Ten EXPENSIVE woodworking tools you have to see!

[Music] welcome to a special edition of our cool tools series that i'm calling drool tools this series is usually about finding useful and practical tools that won't break the bank but not today this time it's all about the sort of things many of us dream about owning today you'll see 10 of the highest quality woodworking tools i have ever had the pleasure of using none of them are cheap but even if they aren't in your budget sometimes it's just nice to look at the high end stuff you know what i mean we've got a hand powered table saw a precision disc sander the ultimate sharpening system a dowel jig unlike any other a portable air filtration system a pattern-based joinery system a motorized router table a jet engine style dust collector what may be the world's best random orbit sander and of course something from festool some of these tools i acquired myself a few are from sponsors i'll note those in the description below the video where i'll also place links to all the tools otherwise we'll be moving quickly and while all these tools are definitely drool worthy i'll also be nitpicking to find something negative to say about each one so you don't completely flood your keyboard with drool now let's get started the joint maker pro represents one of the most clever and deceptively useful innovations in hand tool woodworking in a very long time i've long admired the precision that can be achieved with a japanese pole saw that's put into highly skilled hands but my hands aren't highly skilled and i don't have a lifetime to train them by mounting that saw upside down and adding sliding tables with high quality fences and micro adjustable stops bridge city tools has combined the laser like precision of a pole saw with the adjustability and the repeatability of a table saw and the possibilities are limited only by your imagination compared to a table saw the joint maker pro is quiet it's compact it doesn't fill the air with sawdust and it's far safer to make delicate cuts with your fingers right next to the blade compared to a handheld saw it's faster it's more precise in the habits of an average woodworker and the clever stops make even the most delicate cuts repeatable with a high level of accuracy it excels at rip cuts cross cuts miter cuts bevel cuts through cuts and non through cuts you can use it for traditional joinery such as dovetails and tenons to make delicate cuts that aren't practical with power tools or to build entire projects without waking the shop dog if i'm being nitpicky i'd say you must learn to use it properly taking too deep a cut at once for example could bend the blade and while you can safely put your fingers right next to the blade you still must be aware of the blade's location because any blade that will cut through wood will also cut through flesh if you're careless in my shop the joint maker pro is an invaluable companion to my power tools for special cuts but i also find myself coming back to it for more and more cuts that i could make with a power tool because it's just such a pleasure to use i'll link to it below this video so you can check it out for yourself the alberti disc sander was first developed for violin makers to facilitate the shaping and fitting of small parts but its uses go far beyond those specific to instrument makers model makers box makers even furniture makers commonly use disk sanders to shape project parts but this sander takes those tasks to the next level the first thing you'll notice is the quality of every component every moving part runs true and adjusts easily it stays adjusted at precise angles unlike many power sanders the grits are quickly interchangeable due to a clever locking mechanism so you won't find yourself using the wrong grit because you don't want to go through the hassle of changing those adhesive back sanding discs and the hand operated crank gives you a level of control that simply isn't possible with a motorized sander not only is it an excellent tool for precise shaping and fine tuning of project parts but it also makes a serviceable sharpening system both with fine papers and with a leather coated disc for stropping my only complaint is the mounting mechanism at the base it's designed to clamp to a bench top or it can be screwed down as i did mine but i prefer something that's easier to release so you can move the sander around and put it on a shelf would not in use i suspect the manufacturer was most concerned with keeping the unit which is heavier than it looks secure during use and you could make a simple base for it if you like the alberti disc sander has found a place in my shop for precise shaping and fine tuning of project parts there are other ways to get these jobs done but this machine is a real luxury to have i'll place a link below so you can check it out for yourself i've used the tormek water cooled sharpening system for years but i have a big shop and a couple of folks working for me so i decided to get another machine interestingly they have a new concept they're calling the t8 custom which acknowledges that everyone's different so why not strip their flagship machine down to its bare bones and then let the customer build it back up into the system that best suits their needs for example this spoon carver and woodturner chose a diamond wheel instead of the stock stone and several jigs specific to the tools he uses in his craft there's other examples too which got me thinking what would a woodworker choose for his dream sharpening setup well i happen to be a woodworker so here's what i ordered i got the t8 system of course but instead of a standard stone i chose the diamond wheels and their three grits because i love how they never need grading or truing and they never change in size so i can swap between wheels without resetting my jig i also chose the new composite honing wheel instead of the leather one because it needs no paste which is awesome and i got the leather profiled wheels because i like them for my carving gouges these need paste though that completes the machine itself now for the jigs i selected the square edge jig for my chisels and plane irons the tool rest platform for my card scrapers and for freehand grinding the short tool jig for my carving gouges and the knife sharpening jig because everyone has kitchen knives finally i got a rotating base and one of their rubber work mats because these are fantastic this is my t8 custom customized to my shop and my needs of course i've used a tormek for years none of these accessories are new to me so i can speak from experience when i say that this is the ultimate power sharpening system and that shouldn't be a surprise because this is all tormek does they build sharpening machines we've come to expect true innovation from them others have tried to copy their machines and while those knockoffs aren't even close to the tormek in terms of quality and reliability they especially fail when they try to copy tormex jigs i have yet to see a knockoff that works half as well as an authentic tormek product because you may be able to steal their ideas but you can't steal their manufacturing process that's the product of nearly half a century in this business and it's why tormek can offer warranties that far exceed the others and why so many 20 and 30 year old machines are still running strong in workshops today if i had to say something critical about the tormek system is that their stropping paste dries out on the leather wheels you can refresh it with some more paste or even a light oil but as someone who likes to just walk up to the machine and quickly touch up an edge with the strop i have to say i'm pretty excited to try the new composite wheel that eliminates the paste the tormach found a home in my shop years ago as an educator i have to be proficient in many types of sharpening so i have many sorts of systems but when it comes to power there's nothing like the tarmac i'll put a link below this video so that you can customize the t8 to your needs as well the key to dowel joinery is accuracy if you struggled with poor results in the past the problem was most likely that the joint was poorly formed and aligned which resulted in poor glue adhesion five 3 8 inch dowels provide nearly 12 square inches of glue surface if aligned properly a dowel joint can be incredibly strong that's why the makers of the dollar max system set out to make a jig that was not only fast and versatile to use but very precise this means the jig must be easy to fit in exactly the correct position on both halves of your joint or any error may double when the joint comes together to achieve that high level of precision the jig itself must be precisely machined from high quality materials the dowelmax is not cast it's cnc cut from solid aluminum and brass with a total of 75 surfaces that are machined to a tolerance of plus or minus five thousandths of an inch about the same thickness as a human hair there is simply no other dowel jig on the market that comes close to that sort of quality but are dowel joints still practical in a world with loose tenon devices well dowels are loose tenons they're individually narrower than say a domino but they combine to provide more glue surface in fact the manufacturer of the dowelmax jig compared a dowel joint made with their system to one made with the popular festool domino and it did take a tremendous amount of force for the domino joint to fail likewise the dowel max joint also withstood a tremendous amount of force and finally it was the board itself that was torn apart leaving the dowel joint intact does that mean a dowel joint's better than a loose tenon joint such as a domino no it means both are very very strong the difference is in the process and this is my only complaint with the dollmax it takes longer to set up any dowel jig and cut each joint than it does to use an automatic power tool but it's about a quarter of the price the dowelmax is an incredibly precise tool that will produce reliably strong joinery and for that it's found a home in my workshop i'll link to it below if you want to check it out i have great dust collection in my shop but vacuum type systems can only get so much of the dust the fine stuff gets into the air and that may be the most harmful to my health so i was excited to try out axiom stratus air filtration system when i saw it in an ad last year the stratus is an impressive unit it has a powerful five and a half amp motor with three speeds that can move up to 51 000 cubic feet of air per hour that's all the air in a one car garage every two minutes and it removes dust particles as tiny as one micron that is much finer filtration than most ceiling mounted units and while a ceiling mounting unit pulls the dust up past your face a floor standing unit pulls the dust down from your work surface and away from you plus the stratus is portable so it can be placed anywhere to capture dust at its source and it's easier to clean and maintain those filters when you don't have to climb a ladder i only have a couple complaints first it doesn't slide well on a carpeted shop and i suspect it would be worse on concrete i prefer some wheels to move it around because this thing's heavy and it's pretty loud when it's on its highest setting but that's to be expected with such a powerful motor in my shop the stratus air filter has been ideal because i can set it next to where i'm sanding or carving or doing anything that creates fine dust i like that portability and i especially like that it will pull the dust down away from my face instead of up past my face to the ceiling i'll link to it below if you want to check it out for yourself the pantorouter is a prime example of how a simple idea can grow into something truly fantastic pantographs have been used in woodworking and sign making for generations it was just a matter of time before someone thought to turn one on its side and apply the idea to traditional joinery others took the idea even farther refining the mechanisms adding more features and innovations until the commercial version of the pantorouter was born it looks complicated believe me i've owned plenty of all-in-one tools that are overly complicated and just a pain to set up this thing's different it wasn't difficult to master and it's been a pleasure to use my first project was a cart to hold the machine which was designed by jay bates as an exercise in learning the tool's features in minutes we were cutting mortises we are cutting tenons we are cutting finger joints and part after part was batched out quickly and accurately because of some key features first are the templates which are cleverly designed for example the fit of the finger joints can be adjusted by changing the depth of the follower bearing because the template itself is tapered genius integrated stops and fences mean you can use your work pieces themselves to set up the machine eliminating measuring errors and greatly simplifying the process and everything is precisely repeatable if i had to point out something negative i'd say it's loud which is the nature of any router-based machine you definitely want hearing protection when you're using it routers are also notoriously messy but the dust collection shroud on the panel router is surprisingly effective making it one of the cleanest joinery options in many power tool shops that as well as the ease of setup and the precise repeatability of the cuts not only won me over but at one over the skeptics in my shop who tend to doubt the usefulness of some newfangled woodworking jigs if you want to see if you can be one over two check out the link below this video let me begin by talking about what a luxury it is to have a cast iron router tabletop i've got nothing against vanilla tops or other materials but there's a reason why we prefer our table saws to have cast iron tops and bringing that level of flatness stability and mass to the router table not to mention the ability to attach magnetic jigs and feather boards that's something i didn't know i wanted until i got a cast iron router table but that's only one of the luxuries included in the mlcs ultimate powerlift pro system the real surprise is in that power lift part of the name the router lift is motorized and it may be controlled by a foot pedal so imagine making a plunge cut for example such as a slot rather than tipping the work piece down on top of the bit you can lay it flat and then use the foot pedal to raise the bit up into the wood safely and accurately and that's just where the fun begins a tablet connects to the lift via bluetooth so you can control it with an app now you can set the height of your bit precisely and even save your settings so it may be reused again through the course of the project or sometime later down the road add a high quality fence with split faces locking insert rings a three and a quarter horsepower router motor and the robust steel stand and you have a router table system that is really hard to beat my one complaint was my first tablet didn't last long but the mlcs customer service was fantastic and i had a replacement in my hands and email follow-ups in my inbox almost immediately and the second tablets worked just fine i have several router tables in this shop including another cast iron top but the mlcs ultimate power lift pro system is a pleasure to use and i have a feeling i'm only scratching the surface when it comes to the possibilities i'll link to it below so you can check it out too i discovered the harvey gyro air dust processor at a woodworking show some time ago and i have to admit i had no idea what it was it looked like some sort of jet engine and as it turns out my initial curiosity over it wasn't unique i later learned the story of another person who was also drawn to investigate this strange machine at the show he spoke to the representative for a while he heard all about it asked questions and then said can you turn it on well the answer was it had been on the whole time they'd been standing talking now granted that was at a noisy woodworking show but it illustrates how quiet this thing can be not that it won't get noisy it has a variable speed control so you can adjust it to your needs and on its highest setting you'll know it's running because it's pulling over 1100 cubic feet per minute but even at that level it rates at only 71 decibels and when turned down for the average small shop application it's a relatively peaceful 61 decibels and there's so much more going on inside that box the technology is really unlike anything else you've seen unlike traditional dust collection cyclones that slow down the airstream within that cone so that the dust will drop out the harvey system features centrifuges that speed the air up as it enters spinning the dust in the chips at a blistering 4000 rpm creating centrifugal forces that are a hundred times greater than gravity that separates the dust from the clean air with such efficiency that this two horsepower system performs like a machine with a much larger more power hungry motor if there's a downside to this innovative technology is that it takes about five seconds to fully power the unit up which doesn't sound like much but it causes a delay if you want to make one quick cut that may take some getting used to for the impatient among us the g700 has found a home in our corner workshop we even built a bench over it to take advantage of its unique shape and maximize our floor space check it out yourself at the link below this video i drugged my feet a long time before i bought this sander because i just didn't believe it could be that much better than my cheap sanders to justify its price but i hate sanding and i hate dust and i'd heard so many good things about it i find they took the plunge several months ago now i'm a believer mirka sanders have been used professionally in woodworking and auto body shops for many years they're the gold standard and there's a reason for it it's surprisingly lightweight its shape and low profile is comfortable to hold it's quiet when combined with a good dust extractor the dust collection is amazing it doesn't vibrate the heck out of your hand did i mention the dust collection is amazing seriously i didn't know what good dust collection was with the sander until i got that thing that alone has made the price worth it i also love how the cord disconnects from the handle so it's easy to put away i love the paddle switch on the top and the wide ranging variable speed brushless motor and i love how it comes with a sustainer type box that works with the festool ecosystem i've read online reviews from folks who say this sander changed their shop lives because of carpal tunnel or dust allergies others say it cuts their sanding time in half i'm not sure i'm ready to go that far yet but give me time it's already made sanding a lot less of a chore the downside it's a 600 sander but i've never met america user who regrets his investment and so far i think i'm a believer too i'll link to it below so you can check it out when i broke down and bought a high-end sander i thought why hook up a loud dusty shop vacuum to a quiet sander that's optimized for dust collection so i bought a festool dust extractor with all the bells and whistles and let me say this believe the hype everything about this machine is impressive when i turn on a power tool the extractor automatically comes on with it it's far quieter than a shop vacuum and much more powerful it features five speeds and it'll move up to 130 cubic feet per minute of air at high pressure even the hose is kink and crush proof and of top quality plus it stores inside the hepa filtration is top-notch and it cleans itself that's right the filter cleans itself to restore lost suction when it gets plugged with fine dust this is their mid-size extractor they make a smaller one and they make a larger one i was worried it wouldn't be enough for a woodworking shop but it seems perfect both in power and in its compact form i had a hard time finding something to complain about this one i suppose the bags are a little small at 3.9 gallons but that's because it's a compact model still at five bucks a piece they can add up if you're attaching the extractor to big chip making tools and i don't recommend vacuuming the floor with it unless you want to fill those bags fast in my shop the festool midi dust collector has become part of our sanding system and fine dust has been banned it hurt to buy it but i sure do like it check it out at the link below that's it for this special edition of drool tools get yourself a napkin and wipe your chin and i'll see you next time wait don't go yet if you're new here please subscribe and remember to ring the bell i would really appreciate that give us a thumbs up or better yet leave us a comment i always read them and be sure to check out the latest issue of stumpynub's woodworking journal it's always packed with tips tricks and tutorials designed to make you a better woodworker

Channel: Stumpy Nubs

Views: 149,291

Rating: 4.9261212 out of 5

Keywords: woodworking, stumpy nubs, tips, workbench, table saw, scroll saw, drill press, quick tip, band saw, bandsaw, lumber, hack, hand plane, sharpening, tormek, worksharp, diamond stone, water stone, wood turning, bowls, lathe

Id: BtpkbYCnwpI

Length: 20min 37sec (1237 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 22 2020