker these days.
What is my number one cost?
Electricity!
Hands-down, nothing cost more. Not the wood, not the time, not the parts. No, it is the amount of money that PG&E charges me every month for “hitting tier 4” (out of 4 tiers). It should be criminal to do what PG&E does, which as far as I can tell by reading my bill, is to retroactively up-charge every kilowatt hour used in the past month the moment you cross some imaginary threshold.
Every month, I end up paying close to 50-cents per KWh simply because I fall into the highest tier of use (they say).
I run multiple businesses out of my home. I run a (pitiful) server farm which has been reduced to one server, one monitor, and 2 x 24 port switches; I run my woodworking business out of the garage; and one other business.
My obsession with hand tools of late (to the point of manufacturing my own hand tools) is that it allows me to thumb my nose at PG&E a little more. Each day, I get closer to becoming a hand-tool only woodworker.
While I foresee that I will always need a CNC to make this kerfing plane, the plane itself (the way it is designed) allows me to do rip cuts, cross-cuts, kerf bending, rabbets, resaw kerfing, and more.
Though if I am honest, the initial motivation was deeper for creating the kerfing plane.
When I was 6, I was helping build a tree house and was lended a saw. It did not cut straight because what 6 year old can cut a straight line with a hand saw? So my whole life, I wanted a saw that would do the work for me of holding a straight line. It wasn’t until my 40’s that I learned about plow planes. It seemed obvious to me that if you put a saw blade on a plow plane that you’d get a straight cut no-matter what.
So, that’s what I did. I made damn sure my son was going to get the answer before the question. How do you saw straight at a young age when the adults will not allow you to use a band saw or if the material is either too large to bring to a machine or is already attached to something (like a tree house), precluding you from taking it to a machine? Oh, and back in the 80’s tools were much more dangerous (no brakes on any tools — circular saws kept spinning after use and they didn’t have those cute snap guards that cover the blade after the cut), so the likelihood a 6 year old was going to be handed a circular saw was nil.
Nah, when I was growing up, no power tool was ever deemed kid safe.
I want my kid to be able to build things that require sawing and I don’t want him to be frustrated and give up on woodwork by being told at the precise moment that he is making a judgement about the trade:
“Sorry, Timmy (not his real name), I know you are having a hard time cutting straight with a hand saw, but you cannot use the track saw, circular saw, band saw, chop saw, or radial arm saw yet. You are simply too young. Maybe when you turn 12 we can start on the scroll saw, but as a 6 year old, this hand saw is all I can give you, and I know in your hands it will not cut straight because your small stature and lack of command over the tool.”
This broke me at the age of 6 and I did not return to woodwork until nearly 4 decades later when I had the disposable income to do so.
So, naturally, after realizing I absolutely can make my own tools (after making a single hand plane, from a kit even), the very first serious thing I set out to make was a saw that will cut straight regardless of the user.
Albeit, I might have to make a smaller version for a 6 year old, but by-golly, we’re doing it! The tool works and requires very little skill to use, only a modicum of coordination. Anyone that can hold a tool with two hands and rock their body back and forth can now cut a straight line by hand without electricity.
Sure, everyone will dismiss both me and my tool, because surely, hand saws (be they push or pull) have done this for millennia — my kerfing plane is admittedly useless in some circumstances. However, I built it for making really long cuts and for my kid. Both long cuts and cuts made by the inexperienced will suffer when made using a regular saw.
I can envision it now. Put regular saw in kids hand. Kid cuts a wobbly line. Asks me how to cut a straight line. I pull out a miniature version of the kerfing plane scaled down to fit his tiny hands. He cuts a straight line. All is good and the boy continues to love woodwork.
Instead of what happened to me. Which was to be told in essence that while there are no less than half-a-dozen ways that the adults could cut a straight line, there was exactly zero methods explained to me how I, a 6 year old, could cut a straight line.
Of course, if only one of the adults had taught me about straight edges, guides, and clamps, then none of this would have happened. But instead the adults just shrugged and said “well, you’re just going to have to do the best you can with what I have given you.”
Well, damnit, that wasn’t good enough. I suffer from hyperthymesia, which means every moment of my life is vividly memorable, down to minute details, including things I am not paying attention to. Forgetting anything is extremely difficult, and if I am not careful, I can accidentally remember too much.
So while it is convenient for me to be able to thumb my nose at Pride, Greed, & Electric by using hand power, I am most chuffed about being able to mentally right a wrong — that if my son is anything like me and wants to build things at a young age (like I did), there will not be a brick wall placed in his way — to go so far and then be told you can go no further due to danger and now a required reliance on adults. I felt that was a cop-out by the adults.
Ended up spending 4 decades devoted to learning computers because the adults never put barriers in place with computers (mind you, the Internet did not exist at the time, so there were literally zero barriers placed in my way as a child when handed a computer; just told to go have fun).
It made me so angry beyond belief as a child that making this tool today is something visceral to me felt on a level that is in my bones.
It’s a rush, for sure, but what is sobering is coming to a realization just how expensive it is to be a maker these days.
What is my number one cost?
Electricity!
Hands-down, nothing cost more. Not the wood, not the time, not the parts. No, it is the amount of money that PG&E charges me every month for “hitting tier 4” (out of 4 tiers). It should be criminal to do what PG&E does, which as far as I can tell by reading my bill, is to retroactively up-charge every kilowatt hour used in the past month the moment you cross some imaginary threshold.
Every month, I end up paying close to 50-cents per KWh simply because I fall into the highest tier of use (they say).
I run multiple businesses out of my home. I run a (pitiful) server farm which has been reduced to one server, one monitor, and 2 x 24 port switches; I run my woodworking business out of the garage; and one other business.
My obsession with hand tools of late (to the point of manufacturing my own hand tools) is that it allows me to thumb my nose at PG&E a little more. Each day, I get closer to becoming a hand-tool only woodworker.
While I foresee that I will always need a CNC to make this kerfing plane, the plane itself (the way it is designed) allows me to do rip cuts, cross-cuts, kerf bending, rabbets, resaw kerfing, and more.
Though if I am honest, the initial motivation was deeper for creating the kerfing plane.
When I was 6, I was helping build a tree house and was lended a saw. It did not cut straight because what 6 year old can cut a straight line with a hand saw? So my whole life, I wanted a saw that would do the work for me of holding a straight line. It wasn’t until my 40’s that I learned about plow planes. It seemed obvious to me that if you put a saw blade on a plow plane that you’d get a straight cut no-matter what.
So, that’s what I did. I made damn sure my son was going to get the answer before the question. How do you saw straight at a young age when the adults will not allow you to use a band saw or if the material is either too large to bring to a machine or is already attached to something (like a tree house), precluding you from taking it to a machine? Oh, and back in the 80’s tools were much more dangerous (no brakes on any tools — circular saws kept spinning after use and they didn’t have those cute snap guards that cover the blade after the cut), so the likelihood a 6 year old was going to be handed a circular saw was nil.
Nah, when I was growing up, no power tool was ever deemed kid safe.
I want my kid to be able to build things that require sawing and I don’t want him to be frustrated and give up on woodwork by being told at the precise moment that he is making a judgement about the trade:
“Sorry, Timmy (not his real name), I know you are having a hard time cutting straight with a hand saw, but you cannot use the track saw, circular saw, band saw, chop saw, or radial arm saw yet. You are simply too young. Maybe when you turn 12 we can start on the scroll saw, but as a 6 year old, this hand saw is all I can give you, and I know in your hands it will not cut straight because your small stature and lack of command over the tool.”
This broke me at the age of 6 and I did not return to woodwork until nearly 4 decades later when I had the disposable income to do so.
So, naturally, after realizing I absolutely can make my own tools (after making a single hand plane, from a kit even), the very first serious thing I set out to make was a saw that will cut straight regardless of the user.
Albeit, I might have to make a smaller version for a 6 year old, but by-golly, we’re doing it! The tool works and requires very little skill to use, only a modicum of coordination. Anyone that can hold a tool with two hands and rock their body back and forth can now cut a straight line by hand without electricity.
Sure, everyone will dismiss both me and my tool, because surely, hand saws (be they push or pull) have done this for millennia — my kerfing plane is admittedly useless in some circumstances. However, I built it for making really long cuts and for my kid. Both long cuts and cuts made by the inexperienced will suffer when made using a regular saw.
I can envision it now. Put regular saw in kids hand. Kid cuts a wobbly line. Asks me how to cut a straight line. I pull out a miniature version of the kerfing plane scaled down to fit his tiny hands. He cuts a straight line. All is good and the boy continues to love woodwork.
Instead of what happened to me. Which was to be told in essence that while there are no less than half-a-dozen ways that the adults could cut a straight line, there was exactly zero methods explained to me how I, a 6 year old, could cut a straight line.
Of course, if only one of the adults had taught me about straight edges, guides, and clamps, then none of this would have happened. But instead the adults just shrugged and said “well, you’re just going to have to do the best you can with what I have given you.”
Well, damnit, that wasn’t good enough. I suffer from hyperthymesia, which means every moment of my life is vividly memorable, down to minute details, including things I am not paying attention to. Forgetting anything is extremely difficult, and if I am not careful, I can accidentally remember too much.
So while it is convenient for me to be able to thumb my nose at Pride, Greed, & Electric by using hand power, I am most chuffed about being able to mentally right a wrong — that if my son is anything like me and wants to build things at a young age (like I did), there will not be a brick wall placed in his way — to go so far and then be told you can go no further due to danger and now a required reliance on adults. I felt that was a cop-out by the adults.
Ended up spending 4 decades devoted to learning computers because the adults never put barriers in place with computers (mind you, the Internet did not exist at the time, so there were literally zero barriers placed in my way as a child when handed a computer; just told to go have fun).
It made me so angry beyond belief as a child that making this tool today is something visceral to me felt on a level that is in my bones.
