Thread: Starter tool sets!

Trouble is, good tools cost money and there's a certain minimum quantity you need to actually get started in any meaningful way.

Often you also have to be able to put tools to use immediately ("Yes, honey, I have the screwdriver and drill now, but I still have to wait till I can afford to buy the plane to fix that sticking door - it'll only be about 6 more months, promise...").

I go for the buy cheap (but acknowledge that it's cheap) and upgrade when you know you enjoy a particular activity. Like, I generally hate manual sawing, so even the best manual saw in the world wouldn't change my mind there.

I can get quite carried away with planing, but I don't think I'll ever buy a L-N, so the low quality control era Stanleys will have to do. I don't mind using a hammer...but when I'm putting up a fence there's no way I'd choose a $200 hammer over a $200 nail gun.

If the tools were merely for hobby use, you could do it. But generally there's an expectation that they will be used to get spouse-friendly things done, in a timeframe of 'now'.*


*Actually, its worse when the comparison is "Shirl at work had problems with the doors at her house, and she got a handyman in to fix them and it only cost her like $120 for all the doors in her house and she's really happy with it....what do you need that $600 thingy for anyway?"

Chook, I agree with your sentiments and hold very similar attitudes towards my own work - striving to do better than last time is what keeps me going, too. If you are the driven type, you will always want to go on to new challenges & better outcomes. However, we do need to allow for a wide range of expectations, budgets, and goals, when newbies seek advice from the collective wisdom, here. They always get a range of (sometimes conflicting) opinions, which I don't think is harmful, because there are many paths to any end point, & human nature being what it is, people heed advice that best accords with their own beliefs & expectations. OTH, if someone says something that seems to be foolishly wrong, or worse, downright dangerous, we should respond accordingly (politely, of course! )

As you say, brilliant work can be done with the crappiest tools -I've seen it with mine own eyes. Skill is the secret ingredient, & for most of us, that is only acquired by dedication & through time. "Good" tools can be easier to use if set up correctly, but you can still make a mess of good wood with the best of tools, & you can make a 'good' tool into a 'bad' tool through ignorance & inexperience (DAMHIK!). A Lie-Nielsen plane may take nice shavings out of the box, but in the hands of someone who has never used a plane before, what will it be like after 3 or 4 attempts to sharpen & reset the blade? Probably very little better, if at all, than a flea-market find fettled by the same hand. Same goes for hand saws, only p'raps more so - I'll bet there are a few expensive brass-backed saws out there that are cutting about as well as the dog your son brought home from the hardware store! So for a newbie, there is something to be said for building their tool fettling skills on something that would not cause any of us to shed tears if it all goes horribly wrong. Buying a tool that works well out of the box definitely gives you a reference point, and this is often quoted as a compelling reason for buying the 'best' straight off. If you've got the readies, by all means buy nothing but the best - you are highly unlikely to regret it. However, some folks just plain can't afford to do that. I spent the first 20 years or more of my woodworking life as a student, grad student, mortgagee, & parent of teenage children. How I drooled over those early LV catalogues, but all I got was wet paper!

I appreciate your concerns about pople starting with really crap tools. There is no doubt cheap tools can frustrate you, just how much depends on your expectations, and there is a real danger that it could turn a potential woodworker off the whole damn business. But even with the best of tools, inexperience coupled with high expectations & no help, could have the same outcome, which is one reason I always advocate that beginners find a woodie club or a good mentor to lean on for the first little while. Books, videos, whatever are a huge help, but unless you are a dedicated loner, a bit of on-the-spot help is invaluable.

In retrospect, my inability to buy the tools I lusted after turned out to be no handicap at all. For starters, I would have ended up with three times the number I now own, and two thirds of them would be sitting unused in my toolbox. As you said, this is a journey, but a long one, so there are bound to be wrong turns and bumps in the road, but it's all good, and as I'm sure you well know, mistakes often teach us far more than easy success. Being forced to be an opportunist tool hunter requires patience, but it has its rewards. Words can't convey the sheer joy of stumbling on an old Rosewood-handled Record 07 at a flea market, in excellent condition (a little surface rust made it un-pretty), for $50! Rehabbing old tools, learning for myself what is likely to be good & what to leave for someone else, and especially making my own tools, have all added much to my skill set, and have been a thoroughly enjoyable activity in themselves. By the time I could afford "the best" tools, I realised I no longer needed most of them because my old 'second-best' tools do the job well enough, thanks to much fiddling & fettling, and besides, I don't think I could bring myself to part with some of my old faithfuls no matter how much brass & bling you offered me on a replacement......

So 'viva les differences', is my motto - let the opinions and debates roll on, and let the readers decide what suits their temperaments, budgets & ambitions best. We're all trying to help as much as we can, but in the end, I think it's up to individuals to decide which road they'll follow at each of the many forks in this road....

Cheers,

The cost of tools can be expensive and there is no getting around it. But you can a basic tool set for not so much if you are careful. I have the following planes
Stanley no 7 jointer : a gift from a wonderful old man
Stanley no 4: $2
Stanley no 5:$2
Stanley no 110 block plane: given away at a garage sale
Stanley no 78 rebate plane: $20 flea market
Stanley no 71 router plane: $50 flea market
Veritas low angle smoother: $280 Carbatec

Apart from the Veritas plane I got all the rest at garage sales and flea markets and restored them.

I have a 3 Veritas saws (rip, cross cut and dovetail) which cost me $200 in total. I also have an old Sandvik tenon saw which I have had so long I don't remember when or where or how much it cost and a couple of Japanese pull saws worth about $30 each.I have some marking gauges, a marking knife, fret saw and a coping saw. I still use an old set of Stanley chisels which I keep razor sharp with a small set of Waterstones. I have some squares (large and small) and a bevel gauge.

Now I suppose that all of this would have cost me somewhere less than $1000 and I do basically all of my hand tool work with these tools. There are a few things I would like to change but I can cut most every conceivable joint with these tools and they will probably out last me. Most of them are not Rolls Royce tools but they were all good quality tools when they were made and remain so now. (The 110 block plane is on probation.)

I am not sure that there are many crafts where you can set yourself up so cheaply or so well.

I will not lie though. I also have been collecting power tools and machinery for a long time too and these do cost a lot more money
.
Men will smoke and drink themselves into ill health and early death. For a fraction of the cost they can have a useful pass time that will last a life time and do them untold physical and mental benefits.

Hi Chook - looks like a lot of us in S.E. Qld are holed up indoors today!

Yep, what comes out of your list & my own tool-gathering experience is that you most certainly can acquire a lot of good tools for not much money, but it can take years, depending on where you live, and your access to the right places. You need a little patience to go that route, but as you've amply dmonstrated, it can certainly be rewarding!

Now, you could have made yourself a couple of nice saws & saved even more....

Cheers,

It's a Catch-22...

You can find & buy good, cheap tools - both second-hand & new, "off the shelf" - once you know what you're looking for.

To know what you're looking for takes experience using those tools.

Besides, the biggest problem for a beginner, as I see it, is that they don't really have any idea what they want. As often as not they don't really have any idea what type of woodwork they want to do. Hpw many beginners have gone out and spent a fortune on a ranget of tools and doodads, only to decide they want to make... let's say Bandsawn Boxes... and 90% of their purchases end up rusting in drawers?

Better to buy what they need for the job in hand, as & when they need it. Not the cheapest tools, either, (nor the most expensive!) and if/when they need replacing buy a better set according to what they have learned.

There are certainly some very deceptive tools out there; which either look bad but handle well or vice-versa, but isn't that part of what these forums (fora? forii?) are about? To point out the good buys and the bad?

Agree with you Chook. The standard advice was few and good. Only get what you need to begin with and make sure you can use them. Difficult advice nowadays when the advertising of cheap garbage is making them sound fantastic. The description, "tradesman's tools" usually refers to painters - i.e. will be ideal for opening paint tins or scraping spills off the floor.

hmmm.... Chook, I agree with your sentiments, but....I had stuff all $ when I started buying tools so the 'New top of the range' tools were out of my reach, and I still hesitate to buy them. So I mostly bought old tools.... and spent who knows how many hours and materials getting them into working order. (with the benefit of having to work out how the tools worked). Bit of a catch 22 situation really, buy new and good quality and take years to get the tools you need to start out, or buy old and spend time and money fixing them up to good users. So, starting all over again an if I had so much money that I could buy what I wanted.... I'd buy an investment property.