Trying to improve my efficiency

[gee-dub]

3 hours ago, legenddc said:

Helical head for your jointer?

Took me forever to sand the kitchen helper. I can't remember how long, but I know my wife couldn't believe I was still sanding each evening.

Take a look at your abrasives.  There is a world of difference in something like the Klingspor products or Industrial Abrasives and the stuff at the BORG.  If you are not getting a marked difference after a half a dozen strokes, you are wasting your time.  Cheap abrasives are a false economy.  Better abrasives do a better job, faster, last longer and are less expensive in the long run.  If you are using Norton or Gator abrasives, get ready for an eye opening experience.

[Chet]

26 minutes ago, gee-dub said:

Take a look at your abrasives.  There is a world of difference in something like the Klingspor products or Industrial Abrasives and the stuff at the BORG.  If you are not getting a marked difference after a half a dozen strokes, you are wasting your time.  Cheap abrasives are a false economy.  Better abrasives do a better job, faster, last longer and are less expensive in the long run.  If you are using Norton or Gator abrasives, get ready for an eye opening experience.

Have have to agree with this.  This is a lesson I learned about a year ago.  Money well spent.

[Tom King]

3 hours ago, bleedinblue said:

At least I'm not alone!  Even with a quality plane and a super sharp blade direct from Tom, anything wider than the body of the plane gets tracks and gouges. 

It's not a hard project at all, but I confused myself with Domino layout.  I think each one has a half dozen plugged mortises...that really frustrated me.  Now it's down to round overs and lots of sanding.  Yes, I'll try to incorporate the smoother, lol. 

Try relieving the left corner of the iron a tiny bit with you finest stone.  The right corner was already relieved more than it needed to be.  I didn't really spend any time cambering it once I saw what the issues were. You had it sharp when it got here, so I figured you could take it from there.  

Don't lock the iron so tightly in the plane that you can't adjust it on the fly.  Start making strokes with it with the iron not touching the wood, and lower it slowly until you are taking thin slices.  You may need to adjust the tilt of the iron in that process, so start on some soft scrap.  It's one of those things that's easy once you know how, but you can't learn how to do it by thinking about it.

One thing I like about my work is that it requires almost no sanding.  I might relieve edges with a sanding sponge, but otherwise, smoother tracks are good.

[bleedinblue]

For grins, here's the layout of my shop space in relatively accurate dimensions.  If there are obvious improvements to be made, I'm all ears.

[bleedinblue]

I spent almost an hour this morning taking hand planes to the unassembled portions of the project.  For the most part it turned out really ok.  Tear out issues with a couple boards with squirrely grain.  Most plane track marks were difficult to see but could slightly be felt.  I have not eased that corner yet Tom, I wanted to really give it a go to truly judge performance.  I think this will eliminate at least one or two grits of sanding with the 4" wide boards, and might eliminate all sanding on the boards narrower than 2".

[legenddc]

17 hours ago, Chet said:

Have have to agree with this.  This is a lesson I learned about a year ago.  Money well spent.

@gee-dubThanks for the reminder. I meant to buy some better stuff after that but forgot to.

[djhb20]

On 7/20/2017 at 3:21 PM, bleedinblue said:

Try two at once 

There is no way I'll put a helical head on this Ridgid, I guess unless I find one deeply discounted.  A $400 head on a jointer with probably less than $400 doesn't seem like a good investment. 

That's one way to look at it, but that head will retain its value outside the Ridgid, so if you ever  sell, you aren't wasting money. 

 

I put a Byrd in a $75 Craigslist no-name 6" jointer and it's been a huge upgrade. Well worth it. It made a cheap machine into a $400 machine. When I upgrade, if needed, I'll swap the original back in and sell them separate. Or if someone will pay for a no name jointer with a brand name shelix head, even better. 

[bleedinblue]

19 minutes ago, djhb20 said:

That's one way to look at it, but that head will retain its value outside the Ridgid, so if you ever  sell, you aren't wasting money. 

 

I put a Byrd in a $75 Craigslist no-name 6" jointer and it's been a huge upgrade. Well worth it. It made a cheap machine into a $400 machine. When I upgrade, if needed, I'll swap the original back in and sell them separate. Or if someone will pay for a no name jointer with a brand name shelix head, even better. 

Valid point.  I just checked and the Byrd head that fits the Ridgid also fits a lot of other popular machines, I assumed the range of jointers it would fit to be more narrow. 

I bought new knives for it, if I cant get the jointer dialed back in after replacement I'll have some decisions to make...either go Byrd or replace the jointer.  Either of these would probably mean canceling my supermax order, I've spent a lot of money on tools this year.  And last year, and the year before that...

[bleedinblue]

On 7/20/2017 at 11:30 PM, bleedinblue said:

For grins, here's the layout of my shop space in relatively accurate dimensions.  If there are obvious improvements to be made, I'm all ears.

Yesterday I moved the drill press next to the workbench and the router table between the sander and bandsaw.  I moved the sander closer to the tool box and the bandsaw just a couple feet closer to the scrap pile.  I'm not sure what this will do to workflow, but mannn it looks so much more open now...to the point that I'm not sure I want to clutter it back up with a drum sander.  I'm not too sure I shouldn't just get a bigger jointer and forget about the drum sander.  It's a good thing I've got time to figure it out before the sander ships!

[bushwacked]

What are you using to draw that?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[bleedinblue]

44 minutes ago, bushwacked said:

What are you using to draw that?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

It's just Grizzlys shop planner.   I think I had to screen shot it, crop it and drop it into paint to add text. 

[Eric.]

Looks good Frank.  Have you tried moving the jointer to the right side of the table saw?  That would give you more space for your planer.  I had my shop like that for a while and it was a very logical place to have it...until it wasn't.  You don't need that much space in front of the jointer to use the machine, and only enough space to the side of the planer so you can walk.  This is all the space I have to joint and while it would be nice to have another foot or so...it's fine.

[bleedinblue]

Do you mean to the right of the table saw from the orientation of the picture, or when standing in front of the TS?

I haven't tried much really...as I acquired tools they mostly got dropped in the place they are now.  Switching the router table and drill press are really the only changes I made.  I need to update the sketch.

I'm game for trying anything different, everything except the jointer is mobile (and the jointer is small...) so it's relatively easy. 

[Eric.]

5 minutes ago, bleedinblue said:

Do you mean to the right of the table saw from the orientation of the picture, or when standing in front of the TS?

To the right of the TS standing in front of it.  It would get in the way if it were to the left.  The right side of the saw is a finite space since you'll only use as much as the fence will allow.

[skiback46]

On 7/20/2017 at 1:59 PM, bleedinblue said:

Don't get me wrong guys, I obviously know sanding is part of the game and can't be eliminated.  For this project as an example though, I started with 80 grit on the ROS just to clean up remaining glue squeeze out and to level out slightly off set joints.  It took me about ten minutes per, and there were four of them..so right there was almost an hour just to get them sanded up to 80.  

I could have passed these through a DS a few times to quuckly get them up to 120 or so, the rest of the ROS work would be a breeze.

I think this post is interesting/enlightening.  I don't have a drum sander so I may be wrong, but I think throwing the glued up assemblies through a drum sander would create more sanding for you to do after, since all the rails would be sanded across the grain, and you would have to work to get all those scratches out.

I spend a lot of time thinking about efficiency since like most hobbyists I have other commitments (job, family, other hobbies). For me the biggest improvements in efficiency have come from rethinking the workflow, and not necessarily a specific tool. In the case of the kitchen helper, it has lots of rails, and cross-grain joinery.  Anytime there are spindles, or lots of internal parts like that I try to do the surface prep before the glue up.  I also try to address any fit problems during this stage as well.  Often a dry fit (with clamps) has saved me from trying to smooth out a corner later risking tear out or driving me mad with sanding.  When I built the kitchen helper I dry fit each joint for alignment, tuning the offsets with a plane. Then once I was happy I did an entire mock glue up with clamps.  Then I took it apart smoothed each piece (especially the rails and hard to reach parts).  

I also have started to use less glue.  In most cases gluing only one side still gives me a reassuring small bead of squeeze out, but greatly reduced the chore of cleaning the joints.  For M&T joints I tend to have better luck with only applying glue in the mortise.

Of course I still forget to do all this before every glue up, and instantly regret it when I have to clean up the joints...I keep hoping the torture of joint cleanup and sanding will force me to remember to do it beforehand, maybe some day.

[bleedinblue]

2 hours ago, Eric. said:

To the right of the TS standing in front of it.  It would get in the way if it were to the left.  The right side of the saw is a finite space since you'll only use as much as the fence will allow.

Ahhh, gotcha.  The jointer and planer actually do get flip flopped from time to time as sometimes I need more room for one or the other. I had moved the jointer further away from the dust collector because I needed the extra infeed room at the time...remember, my jointer is tiny compared to your beast and the infeed table is only 23" or so.

I do intend to get rid of the cabinet I have the finishing supplies in.  I can probably throw away half of whats in there since I use ARS 95% of the time anyway.  When I do that I can move the dust collector back a couple of feet.

If I switch the jointer and planer back to how it was before, this is what I'm working with.  I love the open feel switching the router table and drill press gave.  I don't think it reflects in the diagrams, but the bandsaw/drillpress/sander was far too cluttered and this solved that.

I'm still 50/50 on canceling the drum sander and using the freed up space to house a larger jointer and/or floor standing planer.

[legenddc]

Hard to tell without pictures of your space. Would the toolbox fit under the tablesaw wing? Also seems like a lot of the top 11'x9' area is fairly unused. 

[bleedinblue]

28 minutes ago, legenddc said:

Hard to tell without pictures of your space. Would the toolbox fit under the tablesaw wing? Also seems like a lot of the top 11'x9' area is fairly unused. 

The toolbox is a bit too tall to fit under. 

The diagram is a bit misleading...the room doesn't end up there, that leads to the rest of the basement and the walkout.  

[legenddc]

29 minutes ago, bleedinblue said:

The toolbox is a bit too tall to fit under. 

The diagram is a bit misleading...the room doesn't end up there, that leads to the rest of the basement and the walkout.  

I figured as much. Didn't see any doors and I was assuming you had to get in and out somehow.

[Tom King]

I like my jointer where a piece can go right from the outfeed table of the jointer, onto the right hand table of the tablesaw, without extra footsteps.  A long right side of the tablesaw is used much more as a staging area than it ever gets used for cutting plywood.  It's a rare time for any piece of wood to go through the table saw before it's been run across the jointer.

[Chet]

6 hours ago, skiback46 said:

I think throwing the glued up assemblies through a drum sander would create more sanding for you to do after, since all the rails would be sanded across the grain, and you would have to work to get all those scratches out.

I pretty much run my drum sander loaded with 120 grit.  Once a piece is done going through the drum sander I start my random orbit sanding routine with 80 and then work through the grits 80, 120, 150 and 180.  Because the drum sander has done all of the heavy lifting you go through the grit progression pretty quickly.  Any cross grain sanding the drum sander did, the 80 grit takes care of real fast  because everything is flat and ready to go.

8 hours ago, Eric. said:

Have you tried moving the jointer to the right side of the table saw?

Frank, my jointer is to the right of the table saw and I face the saw when using it.  I also have it just about as close to that end of the saw as you can get it.  When things come off the jointer I can stack them right there on the end of the saw until I am done.  One of the best move I made in the shop.

[bleedinblue]

25 minutes ago, Chet said:

Frank, my jointer is to the right of the table saw and I face the saw when using it.  I also have it just about as close to that end of the saw as you can get it.  When things come off the jointer I can stack them right there on the end of the saw until I am done.  One of the best move I made in the shop.

I've seen that done before for sure.  It's easy enough to try it and I can't really say why I haven't.  I'll test it out.  That would free up almost that whole wall.  

[bleedinblue]

I ran down and moved the jointer over.  Whoa.  It is very interesting and I see no reason why it won't be an improvement.  It just feels...weird.  Here's how it basically looks, I didn't take the time to label everything.  The planer is on a mobile cart so it's just kind of hanging out there "somewhere" along that empty wall.

[Eric.]

Tough to get a real idea without seeing meat space but from the diagram it looks like it opens things up quite a bit.

Is there a reason you can't put the drill press on the opposite wall?  You're rarely drilling on 12' boards. LOL  And it would actually have more space on that wall.

Then you could turn your bench 90* and give yourself room to use it from all four sides, which is an advantage.

[bleedinblue]

4 minutes ago, Eric. said:

Tough to get a real idea without seeing meat space but from the diagram it looks like it opens things up quite a bit.

Is there a reason you can't put the drill press on the opposite wall?  You're rarely drilling on 12' boards. LOL  And it would actually have more space on that wall.

Then you could turn your bench 90* and give yourself room to use it from all four sides, which is an advantage.

This is why fresh eyes are helpful.  The drill press is by far the least used tool, I don't really care where it goes.  I'd even been trying to figure out how to get to all four sides of my bench, but I never considered turning it 90.  It always just seemed logical to have the little rectangle in the same orientation as the big rectangle.  I'm definitely going to try that.