My father, “PopPop” loved to woodwork, spending hours making furniture, toys, knick-knacks, Christmas gifts, and lots of sawdust. Many years after his death I was fortunate to move his old shop equipment into my garage but had not used much of it until last week.

As part of my home renovation, Jeff and I have been working on the one and a half story two-car garage. We purged my home office on the back left in April 2017 for a complete makeover; new flooring, walls, and ceiling, wired internet connection, treatment for carpenter ants, a new AC/heating system, and relocation of the incorrectly installed, solid metal door.

A while ago Jeff meticulously moved the door making it perfectly vertical and square but the walls are not plumb. It needed new framing but regular square cut boards did not match the out-of-true walls. The right and left framing pieces needed long tapered cuts on one edge. That required some ingenious jigs designed by Jeff. 

The next problem was thickness; 3/4″ lumber was fine for the top and right side but the left needed exactly 7/16th”. Hmm, not easy to trim an 80″ board to that exact thickness with a table saw. What to do? 

Then I thought of my father’s planer.  His legacy comes to the rescue!

Hidden among his shop equipment was a remarkably heavy W&H Molder-planer caked with sawdust and stiff with dried grease. Couldn’t turn the adjustment knobs. Would this work safely after fourteen plus years of inactivity? Or at all?

I didn’t even know how to use it.

New oil and muscle got it working but not without a lot of head scratching and some common sense problem solving from Jeff. A bigger learning curve came from the adjustments. Hint … take off very small amounts with each pass, about 1/16″ of an inch (one-half turn of the adjustment lever) is the maximum. Oh yeah, the wood only goes in one way and be prepared for lots and lots of shavings! 

Thanks PopPop for the great tool and passing on your woodworking legacy!