Whenever you are glueing glass you must consider the visibility of the adhesive. If the glass is translucent, you will want a glue that dries as clear as possible. Before glueing any glass bond be sure that the glass is clean, free of any oil (even from your fingers) and dry.
Do you have any chairs, tables, or other wooden furniture that are a little wobbly due to the glue drying out? Here’s how you can tighten things up. First, disassemble the joined pieces. Clean off all of the old glue and dirt with warm vinegar. Rinse with clean water, and let everything dry completely. Use yellow carpenters glue to reassemble all the pieces back together.
A way to get a good fit when installing decorative molding is to install the first piece with a square end. Then cut the second piece at a 45-degree angle in a miter box or saw to expose the profile. Use a coping saw and follow the edge of the profile, under-cutting it about 3 degrees. This lets you get a good fit, even if the corner is not perfectly square.
An easy way to prevent a nail from splitting wood is by tapping the point of the nail with a hammer. This blunts the point and prevents the wood from splitting.
You should choose a handsaw based on the type and size of wood you’re cutting, and the direction of the cut – either cross cutting (cutting across the grain) or ripping (cutting with the grain).
Saws with fewer teeth per inch provide a faster, but rougher cut and are generally used for “ripping” wood, cutting in the same direction as the grain. The teeth of these rip saws are filed differently than the teeth of a cross cut blade to take advantage of the type of grain in the wood.
Cross cut saws are used for cutting across the grain and have finer teeth, usually from eight to 15 teeth per inch. When cutting thicker pieces, a saw with more teeth per inch may produce more debris than it can handle and possibly clog the cut and slow the cutting process. This can be avoided by using an old candle or paraffin wax and rubbing the blade to make it cut more smoothly through the wood. Remember to hold the saw straight in the cut so it doesn’t stick.
To get a better grip in a stripped screw hole, insert a few wooden toothpicks before rescrewing.
When clamping long or wide panels with bar clamps, a dowel inserted crosswise between the jaws of the bar clamps and the wood will help center the pressure and keep it uniform. Use dowels about as thick as the thickness of the wood you are gluing up.
If you need to hacksaw through a fastened pipe or rod, but the space above is cramped, try this: Remove the hacksaw’s blade, straddle the pipe with its frame from below, then reinstall the blade upside down. The teeth of the saw will cut through the pipe from the opposite side. In many cases this trick will allow you to complete a cut that would be otherwise impossible.
On certain projects, you may be required to work with brass screws. While the brass results in an attractive finished project, it is a soft metal that can easily be scratched or damaged. The solution is to use your drill to create a pilot hole, then drive a regular steel screw of identical size into the hole. After the hold is created, remove the steel screw and replace it with the brass one.
Using smaller tool boxes for individual projects can save you time and effort. Subdivide you larger set with just the tools needed for that project.
