ShopNotes Podcast Episode 218: Dis-Jointed
On this episode Logan Wittmer, and John Doyle, and I talk about the value of dedicated storage, respond to listener comments and questions, and hear the tale of stolen(?) vintage woodworking machinery.
1. Listener Questions and Feedback
We started by reading off some comments and questions from previous episodes. covering topics like:
Creative dust collection systems, including ceiling-mounted filters and multi-tool setups.
It seems we just can't escape talking about the Shopsmith. A listener asked about it as an entry-level lathe for turning larger pieces, with Logan explaining its limitations for heavy-duty bowl turning compared to spindle turning. While the price is attractive, there may be better options out there in the used tool market.
2. Tool Storage Inspiration
I shared a home repair project where I was thankful that past self organized tools into dedicated totes for tasks like electrical, plumbing, and painting projects. Logan and John chimed in with a few of their storage collections as well.
Logan describes rediscovering his hole saw collection after creating a dedicated container.
One of my first projects of the year was completing a box with a sliding dovetail lid for organizing my set of rifflers. Complete with a Niffler carved into the side.
3. The Stolen Jointer Saga
Logan told the latest in the saga of his WWI-era Towsley jointer. A man contacted him claiming it was stolen. It was clear that at one point, the jointer had been his. He had detailed information about the machine’s history, leading to a fascinating investigation:
Logan verified the machine’s origins, consulted police and legal experts, and determined it wasn’t stolen but abandoned during a property dispute.
The incident led Logan to acquire another jointer — a 16-inch Moak, which he plans to restore and integrate into his shop. And perhaps sell the Towsley??
Questions, Comments, Smart Remarks
The ShopNotes Podcast encourages listeners to share their own stories, questions, or feedback by emailing woodsmith@woodsmith.com or leaving comments on the ShopNotes Podcast YouTube channel.
Episode Transcript
Phil Huber (01:31) Hey everybody, welcome again to the shop notes podcast. I'm your host Phil Huber along with Logan and John. Today's episode is number 218 on today's episode. We're going to be listening to some viewer and listener feedback and responses. We'll be talking about tool storage ideas and we'll also be traveling down the jointer journey with Logan. So you want to make sure you stay tuned to that. Special thanks to everybody who subscribes to Woodsmith, Shop Notes, and Popular Woodworking, or is a member of one of our online programs. It's what you do that allows us to be able to do the podcast. Thank you.
All right. We're going to go back all the way to last year for a few comments from our, from episode 217 tool mules.
Daniel Else says, I use a combination of the Ryobi shop blower, the Ryobi cordless vacuum, a Craftsman shop vac and a Harbor Freight dust collector, Rockler ceiling filter and brooms in addition to the face mask. No woodworker lung yet.
feels like he's got that taken care of pretty well.
Dale Siding says shops miss sells the shorter version.
think we had talked about for talked about for turning or using as a dedicated sander. Yeah. Puppy Doc, Bob chimes in 2024 lessons learned don't buy Logan sawmill. Actually, actually, I'm loving it. Actually, I'm loving it and having fun. My wife was hoping the neighbors would complain. We live in a neighborhood with an HOA. Oddly, all the neighbors seem to love it as much as I do, and they don't get to play with it.
Logan (03:25) It works great!
John Doyle (03:33) Mmm.
Phil Huber (03:39) Michael Thompson has a question for Logan. I live near Pittsburgh and looking at marketplace, I can get a used Shopsmith for between 400 and 600. If he used it as a dedicated lathe, would this be a good way to get into turning larger pieces at a much lower cost? Yes, I'm frugal. I have an old Delta pen lathe, which is fine for little things and learning some basics.
Logan (03:53) answer is no.
John Doyle (03:54) Hahaha.
Hmm.
Phil Huber (04:09) but it maxes out at about 18 inches in length. From memory, a Shopsmith is roughly 32-ish between centers.
Logan (04:20) So the question I have is, does he want to turn longer stuff or bigger stuff?
Phil Huber (04:28) that's a good question.
Logan (04:29) Because in my mind, when I'm talking about turning big items, I'm talking about big bowls or big platters or stuff like that. I'm not necessarily talking about like spindles, like railing spindles, which are, yeah, those are bigger, they're longer. So I would say I would be more apt to use a Shopsmith having never used one. I'd be more apt to use one for longer spindle items like a baluster or a
John Doyle (04:31) Okay.
Phil Huber (04:41) tool handles or.
Logan (04:58) chair leg or a stool leg or something like that rather than turning a big bowl on it because those big bowl blanks have a lot more mass so they're gonna induce a lot more vibration whereas a spindle blank is I mean more balanced and you're not gonna have that need for that much rigidity which I'm again never using and never having used a Shopsmith I don't know how rigid they
Phil Huber (05:24) Right. Yeah. I mean, we've seen Shopsmith iterations in different places. And like you said, like mass equals stability when it comes on the lathe, especially here in the video studio, because we've had some pretty stout lathes that still vibrated when you were turning bowls, because we have different parts of the floor flex here. So.
Logan (05:44) big bowl.
Yep. Yep.
Weight is never a problem in LA. You always want it as heavy as you can.
Phil Huber (05:59) Yeah,
sure. So in one sense, the answer is yes, that would be a good way to get into, to see if that's something that you're interested in. But there are going to be caveats if the guy wants to do bull turning.
Logan (06:08) Yes.
Mm-hmm.
and also understand that I don't know any professional turners that turn on a Shopsmith, even though they still make Shopsmiths. knowing, so I guess what I'm saying is go into it understanding that it's a Shopsmith and
Your experience turning a large item, whether it's a baluster or a leg or a bowl on a shop Smith is going to be different than turning it on like a big Powermatic or a Harvey or a Vic Mark lathe. Like there's there's differences.
Phil Huber (06:53) Sure.
Yeah.
John Doyle (06:56) I don't know the market in Pittsburgh, but is that any cheaper than an entry level lathe on the used market?
Logan (07:05) Yeah, have to, yeah. Yeah. So yeah, if you're looking at
like that length of stuff, like you could probably find a Grizzly lathe for the same price, which I think would be better, a better, like if you're wanting to turn, I would go with that. I'd go that route. I don't, so I used, let's just say I used Powermatic. I used, oh, 4224. That's a $4,000 lathe used.
So yeah, significantly cheaper. But I think you could probably find a Grizzly, one of the Grizzly 16 inch by 42 inch lathes, 48 inch lathes for that same price. That would probably be a little bit better built as a lathe.
However, if you decide you don't want to use the shop smith as a lathe, you can turn it into one of the other things.
Phil Huber (08:01) Yeah, that's true. Here's a question going back to something that you kind of just alluded to.
You say that you don't know of any professional turners that use a Shopsmith as a lathe. However,
There's only so far that that goes, right? Like as a hobbyist, you have a budget calculus for tooling than a professional would, right?
Logan (08:32) Yes. Yes.
Yes. But I would also say if it was a good lathe, you'd have people teaching on them, I would think.
Phil Huber (08:44) That's fair. Yeah, if you... Right.
Logan (08:44) You know what I mean? You know what mean?
it doesn't, guess when people ask for suggestions for lathes, like entry level lathes, I've never heard anybody suggest the shops, man.
People use them, but I've never heard it suggested.
Phil Huber (09:04) Okay.
Logan (09:05) Because it is not a cast. mean, cast iron is the most vibration absorbing material and it's Shopsmith is built off of like tubular steel. It's similar to the Koneg I had a little bit. But, you know, just different. mean, it's different. It's different.
Phil Huber (09:24) So yeah.
That's fair.
Logan (09:38) It's like classifying a moped as a motorcycle.
Like.
Similar.
John Doyle (09:45) You know, mopeds are like Shopsmiths. They're fun until your friends see you on them.
Logan (09:51) Yeah, true.
Phil Huber (09:56) Welcome to 2025, same as 2024.
Logan (09:59) Bring it in hot,
yep.
John Doyle (10:00) Yep.
Yep.
Phil Huber (10:02) Send your hot takes to Woodsmith at Woodsmith.com or you can leave them on our YouTube channel. Heck, even our Instagram. Just light it up. Bring it on. It's the year of engagement.
All right. Item number two on the list here is talking about tool storage ideas. And this came to me over the time off that I had around Christmas as I was doing some work around the house. So not specifically woodworking related, but it will get there. Is I was having trouble with one of the outlets, one of the GFCI outlets in our house.
tripping for no apparent reason. So I feel like it was just time for that GFCI to get replaced. So that and then a handful of switches, kind of upstream of that, I ended up replacing all at once. And it made me really happy to know that Past Self had put all of the electrical tools into one toolbox.
complete with an extra screwdriver and actually like two screwdrivers in there so that I only needed to take one tote all around the house and take care of all the stuff.
So it is worth it to both organize yourself that way. And if you need to like get a couple extra screwdrivers, it's okay.
Logan (11:47) Yep, I have a tote for electrical. I have a tote for plumbing. I have a tote for painting. I have a tote for drywall work. I have a tote for tile and flooring work. The real trick is remembering which tote I put the cotton in and when I can't find it, I buy another one. So I end up with eight of them.
Phil Huber (12:06) Right, none of them where they need to be.
Logan (12:09) No, nope.
John Doyle (12:11) Yeah, I have drywall buckets of each one of those categories. I've done enough drywalling where I've filled them up with categorized tools for jobs.
Logan (12:17) and
Phil Huber (12:26) You know, and on some
things it makes sense, like you were talking just before we started recording here, Logan, about having a tote container, whatever, for your hole saws. So even though you were looking around for a particular hole saw, it ended up, oddly enough, in the place where it should have been.
Logan (12:38) Yup.
Well, I forgot I made that container full of hole saws.
Phil Huber (12:50) Hahaha!
Logan (12:53) Yep. yeah, Phil, you were asking why I my so I'm in my office in the shop. The first podcast like way later than I expected to be. My mini splinear is not hooked up yet. And you said, why isn't it's hanging on the wall? But why isn't it hooked up? And I well, be honest with you, it's really cold outside. And B, I could not find the hole saw sized for that little tube that goes through the wall. And that's where I found
Phil Huber (12:55) All right, that's fair.
Logan (13:23) I was looking for something and I found this tub and I was like, look at all these hole saws I put in this tub. And that was where the Mr. Cool hole saw was. Weird.
Phil Huber (13:36) nice.
Logan (13:36) Now it's
just way too cool to go out and do that.
Phil Huber (13:39) Right. It'll come. Sun is out today. There's a feeling of optimism all the way around. right. Last year at my birthday, I found at a antique, local antique store called the Picker Nose, a set of rifflers, which is a very specialized tool admittedly, but are super fun to use and really handy. So this set.
Logan (13:46) Yeah. Yep.
John Doyle (13:46) days are getting longer.
Phil Huber (14:08) is the iridium set made in Italy. I think there's eight of them. I'll put a photo on the on the show notes page here and I wanted a place to keep them. So I made a little wood box out of some white pine with a sliding dovetail lid. So it was just made out of a single piece.
those in.
slide the lid on. And I even did a little carving of a rifler on the front. So just one of those things about having dedicated storage because the little riflers, you you'd only use like one or two on a given project and then they're very easily migrating into different corners of the shop. And then pretty soon you don't know where any of them are. So.
Logan (14:56) and their self-sharpening in them.
Phil Huber (14:58) Right. So there's just enough room in there for them to move around. And if I juggle the box around, yes, they will rattle but they're most for the most part, they're okay. So and then for all the Harry Potter nerds out there, Riffler rhymes with Niffler. So I got a little Niffler that I carved on the end. So
Logan (15:08) They'll self sharpen. Yep.
John Doyle (15:18) you
I thought that was
a seal of approval or something. That was a seal, but that makes sense.
Phil Huber (15:30) There you go.
All right, segment three, today's episode. John and I were both delighted and horrified over the Christmas break to get a message from Logan on our group chat that says, don't worry, it's okay.
and then it was followed by a photo of a trailer that had a snow plow attachment for your skid steer. And what appeared to be a large format vintage jointer that looks suspiciously like your Towsley, but is not a Towsley.
Logan (16:01) You
Okay.
So you guys were horrified to get that message.
I got a message, I got an email, okay, on Christmas day, okay. This email comes in about, I don't know, one o'clock, 1.30, two o'clock in the afternoon, sitting there, kids are playing with all their toys that Santa brought them. I'm sitting there, working on my computer, and this message is about the Towsley that I have, So, let me, I'm pulling up the message.
Hold on a second. So basically, bought this Towsley two years ago. I bought it in July of 24. And I immediately brought it into the office, started taking some photos on the restoration, published that article, had a lot of comments about it, and then kind of nothing happened with it because it needed some stuff done to it.
And I needed to get a new cutterhead. I needed to have bearing blocks cast. It's been a slow burn. OK, and this is what we call simmering.
John Doyle (17:34) Thank
Logan (17:38) In the meantime, Colin, my digital editor, had published this article online. It gets a lot of traffic. This article in particular gets a lot of traffic. So this is the email I get on Christmas day. I'm not going to use this gentleman's real name. What should we call him? Let's call him Aaron, because nobody likes Aaron Rodgers. So that's somebody that everybody can agree that we don't like. Hi, Logan. This is Aaron.
John Doyle (18:01) Hahaha!
Logan (18:07) The 24 inch jointer restoration, I would like to know where that jointer came from. It looks very much like I had one, like one that I had that was stolen out my garage and I'd like to have it back. I have the bearing blocks to that machine and the four knife head and the motor were taken off because the motor was, the head was bent, the motor needed to be removed, yada yada yada. So basically, the guy's saying, hey, that jointer that you have,
is mine, it's stolen, I want it back. I'm like, okay. So I emailed him back, Dear Mr. Rogers.
John Doyle (18:42) Ahem.
Yes.
Logan (18:48) I'm very interested in talking to you because I want to know how a 2000 pound machine was stolen out of your garage.
John Doyle (18:54) You
Logan (18:57) So I was like, I'll call you tomorrow. So I called Mr. Aaron Rogers. It really wasn't Aaron Rogers, but called Mr. Aaron Rogers and said, hey, Aaron, this is Logan. You know, I'm interested to hear your story. And so basically this guy had said, look, that machine was mine. It was stolen out my garage. Here's how I know it was mine. If you look on it, there is a tag that says WP and L co. And it has a number 192 on it. I look, sure enough.
Wisconsin Power and Light Company, machine number 192.
I said, this is interesting. Like, how was this stolen? Because I bought this from a gentleman up north of me. And it was, if I remember right, he bought it as part of a machinery lot. And he didn't want this one. He had several other big joiners.
He's like, well, he's like, if you could get a hold of that guy and let me know how, you know, where he bought it from, if it was an auction house, you know, I track down all the stolen machine. was like, all right, let's back up Aaron. How did these machines get stolen? Okay. Because this is very interesting to me. Like this is not a small machine. This is a very, very large machine.
John Doyle (20:05) you
Yeah, one does not back up a small trailer in somebody's garage and drive off with this.
Logan (20:17) One duck no.
No,
no. And at this point, it's quite clear that, I mean, this guy knows everything that's on it, tag wise. He knows the stuff that was broken on it, all that stuff. Okay, very clear that at one point this guy owned this machine. This was in Cedar Rapids, which is two hours east of here. And so basically, I'm gonna abbreviate the story. The gentleman and his ex-wife had gotten a divorce.
John Doyle (20:38) Yeah, sure.
Logan (20:50) The machines were in the garage. He was given X number of days to get them out. He did not. So she sold them. And he said he had reported Cedar Rapids Police Department. I'm like, okay, that's interesting. mean, if these were indeed stolen, clearly you know who sold them. Something would have happened with your ex-wife. I was like, that's interesting. I was like, well.
Aaron, here's the thing. I was like, if this is a stolen machine, know, obviously I'm to have no right to it then, even though I bought it. However, at this point I have, you know, basically 6,000 bucks wrapped up in this between buying the machine and the cutter head and all that stuff. I was like, so, you know, quite clearly I have this cutter head. It's a brand new cutter head. It was, you know, close to four or $5,000. I was like,
I need something for that, you know, because this is the only machine that that fits on. Like, you know, I'm not worried about the jointer itself because if it's yours, it's yours, you know, whatever. I was like, we'll figure out something. So the next day, I found this gentleman's ex-wife's name. There is a long list of public court documentation that has both their names on it.
Phil Huber (22:16) Alright.
Logan (22:17) and found out that we have some mutual friends from Cedar Rapids that knows the ex-wife. So I called her, talked to her. I said, hi, Mrs. Erin Rogers. Sorry to be calling you, but I want to know what the story is. So basically, the story is that this gentleman was given 30 days to get stuff off the property. She offered him 90 days. Almost two years later, she was wanting to move and sell the house, and the stuff was still there.
So she sold that all at that point. So I called Mr. Aaron Rogers back the next day and said, Hey, Mr. Aaron Rogers, I spoke to the Cedar Rapids Police Department and in their minds, this was not a case of stolen property. This is a case of abandoned property. And speaking to friends that are in the legal field, they said that this is what is considered a dissipation of assets. Okay. So dissipation of assets is one portion of a
divorce couple sells assets that were jointly bought with the couple's money during the time of marriage that was then sold. And, you know, legally you have a right to half that money that she sold it for, but it's not stolen property by any sense of the imagination, like legally or whatever. And Mr. Rogers is like, Nope, I'm sorry. I don't agree with you.
to in my mind that is my machine and that is stolen. said, well, I'm sorry, Mr. Aaron Rogers, that is not the case. This is not stolen machinery. You cannot call this a stolen machine, right? It is not. So that's where that's where Mr. Aaron Rogers and I left this. Okay. Now in that time between this was, that was maybe a four or five day span. I started looking at that like, well, I mean, yeah, this, if this guy had this machine stolen from him,
Phil Huber (23:46) you
John Doyle (24:05) Ahem.
Logan (24:13) You know, I'd want it back too if it was mine. However, I started looking around to see what there were out there for vintage joiners, just as one naturally does. Yeah. I mean, yeah, I can't get rid of one vintage joiner and not have another. So I found a 16-inch MOLAC jointer, okay?
Phil Huber (24:26) Right, right, because why would you not?
John Doyle (24:29) Mm-hmm.
Logan (24:40) Moac made joiners. Actually, Moac was in business up until 2020. They made machines up until, I think, the 90s. They started in the 20s, made machines up until the 90s. Parts were still available up until 2020. Somebody was making parts or selling parts for them. Anyways, I found this machine in Omaha, Nebraska. And it's a tripod.
John Doyle (24:44) Hmm.
Logan (25:09) So it's a three-legged jointer. on the, would that be the far side, the outfeed side, there are two legs. There's one leg on the in-feed side. And it's in beautiful shape. It is an absolutely beautiful shape. The gentleman and his father that had it, it was not stolen, I asked. And it was a family, friends cabinet shop had closed. So I specifically asked if it was stolen.
Yeah, he had it his shop. It was not in use. The shop I got it out of was a woodworking shop, but it was not set up to run in there. They had a lot of other things in their store and he rented the space and stuff, so there's a lot of other stuff in there. But I drove other and I picked it up. I got it for what I consider is a fair price for the jointer. Knowing full well that I'm going to drop quite a bit of money, I am going to put a heel...
head in it. And the whole reason is that I have a problem and that it is, I believe, a nicer size for my shop. Because I bought that jointer before my shop was done.
Phil Huber (26:26) Right. Yeah.
Logan (26:26) The Towsley, I did buy
that jointer before my shop was done. The 16 inch is a nice size. will fit nice, perfectly adequate. Yes, it's a very average size jointer. And it will fit next to my planer with the in-feed bed over top of the planer motor. So like they'll kind of nestle together nicely.
John Doyle (26:36) Perfectly adequate size.
the day.
Logan (26:57) So I did drive out and pick that up. And I picked that up for two reasons. One, it was a great price and it's in very good shape. It does not need anything to run other than a VFD put on it. Honestly, it has oiled bearings on it. So either I need to oil the bearings or I just need to tear apart and put new bearings in it that are permanently sealed, which I will probably do when I get a helical head for it. So I'm not going to do that right now.
But there is still a possibility that I'm gonna get rid of that Towsley jointer. And here's the reason for that is there are, that we know of, there are four of those Towsley jointers in existence that size, okay? One of them just recently got finished restoration and it was sold to a gentleman in Colorado. So that has the original straight knife head in it.
So if that gentleman in Colorado is interested in purchasing the heel-cle-head I had manufactured for mine, then I will get Mr. Aaron Rodgers this Towsley jointer back in trade for a South Bend lathe that he has. Because that was kind of the original discussion I had with him. This is like, look, I have this heel-cle-head that was made for it. I spent a lot of money on this head. I can't just...
I'm not just give this all back to you." And he said, well, it's like, I can pay you in payments. The gentleman's on disability now, it doesn't work anymore. He doesn't have the money to pay for the head immediately. But he was telling me that had a bunch of joinery in, or a bunch of machines stored in some semi-trailers on his property. And then he said he had a really nice South Bend lay that had been restored in one of them. And I said, well, I'll...
be willing to trade you that for this helical head." He said, yeah, absolutely. That sounds like that'd be great. So when I talked to Mr. Aaron Rodgers the second time saying, look, you know, Mr. Rodgers, you cannot call this stolen machine because you're the only person in this world that believes these were stolen. And unfortunately, the law is not on your side on this. And I'm not going to take a loss at my... Your situation is unfortunate, but that's not my situation. So I'm not going to take that burden on for you.
I said, look, if this gentleman in Colorado is interested in buying this helical head, I will trade you the jointer as I bought it for that South Bend lathe still. And his, I think his comment back was, well, I think I paid $3,000 for that lathe. And I said, well, that's a coincidence because I'm asking $3,000 for this jointer. So it's just one of those things. did, did talk to the gentleman that I bought this from.
And I asked Nate, hey, do you remember where you got this? He said, I remember it very specifically. I bought it out of Cedar Rapids. And it was a super narrow, long driveway to a garage behind the house. And I'm kind of conveying this to Mr. Aaron. He's like, yep, that would have been my house. And I said, well, here's the thing, though. Nate told me that he bought it from a gentleman that ran a machine.
John Doyle (29:57) Hmm
Logan (30:22) and fabrication shop out of his garage back there. So I don't know if this, yeah. So I don't know if, I don't know, this is all speculation at this point. I don't know if he had sold this jointer at one point because he needed the money. And then when he filed this kind of blanket police report saying all this machinery was stolen, that he was hoping at some point to get it back. I don't know, this is all speculation. But.
Phil Huber (30:27) Ooooo
John Doyle (30:29) Hmm.
Or, or, here we go, maybe the ex-wife has a type.
Logan (30:57) She might have a type. Maybe, maybe. I, I, yeah, it was, and Nate was very, cause this would have been, so I buy it from 20, from him in 2022. He said he had it for eight years prior to that because he moved it between three different shops. And he said, he's like, I distinctly remember the gentleman saying he bought it from out of state and he had given me a business card for his welding and fabrication shop.
John Doyle (30:59) You
Logan (31:28) So it to me appears that this guy had sold it, needed the money and was just looking at a way to get it back by claiming it was stolen, even though it wasn't. At the end of the day though, okay, there's a couple of good things that came out of this whole situation. First of all, it was hilarious. Like this whole situation was hilarious. Second of all, I got a new Mooc joiner out of it.
Phil Huber (31:46) All right, turn the problem into a friend.
John Doyle (31:48) Yeah
Mm-hmm. It's a win-win-win.
Logan (31:58) So there's that.
Phil Huber (31:58) Mm-hmm. Right.
Logan (32:01) Yeah. And then the, you know, the third thing is now I've started, well, actually there's two other things. I've started to kind of really dive into this thing now out of spite. Like, you know what, you're trying to get my joiner back? Heck no. So I have 3D printed the bearing blocks to make sure that they're gonna fit before I have them machined. Okay. So I have those 3D printed already. So it's kind of kicked me into gear to get this thing up and running because
Phil Huber (32:20) Okay.
Logan (32:27) Either I'll figure out if it does fit in my shop, then this Mooc might come into the office shop. We'll see. Or I'll sell it, you know, either or. And then finally, I know how I know what happened to this jointer. So like it was damaged, right? It was damaged when I bought it. It was damaged when Aaron bought it. It came from the Wisconsin Power and Light Company. OK, the guy that had it.
So those tables on this Towsley jointer slide apart. So on most jointers, those tables only go up and down. Depending on if it's a parallel design or whatever, they usually only go up and down. These vintage jointers, they can actually slide apart. So you can take what is all the way nipped and tucked, it's probably seven foot long. You can get it to almost 15 foot long by spreading those tables way out.
So this guy had the tables spread way out to like the full 15 feet and he was running like a 30 foot two by six through it. And that's what grabbed and bent the head, broke that in feed table and busted the motor. So at the end of the day and soiled his pants.
John Doyle (33:40) Okay.
Phil Huber (33:41) jeez.
John Doyle (33:46) and soiled his pants.
Phil Huber (33:49) Hahaha
Logan (33:52) Now, Mr. Aaron has the parts I'm missing for this jointer. Okay. So the first time I talked to him, I said, look, Mr. Aaron, is, there's two ways I see this shaking out. First of all, you know, if this is indeed stolen, you know, obviously we're gonna get back to you. Need to come up with something for this helical head that I have bought. But, you know, at some point it will get it back to you. I said, or carry me out.
John Doyle (34:15) Thank
Logan (34:22) You're telling me your situation that you're in, you know, you don't have a house, your machinery is all stored in trailers, you're living with a girlfriend, you know, it sounds like you could use the money more than the machine right now. So like I am willing to buy the parts off you that I'm missing for this thing. You know, I'm going to spend 500 bucks to have the bearing blocks cast. I'm going to spend another 500 bucks for a motor. was like, I'll make it worth the time for you to sell me these.
Knowing full well that you told me you paid $125 for this joint or from the guy in Wisconsin.
And it sounds like he has an emotional attachment to this thing. He's like, nope, I just want my machine back. I'm like, well, not your machine, sir. I told him, was like, I, yeah, I was like, you know, I feel like Shaquille O'Neal stole his mansion from me. So I'm probably gonna file a police report on that, see if I can get my mansion back.
John Doyle (34:59) you
Yeah, you're like I'm in love I'm in love with it now
Phil Huber (35:05) Sorry. Yeah.
Yeah.
Ha ha.
Logan (35:20) So yeah, was just, was a very interesting couple of days.
John Doyle (35:21) The other, the...
Yeah. The other positive out of all of this is you're probably a lot nicer to your wife, like for fear that she's going to like sell your tools. Yeah.
Logan (35:37) Well, I don't thought about it like that.
But then I just filed a police report and it's fine. So, yeah, it was it was interesting. I will say loading up that Moloch wasn't was an experience as well because it's a tripod. So the the gentleman I bought it from his name is Jeremy. Jeremy's like, don't know why they made these machines with three legs. And I was like, well, because back in the the best I can tell this machine was made in the late 50s, early 60s.
But back when they came up with this design in the 20s, know, concrete floors were not super high precision. Like they were pretty, pretty wavy. Like a three-legged machine always is stable. It's like a stool. A three-legged stool is always stable, whereas a four-legged one always rocks, right? But God, that makes it a pain in the ass to move this machine, because how do you pick this thing up? I mean, this thing weighs 2,000 pounds. So.
He had an overhead chain hoist on an I-beam. I'm like, cool, we'll just like, we'll pick it up, I'll back the trailer under it, drop it down, no problem. Well, there was way, way, way too much stuff in the shop for me to back that trailer in there. Like, it would have been on the tailgate of the trailer, and like no bueno, right? So we used the chain hoist to lift it up, put the pallet jack underneath it.
Phil Huber (36:39) Okay.
Logan (37:02) The pallet jack had, so the two legs were sitting on the front end of the pallet jack. At the tips of the fork was the one leg that we put a two by four across. Then we were able to jack it up and the trailer I used is a hydraulic drop bed trailer. So you press a little button, the entire bed of the trailer lowers to the ground so you can roll pallet jacks into it. So we rolled it up into there. Then it's like, well, shit, how do we get this pallet jack out from underneath this jointer? So we're like, well,
Phil Huber (37:21) Okay.
Logan (37:32) I got a jack in my truck for changing like a flat tire. So I started jacking this jointer up with two by sixes under it and stuff. It was, yeah, it was a whole thing. It worked. It worked though. It's here. It's beautiful. I'll be able to move it with my pallet jack pretty easily. Yeah, it's, it was a thing and it's, it's in such great shape too. It is, it's, it's, it is truly in like, I don't think it's been repainted at all. A lot of times you find these older,
machines and at some point during its lifespan somebody had repainted it and most of the time it was like, hey, machine operator, we're slow for two days so I need you just to repaint this thing so I can keep you employed and keep paying you and you can do something productive. So most of time they are not what I would call high quality paint jobs. This one is all original. has tags on the front from, oh God, like the national,
I don't know what it's called, what it was. It's like the National Lumber Wellness Association or something. It's a very, very cool machine. It does have a guard on it. But one thing I don't understand though, and I don't know that this was standard, the on-off button is on the backside of the jointer.
So it's not on the front where you'd expect it. So you gotta walk behind the jointer to turn it on, and then you gotta walk behind the jointer to turn it off. But it does have a blade guard. Yeah, it does have a blade guard. Yeah, so it'll be cool.
Phil Huber (38:59) and there are two keys.
All right. All right. So to sum up
John Doyle (39:10) You
Phil Huber (39:12) For those who have just fast forwarded to this point, you are in now possession of a 24 inch jointer that we shall say is in process and a 16 inch jointer that feasibly could be fired up with the addition of tomorrow with a VFD.
John Doyle (39:13) Yay.
Logan (39:24) Yes.
Tomorrow. Yeah,
John Doyle (39:34) Thank
Logan (39:36) 100%.
Phil Huber (39:38) In your ideal scenario, are you ready to kind of like cut your losses on the 24 and move the 16 in?
Logan (39:47) Yeah, probably at this point. Yes, just because of how much room it's taking up out in the shop right now. And it's a big project like. Like honest, oh yeah, yeah, like if this gentleman in Colorado wants to buy this head off me for what I put into it, I mean, I'd even take a loss on that head then. Yeah, then I don't have to invest any more money into it now. Without all said, I will probably be about.
Phil Huber (39:49) Okay.
It still is a big project.
Logan (40:16) seven grand into this planer or this jointer altogether. Okay. Then that's a lot of money for a jointer. That's a lot of money for a jointer. I mean, could outfit an entire shop of new tools for that. But to buy a brand new 24 inch jointer, it's $30,000. Like it is very expensive. So the one that was recently restored by one of our subscribers, this exact jointer I have, the exact jointer I have,
John Doyle (40:26) Thank
Logan (40:45) He sold it for 10 grand. That was with the original straight knife on it. So I figure with the helical head, it's probably a $12,000 joiner. So I'm still money ahead if I do restore it and sell it. But there's something to be said for just, I mean, I only, yeah. There's something to be said for not having it sit here.
Phil Huber (40:50) Well, okay.
I mean, there's
the opportunity cost of like, do you want to invest that time that's necessary in order to turn it into a $12,000 tool?
Logan (41:18) Yeah, and so I print off these bearing blocks. So the next thing that needs to happen, now that I have the helical head here, the next thing that needs to happen is the bearing blocks need to be made. Now I was gonna have those cast at a foundry down in Mississippi. And then I said, well, I'm on the advisory board for the University of Northern Iowa's technology department. Like they have a casting club, like they could cast it for me. And...
So I was down that route for a while and they were moving, moving buildings, yada, yada. That never came to fruition. So I'm at a point where it's either I have them cast in Mississippi or after I 3D printed these, I was like, I could just drive these over to a machine shop in town and have them milled out of a solid block of steel. Like, I don't know that there's any reason to have them cast versus machine.
You know what I mean? I don't think there is, and it would be faster just to have them machined. But that's the point I'm at, is now the bearing blocks need to be done and I can start painting, stripping and painting. So yeah, just make ends meet. Yep.
John Doyle (42:27) Whatever you need to do to pay for this.
Logan (42:35) Oh man. But yeah, I don't know. I think looking at it, the 16 inch seems like it's a more appropriate size for the space I have. I could rearrange some stuff in the shop and have the 24 inch fit. The whole thing, this whole conversation would definitely be different if I didn't need to move photo equipment around and take photos.
If I wasn't concerned about that, then this is a completely different conversation. But because I try to keep stuff fairly neat and tidy and situated to where I can have clean photos and stuff, that's where I'm
Yeah. Yep. interesting. Yeah. This is just, this was a soap opera of the jointer. So I was like, be driving to driving to family Christmas and I'd look at my like, you're ready for episode number three? And she is just like, why are you? like, why are you talking to this guy? Like, she's like, now he has your phone number. I'm like, no, I, I generally call people with my phone number blocked. If it's like a somebody from a work standpoint, like, you know, I don't necessarily carry out my phone number.
But it was just it was very interesting. This is not this was not on my bingo card for 2024
Phil Huber (43:57) Right, but a great way to close it out because it was unexpected. It was like the perfect Christmas gift. Yeah.
Logan (43:59) It was! It was exciting! Yeah, it was exciting!
John Doyle (44:06) But then
Aaron Rodgers got the last laugh on you by beating your Dolphins and knocking them out of a playoff contention.
Logan (44:10) I know he did. I know. I know he did.
Phil Huber (44:13) hahahahah
Logan (44:15) I know. But you know what? He's not gonna get his damn jointer back.
John Doyle (44:19) I mean just to get it to New York would be too expensive.
Logan (44:24) Yeah, yeah,
Phil Huber (44:24) Right, yeah.
Logan (44:26) yeah, yeah, it's just I don't know man And then it was I was telling the the gentleman I bought the joiner from I was telling him all this and he was like what the heck
Well, because legitimately, I was like, well, I mean, if this was all stolen from this guy, like if he went out of town for two weeks on a vacation and came back and the shop had been broken into and somebody stripped it, like, I get it. And if it was sold through an auction house, they'd have paperwork and like, so like I was trying to genuinely help the guy until I realized that he was he was trying to take advantage of me. Yeah, he had his hand out. Yep. So.
John Doyle (45:00) He was reaching.
Phil Huber (45:03) Yeah.
All right, you've heard Logan's cautionary tale. I would love to hear if you have any cautionary tales out there on buying a tool and maybe the deal went south or who knows what. Can you, anybody listening to this, can anybody top this or even match it? I want to hear about it. We'll share it in upcoming episodes. Yeah, I don't know where else to go from here. I feel like we just leave it at that.
Thanks for listening to the Shop Notes podcast. As always, you can send us an email, Woodsmith@woodsmith.com or leave a comment in the comment section on our YouTube channel. Who knows what else 2025 is going to bring to us? Thanks for listening, everybody. Bye.
