Pure luck
Ever do something in the shop that you thought would be a lot of work, but by pure chance you caught a break and it turned out lots easier? I…
Ever do something in the shop that you thought would be a lot of work, but by pure chance you caught a break and it turned out lots easier? I just did that.
Last time, I talked about reworking a series of benchtop tools to accommodate the addition of a miter saw. In doing it, I thought I’d need to seriously rework the dust ducting for two sanders. I still needed to tweak things, but once I got underneath the cabinets to where the ducting was it turned out to be much easier than I thought.
As it happened, when I installed the original ducting I had to run more flex hose than I remembered to reach from a “Y” adapter underneath to the dust port up above near the tool. To redo it for the sander’s new location, I only needed to shorten the flex hose and add a dust port near the sander’s new location. That old dust port, in turn, just needed a short length of hose to mate it into the main duct for the miter saw. Bingo-bango, and it was done.
In all, I thought it was a task that would take all day. Instead, it took only a couple hours.
Luck, when you have it, is a wonderful thing.
A.J.
A.J. Hamler is the former editor of Woodshop News and Woodcraft Magazine. He's currently a freelance woodworking writer/editor, which is another way of stating self-employed. When he's not writing or in the shop, he enjoys science fiction, gourmet cooking and Civil War reenacting, but not at the same time.