The Bessey WS angle clamps differ quite a bit from your standard corner clamps. They’re designed to hold, fix, and align material at a 90° angle, and they adjust to variations in wood thickness. They also feature a slot in the clamp, so you can drive fasteners in the joint while the glue’s drying, without the entire piece shifting.

They look pretty handy for furniture assembly and framing, plus they’re pretty small so you can throw them in a drawer or toolbox when they aren’t needed. We can definitely see ourselves taking advantage of the added slot in the clamp. If you think you need these, you might have to hurry, though — we’ve heard a rumor that Bessey’s going to discontinue them soon.

WS Angle Clamp [Coastal Tool]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]

We were in a bind last week in the Toolmonger shop. We couldn’t find the stain we wanted anywhere locally, and we needed it pretty bad to get a project done on time. We swallowed hard and ordered online from Woodcraft. In short, we were impressed.

Woodcraft carries a dizzying array of woodworking items, as anyone who checks out their site can plainly see, but we found the uber swift service to be the real star of the show. After selecting our Red Mahogany Danish oil from the website last Thursday, we paid for it and hoped for the best — but feared the worst. Tales of woe about ordering wood supplies from online suppliers haunted us, but only for around ten minutes. That’s about all it took for Woodcraft’s communication system to kick in.

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Congratulations, everyone! Our tools now come equipped with laser beams — we’re officially in the future. Many drill presses, circ-saws, miter saws, and even some wacky hand tools now feature lasers for precision work. It seems manufacturers are anxious to put as many laser beams on their products as possible. I’m sure we’ll see a hammer that shines a laser on the head of a nail by year’s end. But do these high-tech beams of light really help?

I recently acquired a jigsaw that had a laser on it. I thought is was a bit weird, since lasers shoot straight and jigsaws are meant to cut curves — but I tried it out. Although it seemed to work at first, I wound up watching the laser instead of the blade, and my cut started to wander.

My Ryobi drill press also sports a laser. Although the laser crosshairs can be useful, I have to realign it almost every time I use the darn thing. On the other hand, I used to cut granite commercially on a large wet-saw, and my cuts would’ve been horrible had I not had a laser to align them.

So, are laser alignments hot or not? Do you have a tool with a laser? Which one? Do you use the laser, or does it just get in the way? Let us know in comments!

Saws With Lasers [Google Products]
Drills With Lasers [Google Products]

Think your old woody was the last car that meshed woodgrain style with an automobile? Think again. The Splinter, a 600 HP mid-engine supercar, incorporates wooden components wherever possible, including the chassis, body, and large percentages of the suspension components and wheels.

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Have you ever watched a how-to video and wanted to jump right into a new project as soon as it was over? That’s how I feel after watching part of Taunton’s three-DVD set on house building.

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Sean posted about Bench Dog’s ProMax Cabinet back in 2006, and now in 2008, for a limited time, Amazon is listing the Bench Dog ProMax Complete Router Table System with free shipping for $970. This “system” — really the whole kit and kaboodle for routing — includes the ProMax cabinet, ProMax router table, ProFence, cast iron end cap, Porter Cable router, and four Cab-Loc casters.

The cabinet features integrated router bit storage, pull-out shelves and flip-up doors, and a lower cubby for router storage. Bench Dog makes the cabinet with bolt and cross dowel construction, birch plywood side panels, and steel hardware for vibration dampening.

Promax Complete [Bench Dog]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Street Pricing [Google Products]

I’ve often wondered how something like lacewood would finish out, if used as a main design piece. Photo pool member Butterjug2000 has removed all doubt in this matter with his recent mantle project.

Normally, we don’t see much lacewood outside of veneer, but this looks to be a solid piece. If it’s not, Butterjug did a masterful job of concealing it with the finished edges. We also applaud him for keeping the design very simple and letting the wood speak for itself.

Toolmonger Photo Pool [Flickr]

I’m finally getting into the world of routing, and my entry point is this Hitachi KM12VC plunge and fixed-base router kit, available from Amazon for $130. The router features an 11A, 2-1/4 HP variable speed motor (8,000 to 24,000 RPM), and it includes the plunge base, 1/2″ and 1/4″ collet chucks, template guide adaptor, centering gauge, sub-base plate, three wrenches, and a five-year warranty.

I chose to save a Jackson and a Hamilton and get the refurbished model from the folks at Reconditioned Sales for $102.

KM12VC [Hitachi]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Hitachi KM12VC Refurb [Reconditioned Sales]
Street Pricing [Google Products]

The drill press might be one of the more overlooked shop tools when it comes to dust collection, but it still can make quite a mess — especially if it gets dual use as a drum sander. The dust and shavings also make it hard to see your workpiece while drilling. Peachtree Woodworking Supply sells one solution: a versatile kit that makes collecting dust at the drill press easy.

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A float is a tool similar to a rasp, but it cuts more aggressively, and you can sharpen it with a triangular file when it dulls. We’ve covered Lie-Nielson’s Planemakers’ Floats on Toolmonger before — now they offer a new line of joinery floats more suited for cabinet-making and furniture-building.

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Creative woodcrafters and hobbyists alike have turned to alternative sources for the rare wood and sweet deals they crave. We support this trend — it brings recycling and a certain amount of free-thinking to woodworking. Lately, we’ve heard this question a lot: How much should I pay for this recycled wood from old barns or 100-year-old houses?

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Toolmonger’s own Benjamin Johnson offered up this seriously sweet and sandy ride. Ben created this awesome Dodge sandbox truck for his daughter, with help from his father-in-law.  Ben built some wheels onto this completely cool plaything, so it can be moved around the yard. Someone’s thinking.

Check it — this ride comes fully loaded with brake lights, license plate holder, steering wheel, wooden windows, bench seating, and a hard, flip-up sand cover. Ben has single-handedly raised the bar for sandboxes around here — nice.

Toolmonger Photo Pool [Flickr]

Using simple geometry, Rockler’s mortise-centering router baseplate can help you make perfectly centered mortises. Rockler makes the baseplate from 1/4″ clear acrylic, so you can see exactly what you’re routing. Two solid brass, 11/16″ pins screw into one of three sets of inserts drilled into the baseplate to accommodate different board thicknesses.

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How do you make tambour doors — you know, the rolling doors in roll-top desks and appliance garages?  You could glue the slats to a cloth backing, then fish a wire through every slat to hold the tambour door together, or you could use Amana’s new bit set. With Lonnie Bird’s three carbide-tipped tambour/appliance garage door bits, you can create uniquely shaped slats that interlock.

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We’ve covered tools to help collect sawdust from your miter saw here, but this model from FastCap collapses for portability and easy storage. The ChopShop saw hood keeps your work area cleaner by catching the sawdust that sprays behind your saw. When working outside, the saw hood can also help protect your equipment from the elements.

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Until recently, if you wanted a CNC machine you had two choices: buy one online, or build one yourself. Today, a guy can actually go to the store and buy a CNC machine. Sears was the first big retailer to start selling a CNC machine — the CarveWright — and WoodCraft shortly followed suit. Now Rockler has announced they’ll be offering the CNC Shark. What’s more, supposedly you can watch live demos at your local Rockler.

The CNC Shark can route wood, engrave or cut plastic, and etch or cut tile. Constructed from steel, aluminum, and HDPE, the Shark’s X and Y axes can travel 24″ and 13″ respectively, while the Z or vertical axis can travel 4-1/2″. It also moves pretty fast — 120 inches per minute or more — and it moves precisely in increments as small as 0.0000625″. A 269 oz/in stepper drives each axis. And each axis also utilizes four precision linear bearing guides for rigidity. A Bosch Colt palm router mounted to the Shark supplies the cutting power.

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Whiteside Machine combines a flush trim bit and a template bit into one router bit, saving you money, time, and confusion. The two ball bearings — one on the tip and one on the shank — allow you to use this bit for cutting out templates and patterns, as well as for flush-trimming laminates and edgings.

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