Hello from Mordor's Workshop.

**MGfurniture** · 13th October 2015, 02:31 PM

Hello to all you folks in the Woodworking forum. I'm a furniture maker who lives in New Zealand and who works solely with recycled timber. Here in New Zealand nearly all of our houses are made from wood. When the colonialists first came here over 200 years ago they started building houses from magnificent trees. Some of these trees were thousands of years old and many of the timber houses that were constructed from these giants are still standing. People often replace the old weatherboards with new pine ones and i pick up the old Kauri or Rimu ones and make furniture from them.
Kauri is a beautiful straight grained timber that has few knots and was also used extensively in boat building. It has a high resin content I think which helps it to resist rot.
Rimu on the other hand tends to have a lot of knots and can be very hard.

I have only been in business for about 6 months but orders are already backed up. I feel lucky that i am in this situation, but i cannot keep up with the pace of the orders i am receiving.
The only sander i currently have is a Bosch belt sander (PBS 75A) and a cheap little Ozito 1/3 sheet sander.
I also have a bench planer (1960's Tanner one) and power plane (Hitchi f30 + Makita 82mm). The Makita is old and worn and i just use it to remove paint from the weatherboards.
I have sufficient saws (table/scms/band) but i don't feel my sanding finishing set up is efficient.
Now i need to invest in more tools/machinery because my current setup is inefficient.

I do some work off site. For example i just finished making a built in bookcase for someone which required me to do a lot of work on site.

I have about $3500NZD to invest in some new tools.

I want to speed up my prepping wood and sanding stage.

I was thinking of doing this.
Thicknesser - JET - JWP12 - 12" benchtop thicknesser - $579
Festool Rotex 150 - $1013
Festool CT17 extractor - $490
Carbatec 400mm wide drum sander - $1124
I would also like to invest in some quality handplanes and also little bits and bobs like magnetic angle gauge (so that i can set my table saw/scms/bench planer(buzzer) accurately)

Can you please give me some advice on the above.
Should i invest in the drum sander? Or not bother and instead invest in a better thicknesser and some hand planes.
Also is the Festool extractor worth the money? Should i get a different extractor? I need a mobile extractor that i can use at peoples houses.

Thanks in advance for all your advice (i think)....
Cheers,

Max

**crowie** · 13th October 2015, 07:18 PM

G'Day & Welcome to the Great Southern Land [the big island across the ditch] and to a top forum "Max".
There are quite a few members from the Land of the Long White Cloud and the rest of the world.....
You'll find a heap of helpful & knowledgeable blokes & ladies on the forum and for most very willing to assist.
Make sure you show off your handiwork as everyone loves a photo, especially WIP [Work In Progress] photos with build notes.
Enjoy the forum.
Enjoy your woodwork..
Cheers from On Top DownUnder, crowie

PS _ May I suggest you post the tool questions in either the tool or general subsections to gain a wider audience and thus more answers....

**Gabriel** · 13th October 2015, 07:41 PM

I can't recommend the festool ros enough. I am not in production work, and only use it occasionally for work (carpenter), but hooked up to a festool vac it really does make finishing a dream. It can quite happily take rough sawn timber to a mirror finish (working up through the sandpaper grits) effortlessly and quickly.

Oh, welcome to the forum also.... great bunch of folks here with a wealth of knowledge about most things.

Just my 2 cents

Cheers
Gab

**MGfurniture** · 13th October 2015, 08:05 PM

Hey crowie and gabriel,

thanks for getting back to me so quickly.
I will transfer this question to the tool or general subsection now. I'll even pop in a couple of photos too.

**Keith_1** · 13th October 2015, 08:26 PM

Welcome to a great Forum

Hope you enjoy corresponding with many tremendous people and form long standing friendships

All the Best

Keith

**MGfurniture** · 13th October 2015, 09:21 PM

Thanks Keith. I hope to!

Cheers

Max

**old1955** · 14th October 2015, 12:53 PM

Welcome to the forum Max.

**JJF** · 17th October 2015, 07:10 AM

Welcome to the forum

**bsrlee** · 21st October 2015, 01:55 AM

Hi Max

If you are doing a lot of paint removal from old boards, and want to live to collect the pension, I'd strongly suggest investing in a dust collection/extraction system when you start spending. You could just get a mid priced bin type vacuum and connect one tool at a time but that is minimal, a bigger semi-industrial dust sucker would be better in an outside enclosure so the really fine dust blows away rather than being re-cycled inside the workshop - you will find plenty of lengthy discussions on this on these forums

Most old boards had 'red lead' undercoat and white paint contained white lead oxide until the 1960's (or later if imported from countries more concerned with low costs rather than safety) - the really old white lead goes grey eventually - lots of not-quite aware 'restoration' experts tell you that everything was painted pink or grey, but that is just the lead undercoat.

Dust from sanding can also have a number of nasty fungi in them as well as the naturally occurring chemicals in the wood that stop it from decaying quickly - all of which can really stuff up your lungs.