Woodworking offers a retreat from all the stress & distraction in our lives and research demonstrates that woodworking really is good for us.

Woodworking takes many forms, and techniques and tools used are often based purely on personal preference. At the end of the day, there are multiple tools offering multiple ways of making the same item.

Traditional Woodworking with Hand tools

• By touching every piece of the timber, you feel you ARE the process, not just part of it; the romanticism of being one with the wood.
• Being one with the work, gives you far more control over the tool’s movement through the wood, which is great for highly detailed work and when you want to avoid removing too much material.
• Process is more fluid, enabling you to match one piece to another as you go along. This is great for joints that need to fit precisely by hand
• Quieter to use, so they can be used anytime day or night without upsetting the neighbours.
• No power cables or remembering to charge the batteries to contend with.  This also means they can be used virtually anywhere with little additional preparation.
• Generally simpler in nature with less moving parts allows them to outlast their powered counterpart.
• Using powered tools is not automatically the fastest solution, in some instances, some tasks are faster when done with hand tools, with little or no set up time and the ability to move rapidly from one tool to the next.
• You find that you bring the tool to the workpiece, as opposed to bringing the workpiece to the tool, negating the need to be walking around your workshop constantly.

Woodworking with Powered Tools

• As their name suggests, powered tools are more powerful than hand tools.
• Incorporated tool guides can give consistent, repeatable cuts.
• High volumes of simple joinery and designs are best suited for power tool work. You’re dealing with absolutes and are often dependent on accurate measurements.
• Powered tools are a fast and simple way to roughly dimension larger timber with a high-level accuracy that’s difficult to master with hand tools
• Some Power tools are designed to plug into dust collection and can therefore be cleaner than their unpowered counterparts.
• Repetitive actions and continuous application of force can be tiring; Powered tools can take away some of the effort required.

A blend of both hand tools and powered tools is a great way of taking advantage of the benefits that each offers, whilst still being rewarded with the feeling of fulfilment and satisfaction from creating something beautiful with your own hands.  Mastering the art of using unplugged hand tools is a great way to understand and appreciate ‘how’ timber works, and how YOU should work with it.  These skills make your job with power tools even easier.

Visit your local Carbatec store or browse our range online!