Dave Morris
07-07-2007, 5:22 PM
Years ago a friend and I tore down a couple old houses for a guy, and our price was any of the old wood we wanted. We managed to save a lot of old growth redwood and fir out of those homes, and used that reclaimed wood on a lot of projects. But, I had to clean some of the wood that had quite a few hidden nails, tacks, staples, etc. I happened to have one of those heavy, clunky "beach comber" metal detectors, and although it was bulky, awkward, and (due to it's size) hard to pin down exactly where the nails were, it served it's purpose. Skip forward to the present time, and I'm getting back into woodworking. That old metal detector is long gone, but once again I'm cleaning up some old wood. A few days back, I found a nail the hard way and ruined a brand new blade on my bandsaw. Grrrrr!:mad:
Figured there had to be some advances in metal detectors for woodworkers, and searching brought up praise for the Lumber Wizard III. So I picked one up at the nearest Woodcraft (no, I didn't get it on sale, so I can't gloat on the price), and gave it a try this morning. I choose this Wizard over it's smaller Junior version because I wasn't impressed with the sensitivity of the Junior model they had for demonstrations, although it's lack of performance could have been due to low batteries.
The Wizard III is still relatively small at about 18" long and a couple/three inches wide, and only weighs 13 ounces. It runs on a single 9v battery, has visual, audio, and vibration signals when it passes over metal, as well as a jack to plug in ear phones. You have the option to turn off either the vibration or audible signals, if that is your choice. Sensitivity is pretty good, I tested it by looking for small pieces of drywall screws and brads that I cut up with wire cutters and placed under a piece of plywood. The Wizard picked them up easily, giving a very decent location pinpoint by traversing back and forth over the same spot while rotating the direction 90°.
It's already saved me twice this morning by finding two broken-off nail bits buried down in this old wood, and that could have easily cost me another blade. I expect it to pay for itself many times over the course of the next few years, saving virtually all the wood-cutting edges on my tools from contact with hidden metal.
So, the minnie gloat... I'm currently resawing useable boards from some old wine vat slats. These slats are about 4 feet long, 4-6 inches wide, and most are a couple/three inches thick, and I can get a nice straight board out of them about 1" to 1.25" thick, and from 30" to 48" long, depending on the curve of that particular slat. I assumed they were all old growth Redwood. Since they are all covered with wine stains, dirt, wax, and other crud, they all look the same on the outside, but some of these slats are a bit thinner, curved more, and felt quite a bit denser than the others. Hmmm, not redwood? I wonder if...
Yup, clean one of the dense ones up, and it turns out to be some really nice quarter-sawn oak. Not positive it's White Oak, as I've never used it before. I guess I'll have to ask my brother in the wine industry what type of oak was used in the old wine vats. Bummer I can only get a couple 24" x 4" x 3/4" usable pieces from each 48" curved slat I clean and resaw, since these *oak* slats are thinner than the *redwood* slats, but they should come in useful for a project down the road. Don't know how many I'll wind up with until the whole stack is done, but still, it's a nice bonus.
Finally, for those of you who have contributed to this forum, what is your method of donation? The wife doesn't like paypal, and to be honest, I've heard of paypal's private info being hacked. Is there an alternative to paypal? Personally, I'm kind of an old school guy, and like using either cash or checks, but I would use a credit card if others do that here as well.
Okay, lunch break is over, time to get back to making straight boards out of curved slats.
Figured there had to be some advances in metal detectors for woodworkers, and searching brought up praise for the Lumber Wizard III. So I picked one up at the nearest Woodcraft (no, I didn't get it on sale, so I can't gloat on the price), and gave it a try this morning. I choose this Wizard over it's smaller Junior version because I wasn't impressed with the sensitivity of the Junior model they had for demonstrations, although it's lack of performance could have been due to low batteries.
The Wizard III is still relatively small at about 18" long and a couple/three inches wide, and only weighs 13 ounces. It runs on a single 9v battery, has visual, audio, and vibration signals when it passes over metal, as well as a jack to plug in ear phones. You have the option to turn off either the vibration or audible signals, if that is your choice. Sensitivity is pretty good, I tested it by looking for small pieces of drywall screws and brads that I cut up with wire cutters and placed under a piece of plywood. The Wizard picked them up easily, giving a very decent location pinpoint by traversing back and forth over the same spot while rotating the direction 90°.
It's already saved me twice this morning by finding two broken-off nail bits buried down in this old wood, and that could have easily cost me another blade. I expect it to pay for itself many times over the course of the next few years, saving virtually all the wood-cutting edges on my tools from contact with hidden metal.
So, the minnie gloat... I'm currently resawing useable boards from some old wine vat slats. These slats are about 4 feet long, 4-6 inches wide, and most are a couple/three inches thick, and I can get a nice straight board out of them about 1" to 1.25" thick, and from 30" to 48" long, depending on the curve of that particular slat. I assumed they were all old growth Redwood. Since they are all covered with wine stains, dirt, wax, and other crud, they all look the same on the outside, but some of these slats are a bit thinner, curved more, and felt quite a bit denser than the others. Hmmm, not redwood? I wonder if...
Yup, clean one of the dense ones up, and it turns out to be some really nice quarter-sawn oak. Not positive it's White Oak, as I've never used it before. I guess I'll have to ask my brother in the wine industry what type of oak was used in the old wine vats. Bummer I can only get a couple 24" x 4" x 3/4" usable pieces from each 48" curved slat I clean and resaw, since these *oak* slats are thinner than the *redwood* slats, but they should come in useful for a project down the road. Don't know how many I'll wind up with until the whole stack is done, but still, it's a nice bonus.
Finally, for those of you who have contributed to this forum, what is your method of donation? The wife doesn't like paypal, and to be honest, I've heard of paypal's private info being hacked. Is there an alternative to paypal? Personally, I'm kind of an old school guy, and like using either cash or checks, but I would use a credit card if others do that here as well.
Okay, lunch break is over, time to get back to making straight boards out of curved slats.