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The most frustrating thing about this hobby in the YouTube age is every "DIY" video employing a full shop with $8,000 worth of tools. How is this different from

The most frustrating thing about this hobby in the YouTube age is every "DIY" video employing a full shop with $8,000 worth of tools. How is this different from professional woodworking? Where are the resources for beginners?

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
ink_13 6y ago
You may be interested in Matthias' videos where he makes his own tools, such as a table saw or a bandsaw.
mturmon 6y ago
You might like to look at Paul Sellers' videos? He can get a lot done with hand saws, marking tools, and chisels. But in general, among hobbies, woodworking is pretty gear-intensive. Even if you try to avoid it.
- mbrock 6y ago
  Rex Krueger is worth checking out too. The series he’s been making now is all about getting started with real woodworking using minimal inexpensive tools. There’s some craft-historical topics too especially in his approach to workbenches: he first makes a simple low bench in an old Roman style (inspired by Christopher Schwartz’s research) and later an English workbench with a big leg vise. Both relatively easy constructions from cheap softwood with ingenuity and definite pragmatism.
- Ma8ee 6y ago
  It's just too easy that any hobby becomes spending hours drooling over equipment you want to buy rather than actually doing stuff (whether it is woodworking or playing the guitar). This is one reason I really like Paul Sellers: You don't need so much.
  - jeromenerf 6y ago
    Paul videos are great but he usually works with prepared stock and mostly focus on the final steps of the projects. Actually, he doesn’t have much "project videos" except for the "workbench" series. You will find that problems arise when you need to prep stock. You can totally do it with hand tools, as it’s been done for centuries, but it’s hard work.
    - Ma8ee 6y ago
      What I do very often is that I adapt my projects to the wood I get my hands on. But otherwise, I have to admit that ripsawing by hand isn't that fun. If I would get one machine for my workshop it would be a bandsaw (and maybe a drillpress).
arnarbi 6y ago
Check out Steve Ramsey: https://www.youtube.com/user/stevinmarin https://www.youtube.com/user/stevinmarin His channel is specifically for beginners on a budget.
- johnpowell 6y ago
  And he also has a thing on getting a pretty good woodshop going for under a grand.
ajot 6y ago
Matthias has an older video making a table frame with minimal tools [0]. I would also suggest watching Steve Ramsey [1], he puts a lot of effort to explain simple and beginner stuff. I believe he still has a PDF in his website about filling a workshop for under 1000 USD. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFPLFyxkhzc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFPLFyxkhzc [1] https://www.youtube.com/user/stevinmarin https://www.youtube.com/user/stevinmarin
jabl 6y ago
There is a large woodworking subculture that uses only (or at least mostly) hand tools. While new good hand tools can be expensive, you can get good stuff at a more moderate cost on eBay. See e.g. Paul Sellers or Chris Schwartz. Sure, you're not going to set up a furniture factory that can compete with IKEA on price using hand tools, but who cares? You're doing it for your own enjoyment. And hand tools are enjoyable to use, much less noise and dust than machine tools.
- preommr 6y ago
  Doubt anyone would save much money on hand tools. Going all hand tools is more of a luxury - those hand planes and speciality saws are not cheap and an absolute nightmare to maintain. Any woodworker is going to need a collection of both. Things like a good chisel set are going to be essential no matter what. The basic power tools like a circular saw and a table saw aren't all that expensive either. Even cheaper if you buy them second hand. Add in a drill press, a jigsaw, router, sander and that's pretty much the basic ensemble. With good sales, all of it can come around to 1-1.5k The real expensive stuff is when people buy useless festool crap when they can make a jig.
  - Ma8ee 6y ago
    You can definitely spend unlimited money on hand tools, but you don't have to. You get very far with just a few tools that you either buy second hand or buy new but avoid the the most expensive brands as well as the cheapest ones. Most importantly, with hand tools you don't have to have a big permanent wood shop. The tools don't take as much space, and most importantly, you don't have to set up dust collection etc.
    - marttt 6y ago
      "... most importantly, you don't have to set up dust collection etc ..." Also, you can work in complete silence.
      - mauvehaus 6y ago
johnpowell 6y ago
When I was getting my woodshop going I was hitting up estate sales/auctions. There was one I auction I scored a nearly brand new SawStop table saw, Dewault planer, and ShopFox joiner (kinda crap) for under 600 dollars. All the stuff was pretty much brand new. I have hit the point where I have more tools than space.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
raister 6y ago
Several resources for manual woodworking, now, if you're thinking about power tool woodworking, then, I agree, you'll have to spend money... there's no way around it, at least not with nice and quality tools. Now, if you want to venture on manual woodworking, several resources from the following masters: - James Krenov (in memoriam) - Paul Sellers, a Lifestyle Woodwoker - James Wright, Wood by Wright - Mike Siemsen - Rob Cosman - Frank Klausz - Shawn L. Graham, Worth The Effort - Roy Underhill - Joshua Farnsworth, Wood and Shop - James Hamilton, aka Stumpy Nubs - Matthew Cremona - Jay Bates - Shannon Rogers - Simon James - Rex Krueger
- jeromenerf 6y ago
  - Lemongrasspicker hacks through projects on his balcony. - Mr chickadee silently uses hand tools on his homestead.
monksy 6y ago
It just enrages me everytime I see a festools used. (It's the biggest brand on ask this old house) They're really expensive.
- mturmon 6y ago
  We should be glad that such fine tools exist, no?
  - cthalupa 6y ago
    They make nice tools. It's debatable whether a lot of them are worth the money. Some of their stuff is nearly indispensable in a high volume or time constrained shop, though. The domino's only real competition comes from mafell, and it's similarly priced. Triton and some others have tried to compete with some dowel joiners, but they don't work nearly as well.
- cpwright 6y ago
  Festool has started sponsoring TOH, but they used the tools before that. The track saw, domino, sanders, and dust extractors are very well built tools. The amount of dust from my Dewalt 5" ROS was night and day compared to the 125mm Rotex. The domino makes joinery much faster, and has become an essential part of my workflow. My beef with TOH is now that all the houses are so expensive and the work is so custom or complicated that it is not relatable.
- rkangel 6y ago
  Why does it cause you rage? It causes me jealousy! When I used to do Theatre carpentry, I regularly used Festool equipment (that wasn't mine). It was an education in how careful thought to your product design can make something much better to use. I have an Evolution Sliding Chopsaw at home. It cost £200 and it's great. The Festool Kapex is just better in a lot of small ways - the mechanism for adjusting angle is quick and precise, the laser lines mark out kerf width accurately, the airflow has been designed so that dust extraction works well etc.. It's 10 times the price though, so obviously not worth it for me at home.
jacquesm 6y ago
Woodworking is very flexible in how much you spend. Most of the expensive tools are time optimizations, you can get by just fine without them but it will be a bit slower. Also, in woodworking you always want that one more tool.
- avar 6y ago
  A lot of these tools aren't even time optimizations at the hobbyist level. There's been so many times I've had to saw say a meter of plywood, by the time I've gotten out the circular saw, plugged it in, taken the extra safety precautions such a power tool needs, sawed the wood, then spent more time afterwards cleaning up. All to realize that I've spent maybe 5-10 minutes in total (almost entirely setup time) making a cut with a powertool I could have just made in 2-3 minutes max of very leisurely sawing with the handsaw I already had at hand right next to me
  - jacquesm 6y ago
    The problem is - and I'm not saying this lightly - that many people don't actually know how to use hand tools properly and would not be able to - for instance - make a straight and perpendicular cut in a sheet of plywood using a handsaw. In those cases the circular saw has a better chance of delivering the goods. Of course it can also be a shortcut to the ER... Saw, set of chisels, tape measure, good clawhammer, drillpress, drills, white glue, good set of screwdrivers. Then some time and materials to bootstrap your way into making clamps, a workbench, miter box and so on and before you know it you have a working woodshop for relatively little money.
    - spthorn60 6y ago
      I'm of the same mind, and tire of the noisy power tools. I'm more likely to reach for my pull saw than unbox and set up the circular saw. I _think_ I've learned how to do it right; online instruction, Jacques?
heinrichhartman 6y ago
> How is this different from professional woodworking? Professional wood-shop costs easily >$100K :) Number one cost factor, IMHO, is space for a shop. You need enough room to store and handle lumber. If you have that, you can start with hand tools (saws, chisels, planes) for let's say ~300$. This will in-principle allow you to do everything. People have done this for ages, this way. Power tools make woodworking much faster. I would start with a jig saw, drill press, circular hand saw. This will be another ~800. The first expensive mile stone is the table-saw. This will be the most used tool in your shop. Everything gets better when you have access to a good table saw. I have spent 1.2K on mine. Next upgrades are miter-saw, band saw, planer, jointer. They need a lot of space and are not cheap. This is were you enter the more professional realm. To get high quality versions of all that tools will cost a lot of money. Oftentimes ebay has used tools for small money. E.g. I bought 15 hand planes for ~100 EUR last year and 50EUR for a used drill press. Happy woodworking!
- mywittyname 6y ago
  Decent "job site" tablesaws are in the $600 USD range. And there are plenty of designs out there for building a work bench that can incorporate one..
cthalupa 6y ago
$8,000 is actually really cheap for a hobby like woodworking. In reality, if you're watching even a remotely large DIY channel on Youtube, outside of ones specifically targeting those that are budget conscious or those that specialize in hand tooling, it's probably closer to $30,000 or $40,000. All the SawStop, Festool, etc. stuff you see is all quite expensive. Freestanding jointers and planers, drill presses, router tables with lifts, bandsaws, drum sanders, dominos.... Even just the lighting in a shop, especially one that's on a YT channel, could be thousands of dollars. But, here's the thing: Most of those tools are about saving time. You don't need a $2000 planer, you can use $200-$300 in hand planes. You don't need a $4500 table saw, you can do nearly everything with a $200 circular saw and straight edge. You don't need a $750 rotex hand sander and a $2000 drum sander, you can use paper and sanding blocks. You don't need a jointer, you can buy pre milled lumber. Depending on what you're working on, you might not need things like a bandsaw or drill press. A handheld router can be turned into a plunge router with some work, you can use jigs instead of a router table, etc. etc. etc. Once you learn how to use a handful of tools - and there's lots of youtube videos on that - and understand how and where they can be used, you can start translating from all the fancy stuff you see in the YT shop to what you have on hand. It'll just take longer. The other aspect of it is... yeah, a lot of people that just do it as a hobby are also spending nearly that much. A lot of the DIY guys are also doing projects that have similar requirements on accuracy/repeatability, etc., that you would see from people doing furniture level woodworking. People doing that for a hobby and using powered tools are going to be spending tens of thousands of dollars, generally. If time was no constraint, you could do basically everything in woodworking with a few different hand saws, hand planes, hand chisels, a mallet, some gouges, sandpaper, and high precision marking and layout tools. And a lot of clamps. You need a ton of clamps if you ever use glue to join material. As for a beginner resource on a limited budget - Steve Ramsey's Woodworking for Mere Mortals is great.
- jeromenerf 6y ago
  "Time" is not the only constraint, "effort" is as important. Woodworking features many health altering hazards, from the obvious cuts to dust poisoning, and what is rarely discussed: joints and back pain, due to repetitive movements, heavy lifting and bad posture. Power tools are easier on the body, but also more dangerous, noisy and dusty. My personal approach has been to learn how to do everything by hand, from felling frees to making doll house furnitures. What I enjoy doing, I do with hand tools, the rest I do with power tools. It takes time to build muscles, posture and risk awareness.
RNCTX 6y ago
Collecting machines from craigslist is a necessary part of the hobby, imo. A 1,000 dollar Powermatic tablesaw is functionally immortal. It will always be worth 1,000 dollars, so you buy it and use it until you don't need it, then sell it to someone else for what you paid for it. When I last had a big shop full of stuff at home, my machine and cost list was... 1) Used Powermatic 66 table saw ($1000) 2) A used Woodmaster 18" planer ($1200) 3) A router table I spec'd to my local machine shop which attached as a replacement wing on the Powermatic 66 to share its fence ($500) 4) A used Grizzly 8" jointer ($500) 5) An "American Sawmill Machinery Unipoint" miter saw from the 1950s ($300) (^) 6) A General International mortiser ($1000) 7) Couple of routers, one big one and one 1.5hp one ($600) (^) This was the best machine I ever had, sold it for $500 when I was done with it. Imagine a miter saw that's all cast iron rather than aluminum and plastic that can cut invisible miter joints. So not 8,000, more like 4,000-5,000 if you buy a bunch of used stuff. I can't think of a reason to buy new woodworking machines, when there are so many used machines floating around craigslist or exfactory on any given day. Any of these machines could be lesser/smaller alternatives, which would not limit the quality of output but rather just limit the size of raw materials you could use and perhaps slightly increase waste. For instance there's no reason you can't cut small pieces on a small table saw and break down 4x8 sheets of ply with a Skil saw. The only thing the big cast iron saw gives you is the ability to skip the Skil saw and minimize waste, really. Similarly, anything that I did on my custom built router table (or a shaper) could be done with a hand router and jigs, it'll just take more time to build the jigs. About 80% of woodworking is learning 'clever tricks' and learning how to conceptualize jigs to accomplish repetitive tasks accurately. Machines can do it for money but your brain can do it for cheap, just a matter of learning how. Look at this dude: https://youtu.be/RYzgP_Ucs1I https://youtu.be/RYzgP_Ucs1I Doesn't have a shaper but he has raised panels at the end of the day ;). I mean, I've stumbled across guys that make a living building wooden windows, doors, and cabinet doors with a small army of used Powermatic 2A tenoners (no longer being made, you can only buy them used). They're not required to build a cabinet door, though, they just reduce it to unskilled labor simplicity.
- rkangel 6y ago
  This is a route I'd love to go down, but for someone who's newer at this it's hard to know which are the solid immortal ones, and which ones are probably already broken. If anyone can recommend UK equivalents to some of these brands I'd be very grateful!
anjc 6y ago
If you want a functioning shop, and you were limited to four initial options: 1) prohibitively expensive power tools 2) prohibitively expensive hand tools 3) cheap hand tools 4) cheap power tools ...I'd go for cheap power tools every time. You could get more tools than you'll ever need for $1-2k buying cheap but usable brands. They probably wouldn't stand up to more than DIY use, but they will work, and you'll learn what items you really value. For example, I now know that I use my cheap table saw enough that I could justify a more expensive one, however I'll never buy an expensive scroll saw. I think it's bad advice to start with good hand tools unless you have a high tolerance for manual labour or are apprenticing under someone in a fine woodworking area (e.g. luthiery).
- mywittyname 6y ago
  The "prosumer" market has done wonders for tool availability. Companies no longer make stuff that lasts a lifetime, but the trade-off is that you can get the same tools a professional would use for much cheaper. Turns out, even pros don't need tools that last a lifetime because they so often get lost, stolen, or dropped off a roof and need replacing after a few years anyway. And you can move down market and get something with a 100-1000 hour service life for half or a quarter of the price.
jpitz 6y ago
Woodworking for mere mortals. https://woodworkingformeremortals.com/ https://woodworkingformeremortals.com/
swalsh 6y ago
You don't need every tool. There are multiple ways to get the same job done. There are some things I'd consider essentials. A table saw, drill, some decent chisels, and maybe a #5 plane. And you can get pretty far with that. You can get started for < $500, and be productive. A band saw is a nice addition as well. A planer is a super productive, and nice tool to have. I'd be lost without mine. But I COULD use a hand plane. It's just slower. I dream of having space for a large 8" jointer, but I don't so I get along with my #7 hand plane just fine. Honestly though, that #7 is a luxury too. I could do everything with just a #5 hand plane.
dekhn 6y ago
You can get by with a $250 table saw, $150 miter saw, $100 drill press, a cordless drill, and about $100 in drills and other hand tools. That's enough to make fairly complicated stuff quickly. I'd love to have a jointer and planer, but it looks like cheap ones aren't worth it.
fimdomeio 6y ago
There are a few youtubers dedicated to low cost woodworking rex kruger and "woodworking for mere mortals" are good resources. "home made modern" and "modern builds" also tend to be light on the tools needed. On a broad sense I think the most important tools if you want to go the power tools route, are: a table saw, a tracksaw (or just a circular saw and a jig, if you're ok with loosing some precision), a router, a drill, an impact driver and a random orbit sander. Then one or two hand saws a chisel a hammer, wood glue and some clamps. Table saw is the most expensive and probably one of the most dangerous machines if not operated correctly but I really which I didn't took that long to invest in it. You can do a lot with it that is very difficult otherwise. Than I would say the best is to start with simple projects so you can keep frustration/success levels in a good balance. and then slowly move to more complex ones.
- fimdomeio 6y ago
  And I forgot, buy a shop vac to collect all that saw dust. :)
panzagl 6y ago
Check out "Anarchist's Tool Chest" from Lost Art Press. It's basically an intro to hand tool woodworking through building a tool chest and what you need to fill it. Not that hand tools can't get just about as expensive as power tools.
- war1025 6y ago
  I've been eyeing that book for about a year now. Really should just go through and buy it.
deberon 6y ago
Chris Schwartz (of Popular Woodworking fame) wrote and printed "The Anarchist's Tool Chest". Goes through building an actual tool chest and filling it with basic tools needed to accomplish most anything a hobbyist would be building. These are all hand tools and a great resource (it's one of a handful of books on my shop bookshelf). https://lostartpress.com/collections/books/products/the-anarchists-tool-chest https://lostartpress.com/collections/books/products/the-anar...

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

ink_13 6y ago

You may be interested in Matthias' videos where he makes his own tools, such as a table saw or a bandsaw.

mturmon 6y ago

You might like to look at Paul Sellers' videos? He can get a lot done with hand saws, marking tools, and chisels. But in general, among hobbies, woodworking is pretty gear-intensive. Even if you try to avoid it.

mbrock 6y ago
Rex Krueger is worth checking out too. The series he’s been making now is all about getting started with real woodworking using minimal inexpensive tools. There’s some craft-historical topics too especially in his approach to workbenches: he first makes a simple low bench in an old Roman style (inspired by Christopher Schwartz’s research) and later an English workbench with a big leg vise. Both relatively easy constructions from cheap softwood with ingenuity and definite pragmatism.
Ma8ee 6y ago
It's just too easy that any hobby becomes spending hours drooling over equipment you want to buy rather than actually doing stuff (whether it is woodworking or playing the guitar). This is one reason I really like Paul Sellers: You don't need so much.
- jeromenerf 6y ago
  Paul videos are great but he usually works with prepared stock and mostly focus on the final steps of the projects. Actually, he doesn’t have much "project videos" except for the "workbench" series. You will find that problems arise when you need to prep stock. You can totally do it with hand tools, as it’s been done for centuries, but it’s hard work.
  - Ma8ee 6y ago
    What I do very often is that I adapt my projects to the wood I get my hands on. But otherwise, I have to admit that ripsawing by hand isn't that fun. If I would get one machine for my workshop it would be a bandsaw (and maybe a drillpress).

arnarbi 6y ago

Check out Steve Ramsey: https://www.youtube.com/user/stevinmarin https://www.youtube.com/user/stevinmarin His channel is specifically for beginners on a budget.

johnpowell 6y ago
And he also has a thing on getting a pretty good woodshop going for under a grand.

ajot 6y ago

Matthias has an older video making a table frame with minimal tools [0]. I would also suggest watching Steve Ramsey [1], he puts a lot of effort to explain simple and beginner stuff. I believe he still has a PDF in his website about filling a workshop for under 1000 USD. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFPLFyxkhzc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFPLFyxkhzc [1] https://www.youtube.com/user/stevinmarin https://www.youtube.com/user/stevinmarin

jabl 6y ago

There is a large woodworking subculture that uses only (or at least mostly) hand tools. While new good hand tools can be expensive, you can get good stuff at a more moderate cost on eBay. See e.g. Paul Sellers or Chris Schwartz. Sure, you're not going to set up a furniture factory that can compete with IKEA on price using hand tools, but who cares? You're doing it for your own enjoyment. And hand tools are enjoyable to use, much less noise and dust than machine tools.

preommr 6y ago
Doubt anyone would save much money on hand tools. Going all hand tools is more of a luxury - those hand planes and speciality saws are not cheap and an absolute nightmare to maintain. Any woodworker is going to need a collection of both. Things like a good chisel set are going to be essential no matter what. The basic power tools like a circular saw and a table saw aren't all that expensive either. Even cheaper if you buy them second hand. Add in a drill press, a jigsaw, router, sander and that's pretty much the basic ensemble. With good sales, all of it can come around to 1-1.5k The real expensive stuff is when people buy useless festool crap when they can make a jig.
- Ma8ee 6y ago
  You can definitely spend unlimited money on hand tools, but you don't have to. You get very far with just a few tools that you either buy second hand or buy new but avoid the the most expensive brands as well as the cheapest ones. Most importantly, with hand tools you don't have to have a big permanent wood shop. The tools don't take as much space, and most importantly, you don't have to set up dust collection etc.
  - marttt 6y ago
    "... most importantly, you don't have to set up dust collection etc ..." Also, you can work in complete silence.
    - mauvehaus 6y ago

johnpowell 6y ago

When I was getting my woodshop going I was hitting up estate sales/auctions. There was one I auction I scored a nearly brand new SawStop table saw, Dewault planer, and ShopFox joiner (kinda crap) for under 600 dollars. All the stuff was pretty much brand new. I have hit the point where I have more tools than space.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

raister 6y ago

Several resources for manual woodworking, now, if you're thinking about power tool woodworking, then, I agree, you'll have to spend money... there's no way around it, at least not with nice and quality tools. Now, if you want to venture on manual woodworking, several resources from the following masters: - James Krenov (in memoriam) - Paul Sellers, a Lifestyle Woodwoker - James Wright, Wood by Wright - Mike Siemsen - Rob Cosman - Frank Klausz - Shawn L. Graham, Worth The Effort - Roy Underhill - Joshua Farnsworth, Wood and Shop - James Hamilton, aka Stumpy Nubs - Matthew Cremona - Jay Bates - Shannon Rogers - Simon James - Rex Krueger

jeromenerf 6y ago
- Lemongrasspicker hacks through projects on his balcony. - Mr chickadee silently uses hand tools on his homestead.

monksy 6y ago

It just enrages me everytime I see a festools used. (It's the biggest brand on ask this old house) They're really expensive.

mturmon 6y ago
We should be glad that such fine tools exist, no?
- cthalupa 6y ago
  They make nice tools. It's debatable whether a lot of them are worth the money. Some of their stuff is nearly indispensable in a high volume or time constrained shop, though. The domino's only real competition comes from mafell, and it's similarly priced. Triton and some others have tried to compete with some dowel joiners, but they don't work nearly as well.
cpwright 6y ago
Festool has started sponsoring TOH, but they used the tools before that. The track saw, domino, sanders, and dust extractors are very well built tools. The amount of dust from my Dewalt 5" ROS was night and day compared to the 125mm Rotex. The domino makes joinery much faster, and has become an essential part of my workflow. My beef with TOH is now that all the houses are so expensive and the work is so custom or complicated that it is not relatable.
rkangel 6y ago
Why does it cause you rage? It causes me jealousy! When I used to do Theatre carpentry, I regularly used Festool equipment (that wasn't mine). It was an education in how careful thought to your product design can make something much better to use. I have an Evolution Sliding Chopsaw at home. It cost £200 and it's great. The Festool Kapex is just better in a lot of small ways - the mechanism for adjusting angle is quick and precise, the laser lines mark out kerf width accurately, the airflow has been designed so that dust extraction works well etc.. It's 10 times the price though, so obviously not worth it for me at home.

jacquesm 6y ago

Woodworking is very flexible in how much you spend. Most of the expensive tools are time optimizations, you can get by just fine without them but it will be a bit slower. Also, in woodworking you always want that one more tool.

avar 6y ago
A lot of these tools aren't even time optimizations at the hobbyist level. There's been so many times I've had to saw say a meter of plywood, by the time I've gotten out the circular saw, plugged it in, taken the extra safety precautions such a power tool needs, sawed the wood, then spent more time afterwards cleaning up. All to realize that I've spent maybe 5-10 minutes in total (almost entirely setup time) making a cut with a powertool I could have just made in 2-3 minutes max of very leisurely sawing with the handsaw I already had at hand right next to me
- jacquesm 6y ago
  The problem is - and I'm not saying this lightly - that many people don't actually know how to use hand tools properly and would not be able to - for instance - make a straight and perpendicular cut in a sheet of plywood using a handsaw. In those cases the circular saw has a better chance of delivering the goods. Of course it can also be a shortcut to the ER... Saw, set of chisels, tape measure, good clawhammer, drillpress, drills, white glue, good set of screwdrivers. Then some time and materials to bootstrap your way into making clamps, a workbench, miter box and so on and before you know it you have a working woodshop for relatively little money.
  - spthorn60 6y ago
    I'm of the same mind, and tire of the noisy power tools. I'm more likely to reach for my pull saw than unbox and set up the circular saw. I _think_ I've learned how to do it right; online instruction, Jacques?

heinrichhartman 6y ago

> How is this different from professional woodworking? Professional wood-shop costs easily >$100K :) Number one cost factor, IMHO, is space for a shop. You need enough room to store and handle lumber. If you have that, you can start with hand tools (saws, chisels, planes) for let's say ~300$. This will in-principle allow you to do everything. People have done this for ages, this way. Power tools make woodworking much faster. I would start with a jig saw, drill press, circular hand saw. This will be another ~800. The first expensive mile stone is the table-saw. This will be the most used tool in your shop. Everything gets better when you have access to a good table saw. I have spent 1.2K on mine. Next upgrades are miter-saw, band saw, planer, jointer. They need a lot of space and are not cheap. This is were you enter the more professional realm. To get high quality versions of all that tools will cost a lot of money. Oftentimes ebay has used tools for small money. E.g. I bought 15 hand planes for ~100 EUR last year and 50EUR for a used drill press. Happy woodworking!

mywittyname 6y ago
Decent "job site" tablesaws are in the $600 USD range. And there are plenty of designs out there for building a work bench that can incorporate one..

cthalupa 6y ago

$8,000 is actually really cheap for a hobby like woodworking. In reality, if you're watching even a remotely large DIY channel on Youtube, outside of ones specifically targeting those that are budget conscious or those that specialize in hand tooling, it's probably closer to $30,000 or $40,000. All the SawStop, Festool, etc. stuff you see is all quite expensive. Freestanding jointers and planers, drill presses, router tables with lifts, bandsaws, drum sanders, dominos.... Even just the lighting in a shop, especially one that's on a YT channel, could be thousands of dollars. But, here's the thing: Most of those tools are about saving time. You don't need a $2000 planer, you can use $200-$300 in hand planes. You don't need a $4500 table saw, you can do nearly everything with a $200 circular saw and straight edge. You don't need a $750 rotex hand sander and a $2000 drum sander, you can use paper and sanding blocks. You don't need a jointer, you can buy pre milled lumber. Depending on what you're working on, you might not need things like a bandsaw or drill press. A handheld router can be turned into a plunge router with some work, you can use jigs instead of a router table, etc. etc. etc. Once you learn how to use a handful of tools - and there's lots of youtube videos on that - and understand how and where they can be used, you can start translating from all the fancy stuff you see in the YT shop to what you have on hand. It'll just take longer. The other aspect of it is... yeah, a lot of people that just do it as a hobby are also spending nearly that much. A lot of the DIY guys are also doing projects that have similar requirements on accuracy/repeatability, etc., that you would see from people doing furniture level woodworking. People doing that for a hobby and using powered tools are going to be spending tens of thousands of dollars, generally. If time was no constraint, you could do basically everything in woodworking with a few different hand saws, hand planes, hand chisels, a mallet, some gouges, sandpaper, and high precision marking and layout tools. And a lot of clamps. You need a ton of clamps if you ever use glue to join material. As for a beginner resource on a limited budget - Steve Ramsey's Woodworking for Mere Mortals is great.

jeromenerf 6y ago
"Time" is not the only constraint, "effort" is as important. Woodworking features many health altering hazards, from the obvious cuts to dust poisoning, and what is rarely discussed: joints and back pain, due to repetitive movements, heavy lifting and bad posture. Power tools are easier on the body, but also more dangerous, noisy and dusty. My personal approach has been to learn how to do everything by hand, from felling frees to making doll house furnitures. What I enjoy doing, I do with hand tools, the rest I do with power tools. It takes time to build muscles, posture and risk awareness.

RNCTX 6y ago

Collecting machines from craigslist is a necessary part of the hobby, imo. A 1,000 dollar Powermatic tablesaw is functionally immortal. It will always be worth 1,000 dollars, so you buy it and use it until you don't need it, then sell it to someone else for what you paid for it. When I last had a big shop full of stuff at home, my machine and cost list was... 1) Used Powermatic 66 table saw ($1000) 2) A used Woodmaster 18" planer ($1200) 3) A router table I spec'd to my local machine shop which attached as a replacement wing on the Powermatic 66 to share its fence ($500) 4) A used Grizzly 8" jointer ($500) 5) An "American Sawmill Machinery Unipoint" miter saw from the 1950s ($300) (^) 6) A General International mortiser ($1000) 7) Couple of routers, one big one and one 1.5hp one ($600) (^) This was the best machine I ever had, sold it for $500 when I was done with it. Imagine a miter saw that's all cast iron rather than aluminum and plastic that can cut invisible miter joints. So not 8,000, more like 4,000-5,000 if you buy a bunch of used stuff. I can't think of a reason to buy new woodworking machines, when there are so many used machines floating around craigslist or exfactory on any given day. Any of these machines could be lesser/smaller alternatives, which would not limit the quality of output but rather just limit the size of raw materials you could use and perhaps slightly increase waste. For instance there's no reason you can't cut small pieces on a small table saw and break down 4x8 sheets of ply with a Skil saw. The only thing the big cast iron saw gives you is the ability to skip the Skil saw and minimize waste, really. Similarly, anything that I did on my custom built router table (or a shaper) could be done with a hand router and jigs, it'll just take more time to build the jigs. About 80% of woodworking is learning 'clever tricks' and learning how to conceptualize jigs to accomplish repetitive tasks accurately. Machines can do it for money but your brain can do it for cheap, just a matter of learning how. Look at this dude: https://youtu.be/RYzgP_Ucs1I https://youtu.be/RYzgP_Ucs1I Doesn't have a shaper but he has raised panels at the end of the day ;). I mean, I've stumbled across guys that make a living building wooden windows, doors, and cabinet doors with a small army of used Powermatic 2A tenoners (no longer being made, you can only buy them used). They're not required to build a cabinet door, though, they just reduce it to unskilled labor simplicity.

rkangel 6y ago
This is a route I'd love to go down, but for someone who's newer at this it's hard to know which are the solid immortal ones, and which ones are probably already broken. If anyone can recommend UK equivalents to some of these brands I'd be very grateful!

anjc 6y ago

If you want a functioning shop, and you were limited to four initial options: 1) prohibitively expensive power tools 2) prohibitively expensive hand tools 3) cheap hand tools 4) cheap power tools ...I'd go for cheap power tools every time. You could get more tools than you'll ever need for $1-2k buying cheap but usable brands. They probably wouldn't stand up to more than DIY use, but they will work, and you'll learn what items you really value. For example, I now know that I use my cheap table saw enough that I could justify a more expensive one, however I'll never buy an expensive scroll saw. I think it's bad advice to start with good hand tools unless you have a high tolerance for manual labour or are apprenticing under someone in a fine woodworking area (e.g. luthiery).

mywittyname 6y ago
The "prosumer" market has done wonders for tool availability. Companies no longer make stuff that lasts a lifetime, but the trade-off is that you can get the same tools a professional would use for much cheaper. Turns out, even pros don't need tools that last a lifetime because they so often get lost, stolen, or dropped off a roof and need replacing after a few years anyway. And you can move down market and get something with a 100-1000 hour service life for half or a quarter of the price.

jpitz 6y ago

Woodworking for mere mortals. https://woodworkingformeremortals.com/ https://woodworkingformeremortals.com/

swalsh 6y ago

You don't need every tool. There are multiple ways to get the same job done. There are some things I'd consider essentials. A table saw, drill, some decent chisels, and maybe a #5 plane. And you can get pretty far with that. You can get started for < $500, and be productive. A band saw is a nice addition as well. A planer is a super productive, and nice tool to have. I'd be lost without mine. But I COULD use a hand plane. It's just slower. I dream of having space for a large 8" jointer, but I don't so I get along with my #7 hand plane just fine. Honestly though, that #7 is a luxury too. I could do everything with just a #5 hand plane.

dekhn 6y ago

You can get by with a $250 table saw, $150 miter saw, $100 drill press, a cordless drill, and about $100 in drills and other hand tools. That's enough to make fairly complicated stuff quickly. I'd love to have a jointer and planer, but it looks like cheap ones aren't worth it.

fimdomeio 6y ago

There are a few youtubers dedicated to low cost woodworking rex kruger and "woodworking for mere mortals" are good resources. "home made modern" and "modern builds" also tend to be light on the tools needed. On a broad sense I think the most important tools if you want to go the power tools route, are: a table saw, a tracksaw (or just a circular saw and a jig, if you're ok with loosing some precision), a router, a drill, an impact driver and a random orbit sander. Then one or two hand saws a chisel a hammer, wood glue and some clamps. Table saw is the most expensive and probably one of the most dangerous machines if not operated correctly but I really which I didn't took that long to invest in it. You can do a lot with it that is very difficult otherwise. Than I would say the best is to start with simple projects so you can keep frustration/success levels in a good balance. and then slowly move to more complex ones.

fimdomeio 6y ago
And I forgot, buy a shop vac to collect all that saw dust. :)

panzagl 6y ago

Check out "Anarchist's Tool Chest" from Lost Art Press. It's basically an intro to hand tool woodworking through building a tool chest and what you need to fill it. Not that hand tools can't get just about as expensive as power tools.

war1025 6y ago
I've been eyeing that book for about a year now. Really should just go through and buy it.

deberon 6y ago

Chris Schwartz (of Popular Woodworking fame) wrote and printed "The Anarchist's Tool Chest". Goes through building an actual tool chest and filling it with basic tools needed to accomplish most anything a hobbyist would be building. These are all hand tools and a great resource (it's one of a handful of books on my shop bookshelf). https://lostartpress.com/collections/books/products/the-anarchists-tool-chest https://lostartpress.com/collections/books/products/the-anar...