Is DIY/Hobby woodworking a dying pastime?

[CHJ]

I ask this because over this weekend I was able to make a direct comparison of Woodworking and Model Engineering from a hobbyist point of view.

My observations were:

1. Manufacture and or Supplier Participation:
Woodworking show, equipment suppliers and manufacturers participation almost non existent.

Model Engineering Exhibition, several hours’ worth of browsing and machine comparison available from a broad spectrum of suppliers meeting all levels of precision and size from table top to substantial CNC.

2.
Machine Costs:
Woodworking. A Higher end Lathe, suitable for a semi professional consisting of just a variable speed motor, rigid bed and an adequate tailstock and tool rest. Only One model on display and costing £1500+

Any others to be seen in current woodworking mags go on up to £3500+ and invariably consist of just a beefed up motor, supply inverter, and castings to compliment them.

Metal Working: For £300 upwards literally dozens of lathes, (mills etc.) capable of providing precision alignment, cutting tolerances to fractions of a millimeter and with a host of gear cutting, saddle traverse, cross-slide traverse and for £1500 one quite adequate for you to build your own motorbike engine.

Absolutely no comparison in engineering quality and bang for bucks between the two disciplines.

What gives, a car manufacturer can get his costs down to the point where an engine is produced for a few hundred pounds, how come a cast beam, a three phase motor with controller and 20 kilos or so of basic cast iron add-ons costs double or treble; surely it can't all be down to scale of production.

3.
Lectures/seminars equipment demonstrations:
Woodworking show, one outside demonstrator (cutting up logs) and less than a handful of the stalwart consumables suppliers doing anything other than a sales spiel and the latter, mostly only on demand when questions asked. A couple of lathe suppliers had working lathes in use demonstrating associated tool use.

Model Engineering Exhibition, Lectures running throughout the day, equipment in use and demonstrators actively stripping down and explaining construction and operating details, and co-ordinating link-ups with complimentary technologies for those interested.

4.
Invited Groups, Clubs and Individuals.

Woodworking: One Turning club I can remember and no other discipline that made enough impact to stick in my mind.

Model Engineering Exhibition: More clubs and individual displays of working models than I could comfortably absorb in a two stage coating of looking at.
Outdoor display of invited working models and their builders to keep an interest going for an hour or more.

5.
Bits and pieces consumables/tools etc.: (outside the Brand Names)

Woodworking: one regular attendee with a somewhat esoteric pricing policy with a high percentage of bits available in the local pound shop or market stall.

Model Engineering Exhibition: several tool and stock material suppliers with a depth of tooling and consumables that really needed a day or at a minimum a half day all to themselves if you wanted to explore the stock available, the pricing being very competitive and balanced across a wide spectrum of quality.

Rant Over, I feel better now but not much.

 

[Anonymous]

So...your point is?
If you want to do wood work, do that, if you want to do model engineering do that, shouldnt matter wether theres a big industy support thing there or not whatever you decide to do :wink: why worry?
woodworkers are generally resourcful people, they make things from wood and find all manner of inventive ways of doing this, quite often interesting diy stuff, traditional technology, recycled technology, home made kit etc etc. That genuine diversity is what I find so intresting :wink: why rely so much on woodwork industry to produce lots of flashy gadgets anyways?

Mind you it might have been a particulalry naff woodwork show and a particulalrly good model engineer one :wink: :roll:
cheers Mr Spanton

 

[mailee]

Well Chas I must say I totally agree with you on this. A few years back when I visited woodworking shows on a fairly regular basis there seemed to be a lot more on offer and much more discounted prices. The goods were on the whole of good quality too. Last year I attended the Exhibition at Horrogate and was dissapointed at the whole show! It was small not a lot on offer and certainly not the bargains I was expecting of past shows. Most of the 'cheaper' items were just as you describe of 'Pound shop' quailty. I drove for around an hour to this show intending to spend a good part of the day there but alas stayed just two hours! I did come away with a diamond stone and a few leaflets but nothing else. There were a few demonstrations and I did like the hands on approach of the Woodrat stand of which I had a play. My final impression though was of complete dissapointment!

 

[dedee]

Is the interest in model engineering in some way due to the engineering & manufacturing industrial heritage of this country? Over the last 10-20 years countless thousands of people have lost their jobs in said industry are still keen to keep their eye in. Some of whom, in my experience, even buying machinery when their company went bust.


Andy

 

[CHJ]

Is the interest in model engineering in some way due to the engineering & manufacturing industrial heritage of this country? ...snip..Andy

To some extent certainly, some of the younger participants spoken to do it because they are now just desk computer drivers (Honda etc.) with no outlet for their skills.

But does this indicate that the Wood industry has been in decline longer and the skill base is no longer there? or is it due to:---

....snip...woodworkers are generally resourcful people, they make things from wood and find all manner of inventive ways of doing this, quite often interesting diy stuff, traditional technology, recycled technology, home made kit etc etc. ...snip...

---limiting the potential for manufactures to develope support tooling etc.

(I don't think so by the way, engineers are constantly using alternate techniques to get round production obstacles.)

Or is it that the dedication or obsession levels are different in the two disciplines, many of the engineering home projects have a construction window running in tens of years let alone weeks or months.

 

[les chicken]

I live in South East Wales which used to be one of the manufacturing centres. Steel works plus loads of feeder industries, cable manufacturers for telephones optic and copper, coal mines with manufacturing requirements, etc,etc,etc. :wink: :wink:

NOW nearly nothing, call centres, B&Qs, shops but no manufacturing. So where do the youngsters get the experience for making things, buy it from Ikea etc. :shock: :shock:

The likes of domestic science, woodworking, metalwork are no longer taught in schools so where are we going. :?: :?:

Les

 

[Freetochat]

Just a thought, but could it be down to the schools/education. Back in the 60's when I was a school we had woodwork classes where we all chipped in making canoes, rowing boats etc out of ply, in metalwork we built go-karts and rebuilt motorbikes. That's when I got an interest, but today, there doesn't seem to be that push in school.

 

[Anonymous]

Nothing strange really, I think I am right in saying that Model Engineering has had a large following for most of last century (and before?) whereas DIY and making your own furniture is pretty new as far as hobbies go.

W H Smith I visit has certainly carried more model engineeing mags than woodworking mags as far as I am aware

 

[PowerTool]

The likes of domestic science, woodworking, metalwork are no longer taught in schools so where are we going. :?: :?:

Les

I think this is certainly part,if not all,of the problem.
In DT (Design and Technology) at school,the most practical thing my son could do was "design and construct a CD case" using plastics :shock:
School had a metalwork classroom,but didn't use it anymore.
Woodwork was allowed,but you couldn't use anything sharp.

It's the same with cars - when I was young,you bought what you could afford,and had to keep it running.Now,you buy what you can afford the repayments on,and take it to the garage

We just live in a less practical age,I guess.

Andrew

 

[Scrit]

Nothing strange really, I think I am right in saying that Model Engineering has had a large following for most of last century (and before?) whereas DIY and making your own furniture is pretty new as far as hobbies go.

Hang about a mo, Charles Hayward was writing in the early 1930s and I've got a few even earlier DIY-type books, so, woodworking/DIY isn't exactly new either.

My missus, however, decries the dying-off of non-vocational evening classes from the 1980s onwards - she used to go to sewing classes and genuinely enhanced her dressmaking and tailoring skills, but the number of classes were reduced, then they were completely killed off due to "lack of interest" (???) so she and her friends started a private sewing circle which ran for many years, although even that has died off as many of the members were already at or near retirement age when it started and youngsters simply weren't interested in joining in. She reports a similar dying off of the once large sewing shows which are now dominated by "paper crafts" and the like

Scrit

 

[mailee]

My lad hasn't got a clue about woodwork! (Caught him trying to knock a screw into a piece of wood the other day??) I have tried to tempt him on numerous occasions but to no avail. He can cook some wonderful meals for us both and is a whizz with computers as these are both taught in the school. There seems to be no woodcraft of any sort in his school and therefore no interest. Mind you I think if I gave him a book to read he would ask me where you turn it on! :x

 

[filsgreen]

Don't knock it Mailee, your lad is good at something!!! At least he can cook for himself and is computer literate!!! Too often are the younger generation berated for not conforming, who cares, we all have our specialities. What I wouldn't give for someone who could ensure that I didn't lose my wireless connection on my desk top :?

Phil

 

[Anonymous]

Hang about a mo, Charles Hayward was writing in the early 1930s and I've got a few even earlier DIY-type books, so, woodworking/DIY isn't exactly new either.

Very good point Scrit!
My grandad gave me some old "home maintenance" type books. In fact "DIY" is as old as the hills. Its just the suits that run the shed depots that try to muscle in and make it a multi million doller business, over producing especially chepo power tools etc that are a waste of space. For instance the traditional welsh 3 leg chairs were home made, and marvelous examples they are of ingenuity and genuine diversity. They didnt go to the nearest shed and come away with a bunch of chinease import chairs did they. A case of make it your self, or sit on the floor. Same with recycling, folk always did that as a natural thing at least until post war overproduction and materialism tried to get us to think that reducing reusing rercycling was just for stingy old farts, not so much slash and burn as buy and chuck; now its all under political control and a growing million dollar indusrty.
I was once very impressed by a American wood worker (cant remember who) he said if your a woodworker you should be able to work with the materials you have around you instead of importing (or something like that) If a few manufactures dont show up so what, why not build your own lathes and tools :?:
and scrit when they shut those courses its not lack of interest (your wife as interested for one!) its not enough interest to make a profit. So resources like this forum and alburnams archives etc become very important as a way to share and pass on useful knowledge
mr spanton

 

[woodbloke]

As and ex-teacher of firstly Woodwork in the 1980's, then Craft and Design :roll: in the 90's and finally Technology in the late 90's :roll: :roll: before I delightedly left the profession in 1998, you can see very clearly the way the trend was going, but in my experience, things that 'go round, come around again'. I know of a school in Wimbourne that leapt on to the 'technology' bandwagon in the late 80's, sold all its lathes and planes and then later on had to replace them when it realised that it had made a little faux pas. I'm not sure what the situation is now, but no doubt schools have slid further down the slope into abysmal mediocrity. When I was teaching, I had a department that had three workshops (wood, metal and graphics) with staff for each shop and a reasonable budget for kit and materials. Over the years I lost all the guys as well as my technician and ten years later, the budget was less :!: than I started on, plus of course, I had to deliver a little item like the infamous 'National Curriculum', pretty much on my own within the three shops that I still had to run and maintain. Whenever I hear someone say that they want to be a teacher I always tell 'em that a definite prerequisite for the job is to be able to walk on water, do that and you're laughing.
I agree with Scrit - I've got a Charles Hayward book lurking around somewhere in the bookcase and I think that there has always been a place for the woodwork hobbiest and its probably stronger today than it was years ago. As a case in point you only have to look at the decent tool manufactures with kit available to buy in the early 70's (when I started) to realize that things have moved on apace. Then it was only Record, Stanley, Marples and couple of others. Now, look at the choice of kit available to the home woodworker, without a doubt, spoilt for choice. Still, at least in the 70's you didn't need an ice axe to stay upright on the slope :roll: :wink: - Rob

 

[Anonymous]

Nothing strange really, I think I am right in saying that Model Engineering has had a large following for most of last century (and before?) whereas DIY and making your own furniture is pretty new as far as hobbies go.

Hang about a mo, Charles Hayward was writing in the early 1930s and I've got a few even earlier DIY-type books, so, woodworking/DIY isn't exactly new either.

Sorry Scrit, I really don't agree with your comment at all.

DIY has taken off very recently with the advent of TV programs and the appearance of huge stores such as B&Q. It is a very recent explosion.

Clearly some people have always carried out their own repairs etc., just not on the scale of the past 10? 20? years

 

[Paul Chapman]

Clearly some people have always carried out their own repairs etc., just not on the scale of the past 10? 20? years

My Dad did DIY before DIY had been invented :lol: Back in the early 1970's DIY was thriving. There was a magazine called "Do it yourself" and they used to hold an annual DIY exhibition in London that was on the same sort of scale as the woodworker show at Alley Palley. Around that time a lot of great new tools were introduced, like Ron Hickman's Workmate - I bought mine at the 1970 DIY exhibition. I think it cost me £19.50 with solid beech vice bars. Still use it today 8) Those were the days when Formica and Wareite were all the rage and lots of adhesives (like Thixofix) were introduces plus loads of tools for cutting plastic laminate. Looking back it was quite a good time although there are a lot of better quality tools and materials available now :wink:

Paul

 

[Alf]

Erm... what about Barry Buckner, just to go back even a little further...? What about The Handyman's Book, first published in 1903 and still in print? No, I'm afraid DIY's been around ever since Mrs Neanderthal Man hit Mr Neanderthal Man over the head with a club and demanded a new shelf in the cave to keep the mammoth steaks on. :roll: :lol:

Cheers, Alf

 

[woodbloke]

Alf wrote:

Barry Buckner

Barry Bucknall was the guy Alf, can just about rembember his stuff on the box. Didn't know either that SWMBO's had been making such demands for so long :lol: - Rob

 

[Alf]

That's the fella. A hardboard-lovin' chap, I believe - before my time.

Cheers, Alf

 

[Lord Nibbo]

Alf wrote:

Barry Buckner

Barry Bucknall was the guy Alf, can just about rembember his stuff on the box. Didn't know either that SWMBO's had been making such demands for so long :lol: - Rob

Ah Barry Bucknall the man who indroduced me to the delights of covering everything and anything in hardboard :lol: The forerunner to Norm I don't think I ever saw a power tool used, not even an electric drill. In fact I could list all the tools he used on one hand, well maybe two hands.

1. A panel saw (it might of been a rip)
2. A chisel, don't recall seeing a set of them.
3. An auger drill + bits
4. A square
5. A pencil
6. A hammer + nails, yes nails, no talk of Brads but sometimes mentioned panel pins.

7. A plane, probably a #4
8. A screwdriver (flat) phillips only made toasters back then

No talk of rabbits that was left to Fanny Craddock & Jonny :lol: