Need guidance for equipping small garage/shop

[richard b miller]

I need your guidance in what to purchase for a small, workable shop in my garage.
I have a good PC router kit (strait and plunge), a 9" HF Tools drill press, a ryobi contractors portable saw, belt/disc sander and a few grip & bar clamps.

I plan to purchase a grizzly go715p table saw and was thinking about a 14" grizzly band saw; also a PC biscuit joiner. but from there, not sure. theres so much i could use but i'm just not sure what else, without
just going all out and buy everything - unfortunately funds are limited to about 2k. do i need to get a planer (dewalt 735x) or an oscillating sander? my intent is to build furniture type items but don't care to do turnings.

as for me, i've dabbled in making things but when you don't have "good" equipment, you don't get good results. i greatly appreciate your input.
Thanks
Rich

[paul cottingham]

The three power tools i would not be without are a bandsaw, a planer, and a mortiser. They all reduce the grunt work of the tedious jobs in woodworking; long rips, resizing stock and making lots of mortises. After that, i would buy a drill press. For a lot of folks, the drill oress would be more important than the mortiser, for myself, i dont mind making a few mortises, but a bunch of them is daunting enough that jobs would never be started. I own several braces, and a couple of eggbeaters, and an cordless drill, so a drill press is less important. If mine wasnt an old Delta 220, (which i really love, both for its look and its performance, i would just sell the damn thing.

Buy a few good handplanes (a jack -with a cambered blade-, a smoother and a shoulder plane) and some saws (a dovetail, a tenon, and acrosscut, along with some handsaws a least a ripsaw and a fine crosscut) and a chisel or two (you only really need a few i use my 1/2" 1/4" and 1" the most, if i could only buy one, it would be 1/2") you have a great start.

One of the rules i followed from the beginning was buying the best tools i could. The times i didnt follow this (tablesaw comes to mind) i would up doubke buying, and spent way more money. If i was doing it again, i wouldnt buy a tablesaw until i could afford a good one, if at all. The other instance was chisels. I bought the Narex set, which is a fantastic set of chisels for the money. But i dont like the balance. So i gave them to a good friend who is starting out, and bought a few of the premium Veritas ones. Those are great chisels, but so are the one Lie-Nielsen sell.

Just a few thoughts.

as a quick aside, i hear the Grizz tablesaw and bandsaw are great value.

[Peter Quinn]

Skip the biscuit joiner until you find a real need for it. As biscuit joiners go the PC is not my favorite, it does angles I never use, and for that pleasure you pay more money and get less accuracy IME. Still.... But the you say you want to make furniture....biscuit joiner doesn't come in to play much there for me.

planer/joiner area two important shop tools. You need to be able to make edges straight and square, to be able to create different thicknesses of stock, to have control over the medium and not be at the mercy of s4s from big box strores. Many ways will mention hand tools for that, it is certainly possible, I for one don't have time for that. Either way, I'd make some plan to get control over stock size...most lumber needs to hit the jointer and planer before the table saw. Food for thought.

[Dennis Ford]

My suggestion is to pick out your next furniture project and then buy tooling to make it. Of course it would be wise to choose a project that you can reasonably complete without busting your budget of time and/or money. If you like traditional furniture with square material; a planer and a jointer is very useful. If you like primitive style or free-form furniture; a band saw might be a better choice.

[David Eisenhauer]

It is fairly common to consider a TS, jointer and planer as being the three core machines for power tool woodworking equipment, with a BS to follow, especially for curved item cutting. If, at this stage in your life/woodworking experience, you know that you will stay with this hobby for a long time, then it is usually advised to save for-then buy a quality/of sufficient capacity machine for thickness planning and jointing. That is taking into account that you have a TS I believe? I would think that those machines would be more important now than an oscillating sander. Having said all of this, each of us has different goals, perspective and BUDGET. My house is paid for, my kids (son) are grown and gone and I only have one other semi-expensive hobby, so my perspective is different than that of a younger father with a house payment-braces for the kids-college cost-etc. to consider. I do advise researching equipment type and brand difference plus trying out someone else's machinery if/whenever possible before rushing to buy. The good stuff is not cheap, but is of good value when it is intended to be owned 20-30-40 years. Best of luck.

[John Lankers]

As Peter said, skip the Biscuit Joiner.
A good band saw can perform many tasks as good or better/safer than a table saw.
The router cuts dadoes, grooves, rabbets and mortises.
A good hand plane (Jack or Smoother) cleans up band saw marks easily, I personally prefer the Veritas bevel up planes where you can swap out the blades instead of the frog to change the cutting angle.
You can mount the router in a table to edge joint boards.
Your drill press comes in handy where accuracy is important.
A Dewalt 735 would be near the top of my shopping list, it can also face joint boards up to 13" wide with a sled - not super convenient but it works.
Don't forget to budget for some decent chisels and a "sharpening system" of some sort, I own and really like the Worksharp 3000 with the wide angle attachment for plane blades and wide chisels.
Some quality (not necessarily Starrett) layout and measuring tools.
Also, plan for some sort of dust collection down the road.
Buy quality when ever you can.
My 2cts.

[Steve H Graham]

Definitely get some chisels and planes, as well as some means of sharpening them. Make a shooting board and a bench hook.

I have some big DMT diamond stones for chisels and planes. Not as hoity-toity as waterstones, but low maintenance and durable.

A big band saw will probably be more useful to you than a table saw. It's more versatile, and it's a lot harder to cut your fingers off or fire pieces of wood at your face and genitals. It also makes much less dust. If you have both, you will probably find that you look for ways to do things on the band saw instead of the table saw, because it's more convenient. A shooting board will help you compensate for the band saw's inferior cut quality.

If you can stand it, I suggest you wait for a Craigslist deal on a table saw. You should be able to find a nice Powermatic or Delta for well under $1000 if you wait a few months. They pop up from time to time. I don't know why, but they do. I paid $500 for a Powermatic 66, and I have seen Unisaws for the same price. A table saw is a really simple machine, so you should be pretty confident if you find a used one that looks good.

The Dewalt 735 is wonderful, and you can collect the chips and crap with a simple Shop-Vac hose and Powertec bag. No dust collector necessary. You will definitely want the feed tables. I agree about using it as a jointer. I did it, and it works just fine. It's a little aggravating compared to the ease of a real jointer, but the cost is like $10, and you save floor space. You can also edge-joint using the table saw.

[Von Bickley]

In my shop, the most used tools are the table saw, the miter saw, and the router in a homemade simple router table. One of my least used tool is the biscuit joiner. Instead of a biscuit joiner, I would go for a Kreg pocket hole joinery system or a dowel jig, both if the budget will allow.

[Joe Beaulieu]

Hey Richard,

I agree with several folks advice here, don't scrimp on your tools. Buy the best tools you can, both hand tools and power tools. I would check out the Lee Valley-Veritas catalog, as well as look into several of the highly reputable 2nd hand tool dealers on the web. Don Wilwol at timetestedtools.com and Patrick Leach at super tool.com are both great guys that I can recommend highly. They sell 2nd hand and refurbed tools, and they are both fellow woodworkers in it for the love of tools. They are fair and quite reasonable guys. If you explain you are just starting they will go out of their way to help.

As folks have suggested, a good #5 jointer plane would be high on my list. But before I bought that I would grab as high quality a block plane as I could afford. The Lie-Nielsen 60-1/2 or the Lee Valley equivalent, their Veritas Standard or Low Angle Block planes are fantastic. You can also grab a very nice refurbed Stanley from either of the guys mentioned for reasonable money. That plane, or something similar, is never far from my reach, and is among the most commonly used tools in the shop. A decent carpenters square is a big help, and as everyone has mentioned, a very good set of chisels.

Last at bit of advice - watch YouTube videos on woodworking. There is a wealth of free info there, and beside this board, it is the best resource you can find. Check out Paul Sellers series of videos on hand tool woodworking. He is, IMO, a very good teacher, and is a no-nonsense true craftsman. HTH

Joe

[glenn bradley]

You've noticed that this is a question with as many answers as there are woodworkers ;-) A good point was made that you could pick out something you want to make, assess what tools would come into play and start from there.

Buying tools without knowing where you are going is like buying one of those 66 router bit sets; you end up with 6 bits you use a lot and 60 that stay pristine and unused. The tools you will want will vary with what you want to accomplish.

I found the following to be useful for eliminating cash but, had little to do with making furniture (someone else's list could be the exact opposite and be just as correct):


Biscuit joiner
Compound miter saw
Brad nailer
Dovetail jig
Spraying rig
Any low quality tool (just toss 'em)


Things I would be loath to do without (in order of indispensability):


Bandsaw
Jointer/Planer
Router Table
Planes, mallet, chisels and all those other wonderful things
Hand router(s)
Tablesaw
Drill press


Your mileage will definitely vary :D

[Jim Dwight]

I've been doing woodworking as a hobby for more than 40 years. I've made one kitchen, 8 sets of bedroom furniture, one house full of interior doors, and lots of other "stuff". My first grandson will be born in May and I need to start some toys for him. I've had several shops over this time as we moved and am still getting the current one setup. I've generally followed the rule of deciding on the project and then getting the tools to accomplish it.

I also tend to buy cheap and sometimes regret it. I had several table saws before getting my Ryobi BT3100 - which I paid about $300 for (so still pretty cheap - and the predecessors of the Ryobi weren't very worthwhile). Ryobi doesn't make the BT3100 any more but if you see one used, I recommend it. The top surface is small and it's kind of a cross between a contractor type stationary saw and a portable saw. But it can do really precise work and with the right blade I rip 3.5 inches deep in hardwood with it. I used to have a large base and extension rails on it but I think I've found a better way.

A track saw is a mandatory tool in my current shop. I have a DeWalt which I recommend but I read the Grizzly is not quite as nice but still worthwhile and the Makita has advantages and it about the same price as my DeWalt (the Grizzly is significantly less). Many like their Festools but it is quite a bit more. With large boards, like sheet goods but not limited to sheet goods, it is easier and better to move the saw through the wood instead of the wood past the saw blade. With the track saw I do not need the extension rails and my table saw is significantly smaller now.

An idea to check out is Ron Paulk's workbench and total station. It is made to be moved around which you may or may not want (at home the key advantage would be to allow you to move it out of the way so you can pull a car in). A small portable table saw, a decent sliding CMS (I would go with the Bosch instead of the Kapek Ron uses), a track saw, and one of his ultimate workstations could be a pretty capable shop that could be stored out of the way easily. My current shop is big enough I made a rolling workbench (3'x7') I can roll out of the way when I get enough of the other clutter dealt with and put my small SUV into the shop garage. The top of this workbench is of the Paulk design.


You can get by without a planner if you have a good source of planned wood. I did for many years but like having a small lunchbox planner. Mine is an old Ryobi AP-10 I got used for $100. With sharpened knives it works well. I just made a flip top stand for it and my Jet hollow chisel mortiser. The DeWalt planner is wider and gas good features but all the little lunchbox planners will do work - but have to take small bites.

I have and use a biscuit joiner - to assist with alignment during glueups. I also have a pocket hole jig. I used to have a bandsaw and will have another some day. Right now curved cuts are done by my Bosch jig saw. I have an old Inca jointer but usually use the table saw or track saw to get a straight edge on a joint for glueup.

Another way to do mortises is a Festool Domino. They are pricey (all Festools are) but would take up little space. It can be used like a biscuit jointer for edge glueups. It would also make large enough mortise/tenon joints for chairs and small tables.

[Roger Pozzi]

I need your guidance in what to purchase for a small, workable shop in my garage.
i've dabbled in making things but when you don't have "good" equipment, you don't get good results. i greatly appreciate your input.
Thanks
Rich


IMO, "good" equipment is any equipment that you know and understand how to use correctly.
This desk was made with a Ryobi tablesaw, Hitachi router, and a Ridgid thickness planer. Nothing else but normal hand tools. It can be done.
327963

Since my tools were inexpensive and, produced in foreign countries, most would consider them inferior.

[Dave Arnett]

In my shop, the most used tools are the table saw, the miter saw, and the router in a homemade simple router table. One of my least used tool is the biscuit joiner. Instead of a biscuit joiner, I would go for a Kreg pocket hole joinery system or a dowel jig, both if the budget will allow.

Ditto!

If you plan to buy your wood "in the rough" (I recommend it), you'll need a jointer and planer.

I'm not a fan of the "It all depends on what you plan to make" answers, but it does apply here.

[Derek Stockley]

Another vote for skipping the biscuit joiner. I have one and I don't use it anywhere near as much as I thought I would. Same thing for my oscillating spindle sander - a cheap sanding drum kit for my drill press did the same job for a long time.

You say you want to build furniture type items, and from there you probably want to think about what TYPE of furniture items. Do you want to focus on solid wood or plywood projects? Casework like cabinets and book cases? Tables? Chairs? Built-ins? Deeply sculpted furniture styles like Queen Anne or mostly straight lines like Shaker? You may tackle them all eventually so maybe the better question is what are you doing next. Each of those questions will give quite a different ideal tool set.

That said, almost all of those of things will benefit from a better table saw. A decent, carefully tuned table saw with a cross cut sled will give you square parts that join together easily and produce results that encourage you rather than discourage. I have to respectfully disagree with the guys who say that you should start with a bandsaw over a table saw. I think they're right about every benefit they've identified, but I also think there's a bit more of a learning curve to working that way and it's maybe not the way to start out unless you're absolutely sure that's how you want to work. And there's less information out there for people who want to work that way - almost every magazine article and youtube video and blog you're going to find will have a table saw at the centre of every build.

Given your budget, it might be better to try and locate a reasonable used saw. I had a Ridgid TS3650 for 7 years and liked it a lot. The Ridgid has a good fence that locks pretty solid and square, and I never had any trouble cutting thick hardwood with it. When I sold it, it went for about $300 (Canadian - your used market may vary). With the right thin kerf blade, a cast iron Contractor saw can do a lot and is easy on the budget. I don't see anything wrong with the Grizzly you chose if you prefer to go new rather than used, and that one does have some advantages because a riving knife is a very good safety feature, and those are harder to find in the used market. Also, being a hybrid, it'll take up less space than a contractor saw because you won't have the motor hanging out the back. Either of those options is a HUGE improvement over any plastic jobsite saw and used properly, they will make it easy to do good work.

For me, once I had my table saw, because I like to build solid hardwood free standing furniture, I added a typical imported cast iron 6" jointer and a Dewalt 734 planer - the 734 is less expensive than the 735 and easier to move around. If you prefer building with plywood, you might find you don't need them as much, because if you're only using solid wood for a small minority of your parts, you won't use them as much. So don't skip the "what am I going to build" question - guessing wrong is expensive. A 14" band saw was my next major purchase, and I definitely use it on every project, but of these first four machines, it's the one I could go without the longest. I can't see why I'd bother with a bandsaw if I mostly worked in plywood, because you can do curves in plywood quite nicely with a jig saw and a router.

All four of those machines in the used market around me would be about $300-400 each. All four of them produced good results without needing to fuss too much as long as I respected their limitations (i.e., a 1.5hp table saw will need the right blade and some patience to rip 3" thick hard maple, and a portable planer won't take 1/8" thick passes on 12" wide boards). Within their capacities, they were accurate and reliable. The only reason I don't have them today is that the bug bit me hard and I've steadily upgraded to machines with bigger capacities as I could afford it.

Glenn gave you some excellent advice about what not to buy - at least when starting out. Those are all relatively specialized tools that can make one process easier, but the processes they make easier aren't things you're necessarily going to do often enough to justify their cost.

[Ray Newman]

When converting a garage to wood shop, I always advise that even before buying tools consider:

Location -- no mention of where you are located. Since we do not know and depending upon location, how well the garage is insulated against winter and summer temperature extremes.

Electrical service -- can the electric panel provide 220/240v. service if needed? Same with 110v. -- are there enough circuits/outlets? Consider lighting needs.

Dust collection -- if an attached garage, can the house water heater, HVAC, etc., be "isolated" from saw/sanding dust, etc.?

As another poster mentioned and I agree, buy your tools as you need them.

[Michael Zerance]

For me, the essentials would be the table saw, jointer, and planer. You have to be able to start with well prepared lumber.

A good cordless drill/driver is also essential. As well as a circular saw and jigsaw.

From there, buy what you need based on the projects that you have coming up. There is no point in buying tools that you don't have a specific use for. I have always bought tools based on need unless I came across a really great deal on something. There's a lot of stuff I want but, at this point, really very little that I can justify buying because I don't have a specific use for it.

I buy a lot of used equipment. I'm picky and only buy stuff that looks rarely used or new. You can get great prices and, when you sell to upgrade, you cut your losses to zero (or make money, sometimes). It's hard to take a 30% loss on selling a piece of equipment that you bought new; however, when you can sell it for what you paid, upgrading is easy.

Keep a small reserve of funds so that you can jump on those great deals when they pop up.

[Wakahisa Shinta]

I'd say buy the tools according to your projects. I first started with building cabinets, so I acquired a circular saw, hand drills, squares, rulers, etc. After a few years of building large and small boxes for storage, I wanted to build things out of solid wood. To this end, I bought a table saw, a jointer, and a planner to dimension rough lumber. A small used drill press came after quickly. Then a low angle block plane. Long afterward, I bought a band saw. Waiting that long to get a band saw was a mistake. I use my band saw just as much as my table saw! I bought tools as my projects dictated at the beginning. Looking back, this is what I would start with:

Table saw
Jointer
Planner
A block plane
A #4 plane
A set of chisels, mallet, etc.
A set of marking tools of excellent quality (buy once and never again!)
A band saw (buy the biggest you can afford or be able to fit into your shop. Why? To resaw!)
A ROS
A good router table with an excellent lift (Oh! The joy of a good lift! I don't hate my router table any more)
A reputable router. Or routers!
Save some money for toolings! This can get expensive quickly.
Save some money for acquisition of reference tools to set up all the above!

Best of luck! It's a bottomless pit......

[Bill Adamsen]

You say "my intent is to build furniture type items" so with that in mind,

space to work
light to see
workbench
layout tools (square and pencil)
saw(s)
chisels, [mortise and paring type] mallet and sharpening system (could be granite/glass and sandpaper)
plane(s) [block, rabbet, bench, jointer maybe shoulder?] and scraper

You could probably make beautiful furniture with just the above - and I don't mean that to be glib. Some of this stuff we take for granted and probably shouldn't (adequate light). It is a slippery slope though ...

[Art Mann]

The recommendations you see eventually fall into one of two camps. You need to decide which camp you are in. There is a strong community of people here who cherish their manual woodworking skills and look upon power equipment as mostly unnecessary and robbing the hobby of much of its craftsmanship and charm. I admire these folks and cruise the "Neanderthal" forum often to see what they are doing. On the other hand, I came from a cabinet building and finish carpentry background and I am accustomed to doing things more quickly and efficiently with power tools. I own exactly one hand plane, which I inherited from my father, and I use it about once a month. I have near a full complement of power tools and I even use a CNC router for some of my carvings and sign work. I don't find fault with either direction but eventually you will want to spend your money where your heart takes you.

There is one other thing I want to mention. You will often see advice to "buy the best". I don't agree with that concept. You need to concentrate on buying what you need to get the job done. For instance, I have a so called benchtop screamer thickness planer. It is loud but has produced high precision work for me for many years. I used to have free and convenient access to a friend's 20 inch 5 hp Powermatic thickness planer. I very seldom used it because my planer does all I need. In fact, he sold his Powermatic and is buying a planer similar to mine because he needs to recover some space in his shop. For me, buying the best would have used up several thousand dollars and ruled out the immediate purchase of some other equally necessary piece of equipment.

[Shawn Pixley]

You've noticed that this is a question with as many answers as there are woodworkers ;-) A good point was made that you could pick out something you want to make, assess what tools would come into play and start from there.

Buying tools without knowing where you are going is like buying one of those 66 router bit sets; you end up with 6 bits you use a lot and 60 that stay pristine and unused. The tools you will want will vary with what you want to accomplish.


Things I would be loath to do without (in order of indispensability):


Bandsaw
Jointer/Planer
Router Table
Planes, mallet, chisels and all those other wonderful things
Hand router(s)
Tablesaw
Drill press


Your mileage will definitely vary :D

Glen's list is good though he clearly works very differently than me. Choose your tools by how you work and what you make. My List:

Tablesaw
Planes, Chisels, Handsaws, etc.
Bandsaw
Drum Sander
Dust Collector
Drill Press,
Mortiser

Note I don't have a jointer or planer on my list (Hand Planes and re-sawing). Nor do you see routers. I'd give up the bandsaw before the tablesaw.

[Michael Zerance]

There is one other thing I want to mention. You will often see advice to "buy the best". I don't agree with that concept. You need to concentrate on buying what you need to get the job done.

I agree with this 100%. By all means, you should be buying quality tools but quality tools come in a wide range. "Buying the best" is not really practical advice.

[Jim Dwight]

I will also agree with Mike and Art that "buying the best" is not great advice. For one thing, "the best" is subjective and thus not possible to identify with certainty. Fortunately you don't need to. You might want to decide to buy only tools good enough to be used full time in a cabinet shop. That would be similar to what I think people are saying with "buy the best" but is more definable. I prefer to try to find the least expensive tool that will give me the desired results consistently and for as long as I am around to use them - in my hobby shop. The difference between a great, use full time every day, table saw and one that is accurate and will do good work is at least a factor of 3. A grizzly hybrid would be closer to my "good enough" level than a "use every day full time" level of quality/ruggedness.

Another example of the issue is whether you think a SawStop is the best or a European slider or a PM66. A case could be made for any of these saws. If you buy any of them you would spend most of what I have in all my tools - maybe more. I really don't know what I've spent in total and don't care.

But there is junk out there too. I have a Ryobi table saw, planner, radial arm saw and use a Ryobi router motor in my homemade router table with lift. So I kind of like Ryobi. But some Ryobi tools are junk I have no interest in. I also buy things from Harbor Freight. They make lots of junk but also offer some really good prices on useful things. Best advice I can give for sorting out the good stuff from the junk is to look for reviews online and ask questions. (lest you think I stay with the bargain brands, I also have porter cable routers, a Milwaukee circular saw, a bosch router, a bosch jig saw, etc..)

[Jim Andrew]

I used to get by with just an old Cman tablesaw, a 6" jointer, a hand held jig saw, some hand drills and routers. And a couple planes. About '04 I remodeled an old pole building, set up a shop, and bought mostly all new tools. Been adding a few over the last few years as well. When I was young, just worked with what I could afford, was a big deal to pick up a low angle block plane, now I can afford about anything I want, and my shop is so full I need to build a storage building. And I added on just a couple years ago.

[Terry Hatfield]

Well, as long as we all agree. :D

I could not imagine being without my table saw, jointer, planer, miter saw, router and router table. If you are going to buy surfaced lumber and you buy a good miter gauge or build a sled or two, there is a ton of stuff you can build with just a table saw and a router and router table and a few sets of bits. The initial purchase of machinery really does come down to what you are going to be building.

[Brian Henderson]

Honestly, don't buy tools to have tools, buy tools specifically to fit the project that you're doing. Figure out what you want to do, figure out what tools you need to do that job, get those tools. Lather, rinse, repeat.

[Richard Shaefer]

I'll buck the trend and say a table saw, a miter saw, and pocket hole jig set. I would splurge on a planer. you can go with the megalith DW735, but the little $250 Delta in Lowes is really just as good for a home shop at half the coin. also get a cheap compressor and an 23 ga or 18 ga nailer. I would also go with a used post war Bailey #5 hand plane, which you can get off of 'that auction site' for less than $50, and set of Buck Bros Chisels from Home Depot, which are made in the US and are about $30 for a set of 5.

the table saw and the miter saw in my shop see far and away the most use, and pocket hole jig set is cheap and far more effective than a biscuit jointer, which I think are generally a crap idea.

I would not get a sliding compound miter saw and I worked for many years with a dewalt non-slider. I only recently side-graded to a 7.25" 20v cordless slider for weight reasons, and I do adore it, but at $300, it's a bit princely. I would also suggest a 10" saw instead of a 12" saw. The blades are cheaper and interchangeable with your table saw.

Many people say to get a band saw, but band saws of less that 14" are usually cheap and crappy, and anything bigger is going to cost you a mint. Unless you plan on resawing a lot, or making funky shaped cuts, I would skip the band saw until you're ready for it. Most of the problems a bandsaw fixes for the average woodworker can be fixed with a jig saw or even a hand saw. I have a 17" band saw, but for the Arts and Crafts style of furniture I usually build, I rarely use it. If I'm making veneer or modern/deco stuff, it's always on.

A jointer is a nice to have, but unless you're making table tops, spend the money eyeballing flat stock and edge joint on your table saw. a decent tuned table saw and a mediocre hand plane will give you as good an edge (or better) than even the biggest jointer will, but they do save a lot of grunt work.

I would also suggest obtaining and learning how to set-up/sharpen a hand plane and some chisels. Realistically speaking, you can get a decent set of users for a a Jack plane and 5 bench chisels for less than $100, and you can sharpen them on sandpaper on glass, which is how I still do it, and I have more planes than I care to speak about in front of my wife for fear of reprisal. There's nothing more accurate than a good hand plane. there is no other tool in your shop that can remove 0.0005" from the edge of a board, regardless of budget. There is a reason that handplanes have been around for 1000 years and still exist. And a good set of sharp chisels will be more useful than a small router for most of the tasks that a small router is used for including mortising and hinges.

I will add that routers are cheap on the used market. Like cheap enough that I own seven of them because they're often worth less than the bits in them, and I'm too lazy to change bits often.

I would splurge, like seriously splurge, on a bench with a decent vice on it. If you're as cramped as me, build it into the side table of your table saw. hand tools suck without a decent bench and clamp arrangement.

I think if I had to sit down and think about it, there's probably way too many dollars of tools in my shop. that being said, I could accomplish probably 80% of everything that happens in there for probably 20% of the cost. the rest is incremental gains and replacements as old tools fail. It's easy to say to buy the best available, but when a big box store 12" Delta planer costs $250, and just the helical head option on the $1500 15" planer costs $500, maybe expendable tools aren't so bad ;)

[Stan Calow]

Dust collector.

[Phil Mueller]

I recently completed a hall table and for curiosity wrote down every tool I used along the way. I'm slowly moving to more hand tools...but here was the build list FYI:

Tools for hall table

Power Tools:
circular saw, contractors TS, surface planer, router, 1/4 sheet palm sander

Hand Toos:
1/4, 1/2, 1" bench chisels, 1/4" mortise chisel, mallet, Japanese saw, coping saw, low angle Jack plane, block plane, router plane

Measuring/marking tools:
marking guage, square, triangle, steel rule, mechanical pencil

Tools purchased for the project:
mortise chisel, block and router planes.

If iyou plan to do hand tool work, a good workbench will make woodworking much more enjoyable...I just completed one and wish I had built this long ago.

[Jared Sankovich]

How small or large is the shop? I use my jointer and planer equally, as in every rough board go's through both.

[Robert Wolf]

Return that harbor freight drill press if you can. I blew one up trying to drill through Mahogany with a Forstner bit. It's only good for coring apples.

[Michael Yadfar]

I was in the same boat last year when I put together my own shop with a limited budget. I already had drills, chisels, hand tools, etc. Other than that, the tools I determined to be absolutely necessary were:


Jointer
Table Saw
Band Saw
Planer
Some kind of dust collection (started with a shop vac)
Lots of clamps!


I just kept an eye out on prices and deals, and did a lot of research to try to find what pieces of equipment were the best value. First thing I bought was a Jet 6" jointer with long tables in mint condition I got off Craigslist for $200. I got a miter saw from my dad for free, and got a plunge router for Christmas. I then saw a Ridgid portable table saw at Home Depot on sale for $300, so I picked that up and it's great for my small space because it folds up for storage. Grizzly had their 14" bandsaws on sale so I bought one of those for $500, and also bought a 15" planer with a spiral head for $1,600. I believe a lunchbox planer would suit well, but I just fell in love with that spiral head. I started with a shop vac for dust collection, but quickly upgraded to a Harbor Freight dust collection system I think I got for $180. Everytime I go to Home Depot, I always try to buy one clamp, and I just got some long bar clamps at a yard sale

[Mike Wilkins]

Just started to read this thread. I have the Grizzly 0715 table saw, and really like it. It is not the only saw in the shop, but I use it primarily for joinery work such as grooving/miter cuts/etc. Mine is set to run on 220 volt power, but the motor can be switched to run on 110.
Fine Woodworking magazine has a test report in the latest Shops issue and gave this machine high marks for it power and settings, as well as the easy to change riving knife and blade lock.