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Walked into a shop this morning after 20 years away and barely recognized the layout
My old mentor retired last year and his son took over. First time back in that building since 2005. The whole floor plan got flipped upside down. Used to be all hand tool benches along the wall with one big jointer in the middle. Now it's a CNC machine near the front door and a dust collection system running through the ceiling. He said they cut their waste down by 40 percent since switching to programmed cutting. But I noticed the hand plane shelf was dusty. Is that just how it goes now or do some shops still keep a mix?
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blair_gibson782mo ago
Yeah the hand plane shelf was dusty" - that's a sign they finally wised up and quit wasting time on manual work.
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nathanb712mo ago
Huh, funny you mention that. A buddy of mine who runs a small cabinet shop told me last year he finally moved his old hand planes to a display rack on the wall. They look nice there but nobody touches them anymore. @blair_gibson78 is right, once you get used to the speed of power tools it's hard to go back for production work. He still keeps a block plane handy for the odd quick adjustment, but that's about it.
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