I have been hesitant to post this up because it is pretty redneck, but what the hell. Shop hacks don’t need to be pretty, just functional.
I purchased a proper dust collector for my machine after burning through a couple of vacuums. Yes, it is worth it and it does work better and quieter than a shop vac.
My M2 sled has a port to fit an elbow and then attach a vacuum or the dust collector, but it constantly falls off in the middle of a job, so I either need to pause the job to reconnect it, or just let it finish without dust collection. It frustrated me for quite a while until one day I got mad at it, and glued the sumbitch in. I added the corner brackets to help hold it there while the glue dried, and I could continue working.
My dust collector quit working on me a couple of months ago, and I finally took it in to Busy Bee where I got a lesson from one of the great guys that work there on what causes the problem and how to fix it. The fine dust particles get down into the switch and clogs up the contacts. The simple solution is to take the switch apart and (be very careful doing this as it can fall apart) gently clear out the dust. I’m not a big fan of having to do that all the time, and the little plastic pieces are going to get broken, so I hope that this silly hack with a ziplock freezer bag and zip tied it to the switch casing might help avoid this issue.
I just wanted to add to the syringe and eyedropper paint hacks, too. I got these squeeze bottles from Michael’s, and I really like their fine steel tubes. They work really well for getting into small and intricate carves. The pen tubes are similar, it just gives me a more natural feel like using a pen or pencil.
This isn’t really anything new, and I hope that all woodworkers of all sorts know this already, but if you don’t, here ya go!
Masking tape is a product that I use a lot. It comes in very useful in many ways, besides just masking off areas to be painted.
For this particular example, I am showing two pieces, one that is just measured and cut with a jigsaw directly on the workpiece, and the second piece was covered with masking tape before being cut. The masking tape is quite effective in protecting the workpiece from unnecessary marking by the jigsaw.
You can actually go one step further with this and put painters tape down on the surface that you were attempting to fix something to as well, which will also protect that surface from the glue the same way you are protecting the thing that you are gluing down
This is probably pretty basic and well known, but when doing a simple sign, paint the face of the sign first, let dry and cover with painters tape then CNC the sign.
Rub the painters tape down really good to get a tight seal with the wood after cncing, and use spray paint to color in the letters. Light coats of spray paint wont pass under the paint and is super fast. Remove the tape and touch up if needed with a toothpick.
Save all those tin cans from canned food. Screw them to some scrap ply and mount on the wall. Slide the spray cans in for easy storage and free up shelf space.
Sometimes you just don’t have the time (or lazy) to clean up the paint brushes or rollers or still have painting to do later.
Save your paint brushes and rollers with Saran (cling) wrap. Wrap tight and use tape to prevent it from unwrapping. I have went months and unwrapped a roller that was still wet with paint.
