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Author Topic: Toolz: what have you used and liked?  (Read 268 times)

Offline Brock

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Toolz: what have you used and liked?
« on: January 17, 2026, 04:42:32 PM »
I'm not a wood worker, thus I don't have many tools that a woodworker might have.  But I do like to get new tools ;-)
So, what tools have you used in building your wings?  Specificall (since I'm just about to start the wings) did you use a miter box and hand saw for the butt ends of you your wood?  What did you like best for trimming the spar 8* on the spar-cap.  I do have a router and a decent battery circular saw so I might figure out some of this.

There are some cool little miter chop saws out there but are they worth it?  I don't see myself cutting new molding for the next house renovation.

Edit: didn't mention... Ribs are done, so I'm not working on the small stuff.
s/n: WEB-14, 3VLA
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Offline Kamcoman77

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Re: Toolz: what have you used and liked?
« Reply #1 on: January 17, 2026, 06:12:42 PM »
I used a bandsaw for cutting almost all the wood and aluminum in my XL. The long pieces, like spars (& angle on them) were cut with my table saw. I did use a miter box and Zona saw for some fine trimming on wing rib pieces. I used a belt sander to make the scarf joints on all my long plywood parts like spar webs. I used a drill press for almost all the drilling. I used a small chop saw to cut my 4130 tubing to rough lengths and tin snips and a bench grinder to shape my fuselage joints. I polished all my aluminum fittings with a 3M convoluted wheel on my bench grinder.

Offline Chuck in Indiana

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Re: Toolz: what have you used and liked?
« Reply #2 on: January 19, 2026, 04:53:22 AM »
I bought a compound miter saw and use it a lot. Another really useful tool is a Japanese pull saw. Most stuff was done on the table saw with home made tooling, however. I'm building a Pietenpol now, though, and have bought some more wood working stuff. As you mentioned, who doesn't like an excuse to buy new tools? ;)
Edit:
Thinking back and looking at my build thread, I bought a little trim router, and it was pretty handy for many jobs.

 

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