We now have “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” T-shirts back in stock in sizes ranging from medium up to XXL. Also, a gentle reminder: If you would like to order the DVD “Inside the Anarchist’s Tool Chest” for $10 plus free shipping, you should place your order now.
The special price expires on Wednesday, Aug. 31. After that, the DVD will be $12 plus shipping charges. Here are some links for you:
“My envy is all too frequently aroused by those marvelously equipped cabinet benches that the hardware store displays at its center of interest in a holiday window. Folding doors are thrown back, bristling with tools of every conceivable kind; the top lid is raised to display supplemental racks of more tools; drawers and cupboards hold neat arrays of supplies….
“The cabinet workbench is a blood brother of the plaid golf bag; there is no inherent reason why its owner should not do great things with the contents, yet he rarely does.”
— Henry H. Saylor, “Tinkering With Tools” Little, Brown, and Co. (1924)
Next month I’ll pack up my tool chest and drive to Waterloo, Ontario, for the grand opening celebration of Lee Valley Tools’ newest store.
In addition to signing books and letting people root through my chest, I’ll also be giving some short seminars on tools, shop set-up and chest construction during three days: Sept. 22-24.
I’m one of several exhibitors who will be speaking and teaching at the store, including Konrad Sauer of Sauer & Steiner Toolworks, Dan Barrett of D.L. Barrett & Sons, Rick Blaiklock, the director of research and development at Veritas Tools and several other experts on woodworking and gardening.
Many of the seminars during the grand opening are free; a few have a minor entrance fee. All net proceeds from the event are donated to the United Way.
For those of you who are not Ontario-savvy, Waterloo is about 90 minutes west of Toronto – not too terribly far from the border (but yes, too far to tunnel there). I’ll be driving to the event because my tool chest will not fit in the overhead bin of an aircraft.
I haven’t been to Canada for three years and am greatly looking forward to seeing the new store, getting to meet Canadian woodworkers and hang out with some of the other demonstrators. If you’ve never been to a Lee Valley retail store, they are worth the trip – they are just as special as the company’s catalog.
Below is the schedule for my seminars plus the description of the seminar as written by Lee Valley Tools.
The Tools, the Toolbox and Everything
Thursday, Sept. 22, 4 p.m. to 6 p.m.
Join Christopher Schwarz for a talk on his work to date, with highlights from his most recent book, “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest.” Chris will briefly go over his philosophy on woodworking tools, toolboxes and woodworking in general.
Fee: Free
Meet Christopher Schwarz: Author/Publisher/Woodworker
Friday, Sept. 23, 9:30 a.m. to noon
and
Saturday, Sept. 24, 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.
If you have one of his books, have followed his blog, and/or read his articles, you won’t want to miss this great opportunity to meet Chris. There will be book signing and a general discussion on woodworking.
An Overview of Shop Set Up
2 hours
Friday, Sept. 23, 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.
What tools and equipment do I really need to become proficient at woodworking? Do I need a cabinet saw or will a contractor’s saw do just fine? What about a router: fixed base or plunge? Do I really need to buy a jointer and a thickness planer? As woodworkers, we are bombarded with sales pitches telling us that we need a shop full of expensive tools and equipment. But what tools and equipment do we really need? These are the questions Christopher Schwarz will answer during this session.
Fee: $20
Tickets will go on sale in early September. To purchase tickets call 519-746-2555.
Few hand tools come with instruction manuals that give you enough information to use the tool. Same goes with workbenches. We are supposed to either know how to use the tool or get that information from somewhere else.
In “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest,” I should have included more information on how to actually use a traditional tool chest. Perhaps I was blinded a bit because I have been working out of a tool chest since 1997.
So I need to provide some critical information on this topic here on the blog until I can revise the book itself.
Several critics have mentioned that tool chests are terrible to work with. Here’s an excerpt from one comment on Lumberjocks. This comment was posted below a review of the book that you will enjoy reading if you dislike the book or my writing. Check it out here.
“They (tool chests) are miserable to work out of. Forever sliding tills back and forth to get to something that you cannot see down in the dark depths. Something shifts and sticks up and the tills don’t slide at all. Always sitting in the wrong place so you have to walk and work around them. If you replace a tool, you have to find one that fits.”
This comment nicely sums up a lot of woodworkers’ thoughts on tool chests. However, I strongly disagree with their assessment on every point. I started woodworking with a tool chest, then I tried building a wall cabinet, wall racks and a shelf solution instead. After trying all those, I kept coming back to my two tool chests – one at work and one at home.
Let’s take these objections one by one.
‘Forever sliding tills.’
If you are sliding around a lot of tills, then you are doing it wrong. Array the two or three tills so you can see every tool in the tills. Then you don’t have to move anything to get to the tills. And if you array them properly, you are only one hand motion away from any tool in the chest. I am going to post a video of how this works this week. I show it on the DVD, but apparently it’s not explicit enough.
‘Something shifts and sticks up and the tills don’t slide at all.’
This happens only in small tool chests. I’ve never had this happen in a 24”-high chest. If you are piling tools upon tools upon tools, you might have too many tools.
‘Always sitting in the wrong place so you have to walk and work around them.’
My chests and many others are on casters. So they are easily movable and can serve you as an assembly table, a sawbench, a place to sit at your bench.
‘If you replace a tool, you have to find one that fits.’
Traditional chests hold all the tools, even if you change them. The only time you are going to have problems upgrading your set is if you “French fit” all your tools. French fitting is where you create a tool-shaped compartment for each tool. This was rarely done in traditional chests. It’s more of a NASA thing than a woodworking thing. I use almost no dividers in my trays or on the chest floor. This gives me flexibility. And more space – dividers eat up space.
Tool chests aren’t good for people with bad backs.
This is something I did cover in the book. Use your off-hand to support yourself. Use your dominant hand to get the tool. Try it. My back ain’t great. Concrete floors are harder on your back than a tool chest.
Why a tool chest instead of shelves, wall cabinets or wall racks?
You can use both. And they aren’t mutually exclusive. When I start the day I’ll take my bench planes out of the chest and put them on the shelf below the benchtop. My common tools go in the rack behind my bench or in front of the window.
The reason I prefer a tool chest is that it does a better job of protecting tools from dust, which carries salts that absorb water. Dust has always been the enemy of hand tools, and old-school woodworkers went to some lengths to seal their chests from it.
Comparing a wall cabinet to a tool chest is more difficult. A well-designed wall cabinet could perform all the functions of a chest if properly designed. I just haven’t seen or built one that I like as much as my tool chests. That’s my failing as a designer.
So if you are still wondering why I like tool chests compared to other tool storage solutions, stay tuned to the blog.
While at the Connecticut Valley School of Woodworking and Lie-Nielsen Toolworks during the last 15 days I took a lot of notes that I will be vomiting into my blog this week. Some of the entries require me to purchase some liquid plastic, wax paper and Wesson oil.
Or is that the shopping list for my next house party?
No… that’s the woodworking list.
Anyway, one of the cool little things I saw at Lie-Nielsen Toolworks last week will excite both the tool collectors and users.
Lie-Nielsen has added an extra inch of length to its much-beloved dovetail saw. The saw’s blade now comes with a 10”-long blade instead of a 9”-long blade. What does this mean for you?
If you are a user, it means the saw is a little faster in the cut. The Lie-Nielsen saw was already fast. This added length (and a tiny bit of extra weight) makes it noticeably faster. After using the new saw for a few days, I don’t think that it affected the balance of the tool. I was worried that it would be more toe-heavy as a result – a bad thing in my opinion.
The longer saw is now being sold by the company. The price of the longer saw is the same. And the 9” saw has now been discontinued.
And that will make the tool collectors tingle.
The 9” saw will now pass into legend and increase in price on the secondary market, just like the Lie-Nielsen bronze No. 9, the company’s chamfer guides for drawknives and the small bronze shoulder plane kit it used to sell.
So take care of those 9” saws for your children, especially the early ones stamped “Independence.”
