Are we entering a hand tool Renaissance?

[froglips]

Great insights! (imho) Bas.

I might need to stop picking on carpenters and call them contractors......

In talking with Roy and Chris (over beers), they did mention that the average age demographic they are tracking with is around 55 years old.

Excellent point on the performance of poor quality hand tools vs. power. I hope to add that to my bag of tricks.

Jim

 

[CarvedTones]

Some may disagree with me on this point, but I think that quality is more important than hand tools than in power tools. You can get reasonable results with a mid-range lunchbox planer, but dimensioning rough lumber with a cheap Stanley or Buck Bros plane, that's a tall order.

Not complete disagreement, but partial. I almost put that on my list. You can get greater precision with poor quality hand tools than you can with poor quality power tools. I don't recommend that you get nothing but low end junk, but for something you rarely need you can make the trade off of having to resharpen often or checking and making minor adjustments on a plane. Good saws seem to be able to magically follow a pencil line while lesser quality saws require some persuasion but can be kept on a line also. I have bought cheap power tools that were frustrating to use because they butchered the work or quit working completely. With hand tools, my disappointment is usually more with dulling quickly, easily wandering that's preventable but annoying and poor manufacturing that requires me to work on the tool before I work on the work. About the only thing an end user can't fix on a hand tool is quality of steel. The list for power tools is much longer.

Just to reiterate, I don't recommend getting only low end hand tools, but I think it is an important distinction to make that low quality hand tools can still yield quality work in the right hands. The same cannot be said for low quality power tools, especially ones that let the smoke leak out.

 

[Dean Maiorano]

A little poem for our cherished toyls...

hand tool old friend
thankful you didn't bend
to electric siren call
and like the calculator fall

:rotflm:

 

[Bas]

Just to reiterate, I don't recommend getting only low end hand tools, but I think it is an important distinction to make that low quality hand tools can still yield quality work in the right hands. The same cannot be said for low quality power tools, especially ones that let the smoke leak out.

I completely agree with your observation. The key element here being the right hands. A lunch box planer requires only a very small amount of skill: Plug it in, don't hog off too much. Advanced skills include waxing the tables and changing the knives nowand then. With hand tools, you need expertise to know when to switch from scrub to jack, you must be able to sharpen the blades accurately and consistently, understand how to deal with difficult grain, and master basics such as supporting and holding the boards.

I tuned up a simple Stanley block plane, and there are times when it suits my purpose better than my fancy Lie-Nielsen. That one I think I figured out. But using a Jack plane, my technique resembles someone whacking a tree with a sledge hammer. That's when I usually turn on the machine. But I keep trying.....

 

[leftoflefty]

It's funny I saw this topic. I plan on spending the next couple of days sharpening all of my chisels and planes.

I've just recently started to use hand tools, and I have to say I love it. While power tools may get things done faster, theres nothing like planing an edge and running your hand down said edge to feel what you've accomplished.

 

[Gofor]

Great thread!! Thank you!

Go

PS: Lots of good observations here. I enjoy reading threads like this.