Gosh. Things have changed since I last did "proper woodwork".

[Beatsy]

I've returned to woodworking after not doing much since I left boat building, around 40 years ago. I did continue using my small collection of hand tools for all carpentry around the house but never tackled "for fun" projects and didn't buy (many) new tools in the interim. I was well out of touch with the woodworking world. Until now.,,

Wow - things have changed a lot more than I thought! In no particular order, things like...

• Tools from the usual DIY outlets are rubbish. Back in the day you could buy Stanley and be sure of a getting a decent bit of kit. Maybe not always one to last a lifetime, but close. Not so much now. Quality materials and decent tolerances seem to have been dispensed with entirely. Tools of similar accuracy and quality to those I once bought as "standard" are now "super-premium" and very, very costly. Booo!
• Inaccuracy in lumber machining and thickness of ply in particular is just "accepted" now!? I used acres of 3/4" mahogany-faced marine ply when I was a boat builder. It was always 3/4" inch thick. Every sheet within a batch of 12 eight-by-four sheets would be the same thickness. You could feel a slight thickness difference if you compared sheets from different batches, but could barely see, let alone measure that difference. I recently had some square blocks cut from "25mm marine plywood". Hah! When I got them, they ranged in thickness from 23.4 mm to 24.0 mm - and all were cut from a single sheet. An unpleasant surprise. Booo!
• Glue - still mainly PVA or urea resin. OK - so far, so boring. But what ever happened to my beloved Cascamite!!? I was so pleased to find it was still available (I used it all the time on the boats). I was devastated to find out how the new owners had messed with it. First tub I bought was "in date" and back to the original formula "you know and trust" (allegedly), but it was from a bad batch. It didn't set properly and left a powdery, weak joint once dry. So glad I tested it or I'd have lost some irreplaceable veneers to that. It put me right off Cascamite though - so I had to look for an alternative. Titebond was new to me (even though first made in 1955) so I tested some versions of that. I like the longer open time and better water-resistance of Titebond III, but it sometimes (often?) leaves dark stains at the glue line or when mixed with dust (hardwood veneers). So I settled on Titebond II for general use - and double sided tape for more than I care to admit to. Booo and yaayy!
• Sandpaper, of various types, has improved no end! Cuts faster, lasts longer, with "no-clog" versions that actually do what they say on the tin. DIY stores (in UK) are seriously gouging on prices though - and don't stock a wide enough range. Shout out for Norton A275 AO papers (bought online). I got long rolls of various grits after discovering how superbly well it works. Probably bought too much given how long the first few pieces are (still) lasting. Yaayy!
• Finishes. Wow, there are so many neat and useful finishes now, it's hard to know where to start. I'm familiar with the old stalwarts like tung oil, french polish, yacht varnish etc, and those are still perfectly viable, but some of the the new ones are pretty cool. Currently exploring Rubio Monocoat 2C. It has the "look" I want and is dead easy to use, but the "don't go over 180 grit" thing is a problem for my application (not flooring). I've been experimenting though and think I can safely go to 400 grit now - which is just about acceptable. Just a few more tests and I'll post separately about that.

That will do for now. Not exactly a "things were better in my day" post, but I suspect responses (if any) could soon lead that way What do you think?

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Abranet (Toolstation for common grits) for an abrasive and semforite for an adhesive if you miss cascamite.
https://www.maragon.co.uk/glue.html#Init

 

[recipio]

A good summary of the influence of the 'Pacific Rim' on woodworking. I gave up buying Chinese tat and now save up for quality tools even if they put a hole in my credit card. Having gone through six Chinese verniers - they all simply stopped working - I bought a Mitutoyo digital and it is a joy every time I pick it up. Titebond make a 'cold press glue ' for veneering which helps with 'bleed through ' the veneer otherwise any PVA should be fine for joints.

 

[stuckinthemud]

&1 for semforite

 

[Lorenzl]

Chinese verniers

I was given a pair and every now and then they would change zero to 3.75

 

[heimlaga]

This is the very reason why most of my tools and machines are secondhand and made more than 30 years ago.

 

[Jameshow]

Look at titebond epoxy and polyurethane d4 glues

 

[Phil Pascoe]

PU D4 is fine in its place but for many jobs its unnecessarily messy. Everbuild D4 is easier and cleaner to use.

 

[thetyreman]

not sponsored by them but I love wudcare PVA, I don't mind my chinease made aldi digital calipers, still working after almost 7 years now.

 

[D_W]

not sponsored by them but I love wudcare PVA, I don't mind my chinease made aldi digital calipers, still working after almost 7 years now.

I doubt the baseline tools branded by anyone are much different than what's sold by aldi.

The middle of the market is what disappeared, and the branded tools put the cheap junk in the middle. I've got two dial calipers (first digi didn't last me years ago). one is older browne and sharpe, and the other is one that was about $18. there's no real functional difference using the two.

 

[Beatsy]

This is the very reason why most of my tools and machines are secondhand and made more than 30 years ago.

First, thanks everyone for your responses. I did order and receive some Semforite, but yet to try it out. I think the episode with Cascamite has rather knocked my trust in the urea resins. I never knew they had a shelf life until I looked into it. Wish I hadn't now. Ignorance is bliss, eh...

@heimlaga Same here for most things. Not because vintage/used is cheaper (it often isn't) but because it's nearly always made better - and made to repair if necessary.

An example: I recently bought a small job lot of "vintage" Stanley planes - No 4, No 5 and No 5 1/2. Everything present, all works as it should, one damaged handle, but still usable - and easily fixable. All that aside - the planes have obviously been used a lot, plenty of even wear on the soles and edges, but it looks like they were worn down from the "as received" factory finish. That is, there's been no secondary grinding of soles for flatness or the cheeks for squareness. I expected that to be my first task, but it wasn't. Not a bit of it. All three planes are dead flat, dead straight and dead square! Very happy with that.

Cheers

 

[CMax]

Even the last fifteen years I've been into woodworking I've seen quite the shift, most notably, Axminster now selling what would have been their budget range as 'Trade' (specifically thinking of their planer thicknesser combo and bandsaws). The price for these re-badged far-eastern machines is eyewatering for what you get. Over a grand for something worth half that now.

 

[Oakydoky]

How funny... I left yacht joinery a similar length of time ago. Berthon boats in Lymington to be precise.
Ye some things are different but a lot is the same. Most new stuff is pineapples though.... nothing really changes!

 

[nickds1]

A good summary of the influence of the 'Pacific Rim' on woodworking. I gave up buying Chinese tat and now save up for quality tools even if they put a hole in my credit card. Having gone through six Chinese verniers - they all simply stopped working - I bought a Mitutoyo digital and it is a joy every time I pick it up. Titebond make a 'cold press glue ' for veneering which helps with 'bleed through ' the veneer otherwise any PVA should be fine for joints.

Quite amusing: Mitutoyo is a Japanese company.

Japan is a Pacific Rim country...

Several Pacific Rim countries make fabulous tools and pretty much all bulk semiconductor manufacturing (which is as precise as technology gets) is Pacific Rim too...

 

[MARK.B.]

While it is true that a lot of stuff made in China etc is what we call cheap and nasty, the same can apply to stuff made elsewhere and even here in the UK , the Chinese can and do produce some top quality products of very high spec ,the problem occurs mainly due to those companies that want to buy in bulk from China etc not wanting to pay a premium price for quality components as this cuts down on their profit margin when they come to sell them to the likes of you and me. So what happens is they get to save a few pennies here and there by specifying lower quality components to be used in the product,and so the maker in China simply does what his customer asks him to do and we as the end consumer end up with inferior quality built in to many products because they were required to make them that way in the first place. This happens all over the world but because China makes so much more than anywhere else in the world they get to take the brunt of the blame .Back in the 70's a lot of motor bikes made in Japan were labelled as Jap C.r.a.p and they got a bad reputation around the world , yet now they produce high end top quality bikes at eye watering prices because they use quality and more expensive parts to build them .Of course even something high end and expensive can turn out to be a lemon, but there is more chance of getting the lemon fixed or replaced because high end manufacturers do not want to lose their high end reputation .So i guess in the end you get what you pay for and unfortunately Quality does come at a price.

 

[recipio]

Quite amusing: Mitutoyo is a Japanese company.

Japan is a Pacific Rim country...

Several Pacific Rim countries make fabulous tools and pretty much all bulk semiconductor manufacturing (which is as precise as technology gets) is Pacific Rim too...

Yes, Japan is part of the 'Pacific Rim' but the quality of their goods sets them apart from the rest. A degree of cynicism has crept in to woodworking tools produced in the ' Far East '. They no longer have to be fit for purpose, they just have to last until the end of the warranty period if any. I was reduced to buying digital verniers off Ebay for £10 - they all gave up after six months anyway. I have stopped buying digital tools as they will all ultimately fail.
People are certainly seduced by cheap prices into buying 'supermarket tools ' but it's a false economy. Quality remains long after the price is forgotten ?

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Back in the 70's a lot of motor bikes made in Japan were labelled as Jap C.r.a.p and they got a bad reputation around the world , yet now they produce high end top quality bikes ...

'50s and '60s. maybe. I bought my first bike in 1970, a Triumph, which was dire and scrapped at 3000 miles. I was advised at the time to buy Japanese and didn't listen - a few of my friends bought Japanese and didn't have a minute's trouble with them. They were better built than British bikes by a mile.
My friend (12 years ago) was a £100,000 + p. a. salesman for a large firm selling compressors etc. He told his boss one day that a customer objected when he found they were manufactured in India. His boss said the customer had to be joking, the Indian stuff was far and away better than anything manufactured in this Country.
You get much what you pay for.

Your point is sound, though.

 

[D_W]

English bikes had a small following here in the states, too. The real secret to having an English bike was living in a town where there was a one-man (low cost) specialist repairman who did English bikes.

70s honda bikes pretty much eliminated the English brands and harley davidson wasn't so hot at the time. Not sure what HD is doing these days as they made a big charge back in the 90s and early 2000s, and there are still plenty around, but I don't see the big push for people to want to ride motorcycles and ride in boats and such things on the weekends.

I think cell phones and facebook and such have sucked up so much time that a lot of people are no longer stimulated by unplugging for a couple of hundred miles' ride or sitting in a boat and falling asleep in the sun.

Japan was known quality here by the 80s for other stuff - especially power tools and small gas powered devices and bigger lawn mowers (I think honda quit that). At this point, you can't find much from japan here unless you're buying used goods. Taiwan now in quality goods has also been squeezed out by China, indonesia, malaysia, vietnam and mexico.

Some of the most expensive site tools here are made in china - I'm not in that gig, the $700 cordless drill realm, but it sounds like if you break their stuff, they put another one in your hand and there's potentially (probably?) a guy who drives around and brings it to you.

The "made in USA" thing is touted here a lot, but it doesn't mean anything to people on the ground when something else has a lower price and is known to be usable.

An older fellow who I know well often tells me about his childhood when we made the whole range here and a lot of the stuff made - especially consumer to mid level - was junk. i had a junk stripped down USA made delta power jointer that I robbed parts off of and ultimately threw away. The difference, too, was that the junk made here was expensive in relative terms.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Honda still make excellent mowers.

 

[recipio]

China has certainly won the lottery with low labour costs. Any Makita tool for instance is as likely to be made in China as in Japan. The Japanese however have a special line of Makita tools for their own use. They are maroon coloured rather than blue so that gives you an idea of what they think of the Chinese ! Too bad shipping costs from Japan are so prohibitive.