Author name: Enthusiast

I went to Lowe’s a week ago to buy some shellac and was reminded that Zinsser, the maker of Bulls Eye Amber, Clear and SealCoat brands, no longer provides the date of manufacture so users can calculate whether or not the shellac will dry properly. And now the company has stopped telling users even that there is a shelf life. If Zinsser wanted to be thought of as a user-friendly […]

The post User-Unfriendly Zinsser Bulls Eye Shellac appeared first on Popular Woodworking Magazine.

On top of the daytime woodworking classes, my school offers to our students the opportunity to stay later for an hour and half of “extended day” classes. My woodworking class is one of the after-hour programs. Together with other subjects such as languages, chess, cooking, felt art, knitting and fencing, our students have quite a variety to choose from. This year is the second time that I have offered a class. […]

The post Build a Tool Tote With Your Kids: Part 1 appeared first on Popular Woodworking Magazine.

Way back in 1992 when I was just a junior in high school, I made a bent laminated wooden spoon in shop class for a Mother’s Day gift. Now 24 years later I’m recreating the spoon for an updated gift to give to Mom this Mother’s…

Thanks to the long-term relationships I’ve made with lumber merchants, I have little trouble with them sending me crappy stock. But even after 20-something years of buying wood from my suppliers, there are times when I get a bogus load of wood. Most problems can be solved by knowing what is standard in the industry. About 15 years ago, I bought 200 board feet of cherry from my dealer that […]

The post How to Test for Case-hardened Lumber appeared first on Popular Woodworking Magazine.

To test how effective your chosen workbench is, you’ll need to make something. Doubtless we all complete very similar tasks, but we also all have our own preferences which leads to tweaking designs. We might take a little off the leg or add an extra dog whole, whatever makes things easier. The first test for my completed workbench was to add some sides to a vehicle jump ramp we made a while […]

The post First Project on the Workbench appeared first on Popular Woodworking Magazine.

A few months ago I was tired of running into my kitchen table while sneaking through my house to get a midnight snack. I’m not entirely sure why I chose to be sneaky considering the only other living creature in my house was the dog snoozing on the couch. So, in a rash of rage from yet another stubbed toe, I decided to move the table and chairs to the […]

The post Simple Seating appeared first on Popular Woodworking Magazine.