


I'm not a fan of New Year resolutions. I vow to stop making them every January 5th, which usually coincides with the same day I give up on the diet/exercise program I started on January 1st. However, this year I decided to give it one more try and announced on Wood Talk Online Radio that by the end of the year I'd give my shop a much needed facelift. This is nothing new in the basement workshop, in fact it's something I had been vowing to do for a long time. For a long time now I've been getting frustrated with how cluttered my shop was feeling and even more frustrated at my inability to get work done without having to constantly move things around just to accomplish a single task. To be quite honest, the extra time it was taking me to clear a spot to plane a board or to set up a tool for a cut that should take only 30 seconds to accomplish was becoming too long. Not to mention that I was constantly losing small items and tools in the ever growing piles. In other words...SOMETHING HAD TO CHANGE! Today's episode is a tour of my new shop layout. I have yet to put it through its paces on a project, but there's room to tweak it for optimal flow and efficiency when I do. A huge thanks to the folks over at Port-A-Mate for their help with a few new items to make the shop a better and safer place to work.

487 Shop Redo

"Straight Grains & Sharp Blades"  This is the audio only feed for MBW.

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The beauty of owning a lathe is being able to turn small scraps of wood into fun little projects. Typically these are quick & easy to make and something friends and family love to receive as gifts (or that you can sell to customers rather than burning in a fire pit with the rest of the scraps.) Earlier this year on a trip to my local Woodcraft store with my wife reluctantly tagging along, we saw these bottle opener hardware kits. Before I knew it, I had a basket full of them and a list of friends who would be expecting one. If you’re new to the lathe, or you just want a fun project that you can knock out in no time at all, one of these bottle opener kits is just the thing you’re looking for. Help support the show - please visit our advertisers

549 Turned bottle opener

It's pretty much next to "NEVER" when Samantha wants to work on a woodworking project with me. So when she asks about us building a large table together I didn't quite jump at the chance at first, I kind of carefully asked some probing questions before I agreed to anything. Don't get me wrong, if you have a spouse that enjoys working in the woodshop with you (even only once in a while) consider yourself lucky. Having a shared hobby with your significant other is a great way to spend time. On today's episode we're building what's become lovingly known as the MattKEA table. A solid wood, farmhouse-style table that easily accommodates 8-10 people with plenty of elbow room for good food and great conversation. So why did we jokingly call it the "MattKEA Table?" While Samantha is helping with most of the assembly, and almost all of the finishing, I was the one down in the shop manufacturing most of the components (except the legs and the top, more about those in the video...here's a hint though www.osbornewood.com.) The idea behind this build is that I'd do all the milling, shaping and joinery and she assembles the final product, just like when she comes home from a trip to Ikea. All kidding aside, it was actually a lot of fun and there's even a chance we'll do more of these joint project builds in the future. Help support the show - please visit our advertisers

548 Samantha's Brunch Table "Woodworking with spouses"

I don’t which I’m more excited about, the new and improved work surface I’m using for my sharpening station or the little addition I just added the other day? Sharpening my hand planes and chisels has always been one of those things that I begrudgingly did. It’s not that I didn’t get good results, it’s just that to achieve those results I felt like I was always jumping through hoops to get there. If you’ve ever seen one of my shop tours in the past you’re probably familiar with my previous sharpening setup, a re-purposed roll-around microwave cart. It did a decent job of acting as extra storage space for all my sharpening accessories and some other things, but what it didn’t do a good job at was providing enough work surface for laying out my stones so I could get to them quickly and easily. With this new sharpening station (which is actually once again a re-purposed kitchen storage item) I have plenty of work surface to lay everything out and still have room to spare. And because of this extra space, I decided I really wanted to have a setup that would make using my waterstones even easier, because up until now my biggest complaint with them was occasionally having to "chase" them across the work surface when using them. On today’s episode I’ll share with you a little upgrade I added to my sharpening station that I’ve been wanting to do for a long time now. The result will eventually be me honing and sharpening my blades more frequently! While I’m on the topic of sharpening stones, for current Chortle & Woobie-level Patrons of Matt’s Basement Workshop, it seems the perfect time to discuss how I care and maintain them, so that’s what we’ll be discussing in this episode’s bonus content. Not a Patron of the show? Please consider joining. For more information visit www.patreon.com/mattsbasementworkshop. Help support the show - please visit our advertisers

547 Sharpening station upgrade “no more chasing the stones!”

I've been trying to distance myself further and further away from product reviews. Since they consist entirely of opinions they can be a little tricky to pull off successfully. This is especially true if you've had plenty of time to try the item out and can navigate your way around it like a seasoned pro, and forget to mention the number of times it took you to get to that point (I promise I've never done that on this show...tempted to do it, but never have!) One tool in the wood shop that doesn't typically have a built in dust collection system or necessarily a great way to capture dust at the source is the drill press. Sure there are different ways to go about pulling the chips and dust out of the way*, but one new option on the market is the Drillnado. The Drillnado is a dust collection accessory for the drill press that slips right over the chuck, the bit and clamps on to the quill. According to the folks at drillnado.com it's designed for use with most floor-model drill presses, but can be easily adapted to many bench-top versions also thanks to the included components in the kit. (**NOTE: After recording the video and sharing it with the folks at Drillnado.com I heard back from them that they’ve started manufacturing the sleeve that fits over the drill bit without the narrower nose at the bottom. They’re now pre-cut to work with the larger diameter forstner and spade bits you might be using.) I haven't used it for more than demonstrational purposes, but given the early success I've had with it, I don't have a problem recommended it to anyone who's looking for a great way to add dust collection to their drill press (there was one little hiccup involving my Festool dust extractor, but I'll explain more about that in the video.) Drillnado is a Chortle-level Patron of the show. *Patrons of Matt's Basement Workshop at Patreon.com will see more about other options in the bonus content just for Chortle-level patrons and above Help support the show - please visit our advertisers

487 Shop Redo

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