I love looking at the whole range of tools all designed to accomplish the same task. The least expensive get the job done, eventually. The top of the professional line get it done in the blink of an eye. How about hanging drywall?Driving drywall screws is actually a complicated task. You need...
Styrofoam (which is actually a Dow Chemical brand name of extruded polystyrene) is a fairly good vapour barrier. It will not cause problems in the Canadian climate if you put on at least 1-1/2 inch thick and preferably in 2 ft. x 8 ft sheets applied horizontally. This actually permits some ...
Smart chargers can prolong the life of power tool batteries.Today, the only problem with memory in power tool batteries is in our own heads. Yes, we remember when power tools had memory problems but we just don?t want to remember that someone told us that power tools have no more memory. Can y...
The power miter box is the tool that drove the Radial Arm saw almost out of existence. Don?t get me wrong, I love miter boxes. But then again, I was the guy that wrote the book on how to use a Radial Arm Saw for precision furniture building. Most contractors only used their radial arm saws...
Power tools are generally designed to do one thing very well, and then with a change of blades or bits, they can often do a decent job on a few other tasks. Accessories, like handles and guides, usually enhance their initial design function. But what about all those other accessories?The dril...
Can you have it both ways? Now with battery converters, transformers that are the shape and size of your power tool batteries, you can plug your cordless tools into the wall when you need power and the batteries aren't charged. This 24volt battery converter was made by DeWalt.Well that was a goo...
One way to minimize chipping when cutting melamine with a circular saw is to turn it over so that the good side is down, as that side will chip the least. On the top side, where the saw blade comes up through the panel, score your cut line deeply with a knife first and then cut just barely away ...
The construction industry uses a lot of power nailers today. Most of these are pneumatic simply because driving a nail in with a single blow requires a tremendous amount of power. A hammer delivers much less power, which means hitting the nail many times to get the same job done. But power...
Crown molding is traditionally cut at a straight 45 degree miter with the molding sitting upright in the miter box. The only trick here is to realize that the saw bed is the ceiling, and the saw fence is the wall, so your molding is sitting upside down in the box. That was fine when we used...
When you cut Plexiglass with a jig saw, the plastic that?s been cut away often melts and closes the cut line behind the saw. Richard from Guelph, Ontario saw me struggling with this and suggested adding motor oil to the surface to lubricate and cool the scrap -- it does work.Probably most importa...
