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1 week ago | 
neversponsored.substack.com | Megan Fitzpatrick
A couple thousand days ago (early 2018), I spent a week applying a perfect-to-me Real Milk Paint finish on my LAP “Anarchist’s Tool Chest.” It was a lovely and laborious combination of several coats of Peacock topped with another couple of coats of Dragonfly. I loved the flat, almost chalky look of the casein-based paint. The last coat was dry a few days before an open house in our shop, and I was looking forward to showing off my work to a bunch of people.
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3 weeks ago | 
neversponsored.substack.com | Christopher Schwarz
Most new wooden yardsticks are garbage. They use crap wood and the simple stick is poorly made, printed and finished. We’ve looked for decent U.S. manufacturers for several years with no luck.
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3 weeks ago | 
neversponsored.substack.com | Christopher Schwarz
For the last couple months, I’ve been stewing about the Taylor Toolworks Bed Rock-style planes we purchased and reviewed. In all, we examined four smoothing planes (three No. 4s and a No. 3). One of the planes was good to go. The other three had problems that would vex a beginning woodworker. This morning, I packed them up in my satchel for my morning walk. I was going to hand them over to the metal recycling company a few blocks away (they take a lot of our steel scraps).
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3 weeks ago | 
neversponsored.substack.com | Megan Fitzpatrick
Some people (Chris) might be surprised to see me using a broom. But when the broom is as handsome as this Streamliner model, it’s hard to resist. We’ve long been fans of the brooms (and other wares) the students make at Berea Student Craft. We have five or six of the various broom models in the shop, as well as some in our home. Most of them we bought at one of the “seconds sales” Student Craft holds on occasion to sell off less-than-perfect items at reduced prices.
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1 month ago | 
neversponsored.substack.com | Christopher Schwarz
For years (maybe a decade) we have used a pressurized plant mister from the home center to keep our waterstones wet. Yes, it’s a luxury compared to the old Windex, but we live on Fancy Street. The brand of mister we can get at our Home Depot is Flo-Master, which is made in China. The first one I bought is still in use. Its tip leaks most of the time. And sometimes it forgets to stop spraying when you release the trigger. But other than that, it’s OK.
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1 month ago | 
neversponsored.substack.com | Christopher Schwarz |Kale Vogt
Because of Paul “Just Sayin’” Sellers’ love for the Preston/Tyzack form of router plane, the price of vintage versions of the tool have increased ($400 is typical these days), so manufacturers have stepped in to fill the demand. Several years ago, Walke Moore Tools began making a version that closely followed the Preston. But we were never fast enough to snag one, and I haven’t seen any activity on the Walke Moore site for a while.
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1 month ago | 
neversponsored.substack.com | Megan Fitzpatrick
Warning: This post is laden with abject feelings of guilt. I recently inherited a piece of antique furniture from my mother – a jelly cupboard that I can’t remember not having in our home when I was growing up. I don’t know if she bought it before I was born, but it was certainly acquired before my earliest memory. Never Sponsored is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
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1 month ago | 
neversponsored.substack.com | Christopher Schwarz
It’s Benchcrafted Week here at Never Sponsored. If you don’t follow the tool news, Benchcrafted recently acquired Czeck Edge tools and has been redesigning the tools. We decided to purchase a few and see if Benchcrafted had mucked them up (spoiler: they haven’t). I purchased one of their new marking knives and both sizes of the redesigned bird-cage awls. We’re deal with the marking knife in a future He-Said-She-Said review where Megan and I have a knife fight. Today let’s look at the new awls.
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1 month ago | 
neversponsored.substack.com | Megan Fitzpatrick |Christopher Schwarz
A fair number of people have asked why we bought another bench instead of simply making one – we do, after all, know how to make one. Or 10. The short answer is: We did the math. Factoring in our time and all materials (including the vises, for which we almost always use Benchcrafted products), we could not build one for less than the price of the Benchcrafted Split-top Roubo.
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1 month ago | 
neversponsored.substack.com | Christopher Schwarz
Years ago I had to have surgery on my left hand to remove a walnut splinter that had lodged under a nerve. It was painful and expensive. Because of that, I have become a serious tweezer. I’ve tried everything that was legal, looked promising or was recommended to me. Today, the only thing I use (or recommend) are the pair of Tweezerman tools, which are widely available in drugstores.