Kurt’s Workshop

I just got the blog up and running on my iPad so hopefully I’ll be able to post a bit more than once per year…

I’ll be attending IWF this year, and I hope to use the pad to blog from the show floor. It will be my first year, and I can tell you I’m really excited to have the opportunity to see and touch the products on the cutting edge (pun certainly intended). More on that to come later this month.

I know some people don’t like poplar, probably because it’s not a true hardwood. It exists somewhere in between, sort of like aspen. But I love the stuff and for the rght application it can be stunning in a way that other woods cannot. The heartwood can be all different colors, from gray to brown to purple to green and lots of things in between. When clear finish is applied overtop, it makes the colors pop, and you get something very special. This photo is not clear coated, but you can imagine what the colors will be like.

When you find very expensive handles like these on sale, you don’t ask questions. You buy them, and then figure out what to put them on later. I bought a few sets of these in varying lengths to make trays and other fun gift-like things out of.

A quick net search shows that a lot of people are wondering how to put together a decent outfeed table for their TS3650. I myself was hoping to find a ready made product, preferably a fold down style table that I could bolt on. No such luck…so I came up with basically an assembly table that fits snuggly to the rear of my saw.

This saw has several issues that you have to consider before drawing out your plan. First, consider that this is a contractor saw, which means that the motor sticks out the back. Secondly, it has both a front and rear rail for the fence. This means that any table must not touch the rear rail or else the fence will not slide. I think commercial setups don’t have this problem because their fences are usually a true t-square design. Luckily, Ridgid appears to have considered this little problem, and have conveniently notched the fence, right near the back, so you can get a properly adjusted table a little bit closer.

Tomorrow I will rout two grooves in there to account for the miter guage slots. I stole some leveling feet off another tool…to which I wanted to add casters…and added those so that I can level the table at the corners. A simple block of wood with a hole drilled seems to do the trick.

I purchased my 17-959L this past fall, and so far it has been a great machine. But the other day I noticed that if it gets really cold I get a LOUD squeaking from the belt housing. I wonder if anyone out there has heard of this problem or could enlighten me as to the cause. It does seem to go away after a few minutes of steady work, but it’s disconcerting none the less.

Do yourself a favor and go strait to your local CMT dealer and buy a bottle of this stuff right now. Trust me you will not regret it. While your there you can get one of their many very fine table saw blades. After using several of the major brands I have to say that I have become partial to them. I might recomend caution during installation however, these babies are wicked sharp. I thought my Freud Diablos were nasty…

It seems as though something has to go horribly wrong with something in order for me to get motivated to write. Today that happened, perhaps because of the cold, perhaps due to negligence on my part, perhaps because Dewalt seems hell bent on letting me down. My DW734 planer has decided to no longer do its ver simple job…slice wood…very fast. Instead it has decided to simple hack and moan and resist. So instead of finishing a simple gift for our soon to be house sitter, I am instead tearing the machine down to its sawdusty guts. When you consider the temperature and the amount of polished metal involved, its not a fun thing to do. We shall see if my efforts pay off when I get back from buying some fresh knives.

To be fair, my planer is probably the second or third most used thing in my shop, and it takes a heck of a lot of abuse. Not only does it handle the finer boards, but on occasion it get used for constrution, and handles all kinds of knotty CG lumber (dare I admit the plywood I once sent through) and whatever else I have sitting around.