Cheers Everybody

[Falling Tree]

Hi all,

Firstly I want to be totally up front by saying I'm green behind the ears when it comes to fine woodworking & skills required, I'm actually a tool maker by trade & always wanted a wood machinist apprenticeship back then but it never happened, and ended up playing with ferrous & non ferrous metals pretty much all my life Lol. Then sold the business 4 years ago and went back to school and became a Quantity Surveyor (big change I know, but thoroughly love my new career), go to work and come home not smelling of machine shop fluid.

So, bored as heck as I don't do anything with my hands anymore apart from using my computer at work and calculus, so at night when lying down I watch youtube about wood working & absolutely loving it to the max!, knowledge is a great thing (well my brain has soaked in the info I've watched thus far but never put anything to practice with my hands yet, I'm embarrassed to say I don't own 1 single woodworking tool, I do have my tool chest full of toolmakers stuff but that ain't going to work very well Lol.

So the cook is right behind me in my new found passion & says well you only live once why don't you give it a go (I haven't told her I'm planning to build Noah's ark in the back yard ).

Back to reality I need a man cave first to progress, bought our little place Dec 2015 with no man cave, what a SIN! to dangerous trying to do things outdoors where I live at night as the bugs & lizards are quite ferocious Lol, problem is the shed size is only going to be around 9 x 4.8, the main thing I need to design is some small future machinery I may purchase (i love machinery) so will use the length of the man cave to future position toys against the wall run and my table saw will be in the middle at one end, will design a gutter in the concrete slab with a cover over it for the Dust extractor run to connect to the Table Saw, I don't want any hoses running along the ground where I can trip, So what I'm thinking I may do is build log of my woodworker's man cave from removing a couple of friggin Palm trees from hell & then right through the entire build process, then walla an man cave with nothing in it, well at first that is, ill buy a chisel and lay it on the concrete floor to make me feel better.

Oh well enough ranting by me & hopefully you all can put up with me on this forum, I'm sure Ill be asking questions as I hit brick walls

Cheers, Nuts & Great Northern Beers from Falling Tree (my real birth name is Tony!)

[Tahlee]

hello Tony
Welcome to the passion .. creating with wood is a great thing ... it is a fantastic way to go absolutely nuts!! while enjoying every moment.

I started wood work just a few years ago .. always wanted to create some heirloom pieces for the family.

The big question you need to ask is whether you are going to be a hand tool craftsperson (like Paul Sellers in UK) or take the more modern approach with thousands of dollars of equipment.

When I retired I built a workshop and kitted it out with lots of machinery .. makes life easy ... but it takes time to master the process.

On reflection I see workshops that use only hand tools ... no planer/jointer machines or table saws .. and I think how pure that approach is ... but I'm a machine man .. so the workshop I have set up is right for me,

You have some great woods in FNQ ...

I spent some time at Taylors Beach (just out of Halifax) Before Larry in 2006 .. loved the place .. but for the moxzzies and crocs

Best regards .. and welcome

Rob

[Falling Tree]

Cheers Rob,

I really have no idea which path I'm going to take at this moment, I have watched Rob Cosman demonstrating his hand cut dovetails over and over, so that will be my start & see where it takes me.

Yes we do have some really nice exotic timbers from the rain forest, friends of mine Mark & Lisa are Luthier's in Port Douglas Hand Made Guitars, Hand Built Guitars, Custom Made Guitars- Cloud Nine Guitars- Guitar building cour and they just bought a Lucas Mill and he experimented on a Mango tree trunk which was absolutely enormous, someone had cut it down on their property and wanted it gone the colour was amazing, should have taken pics, but I think sometimes pics don't give justice, it had this almost like silver/chrome shimmer ridge like fish scales running through it in sections, don't know how else to explain it, anyway its all chopped up stacked in his drying room waiting to be experimented on a guitar one day, so in saying hopefully I will be able to find some fallen trees I can bring to him to saw up for me

Speak Soon

[crowie]

G'Day & Welcome to a top forum "Tony".
There are quite a few members in North Queensland & across the rest of Queensland plus 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 crowie

PS - Enjoy building your shed/Man Cave...
Oh, we drove on the beach back in the mid1970's at low tide all the way to Cape Tribulation point in a Kombi.....lots of hippies and alternates up there back then, may very brown with a stitch on!!

[Falling Tree]

Thanks Crowie for saying welcome aboard, yep I can be very accurate by saying nothing has changed since 1070's lol, well up this far it hasn't, we have a little saying being "Only place in Australia where it takes us 38hrs to watch 60 Minutes" But I wouldnt want to change this place for anything

Cheers

Falling Tree

[old1955]

Welcome to the forum Tony.

[Old Croc]

Welcome to the Forum mate. You may want to think about putting your machines on castors if you have little space for them all. Most of my shop is movable.
Rgds,
Crocy.

[Falling Tree]

Thanks Old1955 & Croc, I've noticed a lot out there are setting up with mobile machinery, it will defiantly be something that I will need to take on board, I'm probably really only going to have to invest in a table saw & band saw to get started when I get around to it, will try and see if I can incorporate the router into the table saw somehow like most

Cheers
Tony

[crowie]

Tony, Just had a thought about your new workshop/shed and machinery being so closed to the ocean plus the tropics; you'll have to pay special attention to maintenance and rush prevention....crowie

[Falling Tree]

Well funny you should say that Crowie, our house is on the beach front, we have only been living here since Dec 2015 & my computer started to play up on Sunday, on opening the box up I was shocked how much salt build up was on the mother board & all over the inside of the computer box, I cleaned it all up but one of my graphics cards had died because of it.

I will just have to use T9 on whatever tools I have, that should keep the surface rust under control, and just need to ensure I regularly check the inside of the machinery and give it a wipe down, it will be a bugger I know, we got a bit of rain last night which is very weird for our dry season & the humidity is at 81% at the moment off my accu weather station on the front veranda.

Cheers

Tony

[JJF]

welcome aboard

[Christos]

Welcome to the forum.

[Falling Tree]

Cheers for the greetings JJF & Christos , been busy doing a lot of reading though the forum posts whenever I get a spare 10 mins Lol