WT279 – No Hand Stands Please

On today’s show we’re talking about crook cane handle designs, defusing shop vac hose static electricity, and resawing with table saw and band saw.

What’s on the Bench?

  • Marc is cutting big bird joints (bridle joints)
  • Matt is cleaning up his shop
  • Shannon is working on a blanket chest but took a few minutes to do some very simple shop improvements

What’s New?

  • Ben shared a video on making Ebony pegs
  • The Highland Woodworker episode 20
  • The Wood Whisperer turned 9 year old!

Kickback

  • Marc explained the uninteresting story of what happened to Festool
  • Shannon gots lots of advice stating that plastic cutting boards aren’t better and he still isn’t convinced.
  • Jim can’t get the video to play on this audio only podcast

Email

  • Jonathan wants to build a cane for his father but is worked the crossgrain situation on the crooked handle will cause him to break a hip
  • Ryan wants to know how to control static electricity with his dust collection so he can stop getting shocked.
  • Kelly wants to know what we think about using the table saw to start a resaw cut then finishing it off with a bandsaw.

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9 replies on “WT279 – No Hand Stands Please”

You asked us for feedback, so my vote is to BRING BACK THE WEEKEND SHOW !!!!… when you guys have time, of course. P.S. A mid-week show would be cool too (just FYI).

I like liver, I like Chicken Meow Mix please Deliver.

Now, that we have that out of the way. More content is always a good thing. Be curious what the cold weather guys do when winter comes and you don’t have a basement shop. Winter is coming and my wood working hobby is probably going to be shelved starting mid-November for about 4-5 months.

I miss the weekend show. The single topic quick episode gives me something to listen to at the end of the week versus the majority of everything coming out at the beginning of the week. If you do not bring it back I and I am sure many others will be sadded.

suggestion for shop-vac static, put a bead-chain around the vac end of the hose that dangles down to the floor, it will constantly diffuse the static because it is effectively grounded.

+1 Dane. The drag chain is effective as long as the floor is clean and not coated by a wax, finish, or epoxy. Unless the epoxy coating is designed for ESD(electro-static disapative) applications. I work for an electronics contract manufacturer, ESD is something we are trained on and review yearly. We keep our production floor at 40% humidity to reduce static build up. Our floor is coated with ESD epoxy coating but it expensive. But Boeing has done testing on in coated concrete and it test within their limits. Drag chains on any dust collecting units to a bare concrete floor, grounding wires for hoses(such as wrapped hoses) can be grounded directly to an outlet either using the screws for the cover plate or the ground lug only on an outlet. I believe Rockler now has anti-static hoses in 2-1/2 and 4″. You’re welcome to Google ESD and enjoy the sleeping material. One more thing as I had heard mention of wearing a foot or heal strap to carry static from the hose to ur body to ground, these only work if the strap is connected somehow to the skin of your foot or leg(a little moisture helps like sweat). These are dangerous during thunderstorms, you become a walking lightning rod. Be safe gentlemen.

Concerning Ryan’s email about static from the shop vac hose, Matt’s suggestion about the anti-static hose is the best course. Grounding your body would be counterproductive since, in this case, you are not the source of the static and you certainly don’t want to be part of the path it takes to ground. To be most effective, the anti-static hose needs to be bonded to a good ground. The bead chain to the concrete floor suggestion might be effective but a better course would be to establish a connection to the electrical ground or a metal water pipe in your shop.

I had a mishap in my shop that I thought I would share in hopes that others can avoid a similar situation. I was running my random orbit sander connected to my shop vac, sanding a table top between coats of poly. I had been hit by a couple of powerful jolts of static from the vacuum hose already but the third time it happened the shop vac and sander shut off. After a quick investigation I found the breaker tripped in the panel. It would not reset until I unplugged my sander. Turns out that the mini-lightning bolt that jumped from the vacuum hose traveled through my hand, through the plastic handle of the sander and zapped the variable speed control. Apparently the fine dust from the dried varnish has a lot of electrical charge, which it happily contributes to the vacuum hose as it rushes by.

After replacing the sander I rigged a drain wire on the hose until I could finish my project. I taped a bare copper wire to the first few feet of hose nearest the sander connection and connected it to a grounded metal box nearby. it was ugly and didn’t work perfectly but I didn’t ruin the new sander and didn’t get shocked nearly as badly while finishing my project.

A Veritas small plow plane can be used as a kerfing plane.

Put a 1/8″ blade in the plow plane. Then set the fence to half the board thickness, or a quarter of the board thickness, etc. Then plow all edges of the board to a suitable depth. You’ve then created a groove for your frame saw or panel saw to follow when when bisecting the board.

On Jonathans cane-crossgrain situation, it would seem you could ‘keep the look’ and reinforce with an epoxied spline – either wood with the grain horizontal – or as Frid showed in a rocker he built – an aluminum (or brass) spline plate sanded flush (looking a bit like a bridle joint when done

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