Woodworker's Journal 2007-Winter, страница 10

A top quality table saw is worth its weight in gold. You'll use it for making the usual straight cuts as well as milling a slew of other joinery. Rabbets, dadoes, grooves, box joints, laps and tenons are all within its capability.

Buy This Second: A Table Saw

Your next investment? Buy a table saw with a quality rip fence. It will give you arrow-straight rip cuts every time, plus it does a fine job of crosscutting and angle-cutting. You can even cut rabbets, tenons and other joinery with a single blade, or speed things up with a dado blade. Odds are, a table saw will become your wonder tool for most straight-cutting tasks.

You don't have to spend a month's salary to get a good saw these days. If you're cramped for space, buy a benchtop saw. For the longer haul, splurge on a heavy-duty contractor's or hybrid table saw in the 1/2 to 2 hp range with an induction motor. You'll never regret spending the extra cash.

Buy This Third: A Jointer and Planer

Okay, I'm exercising a little editorial license here. A jointer and planer are obviously two machines, but they really perform in unison as the "Dynamic Duo" of stock preparation. Don't let anyone fool you into believing you can have one without the other. It just isn't true. A jointer is crucial for flattening edges and

faces, whereas a planer reduces stock thickness and keeps faces parallel. Each machine performs a set of independent functions. Once you have both, you're no longer a slave to the premium prices and iffy quality of pre-surfaced home center lumber. Now you can buy more economical roughsawn stock in any species you like, then surface it perfectly flat, square and smooth.

If you can swing it, buy both machines at the same time. Get a 12"- to 13" planer and a jointer with the longest bed you can afford. A 6" jointer will certainly do the job, but an 8" machine is even better. (Then ask your special someone to buy you a dust collector in the 650 cfm range for your next big holiday gift; jointing and planing make truckloads of chips.)

Buy This Fourth: A Router Table

Want to squeeze every dime from your portable router? Here's how: Mount it to a router table, and you'll double its value as a "poor man's" shaper. The virtues of a router table are many. First, a router table

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You can surface lumber like a pro, but it will require adding two more machines to your inventory: a thickness planer and a jointer. The jointer creates flat reference edges and faces; the planer keeps faces parallel and reduces stock thickness. Neither does double duty for the other.

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