Pragmatic - 120- Vic’s Workshop

0:00Shut the door to the TARDIS and do your thing, I'm ready. Okay, I'm doing my thing. Any second now, once I open the right window I will. Okay. Here we go, right. Welcome to Pragmatic. Pragmatic is a show about technology and contemplating the finer details in their practical application. By exploring the real world trade-offs, we dive into how great ideas can be transformed into products and services that impact our lives.

0:37Pragmatic is entirely supported by you, our listeners, and if you'd like to support us and keep the show ad free, you can by becoming a premium supporter. Our premium support is available via Patreon and through the Apple Podcasts channel subscription. Premium supporters have access to early release, high quality versions of episodes as well as bonus material from all our shows, and it's not available anywhere else. Just visit engineer.network.pragmatic to learn how you can help this show to continue to be made. Thank you. I'm your host, John Chiggy, and today I'm once again joined by my good friend,

1:07Vic Hudson. How's it going, Vic? I am good, John. How are you? I am just dandy. Thanks for asking. I have been wanting to do the main topic for this episode for a very long time and we'll get to what it is in a minute, but just no surprises yet. But yes, so yeah, but I am excited. You picked a good one. I sure did. Anyhow.

1:30So just to kick us off, though, just a little bit of news what's happened since the last time, well, either you and I caught up or. listeners of the show caught up was the last episode I had clay on. But so first of all, the big news in my, I guess you could say, sporting career, which is to say it's not really a career. In fact, it's not even a career at all. But that's fine. It's cricket. And so Ben's my third born son, right? And he is an avid cricketer and has been for years. And we've been playing at the one cricket club for He's been playing at that cricket club for many, many years and he said to me over the years, I'll be great if we played a season of cricket together when he was in seniors. So this wasn't a school thing? No, not at all. No, no, no. It's an independent club. And so we got selected in division six, which is quite frankly the lowest division I've ever played in my entire life. You show up when you feel like it, you bowl if you're not too sore.

2:24If you land on the pitch most of the time, that's probably okay. And if you're the wicketkeeper, consider whether or not you want to hold my beer between over this sort of thing. It's not, and I mean, that's an exaggeration, I guess, but it's sort of, it's laid back and relaxed or rather it's supposed to be. But then when we noticed happening is that we had some players that also played in the next grade up, grade up like four and even a couple of ones higher than that, which is technically not really in the spirit of the game, shall we say. In any case, it got towards the end of the season and we'd already won every single game because the team was stacked with really, really high, like really good quality cricketers. So people who should never have been playing in Div 6 and I was out in the field and it's like, at best I was a Div 4 player, at best. But the reality was, you know, there were people in that team that were far better than me and it showed because we just kept winning every single game and not just by a little bit. So Ben and I had fun.

3:21But then in the last few games, things got really serious in terms of they just wanted to win the semifinal and the grand final. And so anyone that they considered was not good enough just got benched. And it started with me. And they said, well, you know, we want to go ahead with our strongest team or we won't make the semifinals, which was not true since we'd already made the semifinals. That's just it was just they wanted to tell me a reason why they benched me. It was pretty simple. I just wasn't.

3:48to the standard that they wanted. It was supposed to be relaxed and kick back and so on anyway. And then Ben, he then got kicked out on the grand final and the reason they gave him that he got cut out of the grand final was that he wasn't showing up to training enough. Of course, that also wasn't true. So.

4:05It was all very political in the end and the leadership at the cricket club just wanted to win the grand final. So when winning is all that matters, I can understand their rationale. It was frustrating for us because we just wanted to play a season of cricket together. Right. And the way that we were treated by the club, it clearly demonstrated the club's priorities. Ben and I just decided we won't go back to that club. So it was kind of a bit of a disappointing end to the season.

4:31But the games that we did play together we had a great time and yeah it was it was I'm glad I did it that's awesome yeah I know right I'm glad you guys are good with it well I mean this has happened like can I be clear this happened like two and a half months ago so I've gotten had some time and space to get over it okay we're gonna move on because I don't want to go on about it I'm over it.

4:53It's just, you know, I wanted to, I wanted to mention that I actually did play the most of a season of cricket with my son, which is a longstanding promise that I'd made to him years ago. And I'm so glad I did it. And that's the best part, honestly. It was, it was a great experience. And I'll have those memories when we're out fielding together. And when he was bowling, I was bowling or whatever. And we'll have those, and we actually batted out together in the middle together twice. So that's awesome. You know, like those memories I'll have for the rest of my life. So it was well worth it.

5:23That's the stuff moving on so after four and a half years of faithful service my AirPods Max original AirPods Max's I they started to misbehave and by that I mean. They wouldn't shut off so you know you get your you get your stuff and you shove that's a bummer you get your stuff and you shove it in the bra you know I'm saying like you shove it in the bra and it fits good and there's no spillage or anything and it doesn't turn off.

5:52It just bleeds flat. That's not so there was some. No, because what I meant was that every single time I went to use it, you take it out of the bra, you know, you get him out and you would have to plug it into charge for half an hour before you could use it because they were dead because they never shut off. Yeah. And because when they were, when they died.

6:14they were still connected to the last device. So they remember trying to connect to that device. And then it's stuck in this weird, I won't connect loop. So then you got to press down and hold both the buttons for a minute. I think it's 30 seconds, 60 seconds, one of the other. And it forces it to reboot after which you can then connect it to a device and then use them again. So I got sick of doing this. I was doing this for like two months. And I'm like, you know what? I use these by put them in the bra. You mean the case, right?

6:42Yes, the case they call the bra. Is that an Apple term or is that an Australian term? No, that's an Apple geek term. And it's meant to be, I don't know, ever so slightly judgy that it is an absolutely design.

6:57I'm just way too far out of the Apple loop then because I actually had never heard that phrase before. Yeah. Well, they, yeah, I wasn't the one that coined the phrase. I forget who it was, but someone in the Apple sphere coined the phrase, the, um, the AirPods bra. So it's not a fish or Apple, but it's not official Apple. Okay. Apple would never call something a bra. That would be some kind of sexual connotation that they couldn't handle. That's the question anyway. Okay. As you were. No.

7:24If it was run by Elon Musk who would call it all sorts of crazy stuff and there would be a, there'd be a fart mode. You don't want a fart mode on your AirPods. What's the matter with you man? Come on. No. No. All right. All right. All right. All right. No more Musk talk. But yeah, so I upgraded finally to the AirPods Max 2 and these are the newest ones. I had to wait for them to come out.

7:48And instead of getting blue, I got black this time. And actually, they look pretty fire as my oldest son said. Nice. Damn, these look fire and black. I'm like, yeah, they look good. Thanks, Al. That term I'm familiar with. Good. Well, we got kids of similar ages, right? So, yeah. All right. So they are fantastic. And because I use them for podcasting from time to time.

8:15Um, you know, I, yeah, they are seeing, I see them as a, as a podcast expense. So they were a great investment and I've been using them because I use them for editing, uh, because you can tune out and do all the noise cancellation testing and so on and so forth, make sure everything's all nice and clean. And everyone says my audio sounds lovely and clean. And yeah, yeah. Part of it's come down to the editing. So I use it for editing. So that's cool. All right. So moving on. Nice. Moving on. Uh, John has a new shed. And by that, I mean.

8:41I have a slab on the ground and I'm waiting for the shed to materialize on top of it, which it will hopefully next week. So what I'm hearing is you have a patio. I don't even know if I'd call it a patio. There's no cover. There's no shade. There's no nothing. There's just a slab and some metal. Yeah, that's a patio. That's a pretty s*** patio.

9:08Anyway, at least here in America it is. Okay. Well, I got a concrete slab in the middle of my front yard. Yay. Anyway, that's fine. It has potential shed energy. So this concrete slab is eventually going to have walls in a roof? Yes, eventually. Okay. All right. But not for the TARDIS, just the cars. No, just for cars this time. So yeah, because basically the problem is that Housing is so expensive now in Australia that my kids are, we're struggling to get them their own place. Like they can't, like they're trying to get jobs that pay enough money to save for a deposit to get a house. It's absolutely horrible. Right. Yeah. Even a unit apartment, things that used to be cheap and just not. So I've sort of reached the conclusion that my kids aren't leaving home anytime soon simply because I can't afford to in the market in Australia, which is terrible. Are you going to build them apartments out there by the tortoise? No, I'm not.

10:03But what I am doing is I'm accepting the fact that I'm gonna have six cars, mine, my wife's and then one for each of the kids because my youngest is in four months time. I thought you only had three. You got four? I got four kids. Yeah, I got four kids. Okay, I missed one somewhere. I'm very sorry. You do. So you should be, mate. I really should be. The number of children I have.

10:24is not the first thing you wake up in the morning. You would think I'd know this at this point. I very sincerely apologize. That's all good, man. It's fine, but the whole concept was- I thought you had two boys and one girl. I have three boys and one girl. So yes. I apologize to the missing Chiji son. Yeah, the youngest, yes. His name is Sam, my youngest, and he is quite- He's the quietest and yet spiciest of all of them. So yeah, the kid's got attitude to spare and he doesn't let you know until you least expect it. So you're not going to boot them out to the garage with the tortoise. You're just not yet building extra car housing for the vehicles and leave them in the house. Yeah, basically. Yes. For now.

11:10So it adds value to the property and I vote for at least one or two of the older ones getting an apartment with the tortoise. Yeah. Well, I'll see what they say about that. I'll say, Hey, I've got a ready made room. You can only stand up in it, but it's otherwise really warm after about five minutes. No, not in the tortoise with the tortoise. Oh, so you can look at this.

11:31You can look at this unpainted potential TARDIS. Yes, you can. I really should paint this blue. It's on the to do list, but you know, paint is expensive. Seriously, though, all jokes aside, like if you could build a little apartment out there, that's a good, like halfway step out to being on their own. It is. And that's true. And I did look into and we have considered the option of building these things these days. The coined term is a tiny home, but.

11:57Traditionally, it's been referred to as a granny flat whatever you want to call it the idea is we could because I've got a whole acre So I could easily build a second house so long as it's not more than 100 square meters, whatever that is in square feet. But in any case, so it can't be any more than about because my house is big, right? It's a five bedroom house with a built-in garage. So it's like 224 square meters is what I've got. Nice. Single floor, single story. Yeah, it's a big house, but it's, you know, it also gets crowded and noisy with four kids. Oh, yeah. Going on. But anyway. Yeah. So I have looked at it. You're almost not cheap. It's not going to be for a while.

12:36All right. I want to keep moving because I'm conscious of the time and the next thing I want to quickly mention. Oh, no, no, you do apologize, man. The next thing I want to talk about is I have now gotten into roasting my own coffee. Finally, because I thought about this four years ago. Yeah. But funny thing is I threw this out there and I copied Marco. Hey, I finally started roasting my own coffee and then he came back with you. I stopped roasting mine a few years ago. Man, did I miss that memo?

13:05And I'm like, it's not like I was doing it. So you've gone for Marco after Marco abandoned Marco. Yeah, something like that. So I got to see if Marco wants to come back on so we can just sort of like describe like what his thought process was because things in the roasting will come a long way and I don't want to go into it too much. He's probably just buying it from one of the sponsors or something. I have to confess I haven't listened to ATP in a long time so I'm not sure what he's doing.

13:30I did see, I think he's owning a restaurant now. Is that correct? Yeah. That's right. Yeah. So I went off ATP there for a while because, and I usually get Jack of it during the speculation season with Apple because there's nothing that I can't stand. The one thing I really cannot stand. Because nobody really knows anything. Everybody's just guessing. Yeah. It's like, well, there was a leak. There was a render.

13:56There was a someone, you know, got out there Ouija board and someone from a past life in the future said, isn't there always. I just can't deal with that. Because I'm just like, well, it could be this. It could be that. I don't care. Look, I realize you guys want to talk about stuff. That's great. But I even back when I was really.

14:15deeply into the whole, you know, Apple blogosphere, that still irritated me back then. Now I'm just older and crankier. I'm even less interested in it. So normally I go cyclically with ATP. So anyway, but yeah, I have been listening to ATP on and off a little bit recently and making gratuitous use of chapters to skip to the good bits that I want to listen to. But the reality is that Marco has just for whatever reason gone off of roasting. But when he was doing it, he was using an old school Well, old school, but you know, like a larger bit more, I think it was a bit more 2400 or 1200 roaster, which is like a drum roaster. If I remember correctly, that sounds familiar. Yeah. Yeah. Whereas if I had to guess, it's probably got to do with that whole, you know, he's got a family and a kid and apparently now a restaurant and he's still running overcast and some things got to go, man. Yeah. Well, that's true. And so what I've done is I've gotten one that's more like an air popcorn popper.

15:13If you've ever seen an air pop, right? I have one of those. We actually love it. Oh, that's our favorite method of making popcorn. Yeah, it's really good. You never get burnt kernels. Yeah, I know, right? It's really, really cool. So this one is a company in New Zealand called Cafe Logic, and they've released this product that essentially is a precision popcorn popper, but for coffee. And it's really.

15:36Yeah, it's really, really good. So you tell it as pre-configured profiles. So I'm guessing as soon as they get like perfectly roasted, they're light enough that they just blow out.

15:44Not exactly, but it does the blowing out that what it does is it blows the chaff off. So all of it. Ah, okay. So the chaff gets blown up to the top and then it's sort of like the the turbulence catches it in a special catcher. It actually works incredibly well. It's a beautifully engineered product. I like it and it's within 12 to 15 minutes. You can roast about 100 grams of coffee, which is enough for me for probably three days maybe. That's not bad. Depending on how many I have.

16:14And the freshly. Yeah. And the freshly roasted stuff is the best. Like I don't even let it sit. Like you can do ready to drink where they roast it a certain way to certain temperature profiles such that it degasses very quickly so you can basically just drink it. Right. So anyway. Yeah. So I need to do see if I wanted to see if Mark wants to come and talk about it. We'll see. No promises. But in any case. All right. Sweet. I want to keep moving. Right. All right. Last one before we get stuck into the main topic. And that is.

16:42I have become increasingly annoyed with, well, a lot of things because I'm getting old, but specifically AI. And I don't mean AI in totality, but I mean the people that are using AI way more than they should. Now, I've been- Would you mean the fake AI generated content forms by any chance? Yes. Yeah, that kind of s***. Yeah.

17:07Somebody might have got that idea from your last episode. Yeah, well, hopefully not. But yeah. No, no, no. You should plug back. I was trying to hook you up, man. No, no, man. The last episode about photography and AI and everything, though, this is what in the context of... It relates. Yes. In the context... And Clay was the bomb. In the context of the network and what I produce is what I mean. So... Right.

17:34I decided to write an AI policy for the engineer network. So everything that I create, I now have written and will follow an AI policy. And by that I mean an AI usage policy. So basically, the only thing that I used AI for ever was transcription. So I used a large language model, which is MacWhisper. And the MacWhisper model I use is the large model from Geez, whichever one he pulled it from, I forget now. And I use that to create a rough starting transcript. Think I heard Scott talk about this a while back. Yeah, we did. Is that the same one? Yeah. Okay. So, yeah, so I use that. And, but what I do is I only publish those to my feed as in the source.

18:21Transcript file to my feed once I have vetted it myself with my own eyeballs I will take that and listen to the episode and make any of the corrections that I need to and I only have done that. For about 10 episodes of causality because it's a lot of work. So I don't accept that an LLM or an automatically generated transcript is is just good enough because they regularly.

18:44Terrible varying levels of terrible and my problem is that because my shows particularly causality are very heavy in things like Technical terminology measurements, you know like standard units, you know things like well like whatever it might be Words that normal LLMs will struggle with you know I have to go through rating it and then very carefully betting Yeah, because doing it that way is actually quicker than me typing it and whilst it is a scripted show. Oh, yeah It still takes time. Yeah, exactly. But whilst it is a scripted show, what I can't do is automatically turn that script into timestamps. So I can't just say, hey, create a timestamped SRT file or VTT file that's based on this text because it doesn't know how fast I'm reading. So it's the best way to go in my opinion. So but what I have said though is that I had it's only been one person and you know, I maybe it's an overreaction. I don't

19:39think so because as far as I'm concerned, it's a fair statement to make. Someone came back and had a query slash correction for a transcript file. Then I did not. It wasn't one of my transcripts. So this was many, many months ago. This is like six months ago. This is not an overcast one. This was some other system. And I can't even remember which one I was now to be honest thing was even on Android. But so some other software had transcribed one of my episodes got it horrifically wrong. And they were calling to get me to correct my transcript file. And I'm like, but I haven't done a transcript of that episode. So, you know, no. So I bound added to the policy. Look, um,

20:19If it's not vetted by me by my eyeballs, then it is not an official transcript and I will and no correspondence will be into at all like I'm going to respond to you like if you come back and say fix your transcript on episode that was what I generated by I don't care what if it wasn't vetted by me sourced from my rss feed get bent I'm not I'm not talking to you because this is the kind of end result of you better generate an auto reply for that one something like that So yeah, it's really it's it kind of stuck in my neck a bit and I thought about what can I do about it? And the answer is simple. I haven't used AI to generate artwork. I haven't used AI to generate show notes. I haven't used AI for music. I haven't used AI for anything at all. And I just wanted to state that loudly and proudly if I may, to say that you know what? This show is actually made by a human for other humans. That's it. And I think that in coming years, this is actually going to be a big deal.

21:14Because I think that people will say, I think I agree. Yeah. So I wanted to get ahead of the game and say, you know what? Here's my policy. Suck on it. Or words to that effect. Anyway. Here's my policy. Here's the policy. Suck it. If you need AI to do this for you. Please tell me you're gonna edit that. Probably gonna. I don't know. I'm just I'm pissed off, man. I'm really sick of it. It's like these these People are generating content that don't know what they're talking about that don't spend the time and effort that I do. And they're trying to pass their office credible and it's crap right. It's just I can't even a I get it. I get it and I agree anyway. Yes. All right. That's it for me. So so what's been happening with you. I have no news. Let's get on with the show.

22:09Oh, excellent. Well, thank you for the update. Appreciate that. That was fantastic. I'm pretty eager for this one. All right. Well, then without further ado, Vic, over to you. You're not even going to announce what we're talking about? Okay. All right. Here's the lead-in. Dear listener, in my past, in my youth, I did two classes at school that were relevant to this conversation. One of them was metalwork, where I learned that metal splinters really do burn like a ****.

22:39They do. For this reason. They do. You are not wrong. Oh yeah, and welding is really hot and horrible. So I decided that metalworking was not for me, but the one thing I loved doing was woodwork. And unfortunately, because I had more of an academic bent, I left my woodworking learning experience more or less there until more recent years. When I decided it would be a good idea to build this podcasting booth that I'm actually recording this in right now. AKA the TARDIS. The TARDIS. That's right. And this thing is, is she a bit ramshackled around the edges and not held together by duct tape, mind you. Better than duct tape. It's some really long ass screws and anyway, but we'll get to that. So I thought it would be fantastic if

23:32Because this is something that you actually know a heck of a lot more about than me, and you're far more embedded than me. And not only that, you've actually made money selling your stuff. So I had some money. I wouldn't say a lot, but I made some. OK, well, that's more than I've ever made from anything I've made out of wood, to be honest. I mean, the best I've got is this podcast booth, and it hasn't fallen on my head yet. So I'm going to call that a win. But no, that is a win. Anytime the project doesn't fall on your head is a win. Because I've had some fall on my head, man.

24:01All right, so where do you want to start? So we are going to talk about woodworking and I'm officially about to take this one over so all you commenters in the past that said Vic doesn't contribute much to quote Chiggy from Raythear suck it and you can edit that if you want. See how I feel. See how I feel.

24:25I just wanted to do it. So let's talk about some woodworking, John. I have a question for you. What makes someone a woodworker? Man, this is full-on robot on Knott's territory. I think a woodworker would be... You don't think it's almost like somebody gave you the answer in some notes? I'm not reading from the answer from the notes. I want to tell you what I actually think. So I'm intentionally not looking at the notes. Can I? Okay, go.

24:54Okay. In my, okay. My, I'm not, I'm not cheating. A woodworker is somebody that obviously creates things with wood for either artistic or practical purposes. And I guess they do it regularly enough that it becomes something that they have some level skill at. Okay. Because I don't, because I don't, if I had A painting that I'm hanging on the wall and I'm putting a nail into a bit of wood on the wall. That doesn't count as woodwork. I mean, technically I'm putting a nail in wood. Maybe that's not really the same thing, but you could argue if I'm putting nails in wood to make a box, that's woodworking. No, that's just decorating the house. Yeah. Okay. Sure. All right. Hanging the painting. Not the box. What's the right answer? In my opinion, this answer is basically the same.

25:44From absolute beginner all the way to pro and this is where a lot of people get intimidated and they don't even start because they don't think they can But all the way from beginner to pro anybody who cuts or shapes some wood and possibly joins two or more pieces together That's it you do either of those two things or those two things combined you're a woodworker and I had originally Put someone who cuts her shapes would and joins two or more pieces together. But then I actually got to thinking about it and I was like, you know, if there's a guy out there with a wood lathe just turning out chess pieces, he's not joining pieces together, but he's still a woodworker. Yeah. So shapes would is definitely there and then possibly joins two or more pieces together. Okay. No matter how they do it, no matter how fancy they do it, how complicated they do it or how elaborate they do it.

26:40You're shaping some wood with saws, sandpaper, chisels, whatever, and possibly also joining it together. And that's it. You're a woodworker. Cool. Yep. There are people that'll say, you know, go pro, go home, go pro or go home, all that business. And you're not a real woodworker, but that's that's bull. Yeah. I mean, it's just, you know, it's a hobby that's fantastic for anybody to get into. And if you start cutting or shaping or sanding some wood and.

27:09And or possibly joining two or more pieces together, you're a woodworker and you have a fantastic hobby and possibly even a source of income in the future. Excellent. I think, um, well, I don't know where I'm going to put myself on the scale, but maybe when we're, when we're done, maybe I can go back and review and assess where I land on that scale of beginner to, yeah.

27:31But anyway, have you got any critiques on that description? Any feedback or pushback or? No, I think that's I think that's better than my attempt. Yeah, I think that's fine because I mean, I would say there's also different kinds of woodwork, like for example, like turning wood. Most definitely. Yeah, it's like turning wood on a lathe is a very different kind of woodworking to just doing basic joints and.

28:00then you've got structural and non structural. So you could say, well, I'm building out like this podcast booth was was a structural build. You know, if I've got a table, I'm building a table and chairs. Then, you know, that's that's different again from if I'm building a planter box or or whatever else. So I can I can see there's different kinds within that. And yeah, anyway, yeah. Well, you've definitely got your different tiers. And I would actually I should say I've been remiss as we go through these notes.

28:29Uh, feel free to throw in wood lathe when you feel we're at the appropriate level because I actually completely overlooked that. I don't have a ton of experience in that. So I haven't thought about it. Okay. I don't know. We'll see. Uh, anyway, we're going to start at beginner. So nobody should really feel intimidated or afraid to try this. A lot of people have the impression that you need a ton of fancy tools.

28:57or expensive gear to get started, or that you've got to start right away with expensive hardwoods and stuff like that. And I want to say that's complete BS. You really don't. It's just nobody should be intimidated or afraid to give this a try. You need no fancy or expensive tools to get started. All you really, really need is a few basic tools and some wood glue. And that's going to take you a long way to learn this.

29:26And it's a really fun hobby and you're going to learn a lot on the way and you're just going to have fun creating with it. You can start out with a construction lumber or inexpensive fence pickets, which I started with and I made a lot of things with all of these. And you'll make a lot of great projects. And I want there's like, if you go down into like woodworking YouTube or Facebook groups and stuff like that.

29:54You're going to really quickly be intimidated by a lot of people that want you to use fancy joinery right off the bat, fancy hardwood or exquisite exotic hardwoods right off the bat. But at a beginner level, I want you to repeat after me when I say this. Pine is fine. Pine is fine. Pine is fine. Yes. And by pine.

30:23I mean go down to your local in the U.S. that's Lowe's and Menards and Home Depot and places like that or even Ace Hardware stuff like that and you're going to get construction grade two before which is a two by four but I like to say two before just because it's fun.

30:48and one by material, which is like one by twos, one by fours, one by sixes, one by eights, one by tens, but they're all made out of inexpensive pine and they're not great fancy cuts of wood, but they are.

31:03cuts of wood and you can make a lot of really cool things from i made a really beautiful child's picnic table which you may or may not be looking at in chapter right now for my grandchildren and it was all from construction grade two by fours i did it looks incredible yeah i did put some extra work into it i mean to be fair this is not a beginner level project this is more of an intermediate because i broke out the router and the power sander and I really, you know, this was literally for my own grandchildren. So I rounded off all the edges. I smoothed all the edges. There was a lot of sanding. There was a lot of finishing going. You wouldn't look at this picture of this picnic table and assume it was construction tube by force because I did a lot of work to it. But by doing all that work yourself, if you have the tools, you can keep the cost of the materials dirt cheap. I literally had like

31:58maybe 30 40 bucks into that picnic table and materials. The rest of it was just my time. And I just made it really, really nice for my grandkids. I was so proud of it. It's probably honestly one of my most one of the projects I'm the most proud of. I just I love the look of it. It makes me want to sit at it, even though I realized that it probably wouldn't take my ass too big. I would give you the same advice that I gave my grandchildren's parents, which is my son and his wife.

32:26You take a notion you want to sit on it, sit on the top. Because while the bench will hold you, it's strong enough you're going to flip over. It's got to hurt. Yeah. No, it's sweet. It looks really good. So I mean, you can make a lot of things from just construction grade lumber. And I also made a, I have made a ton of project from very expensive cedar fence pickets.

32:56In the us here, we can get them depending on where you're shopping and what time of the season you're shopping. Literally like less than three dollars a picket and you can make a ton of stuff from that. You can say in them, you can cut them, you can make them smaller, you can shape them, you can do whatever you want to. I made a bunch of stuff from cedar fence pickets. Uh, probably at the top of the list was planner boxes. Those are They're kind of a big thing here in the States. I don't know if they are in Australia or not. Not so much, but I do know what they are.

33:30Yeah, you could just make lots of different shapes and size planter boxes that people could put plants in. They can grow tomatoes and or flowers or decorate their porch or whatever with and depending on your market in the States, you can actually sell those and make a ton of money. In my particular market, there's a ton of people selling those so you can't make a ton of money unless you really stand out. But yeah, they're still a fun project to make nonetheless and.

33:58You can make a lot of things out of them. I even made the household items out of them. I made a box for my wife to keep her makeup brushes in. I made little tables and trays to put my cat food bowls on, which later because the cats were freaked out by the food bowls up off the floor, it just turned into a little tray after I cut the legs off of it. It had legs once. You can make, I'm.

34:22Yeah, I made a little stand to hold the coffee pods for my coffee maker. You know the single serving pod maker. I just, you know, I cut three pieces of wood and sanded them and shaped them and drilled some holes in them so that the little pods just sat right in it. You know, you can just do a lot of fun stuff with pine and cedar and just cheap lumber.

34:49That just gives you something to work with while you get your hands familiar with the tools and the techniques and and the practice of, you know, refining your your projects and cutting and shaping and drilling and sanding and all that kind of stuff. What I love about pine is it's cheap, it's light and it's really easy to work with and and it's very easy to work with. Yeah. And just.

35:14Yeah, all of those reasons combined just make it perfect to work with. The only downside, I would say, of pine is potentially longevity, but if you treat it properly, it can last a decent amount of time anyway. Some of the heavy woods, depending on what you're using it for. If it's bearing load and stuff like that. But I mean, having said that, this podcasting booth's made out of pine.

35:39So, you know, it isn't your right. It's not the strongest of what you can use. And like, depending on what you want to make out of it, you might want to take it home and let it sit in your garage for a few weeks to a month before you use it just to let it kind of stabilize because like pine has really has a tendency to kind of warp as it dries out and stuff. Yeah. And if you make something with it too soon, then that can have negative effects on your project a few weeks down the road. Yep. I experienced that with this.

36:09Booth because mm-hmm. Yeah, the, um, well, this pine was straight when I bought it. Uh-huh. Two months later. Why is the top end not the same as the bottom? Well, like checking my squares and everything. I mean, we are talking about construction lumber. So to be fair, like when they buy, when.

36:30people buy these and they construct homes and structures with it. They put it into a frame. So it's got like a top plate and a bottom plate and a header board and a footer board and stuff like that that kind of, you know, it one two by four that tries to warps not going to warp the whole wall because there's like 16 others next to it every foot and a half apart. So that's a good point. But when you're making smaller projects, that is something to think about. Yeah.

36:57But I did end up having to put some additional bracing in it to just to square it up and it's fine. Like straighten it out a little bit. Yeah, just a little bit. But it was fine in the end. Well, and you were making a, I can't remember the exact dimensions of your tortoises. Is it five by five or four by four? Yeah, it's four by four. Yeah, I think it's the basis four by four. Yeah. And the height is eight foot.

37:21If those were longer walls, one warped two by four wouldn't do much of damage to it. But since you're dealing with such short walls, that's that then there can really manifest. Yeah. Anyway, did not mean to derail. Please continue. Yeah. No, no, no, no, you're good. So we've discussed what kind of woods are good to get started with. John, what kind of tools do you think you need just to get started? What's the entry level? Do you think? Well, the first and most obvious one is a drill. And I mean, by that, I mean a hand drill.

37:51Drill presses hold another conversation, but the drill and yeah, and just a basic hand drill and these days you can get drills that have got. God, I'm trying to move the technical name for it. I'm sure you can help me out, but the talk setting for when you're doing in screws and you want to over talk screws. The clutch. The clutch. Yes. Thank you. Yes. And then you've got, yeah. And of course then you can leave them on drill mode such that they don't do that.

38:21And so, and basic ones will have a forward and a reverse so you can back it out if you have to. And generally they're pretty cheap, lightweight, and the obvious thing that goes with a drill are your drill bits. And I'd say that that is the absolute starting point. If we're not going to talk about hammers and stuff, but I mean, technically, I guess a hammer and some kind of cutting tool. Hammer's kind of a gimme, I think, because most households have a hammer of some sort. Yeah, I mean.

38:48I've got myself a hammer and everything looked like a nail. So that was fun. Sorry. Yeah. Anyway. No, no, no, no. Good boy. Nail and everything. When you got a hammer, every problem becomes a nail. Damn straight it does and it feels good. Anyway, bottom line is a drill, drill bits and something to cut it with, whether it's a hand saw or something a little bit more. Well, yeah, I guess.

39:16If you look at power tools, you'll be looking at circular saws and jig saws, I guess. Right. Yeah. Probably the circular saw, I would say is a great first saw, but you can most definitely go a long way with a hand saw. Anything you can use, you know, to cut your two by fours and your, your fence pickets and stuff into, into smaller pieces will work just fine. I mean, I survived without a circular saw until like I was just using a hand saw up until.

39:44probably two years before I built this thing. So it would have been six years ago. So about six years ago was the first circular saw I'd ever bought. Right. Yeah. So I did have a, oh no, I tell a lie. That's not true. When I did the flooring for this house, when we first moved in 22 years ago, we bought a sliding compound mitre saw so that we could cut all of the click together floorboards. Right.

40:11And after we've done the whole house because it was cheap, the thing was completely knackered and we had to throw it out. That does happen. Well, it happens when you're not very good at using one and it just got trashed but never mind. I wonder if you could have saved it was like a new blade or anything early. Had you done more damage to it than that? Well, it was permanently attached to the slide mechanism. So you couldn't detach the circular saw and use it.

40:39The whole well, that's the way a writer saw work. Well, yeah. Okay. But my point is that the slide mechanism got. Oh, that's what you made it. Yeah. Yeah. How did you know? This is your show. I'm not going to shame you. No, I don't know. Okay. Let's be clear. So I did you let one of the kids use this.

41:02If you've got to realize this is 22 years ago, my kids were like, my son had only just been born at that point. So my daughter was what, in 10 months? Hang on. No, she'd be a year and something year and three months old. Some of that. I forget whatever it was year and a half. I don't even remember, but she was not that old. So no, she did not use the compound. I was being helped out by my brother in law and my father in law. So.

41:29And they did such a great job, I would never disparage them and say that maybe they did it. I just know that I didn't do it. But for the reference in time in history, let's just say it's my fault. They helped a lot and I do and I am grateful for their help. But at the same time, I'm never doing that again. That was very, that was not a fun time. That was three days of torture, but that's OK. Fair enough. OK, before we move on beyond a drill and a saws, it's worth mentioning that an impact driver.

41:57can be helpful and handy, but they're not really necessary to start. And for those unfamiliar, what an impact driver is, is it's it runs on a different mechanism than a drill. A drill is an old fashioned wire, brown wire bound motor with brushes or brushless technology that spins the motor and pretty much it doesn't stop.

42:21And if you've ever used a drill to try and drive a screw into like not necessarily hardwood, but even softwood like a two by four, you know, you'll reach a point where it stops and then it tries to break your wrist. Impact drivers aren't plagued by that because they actually use centrifugal force on an impact anvil and Okay, so basically, if you listen to the thing run, it goes, and that's because there's actually something spinning in a circle. That's an anvil and it's striking a base plate. And with each strike, it turns it a little bit. And like if you want a really basic example, imagine like if you put a socket wrench on a lug nut and started hitting the end of the handle with a hammer.

43:12You're doing that on a smaller scale and in a tighter cylinder, but it's essentially the same thing So it turns it by impact and those are really handy for driving screws and fasteners in but you don't have to have them But if you're shopping for a drill you can oftentimes find a drill kit combo That includes the impact driver. So that's something worth looking at. So I just want to add when I made this sound booth. I had never used an impact driver before. I had heard of them, but I'd never used one or ever. So when I went to buy the tools for this, I did exactly what you just said. I was in there talking to say, I want to get this standard new drill, new cordless drill and so on. And the guy said, oh, what are you building? I told him, he said, you might want to get an impact driver. We got a combo kit. So I'm like, great, I bought the combo kit. And I can tell you using that impact driver and I had some

44:08these bolts that I've used, they're like, I don't know, like an M, like an M8 or an M6, something like that. Anyway, and these are long bolts holding this together. These are probably a good, oh geez, I don't know, four to six inch long bolts that are different lengths and they go in deep to hold this thing firmly in place. And I tried initially with the drill, just like I ordinarily would on its torque settings.

44:33And it would, it just, it just gave up and then I put the impact driver on it and was just like, boom, boom, boom, boom and just drove it straight in. And I'm like, oh, this thing is amazing. And I'm an impact driver convert at this point. They are so good. And it does not transfer any torque to your wrist at all. No, it doesn't. It's amazing. And I tell you the other thing, yeah, the other thing I found is the amount of heat that it gets generated, like be very careful with the little tip.

44:59because that thing gets smoking hot. Yeah. It's crazy. I almost burnt myself multiple times. Yeah. But yeah. On the flip side of that, you do have to be careful with an impact driver because it does by nature of how it works and how easy it is to use. You can overdrive and you can drive a screw right through your material if you're not careful. Okay. I'm never going to admit that I ever did that all the way through. But we all have.

45:26So there's a couple of, oh, I don't know, maybe about a half an inch. So he got through the two by four and I was like, oopsie, went too far. It really excels at torque and screws down through tough material. And like what most people's familiar experience with impact drivers is if you've ever been in the auto shop where they're changing tires and you hear that's an impact driver. That's because they can break fasteners loose and they can drive fasteners tight without transferring the torque to the user's arm and wrist. Yes. And they're really, really good. Oh yeah. All right. So we've covered some basic tools. In addition, we're going to need some like screws and or nails.

46:21Some wood glue some sandpaper and sanding blocks and that's really I got another thing I'm gonna mention in a minute two more things and I really struggled for whether they should be in the beginner level or the next level But those things that I just mentioned those the absolute beginners. I mean if you have those things you can start making stuff and Like so what kind of things can we build at this level?

46:49You can build cedar pickets and planters are a great start and they can sell well depending on your market. You can start building simple shelves, simple tables, trays, boxes. You'd be surprised to find out that like 80% of woodworking is building boxes. They might not all be closed, but you're building boxes essentially like 80% of the time. You can start looking around your house and think of simple projects that'll be fun to make and useful in your home.

47:18I made several little trays and boxes. I made, I think I sent you a picture, John, of the finest cedar pooper scooper for cat litter boxes ever known to man. Yeah, I was wondering about that. And I'm glad you brought that up because there's a directory of photos. Well, I go ahead. Yeah, it's just OK. So for the for the listeners, this Directory is called the nicest pooper scooper ever made and I believe this but I'm I mean I'm looking at this and it's like it's a I mean okay it's a box without a it's got an opening on one end and it's got a handle I'm just it's got a handle and you put a plastic bag as a bin liner I suppose yep we use Walmart bags as the liner for it

48:13And then we've got this little plastic cheap pooper scooper that you buy to scoop the litter box. Okay. And then you scoop the box and dump it in the bag. And then when you're done, you can just pull the bag out and throw it away and put a fresh bag in it and drop the scooper in it. And you're all set for the next day. Okay. I needed to be more organized with my kitty litter because I just carry the whole bloody, but the key litter out and just scoop it directly into the bin, which this would be so much easier. Why have I been not doing this?

48:43What am I doing? It's really, really simple, John. You're damn right. This is now I can make you some plans for it if you want. But I really honestly, I think you're an engineer. You can figure it out. Don't be so sure. But I mean, honestly, that is, I agree with you. And you've obviously given that a good varnish and everything to seal it up. And it looks really. Oh, actually, all it is is cedar fence pickets.

49:12The handle, I think, is pine. Yeah, it looks like pine. And it's actually a reject from another project that I made, but I cut it and made it fit that. But all it's finished with is some... What's that oil called? Oh, hell. Oh, linseed oil? No, similar. No. No. Mm-hmm. Oily oil. It's got linseed oil. Danish oil. Danish oil. Danish. Very similar to linseed oil.

49:37Very similar. I always forget Danish little less little less fumes. Oh, but I thought we were okay with the fumes so that was wasn't that one of the highlights of. Generally you want to try not to breathe the fumes of your finishing projects but 100% I know they can make you feel kind of weird. Yeah, if you're into that thing maybe.

50:03Yeah, it depends on what you're trying to achieve I also made a little coffee pod stand which is basically it's yeah, you mentioned three pieces of cedar fence picket and They form like a triangular shaped stand with some holes drilled in them so that I can put coffee pods for the single-serve coffee maker in it that we like fill up in advance, you know, for the week and then they're just standing there ready waiting to go. Like if you get looking around your house, you can just find all kinds of little things you can make out of wood that would just maybe be a little bit useful or maybe even make a big impact in your life. Like prior to that, our coffee pods just stayed in a plastic bag in the drawer, which is, I'm actually looking at the, I'll put this in the show art as well. Thank you for showing that one to a coffee holder holder.

50:58Now I know what the heck that is because I'm looking at this. I'm like, what the hell is this? Well, it probably looks a little foreign because they're not actually cake ups in it because we have some refillable pods for ours, but it's the same principle. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I understand. And the giveaway now is the context is it's sitting next to the coffee machine. So now I get it. Cool. I was wondering what the hell this is because it almost looks a little bit like the outside of a Dalek kind of if you flattened it out and I'm like, hmm.

51:27Interesting. Actually, cool. I must confess that I never made the dolly connection and that makes me feel sad as Dr. Who? That's all true, man. That's pretty freaking cool, John. It is very cool, right? You know, anyway. Yeah. All right, please continue. I'm sorry.

51:47Alright, but the idea here at this level is just to start getting familiar with the tools, the wood and some basic fundamentals while you're having fun. You're not looking to make any money here, although you could make some great gifts for family and friends, you know. You just really wanted to just dip your toes into this new and exciting hobby and just start trying to shape and cut and sand some wood and attach some pieces together and make something useful.

52:15Yeah, and then the last two things that like I really debated on whether these should go in this category or in the next level, but uh, yeah, the first one I think really strongly you could put in this category pocket hole jigs and screws.

52:35Craig and Miles Kraft are the two biggest names in this space, but there's a bunch of them dependent on where you live. And I should mention I've got links for all these in our show notes, which I'm assuming John will transfer to the show notes. Yep. Um, absolutely. And a lot of them, most of them I've sent to Amazon because they're more universal internationally. There's a few things down through this list that are going to be US centric stores, but maybe John can help and we can provide some.

53:04more international alternatives do pocket holes give you away so that like with a pocket hole jig what it essentially does is let you make angled holes in the side of a piece of wood so that you can then use your drill or impact driver to drive screws into it at an angle to hold two pieces of wood together and then while the holes will always show the unless you cover them and plug them, which you can do, but they're still going to be, you know, it's still going to be obviously there's a hole there, but they let you use the screw and I usually use them with glue and most people do too. The pocket holes can take the place of clamps, which we'll get to in a minute, but they'll they'll hold the thing together while some wood glue dries and it's a very

53:53basic entry level would joinery method that makes it a lot more accessible to a lot of people. Because when you brought these up, I struggled to find equivalents in Australia and they do import them. But I don't, I couldn't find and I have a bit more of a dig, but I kind of, I have. I know you said bringing in Craig was pretty expensive. What about miles graph? Yeah, I think I found a link and I shot you through that. I thought.

54:22in any case. But my point is that these are all North American import stuff. Like there's no, yeah, I don't, normally there are, shall we say knockoffs or cheap, you know, equivalents of pretty much every other tool. But when it came to these particular guides, jigs and such, I just struggled to find them. Like they must exist. It's just maybe they're called something different, but in any case, I don't have anything like that and it kind of makes me want to buy one if I can if I can get one. That's actually disappointing. I'm almost tempted to send you one no matter what it cost me. Let's not do that just yet. But let me give me a crack at first. But they look like they're really handy and they are so handy Sean and they open up wood joinery to the absolute complete beginning novice. So like there's like we'll get

55:19Later on this list will get into more expensive or not necessarily expensive, but extensive forms of woodjornery like mortise and tenons, box joints, wood dowels, things like that. And those are all really cool and great skills to learn and they're fun to do. But for the absolute beginner pocket holes and pocket hole jigs and screws.

55:42Open up so many doors for ways to simply join your wood together. Yeah. Combined with wood glue, the pocket hole jigs and screws take the place of clamps so like you can put the glue on your wood and you've pre-drilled your pocket hole and then you put your pocket hole screw in it and then they hold until the glue sets and then you just leave them in there or you can take them out if you want, but most people just leave them in there and you've got the combination of the screw and the wood glue.

56:12And it just, it opens up so many ways to join things together for a beginner. Yes. And I'm really sad to hear that you may not be able to find them over there. That sucks. Well, I'll keep looking and I'll let you know. But for me, I've never actually used one of these things, but they look like they could be really handy.

56:31Julie noted there. So should probably keep. Yeah, should probably keep moving. Yeah. All right. And then our last category for this one. And I really, really struggled. It can be an expense. So in a lot of ways, I'm inclined to put it down on the next level. But using it in the entry level, it can save you a lot of time and frustration and maybe possibly cause you to not abandon the craft because it makes things easier.

57:00So I'm tempted to throw it up into beginner and that's brand nailers, battery or pneumatic, either one. Yeah. And you know, especially if you already got an air compressor, you can get a, an air powered brand nail gun for like 60, 70 bucks US. I'm not sure what that translates to in the Australian market. I'm sure you guys have those though, right? Oh, absolutely. Yeah, we do. And yeah.

57:23I personally do not have one, but I do remember I had a friend of mine did have one and watching him just go and put a piece of sheeting, like as a piece of plywood sheeting over a wooden box frame. It was so fast. It was just like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And I'm like, damn, because I would have been struggling with a hammer and a nail. You know what I'm saying? Like, I mean, I do a great job.

57:48pretty good at putting a nail in straight, but I could not beat the speed. Right. That was incredible. And brand nails are a relatively thin nail. The ones I use primarily are 18 gauge. I think that's pretty much what they consider a brand nail. I have both battery and pneumatic. The pneumatic works fine and I have no complaints about it at all. I got that when I was flooring my house and I needed something for, you know, the first few rows of of wood planks and the last few rows of wood planks where you couldn't get the big floor nailer in and it worked fine for that somewhere along the way i upgraded to a battery powered one and uh again i have no complaints against the pneumatic one it worked just fine but the battery is much more convenient because you could just grab it and and there's no cord or airline attached to it yeah but uh

58:42And I use these a lot. I think the thing I used them the most for was like cedar picket planters and stuff because you, you know, you cut those pieces out and then you put the wood glue on them to hold them together. And that's what's ultimately going to hold them together long-term, but instead of taking the time to clamp and wait on it to dry and all that, you can just grab your brand nailer, throw a few brand nails in and that'll hold it till the wood glue dries and you can just move on with your project.

59:11And you don't have to sit and wait on it at all. So cool. They need to invest in one of those. Yeah, they are an expense. And in some ways, the expense would probably put them in the next category. But due to the convenience and the fact that they'll make your job and your life easier while you're trying to learn, I'm kind of inclined to pump them up to the beginner level. So you can use your judgment and your budget.

59:40Your judgment and your budget to decide there where it fits for you. I Kind of like budget that's kind of cool But it is something to think about for sure yeah, and I think I've covered all my notes on the beginner level Did I miss anything you got anything dad not that I know not that I haven't already added I think that There is, I can see why you debated some of the things being in the beginner level and I guess to me it's just, yeah, I'm not, I feel like I'm very firmly in the pre-beginner level because most of the stuff, yeah, there's some things in there I don't have that I probably should have. The pre-beginner level. Well, yeah, no, I, because I don't have, I don't have a Brad Naylor. I don't even have an air compressor and I don't have.

1:00:31these really cool pocket hole jigs and stuff. But you know, having said that, I do have other things from the next level down, which we'll get to, but in any case. Okay. Um, so yeah, I mean, what is the next level down? I guess. All right. So let's move to the next level.

1:00:46You've gotten your hands on some basic power tools. You've gotten comfortable building things with the pine and the cedar fence pickets and stuff like that. You've learned how to make some basic cuts and you've learned how to do some really basic rudimentary joinery. And you've also been exhausting yourself with a hand sander and a block and some sandpaper.

1:01:10Yeah. So when we're going to go into the next level, and I really debated on putting this into the, uh, the previous level too, but I really decided this is next level. You want to look at a powered sander. Yes. Yeah. Oh, yes. Because it's going to save you so much time and effort and maybe honestly it should have gone up into the first level, but I really wanted to keep the first level as unintimidating and expense free as possible to dip your toes in.

1:01:39Truth be told, you can get an expensive powered sander pretty cheap. And you really honestly don't even worry about trying to buy an expensive cordless one because you don't need it. It is my opinion. And I for each, I consider myself a few levels above what we're talking right now, not prefer not pro by any means, but I am a few levels above what we're talking. And I still will not buy a cordless sander because the sander is a tool.

1:02:08that you're going to use for prolonged periods of time. Yeah. And batteries are just inefficient for that. You're going to go through so many of them. You know, if you're sanding with proper technique, you're going to start with like a 60 or 80 grit and you're going to like my technique is I didn't actually send you a picture of this, but I'll dig one up and send it to you. So if you want to use it for show nights, you can. I literally take pencil and scribble all over my wood.

1:02:37and start with 60 or 80 grit and sand it till all those scribble marks are gone. No more. Just enough till the pencil marks are gone. Then you're going to bump up a grit and as a general rule of thumb, you don't want to go more than 50% of a grit increase at a time. So if you start with 80, that means you can go up 40. So from 80, you're going to go to 120 and you're going to scribble all over your wood again and you're going to sand it at 120 till those lines are gone. And then you can add 60 to that.

1:03:08because half of 120. So you're going to go up to 180 and you're going to scribble all over it again. And what this is going to do is this is going to give you a really nice flat. I cannot emphasize that word enough. Flat smooth surface. Smooth is cool, but flat because like a lot of amateurs and I must confess I made this mistake too making the stove cover.

1:03:35You put a bunch of pieces of wood together and you start sanding on them. And like if you've joined pieces of wood together and stuff to make a flat panel, you know, you really want to push down in it and bear down in it because you want to smooth out that groove and you want to get rid of that seam. But that's just you're hurting yourself in the long run because what you're going to end up with is a rippled surface. It'll be smooth, but it won't be flat and you really want flat. And that's what.

1:04:03scribbling and sanding till the scribbles are gone gets you. And you just gradually work your way up through that. And so as I'm describing that, I'm guessing you can imagine that's going to take a while, right, John? I think what you're describing is the next level that I've never done. Okay. Fair enough. No, for real. So when I use a sander, it's usually because, let's say I've got some you know, drywall and I've just put some smack filler over the top. I've done a rough sand back with a sanding block just to get it down to a level where it's kind of smooth-ish and then I'll get out the orbital and I'll run the orbital over it to make sure it's nice and smooth with a nice fine grit just so that I can then like take any dust off and then I can do an undercoat and then overcoat. So more in the context of painting for walls is where I tended to use it. On this sound booth,

1:05:01I don't think I used a sander at all because I didn't really care about the finish so much. I'm thinking about when was the last time I actually, because okay, so I have a corded orbital sander for exactly the reason that you said is that, you know, you are using it. I'm doing the whole house and I'm doing a whole bunch of walls. The battery is just not going to cut it. It's going to die. But I also do have a little, I call it my mouse sander.

1:05:28And it's this tiny little thing that kind of it starts out looks a little bit like an iron. It's triangular on one end. Yes. Kind of rounded rectangle on the other. Yep. You know what I mean? So I got one of those. Gets in the corners really well. Precisely what the orbital doesn't do. So I've got that for doing corners and stuff. So I've got cornices and I've had to patch up, you know, cornices and so on and so forth. And I use it for that. But.

1:05:52Yeah, I mean, the whole drawing on it with a pencil and sending that back, that's brilliant. I never even thought of that. Yeah. That's a great way of, yeah. I can't take credit for that myself. I actually learned it from a really great guy on YouTube that goes by StumpyNub, and he actually teaches a lot of really great woodworking techniques. And I neglected to put a bunch of these in the notes, but I will.

1:06:15before you publish so you can include them. That's okay. And he actually, before that I was actually using my sander wrong because I was just, you know. But Vic, that is how one sands. Given it hell. Yes, give it hell until it's roughly sort of you think it's been ground away to an inch of it. Right, but when you want an ice. I've won sanding.

1:06:44Yes, but when you want a nice smoothly polished piece of wood furniture, that's not the way to go and Yeah, and this is what I'm learning why my stuff doesn't look it should be stated like drywall spackle and plaster sanding is an entirely different ball game from wood sanding I know um there are some similarities in it in the sense that you're a sanding Yeah, but it kind of stops there. Okay. Well, I think we've sanded that today. Okay. Okay. But the idea is because what you're doing and why you gradually work up through those grits of sandpaper is because and this is the part that's going to really fascinate you and your listeners to people that are used to listening to the show. So when you look at sandpaper.

1:07:38Most people don't think a whole lot about it. But what you're looking at is whether you're buying expensive or cheap sandpaper, whether it's actually sand or it's little pieces of acrylic, polymers, or whatever makes up your sandpaper. It is pointed, aggressive granules of something attached to some sort of backing that is literally cutting grooves into your wood.

1:08:06And like in the case of a random orbital sander, they'll be kind of like a circular but not quite circular pattern. But you're literally you're just whether they're small, most of the time, even at like an 80 grit, they're so small, you can't really see them with your eye. But you're cutting grooves into your surface to wear off the surface. And each time you bump up a grit level.

1:08:32It can only do so much with the grit level that was before it because it won't get to the bottom of the grooves That's why you only grow jump up 50% grit at a time. Okay And each time you do you're taking off less surface and you're not being as aggressive But you're also not cutting as many deep grooves so that like by the time you get up to like 220 for most wood finishes for wood projects 220 is a good place. That's probably where you're going to stop. Maybe you might get up to like 320. Auto finishers like finishing car bodies and stuff, they're going to get way up there because cars are like really, really super smooth polished. But for wood, there's actually a level like for a lot of wood finishes, you may not even go up above like 120 or 180 because you'll plug the wood pores and they won't soak up the finish.

1:09:29So you got to be careful about that. Damn. And that's why you gradually work your way up through those levels, you know, just raising your grade at 50% of the time. And then this is cool. Probably I'm going to jump just a little bit down, still in the same category, but I'm going to jump to dust management collection and extraction because while you can sand without any of that, you're going to make a lot of mess.

1:09:57And you're going to be breathing a lot of dust and so go ahead. Yeah, I'm when you brought this up originally when we were talking about this just texting back and forth and I shared with you my dust management technique. I think you were slightly shocked. I do have dust masks, but I don't have any kind of a dust management system. My dust management system is a broom.

1:10:21and maybe the blower if I'm feeling really keen right and my wife will come in afterwards and say someone made a mess and I'm like but I just swept. Did you did you really I don't think so anyway so.

1:10:35Please tell me how I should be doing it because I'm clearly not doing it properly. I honestly wasn't as shocked as you might think because I'm not too far ahead of you in this ball game. For most of us at the beginner level, we're out in the garage working, we're sanding, we're cutting, we're doing our thing. And then when we get done, we open the garage door and we break out the leaf blower and we just blow it all out into the air. Winning.

1:11:02That's my strategy right and then there's nothing wrong with that except life disagrees well yeah and my wife would disagree too because it actually makes its way into your house with you think it does or not yeah that's true it does and also there is the important point that what does this actually very very harmful to our lungs we only usually get one set John I'm sure you're aware of this.

1:11:30It's funny, you know, I just did the episode of causality a few months ago about Whitney, which is an asbestos mine in West Australia. Yeah. I also. I also covered in there the similarly related dust problem of artificial stone benchtop cutting and how like lung silicosis and everything from breathing in that dust is extremely bad for you. And I think the conclusion I reached is if you don't know that a dust is safe for you.

1:12:02Chances are it probably isn't and you can just assume that most dusts aren't good for your lungs. So put on a dust mask for goodness sake It's like right. I know it's really hot and horrible and annoying. It is summertime. I don't care Just do it. Yeah, because honestly, it just there's so many fields that generate so much dust. It's so harmful for us and like yeah people to like Downplay it and not take it seriously. But honestly, it's it's as bad as smoking a pack of marbles a day if you're gonna do it for a prolonged period of time It's really gonna take a toll on you wood dust and granite dust and marble dust any kind of fine dust particles They're bad for our lungs. So yeah, this is Like we're gonna dip really deeply in or not very deeply into this. We're gonna shallow dip

1:12:53into this because it's a topic, honestly, that could be a topic all of itself. So we're just going to briefly cover the basics, but none of these methods should be used without a proper dust mask. If you're doing more than one simple wood project every three or four months, it's time to look for a dust mask and you could find some inexpensively on Amazon or whatever your local market is. You just need something that's going to filter out.

1:13:22those really fine dust particles so they don't make it into your lungs because you got to take care of them and having said that you get one set exactly you get one set i mean i guess if it progresses to cancer maybe you can get on a transplant list and you can get one that way but most of us aren't that lucky and i'm not sure i should even that is not that is not a good back i was getting ready to say i'm not sure i should describe that as lucky so no i mean yeah anyway At the top of my list, which is actually probably shouldn't be at the top of my list because it's honestly should be further down but in the notes at the top of my list are air filters There are many commercially available and DIY projects on the market I've seen cheesy pictures of mine, which he may or may not use as show notes for you guys or as or chapter art Essentially, they're all a box

1:14:17with a fan on one side that pulls air through a filter on the other side to trap small airborne dust particles. I made mine with some pieces of particle board from an old desk that I took apart and I outfitted a small window fan I had on one side and commercially available at Walmart or whatever your local store is, AC dust filter.

1:14:43On the other side so it pulls the air through that dust filter and it was really dirt cheap to make not the most effective not the most Efficient model you can have but it does pull some dust out of the air and this is probably like I said the lowest on the tier because it's probably even if you buy a commercially available one, it's going to make the least impact on you. It will make an impact on the cleanliness of your shop and whether or not that fine dust settles or is trapped from the air before it can settle, but it's not going to change a whole lot for what's going through your lungs while you're working, while you're cutting, while you're sawing, while you're sanding. Next on the list, which should have been higher is dust collectors and extractors.

1:15:30And these are essentially a vacuum supply that's going to pull as much sawdust as possible through a hose directly from the tool you're using. And there's a lot of different options. You can get this. You can get very expensive commercially available dust collectors and extractors, but they all boil down to the same thing. And they're a source of vacuum with a hose that will pull dust from your tool.

1:15:57And the idea is that they should catch as much of it as possible before it makes it into the air. Like I said, there are expensive, hardwired solutions with ductwork that run to all your big tools that we'll get to later on. And there are also smaller ones that are very fancy, but an improved shop vac that pulls dust from the tool.

1:16:23But honestly, the hobbyist or beginner is just fine with a basic shop pack hooked directly up to the tool. The shop pack will be much noisier than the commercial available dust extractors, and it won't include bells and whistles, but it'll do the job just fine. I actually put mine on a smart plug so I can use Siri and the phone as a remote control for it. Yeah. And you can get cool.

1:16:49adapters and kits so that your your shop back hose will connect to your tools and stuff which is what I've done so like when I'm using a sander and stuff and this will actually make your sander more efficient and it'll make your sandpaper last longer if you can hook something up to it that pulls the dust because if your sandpaper doesn't clog up with the dust then it's more effective and more efficient and also it's collecting the dust so it doesn't make it to the air to be airborne or in your lungs. So that's a really cool thing to have. Nice. Yeah. I just want to add, oh, so let's go to the dusts, the separators, or have you kind of... No, we're actually getting to that. Go ahead. The cyclone. Sorry. Okay. So this next one, it didn't, until you, I really took time to look at this photo that'll be currently displayed on the show notes is the vacuum plugged into that separator box. It's sort of set up as a cyclone, like a dust separator.

1:17:47I think. Uh-huh. Yeah. Now I, many years ago back in the throes of COVID, my wife said, wouldn't it be great for us to get a Traeger pellet smoker? And when we bought the smoker, the guy that sold it to us, you know, all about add-ons, right? You know, oh, you need your pellets and you need this cleaning.

1:18:06device you just put a vacuum in one end and it's cyclone separates out all of the ash and dust from the bottom you clean it out after every so many grills otherwise you start getting fires in there and that's generally frowned upon so I actually I know so I bought one of these things and it just occurred to me that that's exactly what you're describing here and I could actually use the same exact thing for collecting up dust and so on when I'm sanding in future because it would be very easy to just to fashion a hose and then connect it up and that would I haven't seen what you're talking about but yeah it sounds like it would be perfect so it yeah is very yeah anyway sorry no no no no you're fine that's actually pretty brilliant nice contribution I didn't realize that was a thing in like the smoker markets so well I didn't either and then I bought one I'm like wow.

1:18:55I just spent money on this. I'm like, okay, I guess it does work though. It works really well. Yeah. Exactly. And while your basic shop facts going to work just fine, it's going to suck dust from the sander and your saws and stuff like that, that all have dust ports on them. You're going to either A, fill up bags or B, if you're not using a bag, you're going to clog your filter. So you're going to go through a lot of those and a way that you can actually help.

1:19:23to preserve the longevity of your filters and bags is by getting a dust separator which is a device that sits in between the tool and the shop bag. Most of them are some sort of cyclone device and there's a bunch on the market. I gave a link to the one I have. John said he's going to show you a picture to the setup that I have and basically it's like a circular device that you Sit on top of a five gallon bucket and if you look closely at my picture, there's actually two five gallon buckets Because the shop facts actually strong enough that when you fire it all up it caves in a bucket With the suction so I stick it in a second bucket and that reinforces the cylinder so I can't do that and What it does is it makes like a little mini cyclone?

1:20:20between the tool and the vacuum so that the heavier wood chips and dust will drop down into the bucket and they don't make it into the vacuum. And that will extend the life of your shop vac bags and your filters by removing the most of the dust before it gets there. Excellent. Yeah.

1:20:38And it sounds like from what you're describing, I never had any clue that that was a thing and like the the smoker and grilling barbecue. And I feel really missed on that because I'm really big on the grilling, but I don't want to have a lot of smoking experience. So that's actually pretty cool to hear. Well, depending upon whether I mess up the smoke because it hasn't been held at temperature long enough, my kids would tell me that I don't know much about smoking either. So it depends.

1:21:03But never mind that opportunity to learn more that happens. Yeah, as I've learned with my smoker, please place it out of the wind on a windy day. It will absolutely kill your cooking temperatures, but never mind that. All right. All right. So is there anything we need to circle back on on this section? Just a couple of small things. So at this level, you're going to start looking at some clamps and oh boy.

1:21:32There's so many clamps to look at. Basically, you're going to look at clamps that match the type of projects you're going to want to build. So you're going to have to do a little bit of your research on this because there's spring clamps, compression clamps, C clamps.

1:21:49pipe clamps, parallel clamps, so many clamps. And this is where a lot of people, when they're getting into woodworking, get really intimidated and spend a lot of money. The type of clamps. I have two clamps. What? I have two clamps. All right. I've got a small handful, but there's still so many more to have. I've got spring clamps and some C clamps. And I've got some.

1:22:14quick release clamps. And there's a lot of different clamps you can get. Basically, clamps are going to hold your wood together while you screw it or drill it or glue it together. And they're going to make sure it doesn't move and they're going to hold tension while glue sets. And depending on the project, it's going to depend on the type of clamps you need. But there are so many types of clamps. And you really, honestly, I wish I could get more guidance in this, but it just.

1:22:43It really uh, there's a large divergence on the type projects you're gonna need that are going to determine the types of climbs you need. Cool. So you're gonna need to find appropriate clamps and you're gonna need to plan this to spin some on your clamps. You can get some bargain options from places like uh in the states here is there's a place called Harbor Freight. Uh Chidgy may or may not be able to put some links for places overseas or in Australia for you. But that's that's pretty much. Yeah. And that's that's why I just I put in our notes literally clamps. Oh boy. I don't I don't know how to give specific guidance on that without knowing exactly what project people are building. And then the next thing it's it's time at this level to build your first workbench. And I feel oh boy. What's that?

1:23:37build or buy. All right. You could buy. You could buy if you want. Yeah. Honestly though, I advocate for building number one because you're becoming a woodworker and it's a thing you can build and it's a thing you should build and it just gives you it's a great intermediate project that will be useful to you as you continue to journey and there's a lot of different ways you can go about constructing it. So It offers you some creativity in it. There's a lot of different methods and plans that you can dig into, but they're kind of too deep for us to go into, but the possibilities are endless. But I mean, if you really want to throw money at the problem, just buy one. A workbench gives you a place to put your stuff while you're gluing it, sanding it, clamping it, screwing it, all that good stuff.

1:24:32and basically it doubles as an assembly table. But by building it, you get one more project you can make. You get one more thing you can add to your confidence level. You get one more thing that you can show off to people. And Chiji may or may not be showing you pictures of mine in my shop bench and in the show art. My workshop bench went through a couple of different iterations. The first version, I still have the tabletop, but I've gone through two iterations of it.

1:25:01The first version I took particle board and some leftover wide oak or no, I'm sorry, red oak floorboards from hardwood flooring that I had left over and I made a tabletop surface of those of particle board and red oak floorboards. And then I use some pie and I made a frame around it and a border and I put it all together and that just sat across a couple of saw horses.

1:25:30And then later on down the road, I actually stumbled across somebody had some kitchen cabinets they had set on the curb to throw away in the trash. Very wasteful, I might add. Yeah, not right. Right? So I actually threw them in the back of my vehicle and I took them home and I replaced the saw horses with the cabinets, which gave me a bunch of storage underneath the workbench.

1:25:54And that's actually the workbench I'm still using. I see you've even got the dual power outlets on one side of it as well. That I put into it. Yeah, but that's really good though. Yeah, right. That's where I plug in my sander and stuff. And so it really works out well. It gives me a lot of storage and I've got that nice big dead flat surface to assemble on.

1:26:22which really comes into place when you're joining a lot of pieces of wood together, like if you want to make a table top or something, because you want a dead flat reference to go by. But there's so many different options and lots of plans on the internet, on the YouTubes. Just get out there, find what you want, but it's time to build your workbench. And it's going to be a fun project for you to make, and it's going to be so useful for all your other future projects down there.

1:26:50You're inspiring me to actually build a workbench because right now I've got a folding table, which is really not a good workbench at all. You should man. I had the folding table for a long time and it works. But a dedicated workbench is so nice. And especially like my problem is that it's not steady enough. The tricky part is you want as much space as possible. But.

1:27:14Yeah, you don't want to make the space that you have to work uncomfortable mine is like I mean my problem with 3.5 feet by like 5.5 feet I'd really like a four by six but in the two car garage I set this one up and it's Big enough so I can go out there and work without having to move the wife's car from the other half of the garage if I want to But not so big that it's not usable if I don't Fair enough. Well, I'm I'm I am inspired to think harder about that because at the moment I had no immediate plans, but I maybe I should. But in any case, was there anything else on that section? Or should we move on? I think that covers that section. All right. So. And I think you've added this is wood turning us or next. Yes. OK. Yeah, you are. Yeah. You suggested that I should add so I have added so I have added wood turning and I don't have much to say.

1:28:11Other than there are several things that I've made on a lathe. The only two that survived were essentially a paper towel holder and the other one was a bowl, a wooden bowl. And so one of them used a face chuck mount and the other one was using the spindle from him correctly, such that I took a, it was a square piece of silky oak, which is a beautiful wood to work with, to be honest. And yeah, it's such a nice piece of wood, such nice wood to work with. And that was the holder. So that one's just, you know, starting out with a rough, I spent so long, I spent 30 years since I made it, but I mean, I still remember how much fun it was making it. And anyway, so there was that one. And then there was the bowl, like I said, which is a combination of pine,

1:29:08and Maranti. So we had two pieces of wood, which we had to cut into sections and then we glued them and clamped them together while they set for a week or two. Before we then started, you know, we turned into a door box. Turning out. Yeah. So we started out. So it was something like, I don't know.

1:29:25six, eight layers, I forget what it was, but it created that two tone effect in the bowl and started out by taking the square shape and then turning it into an octagon and then just rough gouging and getting it down to a smooth shape on the outside and then gouging out the middle for the inside of the bowl standing and varnishing it. And it was a lot of fun. And I've often Well not often but every now and then I threaten my wife you know we really need to lay. Well you know in the shed of course yeah and she's like mm-hmm yeah so that's the problem with the latest as much as I love turning wood it's just it's a big commitment because they're not a little machine they're not a little machine and they're a very specific machine.

1:30:10Yeah. So that's all I really had to say about woodturning is that I really enjoyed it, but at the same time it's more of a niche thing. Yeah. I mean you can make parts for chair legs. Oh, that's what I was going to say. You can make so many things. You can make chair and table legs. You can make bowls. If you're careful enough, you can make plates and there's so many things you can make from a lathe. That's really cool. It's not a thing I've experimented with yet, but it is actually very fascinating to me. Cool.

1:30:40Yeah. Anyway, all right. All right. So what can we build at this level? Well, sadly, I'm going to disappoint you. We're mainly building the same thing since we built at the previous levels. Except. But better and quicker. Yes. You can build slightly more efficiently and you can start adding a little more complexity and possibly you could start selling things as a hobbyist on Facebook marketplace and stuff like that.

1:31:07and the powered sander at this point is really saving you. It cannot be understated how much time and energy you're saving while you're still getting comfortable with all the other tools, but you're saving massive amounts of time from the powered sander. It really makes a difference. All right, so you're ready to step up too.

1:31:29the yep very engaged hobbyist or semi pro yeah yeah i'm i'm i'm ready absolutely let's do this okay all right so i'm going to go through these kind of lists through this list kind of quickly and then we could talk about them in more depth if you want you're going to start looking at things like table saws mitre saws jig saws and other miscellaneous tools Oscillating multi-tools. Routers. Routers are so fun and so cool, John. You could start with a palm or a trim router and think about a router table set up later so you can really save time and money that way. And we're going to start looking at drill presses.

1:32:14Any questions about any of these in particular? I think, so I'm familiar with table saws, mitre saws, jig saws. I actually own a jig saw. I've had a sliding compound mitre saw in the past. I've used table saws before at woodworking.

1:32:31Oscillating multi-tools, not so sure what you specifically mean by that, so I'm just opening that link there. But in any case, but the routers are the ones where, I know a lot of people go on about routers just like you have. Yeah, okay, oscillating multi-tool, yeah, I get it. So I'm most curious about how would you describe how a router works? Okay.

1:32:53and why is it so cool? First, let's just really briefly dip into the others just a little bit for those that might not be so familiar. A table saw is basically a spinning blade that sticks up through a table with a fence guide that lets you cut very straight lines into pieces of wood. You got to be really careful with it because it's probably the number one way in a wood shop that people get hurt. A lot of digits are lost.

1:33:19There's actually a company called SawStop that makes a pretty cool table saw. They have patented technology in there that uses capacitive touch sensors, the same thing that runs our iPhones. So that basically if you get on YouTube, you can find videos of people demonstrating it. They usually use things like potatoes and hot dogs to demonstrate it. But the second it touches something capacitive like our skin, the blade stops and drops to the table in microseconds.

1:33:49So that instead of losing a digit, pretty cool, you get a little cut or a neck. Really cool. Very expensive. But table saws are very, very, very useful in the wood shop. If you need to start making straight cuts into pieces of wood, repeatable and accurate. And especially like when you start working plywoods and stuff, the table saw is the way to go. The miter saw, most of us use it.

1:34:17for 90 degree cuts, just rough cutting long pieces of wood down into smaller pieces. But they also do, you know, mitered cuts at angles and they do beveled cuts at angles through the wood. Pretty cool. Jigsaws offer flexibility for cutting grooves and shapes and things like that. And also things like a scroll saws and bandsaws and stuff like that. The oscillating multi tool is actually.

1:34:47pretty interesting. This is a tech that's actually existed for several decades. You probably would most recognizably know it from if you ever broke a bone and had a cast. The tool they used after your bone had healed to cut that cast off was an oscillating multi tool. Somebody along the way realized, Hey, you know what? We could use this for woodworking and all sorts of other general purpose uses.

1:35:16because what it does is it vibrates back and forth very very quickly. You can attach sanders and various different blades and stuff to it. When it hits a rigid object like a piece of wood or a piece of drywall on your wall or even a 2x4 in the wall or a piece of pipe you're trying to cut, the vibration makes the blade cut through it.

1:35:42However, if it hits something like your skin, which is pliable and moves, then your skin just oscillates with it. So it could cut the cast off your arm without cutting your skin. Right. Right. Cool. And somewhere along the way, somebody got the idea. We can attach all sorts of blades to this to do all sorts of really cool things.

1:36:03Um, they're called oscillating multi tools versus tools. There's a lot of different aims for them, but they all boil down to the same thing. You clamp a blade on it or a sander on it and it just vibrates back and forth on a very small, a very small oscillation. Very quick. Cool. Yeah. Next is routers. Routers are really cool. Routers are a rotary tool with a multitude of different bits.

1:36:33that can go into the check on the rotary tool like a drill, but you got all sorts of different bits and blades that you could put in it. Most people use them, they'll get their start with using things like round over bits or if you're a Johnny I. Fanda, chamfer bit. You're right. They're doing, those are called edge profiles, but you can also do pattern trimming like you can attach a pattern to a piece of wood and then use like a flush trim bit that's got a bearing on one end and a short blade below the bearing or above the bearing that will trace along the pattern while it cuts to piece of wood underneath or above it.

1:37:23And so you can do a lot of really cool things with routers. Most people just spend their time rounding over and chamfering with them. But you can make like the baseboards in your house, like when you look at those contours and trim on them, those are routers. That's what does it. Yeah, that's cool. Because I mean, now I'm getting a better handle on how you would do those complex sort of edge profiles. And it just, it takes a bit of furniture and just turns it from something that's just like a, like a straight edge or a basic chamfer edge. And you can make something like nice and rounded with some grooves in it that looks really, really nice. Right. So if you look down at a piece of baseboard and you look at those fancy carvings that are on the top of it. Imagine all of that is a blade.

1:38:08that when you ran a straight piece of wood through it it shaved off everything but that profile okay you're right that is pretty damn cool i had some yeah that's really freaking cool i've never used a router i've never taken any time to get my head around them but the now that i'm getting my head around that as you describe it that actually does sound really good it makes what you're making.

1:38:28that bit extra classy. And so like if you, uh, if you were to throw up a picture of my picnic table again, like one of the close up detailed pictures and you see those nice smooth rounded over corners and edges on that picnic table so that if my grandkids were to like fall and bump their head on it, you know, it doesn't like puncture their skull or cut their skin or those I did with around over a bit on my router. Cool. Yeah.

1:38:58All right. And that's what most of us at this level are going to be using it for. When you get on down the road, you can be using it for a lot more fancy stuff. And then you can also get into drill presses and stuff, which I have a lot of mixed feelings about a drill press. I think it definitely has its place and it definitely has its uses. But there are some jigs and stuff that you can really use to get by the need to have a drill press. They're just, they're big, they take up space in your shop. They have Very limited use case, and so I'm kind of one. Yeah. I don't want to say I'm negative on drill presses, but I'm negative on drill presses. I got that vibe. Yeah, I got that vibe. There's other ways to achieve the job that tool does.

1:39:43If you are a type that has to drill a lot of straight holes, then a drill press is for you. But for most of the, you know, your woodworkers, that's one of the lowest tools on our list, in my opinion. All right. Fair enough. So now we've got our hands on all these really great tools, which I have none. Oh, no, I have one. I have a jigsaw. I have a jigsaw, but apart from that. Yeah, jigsaw's useful, man. I know. And I, yeah, and I may have may not have killed.

1:40:10Several jigsaw blades from my not keeping it straight, but that's my fault. Anyway, all right, it's fine. So John, can you tell me? Yes, what can we build at this level? Well, I think I said before previously things that you can do with that router is just the next level up It's probably something that's gonna look nice enough that people might even want to pay money for it And that'd be like really cool because right now like I said before this has no chamferedges on anything. There's no finesse to my podcasting booth. And right now you're just singing money in the lobby. I know, but just think of what I could do with a round of man. Exactly. So what do you think? So basically you're building a lot of the same stuff. You could, again, build at the other levels, but you're still building with a fair bit more complex to me. Start selling things as a hobbyist on Facebook Marketplace. You can also build them much more quickly and efficiently.

1:41:05You're starting to get into things like making cabinets and tables at a more advanced rate with more details and complexity. You can generally start looking at a lot more advanced projects and joinery. It's probably time to start considering stepping up to some like pre-surface hardwoods and moving away from construction grade lumber and to make more fancy projects, especially regarding your tables and furniture.

1:41:32This is really honestly, this is a great place to be. This is where I would consider myself now, except I haven't started experimenting with hardwoods yet. You've got a fantastic hobby. You're having lots of fun. You're still honing your skills, but you're also possibly making a little spare cash from your efforts in certain markets.

1:41:52Something as simple as cedar planters can make you a lot of money as I mentioned before if you can make them quickly You're really only limited by what moves in your market and what production and marketing abilities you have You're in a and for the really good place at this level for the record. You are doing some of this. Yeah, you are actually selling stuff. Yeah yeah i've sold some cedar planters um you can throw some pictures in the show nuts if you want i sent you some pictures of them anything i sent you that's already got plants in it or in somebody's front yard is something i sold cool pictures in my garage or things i built that i hadn't sold yet but

1:42:30did end up getting sold. Most of what I have sold has been planters. I'm not going to lie. Which is fine. You know, I had fun building them and I made a little bit of money from them and it was fine. It funded some of my...

1:42:45tools and things to move myself up to the next level. And that probably can't be emphasized enough. You know, you started those earlier levels and if you can sell some stuff, you can buy some of the tools and things in the higher levels to help move yourself up. Cool. So it's, um, so you sell all your stuff through, um, uh, Facebook marketplace. Do you, or some of it or that's primarily where I sold all my stuff was through Facebook marketplace. Your mileage may vary in your particular areas, but it.

1:43:14It's actually a great place for craft makers to reach a market. Yeah. It's your workshop. It's Vicks workshop. Right. Vicks workshop is my Facebook page. Yes. Excellent. All right. Cool. Although my marketplace page is actually just attached to my personal account because I can't seem to. They won't let me attach that Vicks workshop page to the marketplace. I don't know if I haven't experienced enough credibility yet or maybe I just haven't dug in enough to fix that. I don't know.

1:43:43But as it is, I have Vic's workshop, which is a Facebook page, which John can share a link to you and I'll send you John. Which you can use to like follow where I post new things that I made and stuff, which showed the picture that probably got John's attention, I think, to make him want to do this topic. Well, we'll get to that, I guess. But I post all the things I make there and then I put some things for.

1:44:13for sale on the Facebook marketplace, too. Cool. So next question, then, Vic, is you've reached this point, you're making some money. What's the next level above this level? What would you do? This level above this level, I would almost call the top as a hobbyist unless you're going to go completely pro and you're just going to make yourself a woodworker for a living. This is the level I call, I'm all in, please take all my money. And this is where...

1:44:39This is here's some money. This is where you're going to start looking at planers or I know in the UK and I'm assuming this is this way for the Aussies too. They call it a thicknesser. I've never heard of that, but I believe it exists. Okay. And you're also going to look at jointers or a planer for the Brits in the Aussies. Definitely for the Brits. I know that. Yes. Yes. Definitely know that. Okay. And You're going to start looking at specialty tools for joinery. Festool Domino comes to mind, which is a brand that's beloved and be hated in the US because they're very expensive, but they make very, very nice tools. Their biggest seller is a tool called the Festool Domino, which makes what they call loose tenants, a joinery option.

1:45:31And basically it's like a mortise and tenon, but you don't have the tenon part isn't attached to any piece of wood. You're basically making mortises in both sides and then you stick a loose piece of wood in between it with glue. Oh my God, I'm looking at one of these tools right now you're just talking about. I put to a link. It starts at like 300. Yeah. That's US. Oh my God. Man, you'd want to be serious about your mortise and tenon joints now. Yeah. Anyway.

1:46:00The people that have them love them and swear by them and there's a far I'm sure they do There's a big contingent of people that hate on the company and the tool in particular because it's a very expensive tool Well, but it does it's a one-trick pony But what the one-trick and the pony is a very nice one-trick pony. It does it very well Yeah, fair enough. So the planers are thicknessers are basically they make It's a a lot of people call them a lunchbox planer or a bench top planer. You can send a piece of wood through it and it makes one side completely flat and parallel to the other side. Right. The jointer is what the UK and I'm assuming the Australians would call a planer and it makes one side completely flat and it makes a 90 degree side.

1:46:58Perfectly perpendicular to it, right and then you can run the previously flattened side through the planar and then After you've got both sides both of the flat sides parallel and you've got one perfectly flat 90 degree side then you can run it through your table saw and you've got a nice perfectly straight board with perfectly 90 degree square corners on all sides, okay?

1:47:24Cool. And what you're doing with that is you're basically, it gives you the ability. So what can we build at this level? All the previous, but you're running on all four cylinders and really improving your skill set. And you can start looking at buying rough cut hardwoods at lumber yards. And at this level, you're milling and finishing yourself with these tools.

1:47:49So you can make your own finished boards to make your projects with this will save you money on materials, but it costs time and process and obviously getting those tools. And it offers the ultimate in control of your project outcome. Excellent. Yeah. And that's a pretty pro level hobbyist. You're almost getting into like professional woodworking for a living at that point. Yeah. Well, some of those tools like that mortise and tenon thing, my God.

1:48:16It's expensive. Yeah. That's cool though. I mean, I, the thing is, I'd heard about some of these tools, but I'd never actually, you know, thought too much about it. And yeah, I guess I'm glad that it's, that people are able to buy this stuff. Maybe there was a time when it was more difficult to get all these tools just didn't exist or went for retail sale. Like you could get them if you were like a big wood shop or something. Otherwise, I don't know. I think it's kind of great. It's like a democratization really, isn't it?

1:48:46Yeah, yeah, because anyone anyone can buy this stuff and do this in their own garage now and do something that is truly professional grade, which is kind of cool. Yeah, it really is. It opens a lot of doors for a lot of people that would have thought a lot of these things were out of their reach. So I do see that.

1:49:04there is a bit of a debate between corded and cordless, which up till 10 years ago, maybe 15 years ago, there was no conversation because cordless just wasn't a thing. It wasn't a thing or it's very expensive and not very efficient at all. Yeah, it was niche. It was real niche. Right. And like they had, like I had a battery drill that I only recently threw away because the nickel, nickel metal hydride battery pack was just, just hanging on. The old EMA image.

1:49:32I know, right? Everything I've got now is now lithium. Yeah. I know. But yeah, so my, my, if I could summarize my opinion, cordless versus cordon, cordon is for things that you need long run time or a really heavy duty. Um, but if you want to do stuff that is, uh, lighter duty, it's not a full time thing. Like you don't running it for hours at a time or half an hour at a time, then cordless is always better. Cause I cannot.

1:49:59Like when I run my circular saw, um, I keep on wishing the hell it was cordless because you got to do cord management when you're using the damn thing. It is such a pain in the neck. Um, just curious on your thoughts on that. I agree 100% with that. It's, it's all about runtime and, and the application of the tool. Like you just said, like some of the other tools I mentioned, I already specifically said Sanders should always be corded just because the way they run. Yeah.

1:50:27Planers joiners and things like that Always courted they they draw a lot of power and they run for prolonged periods of time and you're just gonna frustrate yourself with Trying to constantly charge and swap batteries using cordless tools for those jobs So one of the things about brands that I don't like about cordless though is with courted tools The power outlet is the power outlet. You know what I mean plug it in away you go extension leads they're all the same but no no no cordless tools of course no this is an opportunity to lock you in yeah so hey I yeah and this is what annoys me is I've basically got locked into the Makita system and and there's nothing wrong with Makita's tools they're perfectly fine I haven't had any of them die on me yet which is great but I mean if you really got extra money and you don't mind it you can always go to kind of I guess I always looked at DeWalt as being

1:51:22sort of some of the most expensive ones. But there's other brands, too. I'm curious if you had any. Actually, honestly, in the States, most people would probably put Makita up there with DeWalt. Oh, cool. Well, there you go. Makita is not a bad brand to have. Well, I like the shade of blue. They have a good reputation. They have a lot of tools with the same battery platform, which honestly, my first tip regarding cordless versus cordless.

1:51:49When you're looking at cordless tools, you want to choose a brand that is readily available to you and offers as many tools offering the same battery platform as possible. You don't necessarily need expensive tools like DeWalt and Milwaukee or Makita to start. There's a lot of brands available at home center and DIY stores that are fine. Like in the States, we have Craftsman, Ryobi, Porto Cable, RIDGID, Flex, Cobalt.

1:52:16Most of those are just fine, especially for people in those first few levels we were talking about and they won't break the bank too badly. Wynn is actually getting pretty popular on Amazon and Craig is actually launched their own brand of power tools that are battery powered too. But the main thing you want to make sure is like cool.

1:52:38take a little bit of time to do some research in your area, wherever that happens to be and find brands that are available to you that offers many tools that use the same batteries and the same chargers as possible. And that's honestly what you're going to want to go for. So that like if you buy a charger and a handful of batteries, you can use as many tools with that as possible. Definitely. I was just going to say, I think the other good advice of those batteries is If you're planning to do a bunch of stuff in a period of time and you only need different tools, having extra batteries charged ready to go, it's always a good idea. Yep. Always, always. And that it leads to the same point, you know, you want to be able to get a handful of batteries and charges, a couple of chargers and a handful of batteries that all run in the same tools. So you can just always have some charging on standby and you're always ready to just swap out and be ready to go. Cool. Yeah.

1:53:37And then you want to be careful looking at the combo kits with many tools in them. You can often get all you need for a great price, but a lot of the times they're loaded with down extra tools and you may not need them or you may not want them and you may be better off to buy separate tools. If you can swing it, I would also recommend buying brushless motors. They're a little bit more expensive, but they're often more powerful and they run longer using less powers, which means more to your less battery charging and change. And then obviously, as we've said, try to get at least a double charger or a few extra batteries. Nothing horses your mojo more than half into halt production to weigh down batteries to charge men. Yeah. It just, it just, it derails you. You go back to another part of the house and, you know, um, the wife or the kids say, Oh, hey, can you insert side task here? And, um, yeah. Sidequest, whatever you want to call it. And then you're done.

1:54:35It's over derailed so yeah that's really that's really good advice I think what I love about all this Vic is just the availability of these tools and you can turn something that would have just been. You would have thought potentially out of your reach to make something that good but you would just be able to buy but you can actually do it yourself in your own home.

1:55:01And if you're smart about it, you don't have to spend a fortune on tools. I actually, I really love that about this hobby. And it's just like, you know, you can get on the YouTube so you can get on the internet and you can find a bunch of plans. And most of them are free. I mean, there's some that that want to charge you for their plans and stuff, but a lot of them are free. And you could just download the plans and you can get some basic tools and you can just get started cutting glue and screwing and you can really make some amazing stuff. I think that.

1:55:30I guess if I could sum this up, woodworking is no longer like a specialized art, although there is still art to it. Like the projects you pick, what you build, what they look like is, and there is still art in how it's finished and so on. But just the tools make it so much easier, which is just nothing but fantastic as far as I can say. So I think it's great. And I'm really glad that You, because I know Vic, you put a lot of time and effort into the prep for this episode and I really do appreciate that. It's something that I know you're passionate about. And unlike me, you've actually made money from selling stuff you've made. That's something that I can't claim. I get very excited when you told me you wanted to do this topic. I've been waiting for it like for years, man, without even knowing it.

1:56:15Well, well, I do appreciate it. Unfortunately, I've hit my time limit. So we have to wrap it up. But I'm sure there'll be follow up on future episodes because I do expect or get some feedback on this one. And I'm sure we'll we'll have more to say. But great. But for now.

1:56:29If so, yeah. But for now, if you want to talk more about this, you can reach me on the Fediverse at chigi.engineered.space or the network at engnet.engineered.space, although probably better to reach out to Vic because he knows more about than me. And if you're enjoying Pragmatic and you'd like to support us and keep the show ad-free, you can. By becoming a premium supporter, just visit engineer.network.pragmatic to learn how you can help the show to continue to be made. Thank you.

1:56:55A big thank you to all of our supporters, a special thank you to our silver producers, Mitch Bilga, Shane O'Neill, Jared Roman, Katarina Will, Chad During, Ian Gallagher, Andy and Jamie Russell, and an extra special thank you to our wonderful gold producers, Stephen Bridal, Kellan Fredelli's Fujimoto, Steve Branham, and our longest running gold producer, known only as R. So if you'd like to get in touch with Vic to talk about woodworking or anything else, what's the best way for them to get in touch with you, mate? I can be found at most places on the internet as Vic Hudson won. Excellent.

1:57:24And I just, yeah, I can't thank you enough, mate. This has actually been really cool. I've learnt quite a bit more than you probably appreciate. So I do appreciate all of this. And so, yeah. So thank you so much again for all of this. I really appreciate it. I had a lot of fun with it, and I really appreciate the opportunity to talk about it. I'm sorry I rambled on for so long about it. Don't never apologize for that. That's what the show's all about. Alright.

1:59:00You know that people are gonna reach out to me and I'll find it like August, right? Okay