No one ever reads the instruction books, even when they are written in something similar to English. But there are some gems of wisdom in there if you wanted to take the time.Burrs on drill bitsTake a look at the drill bit in the first photo. Does that burr on the side look familiar to you? Di...
Aside from the old fashioned mortise and tennon, or the longer tongue and groove, about the only way that craftsmen could join two boards together without hardware was to use dowels. Dowel joints were never precise, even though I have three different doweling jigs sitting on my shelf. But then ...
If you look at the first photo above you will see a very strange thing. I am running a vacuum hose down the backside of a toilet.In the second photo you see what I caught with that vacuum hose, a little ball of polystyrene.In the third photo you see where that little white ball belongs, on the i...
Scoring and snapping drywall is very easy, if you are not near the edge of the board.Sawing it is pretty messy and planing off the edge is long and messy as well when you just want to trim an inch or so from the edge.The secret is to have a special drywall edging tool that has two spiked wheels t...
Have you ever wondered why the centre drill of a hole saw is adjustable? You want it fairly long to get a good centred start before the hole saw hits the material, but if it is too long for the job, you will have problems.Look at the first photo and you will see that the drill is going to break o...
Chloe in Kincardine, Ontario uses a double open-ended wrench to carry heavy pails so that the handle wire doesn't cut into his hand.A slit garden hose can help as well.
When our camera was out in the renovation centre, one viewer posed the problem of having a cedar fence with the top foot rotten but the rest in good shape. Of course this was probably caused by a square top cut not being protected by a fence post cap. Look around and you will see that most fenc...
Zahava from Toronto, Ontario, has a tile that has come loose in a new floor and it makes a gritty sound when you walk on it.Start by cutting away all the grout around the offending tile. Cutting away the grout will liberate it from its neighbours. Then lift it out. It won't be stuck down becaus...
One trick to get melamine tape to stick to the edge of a board is to prime the edge with contact cement and let it completely cure overnight or better still for several days before ironing on the tape. This will provide a very good base for the tape adhesive to stick to.When it is time to trim o...
One viewer has sent in his tip that he can "see" the studs on his wall for hanging pictures by just holding a lamp close to the wall.It sounds fishy but it does work on some wall but not on others.It will not work on freshly painted, or well insulated walls.Actually he is not really seeing the st...
