My new dado set
I installed my new 8" dado set into my Skilsaw 3410 contractor table saw today. It turns out that the arbor will only accommodate 1/2" of the 13/16" set. I guess that I will be making a few more passes than I planned. It will still beat the heck out of making them with a single blade!


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The Ply Wooden Boat Part V Sailing The Sea
Now that the boat was built and waterproofed, the only things left to do before its maiden voyage were to take it to the lake, and determine how I would propel it. I, of course, decided to take it to the lake first, and fabricate its means of propulsion in the parking lot next to the beach.
While Eric used a single oar for his GardenFork.tv boat, I found that with the increased width of my boat it was too wide to use a single oar effectively. I made two (2) oars (like a traditional row boat) instead.
Making the oars was as simple as cutting a rectangle of scrap ? plywood, trimming the corners off and then screwing it to a 2x2. To act as oar pivots, I cut two U-shaped pieces of plywood and screwed them to the outside face of the batten with ran down the top of each side. The oars simply dropped in the opening, which was cut with enough room to allow the oars to move.
Finally, the boat (dubbed the S.S. Sea Man) was ready to set sail.My cousins, Doug and Robert, and I carried it passed the rocks (Lake George is beautiful, but lacks sandy beaches) and into the water. I gave it a brief moment to confirm it was watertight. Then I hopped in and I set off rowing.
The boat was in and out of the water for three (3) or four (4) days over the course of our vacation. It proved a stable craft. My kids (and cousin) enjoyed going out on the boat and it proved a stable platform for launching firecrackers. I was able to successfully carry two (2) adults and probably could have managed a third.
After the first day, I moved the cross batten further back to reduce the number of times I hit my knuckles on it while rowing. That made it better, but not great. In the end, what kept the boats use down were the unbearably uncomfortable square oar handles and the cramps I managed to get from the lack of a seat.

| Have boat, will travel. |
| I built the oars in the parking lot at the beach. |
| I attached the U-shaped oar pivots on the dock. |
| The oars were cut to length on the dock too. |
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| The finished oars. |
| Finally, ready for the open sea. |
| Row like the wind. |
| I did ultimately get the hand of steering it with the oars. |
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| To move the batten back, I first added a new one, then removed the old one so the boat sides wouldnt spring back together. |
| I managed to row a good choices into the lake. Had a had a destination, I may have gone further. |
| Come aboard, were expecting you. |

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| A panoramic taken with my phone from the boat. |
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| The boat survives, to be sailed again next summer. |
Sharpening a Scrub Plane Blade


The scrub plane blade has an arc-profiled cutting edge, with more or less marked radius according to the job required. This profile makes it more difficult to sharpening by guides so many people prefer sharpening it by hand. 
Im not very good at this job, so I searched for sharpening guides available that could serve the purpose. The Record 161 is a guide which is easy to find on ebayUK for few pounds. It has only one central contact point (a rolling ball in the middle) and this permits to incline to the right and left allowing to follow the cutting edge profile easily.
The blade is held firmly in place by a clamp screw that allows unrestricted iron orientation, useful even if it was necessary to sharpen skewed blade. The dark side is that you have to ensure the correct blade position by hand.
For bigger curves the guide can be moved to the sides of the sharpening stone to allow for greater tilt, as seen in the short movie. The result was satisfactory with 35 ° bevel. To re-sharpen exactly to the same angle Ill use a simple self made jig.








