Love Woodworking? Here are some tips to get you started!

DECEMBER 27, 2018

Getting started in woodworking can be easy if you are given a couple of beginner woodworking tips. In my opinion, the single most important thing to achieve success in any part of your life is vision. With that being said, you will need some materials, tools and solid woodworking plans to get you started. In this article, I share a couple of tips and tricks that I hope will help the novice woodworker in getting his hobby of the ground. These tips are my opinion and an opinion is like a nose, everyone has one and it usually have a couple of holes in it.  The first three tips I would say is the most important and the rest is just something extra that I would like to share.

Beginner woodworking tip. 1. Getting the right tools.

I enjoy reading books by people like Warren Buffet and yes, he does not write any woodworking books but please just bear with me for a minute. One thing that I have learned from MR Buffet that I have applied in every area of my life is the following.

Price is what you pay and value is what you get. At the end of the day you get what you pay for and with that in mind I would rather recommend getting high quality tools from the beginning than buying cheap imported Chinese junk at a discounted price.

If you have a limited budget then check out places like Ebay or Craigslist where you are bound to pick up great bargains on second hand woodworking tools.  My recommendation on power tools would be Makita, Dewalt, Festool and Milwaukee. Now yes I am sure we can argue for an eternity about this but remember this is just my opinion. Another aspect that should be taken rather seriously is the maintenance of your tools. If you take care of your gear then your gear will take care of you.

Beginner Woodworking tip. 2. Buying your wood.

Maybe I should have put this one first because you will need wood to be a woodworker. Now if you are buying wood then I would suggest you only start out with enough to finish your project and this is where planning comes in. You will need detailed plans with cutting lists to know the right quantity of wood needed for a specific project. Do not buy more than you need at first to avoid wastage of your wood supple, you can always go back and buy more if you need to in order to finish your project.Your basic woods like pine, oak and cedar are readily available from your local hardware stores but if you need something other than those mentioned then there are a couple of legitimate online timber supply companies that you can buy from. Again, a great place to pick up bargains is Ebay and Craigslist.Another great spot to get wood free or at a great price is either salvage companies or wooden pallets. Care must be taken with this type of timber because of nails that will most likely be in the wood so remove any before working with this wood.

Beginner woodworking tip.3. Accurate woodworking plans.

If I were to start all over again I would gladly fork out double the money for the woodworking plans that I bought. Unless you are an experienced woodworker, you will need decent accurate woodworking plans.

The best woodworking plans would tell you what tools you need, the materials needed with an exact cutting list, how to go about assembling your project complete with diagrams. This would be a solid investment that will save you thousands of dollars in wasted materials not to mention many hours of your precious time in figuring out how to construct a project.

Beginner Woodworking tip.4. Buy only from reputable dealers and sustainably harvested timber.

I add this one as a tip because I believe that it is our duty to protect our forest for future generations.

Most online timber merchants will be licenced to sell exotic species and will be able to tell you where the wood comes from so this is more a tip when buying from a private individual on Ebay or Craigslist. Try to ascertain where the person got the wood from and use a bit of common sense when buying wood. If a person lives in California and he is offering two meter wide Redwood slabs that are still wet then he probably poached the wood so don’t buy from someone like this unless he can provide proper paperwork.If however a person offers you cedar that looks weathered and he gives you pictures of an old barn that was taken down then you are good to go.The reason I add this is that poachers have driven some of the most remarkable wood species to the brink of extinction and we as responsible woodworkers should not have any part in that. In addition, the legal aspect should be considered if caught with wood that was acquired with questionable means.

Beginner Woodworking tip.5. Safety first.

Safety should always come first yes I did put it in fifth place but I am sure you get the point.

A few things that you would need are.

Hearing protection. Listening to a saw or planer does become rather annoying.

Safety glasses/goggles. Nothing will ruin your day like a splinter in your eye.Dust mask or respirator. In case, you work with woods like Tamboti and Black Stinkwood and please do not use Tamboti to cook your meat in a BBQ.

Steel toed safety boots are your best friend. Trust me on this one dropping a block of Leadwood on your foot will make you talk in languages.

Disposable gloves. Helps keep glue and resin off your hands.

Avoid loose fitting clothes. You don’t want clothing getting stuck in a planer or sander. You could also get one of those leather aprons that a blacksmith uses. this will protect your clothing.Invest in a saw stop table saw. This saw will automatically stop the blade should your hand or finger or any other extremity touch the saw blade.

Beginner woodworking tip. 6 Practice makes perfect.

The old adage slow and steady wins the race is so true here.  Start out with a small simple woodworking project before you attempt something more advanced. This is where Ted’s Woodworking is great because it gives you a difficulty rating on each project.

Remember that Rome was not build in one day. Many woodworking projects cannot be completed quickly and you are going to make mistakes. It is normal and do not be deterred if a project does not come out exactly as you wanted to.

Remember that practice makes perfect so start out with cheap woods like pine or maybe even pallet wood or reclaimed wood that you can pick up for next to nothing. It is far better on your pocket to make a mistake with pine than with something like African Blackwood.

Beginner woodworking tip. 7. Ask for help.

Do not be afraid to ask for help. Jump onto woodworking forums and communities on and ask for help. Explain you are new to woodworking and ask for recommendations. Most if not all the experienced woodworkers on those forums are more than willing to help.

Remember the only stupid question is the one that you do not ask.

Beginner woodworking tip. 8. Take care of your tools and keep them sharp.

Abraham Lincoln once said, “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four hours sharpening the axe.”

No that saying holds true in woodworking. Take care of your tools and sharpen tools like chisels on a regular basis to keep them razor sharp.

There are two reasons for this. One is that working with sharp tools are will make your life much easier and secondly when a tool is blunt accidents tend to happen.

Also, replace the blade on your table saw when you feel it blunting. A sharp blade won't tear at the wood like a blunt one will.

Most table saws have a cast iron top and this does tend to rust if not taken care of that is why it is a good idea to regularly give the saw top a coating of paste wax. This will not only help prevent rust but also give the top a slick surface for the wood to glide on.

Beginner woodworking tip. 9. Familiarize yourself with the material you work with.

Knowing the different characteristics of the material you work with is of utmost importance. Here there are many to take into consideration and thorough research on each wood species needs to be done before working with it.

A few factors that you may need to take into consideration is gluing the wood, health risks that the specific wood species may pose to humans and using wood screws on the wood. Now I only mention a couple but there are many other characteristics you have to take into consideration when working with wood. Take the time to get to know every wood type you work with.Woods like Tamboti and Matume are extremely oily woods and needs to be thoroughly cleaned with solvents like thinners or alcohol before gluing and even then, you need to use a glue that does well with oily woods. Many woodworkers recommend using bolts in conjunction with glue to hold the wood pieces together. I have worked with both those woods mentioned above and even after years the oil does not dry out so extreme measures need to be taken to make sure your woodworking projects does not fall apart after a while.Some species of wood can have real health risks that we need to take note of. Black Stinkwood sawdust can be an irritant that causes sneezing and Tamboti carries more extreme health risks.Tamboti sawdust and sap from the tree itself can cause blindness if it comes into contact with your eyes and a rash in sensitive people if in contact with your skin. The sap from this tree is also poisonous to the extend in causing death in humans if a small dose of four drops are ingested.However Tamboti is a stunning wood for the manufacture of high quality furniture if the proper safety precautions are taken.Some wood species like pine and other softwoods takes well to screws but other like Leadwood does not. I once attempted to put a screw into a Leadwood slab and broke it off. The general rule of thumb is that the harder a type of wood the harder it will take to screws that is why you may need to drill a pilot hole first before inserting a screw.

Beginner woodworking tip. 10. Clamps are your friend or enemy.

Clamps are probably one of the most used tool in the woodworker’s arsenal but they need to be used correctly.

If I buy clamps I look for something that has no teeth to damage the wood and preferably something that is covered with a soft rubber where the clamp comes into contact with wood.If you happen to have clamps with teeth on them then do not despair just put a piece of softwood like Pine between the wood you want to clamp and the teeth on the clamp itself.  The metal of bar clamps can react to glue to stain wood, a great tip to mitigate this problem is to take a piece of pvc pipe and cover the bar with it. This way the metal cannot react with the glue to stain the wood. Clamps should be cleaned from glue or stain after every use and a thin layer of oil applied to the clamps metal parts to protect from rusting, just remember to clean of the oil before you use it on the next project.

Beginner woodworking tip. 11. Sanding and using sand paper.

Yes sanding by hand does take longer that using a machine but it does not produce noise or dust and you will be able to get a finish that is better that when done with a machine.Sand with the grain of the wood especially with the later grits to take out all the sanding marks and give you a smooth finish.If you need to get into a curve on the project then take a magazine and bend it with the sandpaper wrapped around the magazine. The magazine with the sandpaper can be bend to whatever arc you need.When finishing a sanding project you sometimes need to be able to smooth the edges or get into nooks and crannies with the sandpaper but the problem is that, the finer grits are bonded to a much thinner paper and can tear easily. This can easily be solved by applying duct tape to the back of the sandpaper. In this way, you will have super strong sandpaper that will not tear no matter how rough you work with it.If you need to sand any concave form like a molding then just find a deep socket that fits the radius of the concave and bend the sandpaper around it, this works like a charm. It is manly to use nail files. You know those one that look like sandpaper on a wooden ice-cream stick. They come in real handy when you need to sand small projects so keep a couple of them in your wood shop.If the pad of your sander ever wears, thin and you cannot find a new one you can cut a foam beer can cover to shape and glue it onto your sander. Really does work.If you fold sandpaper in half it tends to slip on itself so just glue two pieces together and let it dry. Problem solved.

Beginner woodworking tip 12. Working with glue.

Ever noticed how the caps tend to stick to the glue bottles especially with glues like super glue or pvc cement? Well a quick hack to solve this is to apply a thin layer of petroleum jelly to the thread of the bottle before putting the cap back on. This will stop the glue from cementing on over time.Before gluing, any work piece lay a thin sheet of plastic on the work area and glue the project on top of the plastic. Any glue that drips of the project will fall onto the plastic and the plastic can then easily be thrown away leaving a clean workbench. It is better to do this than to clean of hard glue from the workbench. Do not let your glue freeze. Even one freezing and thawing cycle can render your glue useless. So if you live in a colder environment then keep your glue warm.Rather use too much glue that too little. If you do not use enough glue you will get a starved joint that will be weak. Too much on the other hand will need cleaning up but in my opinion, it is better than to little. With practice, you will be able to apply the correct amount of glue that will require far less clean up.Instead of using the bottle that the glue comes in transfer it to an old mustard bottle. They reseal much more easily and they do not clog.Use an oral syringe filled with glue to inject glue into hard to reach corners and crevasses, cleaning the syringe is ease, just add hot water.If possible, scrape of squeezed out glue after about 20 minutes while the glue is still soft. I will not remove the clamps at this stage so just clean up around the clamps and leave the rest for later.Another great tip to help with cleaning up afterwards is to put a vinyl tablecloth on your workbench and work with your project on top of that. The hard glue can easily be peeled from the tablecloth leaving your workbench clean. Store your glue bottle upside down. This way you will not have to wait for the glue to slowly trickle down to the top of the bottle for you to squeeze it out.If you need to repair a crack in a piece of wood were you will not be able to get glue in use this idea. Put the clue over the crack and take a piece of unwaxed dental floss and drag it back and forth through the glue thereby flossing the glue into the crack. Now just clamp it and let the glue dry. Bingo crank repaired.