Rex Krueger

Process Notes: Miter Plane

So, this video is taking longer than usual and I wanted to post an update. Here's the plane in a semi-kind-of-roughed-out state. All the parts are here, but there's a lot of work to do. 

Here she is:

If this looks weird, it is. You've all seen the iron, so nothing new there. But the body is five pieces of Corian solid surface material laminated together. The sides are 1/8" hot-rolled steel....

Sneak-Peek: Low-Angle Mitre Plane

So, my prototype shooting plane is coming along pretty well.  I've got the angle and basic construction worked out. I made a new kind of lever-cap by laminating aluminum and walnut together and I assembled the whole thing in the Krenov style. Here's a picture: 

In this shot, the plane is almost done and I'm just fitting the cross-pin. I've cut chamfers on the corners to make it easier to hol...

Early Access Video: Making a plane blade from scratch!

So, to get ready for my upcoming collaboration with Wood by Wright, I just finished a complete plane iron, made totally at home with basic tools. I only spent about $10 on steel and the iron is as hard as a coffin nail and sharp enough to shave with. Literally. 

As usual, this video is a full week early for all my patrons and I'm always happy to get feedback and suggestions. 

Hope everyone is having a great week!

--Rex

Sneak-Peek: Make a plane iron from scratch

So this, believe it or not, is a heat-treat forge. I made it out of a mapp-gas torch and the most random collection of junk imaginable. It's not a true forge in that it doesn't have insulation or refractory, but it actually works. 

I put a hunk of 1095 high carbon steel in here on Friday, heated it up to about 1400 degrees, and quenched it in canola oil. After it cooled, the steel was glass-hard....

Early Access Video: How to hide shop expenses from your spouse

So, I'm hoping everyone takes this in the spirit of fun and good humor. This video is about keeping your shop purchases secret from your spouse. The tips I present are real and I have to admit that I've done most (or all) or the things I suggest. But I'm presenting it in a pretty overblown and sarcastic way. The tips are real, but the tone of the video is meant to be funny. 

Thanks as always to my own wife, who makes my creative career possible. 

Thanks to all of you for helpin...

Surprise Celebrity Collaboration

It's been another interesting week.

My sawstop video went just about viral and has over 125k views as I write this. My subscribers doubled and I'm getting a nice check from YouTube. 

Despite all the attention my Patreon hasn't grown much and I'm extra thankful for all my current patrons, who will keep my channel running when all the fuss dies down. 

But all the new exposure had one extra side-effect. My videos came to the attention of James Wright, who runs the excellent ...

Early Access and Quality Test: "Easy Smoothing Plane Pt3"

Friends,

Here's the last part in my smoothing plane build. Hilariously, this was supposed to be a single, 20 minute video. Instead, it's a three-part monster that clocks in at almost an hour. 

Anyway, some of my videos display at 480p for some of my viewers and that is not okay, so I've encoded this one with a new format. When you have a moment, could you just look at a few seconds of it and tell me how it looks?  

I'm not posting it to YouTube for several days (because y...

Early Access Video

So, it's been a week. I cut my finger on my saw, I fell through my basement steps, and some kid threw up on my daughter at school. On top of that, I do run a custom furniture business and my customers want their stuff. So, I'm a bit behind on my videos. But here we are with part 2 of my easy smoothing plane series. 

The ironic thing about these planes is that they are easy to build, but they're not easy to make videos about. There are a lot of steps and some of them need a lot of detail. ...

Sometimes, I get ahead of myself.

Friends: 

It's been a week. As most of you know, I had a table-saw injury on Monday. It wasn't that bad, but I spent the day in the emergency room, got x-rays and 4 stitches, and I have to see a hand specialist tomorrow. 

Drag. 

Then on top of that, I was running up the stairs from my shop on Sunday, when the damn things just collapsed out from under me. No joke, the stairs ...

Bonus Video: Table Saw Accident

Friends:

It's been a week. On Monday, I sliced my thumb wide-open on my table-saw. I had to go the emergency room, stitches, x-rays, the whole nine yards. I'm out of the shop for a week while I heal up. It's been a huge drag. 

But, in the world of the small businessperson, you gotta turn crisis into opportunity. I also really wanted to make and release a video about this as soon as possible. I think there's some valuable safety information in here and I wanted it out there to help p...

Early Access Video: The Easiest Plane You Can Make

Okay, after a LOT of experimentation, I've got a plane design and a blade that both work. This video covers making a REAL iron from quality steel. I also go over the design considerations and construction styles of various wooden planes. No one else sees this video until next week, so enjoy and please leave me whatever feedback you have. 

Sneak peak: I think I've finally got it

Last week’s video on the $2 plane iron is doing well on youtube. It’s racking up views and I’ve gotten a nice bump in subscribers.

I wish I could say the iron itself was doing as well. I’ll cut to the chase: it doesn’t hold an edge. You can do good woodwork for about 10 minutes, but then it’s back to the oil stones for a fresh edge. That’s just going to lead to frustration for the user so I’ll have to do better.

The good news is, I think I found somethi...

Commissions come in the strangest ways

This last weekend, my neighbor across the street called and asked if I wanted any of the old wood in his basement. All the houses on my block are about 100 years old and some of them had fancy woodwork when they were built. I guess a previous owner had torn out most of the woodwork in exchange for a more “modern” style but dumped all the trim and fancy doors in the basement. My neighbor said I was welcome to anything I wanted.

2018-02-12 11:43:22 +0000 UTC View Post

Sneak-Peak: The easiest plane you can make.

It’s ugly.

I know. 

But it also works. It works surprisingly well, and I made it in about 2 hours. If you recall my last video, I made a plane iron for about $4.00. The next step is to give that iron a home. I won’t know if that cheap iron is any good until I do some actual work with it.

So I made this hideous little oaken pickle. It’s mostly based on the well...

Doing the math on small jobs

I make things for a local kitchen shop. It’s a good deal for both of us since they mostly specialize in knives and they need other things to fill out their stock.  So I turn bowls, rolling pins, and other round objects that look nice on the shelf. Their shop looks fuller. They give me most of the money when things sell. Everyone is happy.

The last time I was in, the owner asked me to make a small presentation box for a knife set he was making. He can make the boxes hi...

Early access video: The $2 Plane Iron

One week early for all my Patrons: I try to make a plane iron out of a lawn-edger blade. Did it work? Maybe. Am I going to keep experimenting with tool-making? You bet!

Sneak Peek: Make a $2 plane iron (maybe)

My videos on buying and restoring vintage tools are pretty popular, but I do hear one complaint a lot: "That's a very nice video, but you just can't find cheap old tools where I live. They either don't exist or they're worth a fortune. What do I do?"

So I've decided to make more videos about tool making on a budget. Those videos do really well anyway. 

It seems that people really struggle with finding good planes, and that's kinda strange since the plane is probably the most basic w...

Some People Call it Hybrid

There’s a term that’s been bouncing around for a while now: “hybrid woodworking.” I don’t know if he coined the term, but Marc Spagnuolo defined the idea in his book Hybrid Woodworking (Popular Woodworking, 2013). The concept is simple: hybrid woodworkers use a blend of both hand and power tools.

The approach is usually explained like this: machines handle the grunt work, ...

Early Access Video: Are older Stanley planes really better:

One week early for patrons only: my comparison of two vintage Stanley planes. One is from 1890 and one is from 1950. The older one is considered superior and is more collectible, but does that make any sense? It turns out that the newer plane is actually a lot more precise and functional and it's much cheaper. 

Untouched Blacksmith Shop from the 1950s.

Patrons get early access to this video before I post it on Thursday. From now on, Patrons will get access to all YouTube content a full week early. Enjoy!

Is reclaimed wood worth it?

Reclaimed wood seems to be getting more and more popular, at least as a marketing term. In catalogs and advertisements, it suggests authenticity. If your wood used to be the floor of a 19th century fire-house and its surface it was worn smooth by decades of burly men rushing across it on their way to pull children from burning buildings, well, then that shit is real. And by owning a dining room table made from it, you are real as well.

2018-01-16 11:55:57 +0000 UTC View Post

Book Review: Woodworking in Estonia

If you don't know Lost Art Press, they're the publishing imprint started

by Chris Schwarz, former Managing Editor of Popular Woodworking magazine. The press mostly exists to re-print old or lost texts on woodworking, but they also publish books of new content, often with a focus on hand-tool woodworking and furniture building. 

I love their books and I'm a big fan of their missio...