Woodworking is a popular hobby. Working with wood not only requires that you have the right skills, you also need some tools. Professional woodworkers have a wide variety of tools, many of them are quite expensive. But the average woodworker doesn’t need many expensive tools. And a beginner can do a lot with just cheap tools.
The first thing a woodworker needs is a good workbench. It is possible to build your own workbench but that project is best to leave until later. You have a lot of workbenches to choose from. Make sure to select one that has tool trays. This helps you to keep your workspace clean. Since you are going to use the workbench for every project, it pays off to take your time and find a workbench that really suits you.
Woodworking is not without its dangers, so a few safety tools are highly recommended. To protect your eyes, use safety glasses. A face shield gives you even more protection. If you are sanding, a dust mask is recommended. If you are using noisy power tools use hearing protection. Also make sure that you have a first aid kit available, just in case something goes badly wrong.
You need some vises and clamps. The most popular are C clamps, bar clamps, hand-screw clamps and pipe clamps. Additionally, a bench vise for your workbench will free up your hands.
Woodworking requires good tools for measuring. The most basic measuring tools are the steel rule, the tape measure and the caliper. Many more measuring tools are available. Fortunately, most of them are cheap.
The saw is maybe the tool that is most often associated with woodworking. You have a large amount of different types of saws. The most important saws for woodworkers are the back saw, the crosscut saw, the coping saw and the rip saw.
A woodworker does not need as many hammers as one could believe. The most important hammer is the claw hammer. It is used not only to drive nails into the wood, it can also be used to extract nails from the wood. A finish hammer, or finishing hammer, is also good to have. To knock wooden pieces together, use a wooden mallet. It is also used to drive dowels and chisels.
Shaping tools are important in woodworking. The most important are the file, the knife and the plane. The most useful planes are the smooth plane and the low-angle block plane. You have a lot of files on the market. The two most important are the mill bastard file and the flat rasp. A good knife belongs in the basic woodworker tool kit. Woodworking requires sanding. Sanders are the best solution but you need to do some sanding manually as well.
You can use manual drills but an electric drill will be much more convenient. For most people, an electric drill is the first power tool they buy. For woodworking, a drill and a router are the two mostly used power tools.