Good score at a garage sale...

[Southpa]

Its funny how most everyone slows down to do a "drive by" when passing a garage sale. Unfortunately, most of what is being sold is pretty much useless (baby clothes, bookends and 8-track cassettes), unless you are one of the first people there. Well, heres a good tip for ya. The odds of finding tools and such are better if you find those garage/yard sales in the rural areas, outside of town, instead of right in the city.

I was on my way out to do some fence building for one of my friend's neighbors and happened on one such sale. I picked up a No. 5 Este block plane for 15 bucks and a small AC motor (just plug it in) for 5 bucks. I also picked up a set of sawbuck brackets for 2 bucks. There was a heavy duty Rockwell router for sale ($40) as well but I couldn't swing it. I cleaned up the plane and have decided to make today "blade sharpening day" for all my planes and chisels.

A friend of mine who carves slate and soapstone has an ingenious little setup for forming his pieces. Thats where my little motor will come in handy. I plan to get an adaptor for the shaft to attach a 4" diamond grit "Lazer" cutting wheel. You mount the motor on a small plywood platform and have the blade extend over a breadpan full of water. Then mount a plexiglass, plastic, wood, (or whatever) forming platform with a slot for the blade to pass through. The bottom edge of the blade passes thru the water to keep the dust down and you set up a curved piece of tin (sorta like a bicycle fender) over top to catch the spray. The diamond grit on the blade will cut through abalone etc. like butter. As soon as I get it together I'll get some pics taken for everyone.

[Jehle]

Wow, cool idea!

I just happened to have an old fan motor lying around and I had thought about making it into a buffing wheel. I like the idea of making a grinder/sharpener out of it now.