The Woodworker & Woodturner – August 2019

TECHNICAL Measuring tools

30 The Woodworker & Good Woodworking August 2019 http://www.getwoodworking.com

ASCERTAINMENT

THE

OF

Confronted by a mêlée of measuring tools,

Robin Gates has a field day with squares, dividers,

rules and tapes, then makes a handy depth gauge

W

hile searching for dividers

I opened a drawer and plunged

my hand into something

like the mêlée of a medieval

free-for-all, with legs and points going in all

directions. I don’t know how it can have got like

this; some tools seem to multiply in the darkness

like mushrooms. A jab from the chisel-edged pin

of a marking gauge told me it was high time this

chaotic assortment of measuring tools was put

in some sort of order.

I’ve had similar moments with saws, planes

and screwdrivers, feeling suddenly overwhelmed

by their sheer number, and it’s always tempting

to follow the ‘less is more’ idea, sidelining rip

and cross-cut saws in favour of the single panel

saw, renouncing all planes but the everyday

smoother, and forsaking all screwdrivers bar

the one ratcheting handle and its box of fiddly

interchangeable bits. The decluttering lasts just

long enough to pack this spartan kit into some

miserably small bag, when those tools cast aside

begin throwing accusing glances, and I realise how

I’d miss them, their capabilities honed down the

ages by generations of intelligent hands. It’s more

drawers and cupboards I need, not less tools.

So this time my mind turned naturally to

the many aspects of measuring, or at least

those I knew about, or thought I did. What,

for example, do I actually mean by ‘measure?’

The more I thought about it the more confused

I became, until a visit to the dictionary seemed

unavoidable. There I discovered measure to mean

‘the ascertainment of extent by comparison

with a standard’. That’ll do.

Treasured squares

Countless projects begin with planing the timber

square, that is with edges and faces at 90°, for

which the try square has long been the traditional

standard. An old tool with rosewood or ebony

stock smoothed by caring hands, brass bound

at the edges and fixed to the blade by fancy rivets,

is a woodworking treasure – especially so if it’s

survived the years with a true perpendicular.

This is conveniently tested on a board known

to be straight of edge and flat of face (photo 3),

3 Testing the truth of a try square 5 Sliding bevel as a visual guide to honing

2 Sawn ends meet to make a right angle

4 Using the protractor head of a combination set