Steven,

Welcome!  I was born in Philadelphia at a very early age
but grew out of it quickly - we lived off Cottman Avenue
until I was 4.  No, what you did with that hemlock handrail
is *not* cheating, and anyone who would do that with hand
tools is absolutely in the right place!  Pull up a chair.

Sounds like a nice bench.  If I'm understanding right from the
porch dwellers, benches are not a project that are ever
completely finished; if you use it, you'll keep tuning it for
the rest of your life.  There just comes to a time when you
spend less time building it and more time using it.

By the way, kids like eggbeater drills.

Gary K
Close to Buffalo NY

----- Original Message ----- 
From: 
To: 
Sent: Sunday, November 20, 2005 8:04 PM
Subject: [OldTools] bio & ?

> Hello all,  my name is Steven C. Kumpf  Jr.  I currently reside in
> Philadelphia, am 28 with a wife and a 2.5 year  old boy.  I have been 
> consulting the

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> hand, my lathe is belt driven, but I  want to ask, the banister, I bought 
> the
> stock hemlock rail from h*m#  ch!po.  It is close enough that
> I can modify it to match the ballustrades that are in the rest of the 
> house
> which is the whole point of the project.  I planed off the two cock  beads
> that are on either side and planed off about 7/16ths from the  bottom. 
> Then I
> stuck on a 1/4 inch bead on the two bottom sides for the  finish.  Pretty
> simple but my question is, is this cheating?  I know  if I wanted to do it 
> the
> galoot way, I would have had to chop a tree down with  an axe and hew it 
> by hand
> with a hewing hatchet.  Do true galoots only  use wooden planes?  What is 
> the

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