As you might have seen on my Patreon lately, I recently got a couple of new additions for the workshop: the Eastwood mini lathe and mini mill. (So far, so fun.) I’m working on a couple of “newbie versus” videos for them, similar to my MIG welder series. Those…

So I’ve had this giant log in my garage since 2014. The goal was to use it as a base for an anvil for blacksmithing. At the time, I wanted to learn smithing to open up some capabilities in the workshop, like making tools and heavier-duty metal hardware. …

There might be some beautiful wood hiding there. I spent the first five years of living in my current house with a gremlin on my shoulder. In this case, that gremlin was our deck. It was wobbly, weathered, and covered with deck mold. I was advised that it was too far gone, that it had to go. …

A project like this is more about the adventure than the final destination. Don’t forget that when you’re covered in blood and rust at 1 a.m. and need to work in the morning. And so we again return to Project Old Grey, a journey to fix up my dad’s…

In “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance,” Robert Pirsig writes about the effect that one stuck screw can have on a mechanic’s psyche: It’s normal at this point for the fear-anger syndrome to take over and make you want to hammer on that side plate with a chisel…

In this video, I race against time to make two stands for a wedding: One to hold an outdoor arbor in an indoor venue, the other using handy conduit connectors to hold a hanging neon sign. The arbor holder literally could have been a 2x4 with holes in it…

After a lifetime of waiting, Andy has scored his first pickup truck — and, big surprise, it needs some work. — Ever since I have known about trucks, I have wanted a truck. That includes the little toddler version of myself who first laid eyes on his dad’s farm truck at the time, forever hoping, upgraded truck after upgraded truck, that maybe this would be the one he’d drive someday. …

Do you really need to spend thousands of dollars on a computer-controlled plasma-cutting table to make intricate cuts in incredibly hard steel? Well, if you’re in a hurry, then yeah, you should probably buy one of those tables (or find someone else who already has one). But if you’ve…

Warning: This post is about preventing one of the worst accidents a parent could imagine. It’s a sunny Saturday morning. You have lots to do. Mowing the lawn is first on the list. If you’re fast enough, maybe you can beat the coming rain, get the grass cut and…