How much of your work is hand tools vs power tools

[Dennis Petrillo]

Hi all

Most of my wood background is in home improvements with the occasional bookcase, cabinet, etc., but mostly finish carpentry and remodeling. But at this point i want to devote some time to furniture, as a hobby of course. I took some basic classesin the past, mostly in hand tools, but then got side tracked. I have basic tools (tablesaw, router table, a number of Festool tools, chisels, planes).

So now I am looking for some direction for working with solid wood, rough wood, etc....i like the idea of working with hand tools but most advice i get is that you really need a jointer, planer, etc.,machines I don't have and before i make an investment in those products I'm wondering what folks on this forum do.....do you work exclusively with Hand tools vs power tools, 50/50, or some other combination? If you do use machines what are your must haves in order to still maintain a connection with hand tools?

Thanks in advance for your feedback

Dennis

[Mike Henderson]

I do almost all of my stock preparation by machine. If you have a table saw, planer, miter saw, router in a table, and drill press you about have the power tools covered (a band saw and a lathe are nice additions). For flattening rough stock, you can do one side by hand (with hand planes and winding sticks) and then finish it in the planer, so you can do without a jointer.

It's possible to go full hand tools but stock preparation is hard, manual, work. At my age, I appreciate the power tools.

Mike

[Russell Sansom]

I do some raw lumber prep by machine. I suppose it's 80% hand work, 20% board prep. For large productions runs I do all the board prep by machine ( edited---originally I had written by hand).
I would go with bandsaw, jointer, then planer. For me, it's jointer first for two edges and face. I touch up that face by hand, then make the second face parallel to the first by hand. For a large project or one that starts with very twisted lumber I will use the thickness planer. I'm not prepared to joint 100 or 200 board feet of hardwood by hand unless it's already dangerously close to finished thickness. In that case I can do with a less "brute force" approach to thicknessing.
A bench hook, miter box, and shooting board work fine for cross-cutting almost any size job. It' safer than crosscutting with a table saw. But for big production runs or lots of very large lumber, the table saw and a cutoff box are usually way easier than hand work, even if less precise.
Except for shooting plywood edges with a sacrificial shooting plane, I have never found a way to work plywood with hand tools. So, my final tool in the list is a table saw or a good quality track saw for sawing plywood and cutting grooves and dadoes.
russ

[Don Dorn]

In principle, I agree with Mike. It's too laborious and no fun for me to dimension stock with hand tools. I have the standard fare with a TS, Bandsaw, RAS, Drill Press, Planer and Jointer. I also use a sanding station more than I thought I would, but once dimensioned, 98% of the work from that point is done at the bench using hand tools.

[Chris Vandiver]

A band saw, jointer and lunch box planer will make your life easier when doing stock prep. Don't skimp on the jointer. If you're going to be doing a lot of casework with plywood, then a good quality 10" cabinet(table) saw is a plus(must). Of course, all of the work(and it is work) can be done by hand but it will be slow going. Another way to approach it is to have a skilled professional woodwork business(maybe a small shop) do the initial milling for you. Just choose a good one.

[Ralph Boumenot]

I have all the power tools except for a lathe and I try to buy my stock dimensioned already (I agree with Mike here on this). I try to do all hand work now when I build something. I will do long rip cuts on the tablesaw. You can do the rest by hand from there. I find it slower but safer and more satisfying doing what I did by hand what I once did with a machine. It's your choice - hand tools or machines.

[Stanley Covington]

Material prep, with the exceptions of final jointing for edge gluing and finish planing to remove tool marks, is time consuming, tiring and boring. I am in the position now of not being able to use any noisy machines, so I am doing all material prep by hand. Takes 4 times? 5 times? longer than with my 10" Inca jointer/planer. On the other hand, with highly figured wood, machines can cause a lot of wasteful tearout. Or when working with boards wider than what your machine can handle, the only choice is handwork, so you do need to have the tools and skills to do it by hand.

But you will enjoy woodworking a lot more, and get a lot more woodworking done, if you procure a decent jointer and planer (if possible, the jointer should be as wide as the planer). Cons: Machines cost bucks, take space, make lots of noise and dust, are slightly more wasteful of material, leave a less than perfect surface, and can cause you develop a reliance on them. Pros: They save time, and leave you more energy to enjoy the finer points of woodworking.

Stan

[Jim Matthews]

The fun part is the layout, joinery and finishing.

Bandsaws were invented when apprentices became scarce (therefore expensive).
Power drills were invented because cutting lots of holes is boring.

If you buy an old-timer out of his stash, you'll find lots of the lumber well seasoned and near your final dimensions.

I find that a really clean cutting crosscut saw does the bulk of my handsawing.
It's pretty rare that I rip anything longer than 3 feet. After that - it's time to haul out the bandsaw.

A sturdy backsaw like the 16" jack saw from Bad Axe can cut most any joinery I need.

The LN Low Angle jack plane with several blades (set to different pitches) will do most flattening and smoothing tasks,
including jointing. That's three basic hand tools to get most of the jobs done.

After you get those, you can start collecting chisels, like the rest of us.

[David Myers]

I differ from most above only in that I don't have a powered jointer (that works). By far the largest project that I have built was my workbench, and I jointed all the stock by hand. It was a lot of work, but most of my projects since then have had more furniture-sized components and jointing by hand has been quick.

[Chris Griggs]

I do 90-99% of my work with hand tools. I have a router in a router table, a small portable DeWalt TS an ROS and a Circ Saw. The router gets used pretty much only for moldings (if I had a set of moulding planes it would never get used). The TS gets used occasionally if I have a lot of same sized parts (e.g. drawer parts), if I'm cutting Plywood or MDF (which is rare and only for shop projects) or if I have a long or especially thick rip - for the most part it sits in silence though. I think I've used the ROS once in the past 2 years.

I would be happy to go without any of the power tools listed above, BUT that said I often long for a HUGE bandsaw and to a lesser extent a lunchbox planer and drill press. I get tired of spending so much time prepping stock.

[Chris Fournier]

The ratio of machine to hand is entirely project dependant but machines for break out is a pretty safe bet.

[george wilson]

When I was making guitars only,most work was hand work,as was in the museum. Now,I'm too old and arthritic to hand plane and saw a lot of wood. The artistic parts are still done by hand,or turned freehand even if on a metal lathe if contoured.

[Dhananjay Nayakankuppam]

80-90% by hand. I have a bandsaw, a jointer and a router and I should actually get rid of the jointer and router because they see almost no use. I'm glad for the use of the bandsaw for long rips and resawing, although I will sometimes resaw by hand if the wood feels/looks cantankerous. Given that I do not do production work, machines don't make much sense for me. I find handtools are pretty fast and accurate for one-off pieces once you sort of shift a couple of mental gears, and they fit my hesitant, feeling-your-way-around method of working. DJ

[glenn bradley]

Never thought about a percentile. Are we talking about a time requirement ratio? Quantity of material touched in lineal feet? Like others, I use machines to breakdown and mill my parts. Almost nothing makes it to assembly without some sort of non-powered joinery or hand prepared surfaces. Time-wise I mostly do handwork. Quantity-wise I mostly used tailed tools.

[paul cottingham]

I use mostly hand tools, except for the really tedious stuff, like thicknessing slabs, long rips, and mortising a large number of mortises. If this sounds like Chris S, I happen to agree with him. So, I wish I had a good bandsaw (I have an old Sears 12" bandsaw, it works, but.....) I have a good planer, and a good mortiser. My jointer is pushed out of the way to make room in my tiny shop. I have several good, sharp crosscut saws, and rip saws and use them for most of my breakdown chores. I tend to surface with hand planes.
I use power for this basic stuff when it seems more sensible, or when my arthritis is too bad. So as a percentage probably around 70-80%.
I have found that often hand tools are quicker, as they don't require a ton of setup, or push sticks, etc.
YMMV of course.

[Jessica Pierce-LaRose]

I do pretty much everything by hand, excepting breaking out the tiny drill press or every now and then one of those oscillating saws that can plunge into the middle of something. for around-the-house-jobs, the dewalt corded drill comes out sometimes, and occasionally the circular saw, but I'm generally never making enough cuts that it really saves me an appreciable amount of time, so the handsaws get used more because they're easier to clean up after.

I'd kill to have a nice bandsaw for resawing. I'd love to have a planer to cut down on stock prep. My shop space is part of the house, though, and we have downstairs neighbors, and I'm short on cash. I work with hand-tools out of necessity as much as enjoyment. I've learned with a little ingenuity, pretty much everything is possible if you want to put some sweat and some skill into it. Someday I'll have a proper shop space and a few power tools. I don't ever see myself doing so much production that I'd need a whole slew of things; but cutting down on the grunt work and making resawing more viable are the two big ones for me. Looking at the price I pay for finished vs. rough lumber, a bandsaw could easily pay for itself. (Now if I could purchase rough lumber in something closer to 4/4 that might change) In the meantime, I make do with what I can and don't let it hold me back. There are certainly times where the project doesn't matter as much (something utilitarian or for the shop) where I make some slight compromises in design to make it easier to work with easily-available surfaced lumber, but otherwise, as long as this remains a hobby, I'm content to make it work with what I have. You don't *need* machines, but they make life easier, that's certain.

[David Keller NC]

Dennis - The answer to your question in my case is "it depends". Most of my interests are in Colonial American reproductions, and I take "reproduction" seriously - 100% of the work is hand tools only, except if you count the lumber mill's use of power equipment. But if I'm building something in the modern style where perfectly flat, machined and sanded surfaces are appropriate, I do all of the rough stock prep with a planer, jointer, table saw and bandsaw (if re-sawing is necessary). But I still do most of the joinery by hand, and all of the moldings with molding planes - that's because the hand tools are more efficient than power tools for one-offs.

If you wish to limit your initial outlay, then this is what I would suggest: concentrate on your bench. This is the most important tool in a hand-tool shop, and you will have a very hard time doing accurate work with hand tools without it. You can choose whether you wish to buy a bench (a heavy-grade Sjobergs will work just fine, you don't have to spend the dough on a Lie-Nielsen), or wish to make your own.

One note about making your own bench - it's a rewarding task, but it is not a money-saver, particularly for a beginner. By the time you purchase the rough stock, dimension it and cut the joinery by hand (which will take a minimum of 60 hours of quite hard work), purchase a couple of vises to go on it, and deal with a few re-dos to correct mistakes, you will have spent far over the $1500 or so it takes to buy a Sjobergs.

If you choose the Sjobergs route, realize that the "Elite" series is probably the minimum required. You need a hand tool bench to be heavy, at least 250 lbs. The less expensive Sjobergs (the "Nordic Plus" series) won't cut it - they aren't heavy enough, so you would have to either weight them with sandbags (inconvenient at best) or bolt them to the floor, and even then, they flex far too much in use.

[Joel Thomas Runyan]

%100 by hand. Probably in the minority, but I actually enjoy stock prep. Depending on the size of your projects and nature of your work, hand prep is not slow at all, especially if you're careful about selecting raw materials. It's just very sweaty from time to time, and requires a certain level of physical fitness.

[Josh Rudolph]

Major dimensioning is done by machine....at least up to 12".... The width of the jointer. After that i may use a planer sled for jointing and thicknessing, but have hand dimensioned a few. I don't get much pleasure in hogging off material by hand.

After dimensioned, all work is done by hand except for molding. I am slowly collecting a set of hollows and rounds so the router table will see less action as my collection grows.

I do enjoy removing the milling marks by hand and making a surface very smooth. I enjoy paring and chopping with well sharpened chisels. I make far fewer mistakes in the final stages of building something while doing it by hand. I can mess up a part real quick when using power tools.

[Shawn Pixley]

I am another one of the "it depends" crowd. Getting stock to size is a mix for me. I rip and crosscut on the table saw. I flatten and joint using hand planes. I resaw and cut curves on a band saw. I smooth curves with a spokeshave (my current favorate tool). I thickness most times on a planer.

For joinery, it is a mix as well. Through dados on tablesaw. Dovetails by hand (mostly). Mortises by hand or by mortiser (depends upon how big and how many). Tenons either by hand or TS (nearly always "tuned" by hand. Miters by table saw. Inlay by hand. Rabbet or rebates by hand are electron assisted and then tuned by hand. I try to avoid routers, but there are some things where they are much easier. I generally drill with electrons.

Metal work, I do most by hand (forge welding, shaping, and casting). I like pounding the steel. Cut by hand, but drill with electrons (except on forge).

i guess my attitude is I do it the way I enjoy the task the most. Getting the outcomes I want is part of that.

[Dale Cruea]

Most of my power tools are stored in a corner of my shop. 99.9% of my work is hand tools.
I will use a drill press and a band saw but that is about it.
I gave up the power stuff because I didn't want to buy a big, noisy dust collector system.

All stock prep is done by hand. 100%.
I enjoy hand planing.
I gave my power planner to my son and I don't think he has ever turned it on.

If I had the space and the money for all the stuff that goes with power tools I might use a few.
TS, jointer and planer.

[Jim Koepke]

The power tools that get used in my shop are the lathe, bandsaw and drill press.

There is no shame in using power tools. My preference is for hand tools.

Any one trying to do woodworking for a living would be at a disadvantage by not using some power tools.

jtk

[Jim Neeley]

i guess my attitude is I do it the way I enjoy the task the most. Getting the outcomes I want is part of that.

I'm with you, Sean. +1! :-)

[Andrae Covington]

I mostly work by hand. I partially made a decision (noise, dust, scary spinning blades), and it was partially made for me (money, space, power, dust collection) to not buy the big powertools. I do not have a tablesaw, bandsaw, jointer, planer, etc. I have a circular saw with a guide track which I use for long rips. I have a compound miter saw which is collecting dust since I bought a hand miter box, though if I ever need an actual compound angle, I'll probably use it. I have a jig saw and a couple handheld sanders which see infrequent use. Although I have too many brace drills and like them for some things, more often I reach for my cordless drill.

You can see from the comments that most who have stationary powertools use them for the labor-intensive work. In an ideal world, I would like to have a bandsaw for resawing and possibly a planer for initial surfacing. Those two powertools would eliminate the parts of the process that I consider to be "drudgery" rather than "fun" with handtools. They would also give me more consistent results in less time. As Shawn said:


...i guess my attitude is I do it the way I enjoy the task the most. Getting the outcomes I want is part of that...

[James Owen]

For furniture: 100%

I do all of the dimensioning with hand saws and hand planes. All of the joinery is done with hand tools, and all of the final surfacing is done with hand planes and an occasional card scraper. All of the carving is by hand.
I find this to be a pleasant way to work: it's quiet, you can listen to music or talk, you work at a leisurely pace, it's generally pretty efficient, it's a decent workout, and it gives you an opportunity to get to know the piece(s) of wood well, so you know what to expect from it while working on the project.

I sold my nearly all of power tools -- table saw, router and table, jointer, thickness planer, and bandsaw -- years ago.
There are still a couple of power tools in my shop -- a mini lathe, a drill press, and a bandsaw -- but I don't use them for furniture making; they get used for pen-making or bowl turning.

Unless you are trying to make a living doing woodworking, I don't see any need for power tools. For hobbyists, they are certainly nice to have, if you prefer to work with them, but you can build any piece of wooden furniture or cabinetry with a relatively small set of hand tools.
(The obvious exceptions to this are: (1) you have a physical limitation that hinders or prevents you from using hand tools; (2) you use "engineered" materials [i.e., plywood, MDF, etc]. In those cases, you will probably want to use power tools.)

[Adam Cruea]

Most of my power tools are stored in a corner of my shop. 99.9% of my work is hand tools.
I will use a drill press and a band saw but that is about it.
I gave up the power stuff because I didn't want to buy a big, noisy dust collector system.

All stock prep is done by hand. 100%.
I enjoy hand planing.
I gave my power planner to my son and I don't think he has ever turned it on.

If I had the space and the money for all the stuff that goes with power tools I might use a few.
TS, jointer and planer.

Like father, like son.

I have yet to use dad's power planer. My wife let me move to the basement and the trade off for being closer to SWMBO and in agreeable quarters was using hand tools. It was a trade off I was more than willing to live with.

I have a drill press on the way, but that won't be turned on and used for long periods of time, nor will it make loud noises that will scare our puppies. Other than that, it's been 99% hand tools for me. Maybe a little electric hand drilling.

[Carl Beckett]

Im going to be in the 'its evolving' category.

When I first started out, I did everything I could on power equipment. Back then, I didnt HAVE the power equipment. Borrowed it from work (really low end stuff), and gradually built up over the years.

Then as my skills improved (by making stuff), I wanted to do better and better work (or tackle more involved designs lets say). I started adding more hand tool work. And found that for final fit and finish joinery I do as well with hand tools as with power tools/fixtures/etc. (dovetails I do almost all by hand now, and also mortise/tenon - but I will still raise a panel with a big bit in the router). Also I clean up rough stock with machines (jointer/planer).

But I can see a day when I start selling off certain power equipment. Then some day when I cant push a hand plane I might migrate back to the ease of certain machines.

So its been a migration. And likely cyclical.

[Zach Dillinger]

100% by hand, no power tools of any kind from the moment the stock leaves the lumber yard. I, too, enjoy prepping lumber by hand, even resawing is fun with a sharp saw.

[Jessica Pierce-LaRose]

100% by hand, no power tools of any kind from the moment the stock leaves the lumber yard. I, too, enjoy prepping lumber by hand, even resawing is fun with a sharp saw.

You know, I'm of the same mind, ridiculous as it seems - I enjoy the process of prepping stock by hand and resawing. It's a work out, but a fun workout. But about the widest I've resawed is 9". I'll probably feel different of course, when I'm old.

I think the same thing I think when I'm out for 30 milles running errands on my bike - people actually give other people money for the opportunity to sweat at the gym and end up with nothing to show for it? I should get a two-man saw and charge folks for the privilege to be on the other end!

Until I can get a bandsaw, though, I need to get something coarser for resawing wider stuff. My wife balked at the idea of me installing a pitsaw in stairwell, but when she saw the frame saw Bob built on the Logan Cabinet Shoppe, she volunteered to man the other end of something like that. I may have the best wife.