Tips for Working with Wood

The PVC thread went over pretty well, so I thought I’d incite another thread along the same lines… anyone got any good beginner woodworking tips? Where are the carpenters at? I’ll start it out with one a lot of people know: SANDING: Sanding is obviously important—you don’t want to be testing those nice new stocks you made, only to get jabbed in the wrist by a splinter, or have a bad mark left on your neck by the angled edges. The answer to all that is sanding (and sealing too, if you want a great look… but I’ll post that later if nobody else does). First, you’ll want to cut it down close to the shape you want, if a little bigger. Remember, sanding takes wood off, so for surfaces that touch your skin, you want to leave a little extra wood on there when you’re cutting. You can always sand the hell out of it until it gets to just the right size. You’ll also find that the ideal time to sand is after doing all the cutting, but before attaching any metal hardware. If this doesn’t fit the plan for what you’re building, then I’m sorry—you’ll have to improvise. Sand it at first with a very coarse-grain sandpaper, 60-100 grit (lower numbers are ‘rougher’ and leave a rougher finish, but work faster… higher numbers are ‘smoother’ and take longer to get anything done, but leave a smoother finish behind). Sand all the surfaces, but /especially/ those that will be against skin while locked. Run your hands over the sanded surfaces with a good bit of pressure—you shouldn’t feel splinters. If you do, sand that area again. This is also the time to test-fit… if you close it and it’s too tight on wrists/ankles/other bits, then this is the sandpaper you want to use to make it larger. Get it fitting just /barely/ more snug than ‘just right.’ Move up to 250-300 grit next, and sand with that. Just give it a once over and check for splinters. You should be getting a decent finish by now. If you want your finish to be perfectly, velvety smooth, then go for 600-grit as a finisher. This sandpaper will clog up with sawdust almost constantly, but it’s worth it. Go over the whole thing again, about twice as much as you did with the middle-grade paper. After that, you should be done… one final check for splinters, and it’s playtime.;-) So there’s another brain-dumped factoid… anyone else care to jump on? Together we can replace that guy at Lowe’s who knows everything!;-P