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My neighbor Chuck saw my wobbly shop stool and asked why I built the legs with a jig instead of by hand
Honestly I almost brushed it off. I built that stool about 8 months ago in my garage here in Fort Wayne, and one leg sits maybe a quarter inch off. It rocks a little. Chuck came over to borrow my router and noticed it right away, and he goes, "you jigged those angles, huh? Nothing wrong with it, you just get flat thinking." I sat with that for a couple days. He meant it as a compliment, I think, but it got me looking at my whole bench. My crosscut sled, my miter gauge, all of it is set up so my hands never make a real choice anymore. So over the weekend I cut four new legs by hand, just a marking gauge and a backsaw, and the stool is steadier than the first one ever was. Not prettier, but it sits flat on the floor. Ngl it took me 2 hours instead of 20 minutes. Has anyone else caught themselves leaning on jigs so hard they forgot how to cut an angle without one?
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faitha409h ago
The thing about jigs is they dont just take over your hands, they take over your head. I caught myself last month staring at a piece of walnut for like ten minutes because I couldnt picture the cut without picturing the sled first. That's when it hit me, I wasnt seeing the wood anymore, I was seeing the setup. So I started doing what you did but smaller, just one cut per project by hand, no gauge, no stop block, just a pencil line and my eye. First few were rough, one shelf bracket came out so bad I remade it, but the fourth one was dead on and it took me 90 seconds. The jigs are still on my wall and I still use them for repeat stuff, but theyre tools now instead of training wheels. Chuck sounds like the kind of neighbor worth keeping around.
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