Tools that aren't always affordable or available find many uses working with recycled pianos and parts and in a shop full of unusual and unrelated pieces it is almost practical to make some of them. These are some of the tools I use (or plan to), a lot of them took shape with insight provided online by other amateur toolmakers. There are photographs of some of these at http://flickr.com/photos/mireut/tags/tools/

Between manufacturing and piano tuning there is a gap in appropriate equipment.

Storage and work surfaces

I meant my tool chest as a joke but before I identified elm, so just the panels are chestnut (drawers currently are spice and old macintosh computer boxes). Unlike the famous fancy one at the Smithsonian, it's just made from pianos.

A Sjögrens workbench helped planning my new bench as I collected materials. The 2.5m x 0.7m 12cm thick top is laminated from old upright piano pinblocks glued sideways and sets flush on square legs laminated from backposts. The apron and legs are drilled as a useful front vise.

Stands I made for discarded laminated mdf tops are like sawhorses. A more complicated and less robust stand holds a relatively flat piece of granite. A short bench for light hammering and punching is made from two upright piano keybeds glued together mortised to a heavy trestle base, one foot supporting a leg vise.

I put casters on a Kodak branded drafting table with a Mayline Futur-matic base to make the best bench for working on piano actions because an electric motor raises table height from 75 cm to 110 cm.

Hand tools

Adjustable compass planes for concave or convex surfaces share a blade and lever cap.

I keep a Stanley jointer fence attached to a piece of channel made into a special nr. 6 body with a large handle that clamps in a vise.

Scrapers

I nearly always regret using sandpaper on anything except for honing metal tools, when I have different scrapers that leave better finishes faster and more controllable. I keep a few cabinet scrapers and a file near finish work or gluing surfaces. I usually work even short push strokes that twist off axis and upward at the end, lifting and stepping backwards so that each pass covers over the start of the previous, alternating side angles to prevent digging up the mark. I like the tool to make a hissing sound, and try to avoid it chirping or rumbling that might mean a bad edge, chatter or dragging return stroke all which leave marks. When I notice an edge is dulled I move to the next edge, I keep track by numbering on the sides. When they are exhausted I draw each edge a few times squared against knuckles grasping the middle of a coarse mill file and burnish a hook with a pass over the tang. I also use a carbide paint scraper from Sandvik that has a handle above the blade to remove finish. They are nice working up to sharp edges with a hip for height reference. When I need a veneer hammer I replace the insert with rounded piece of rectangular stock.

Tool positioning

Copied from a picture in a catalog, that I picked because of its price, so far my tool holder attaches to a power screwdriver, a router, and a binocular microscope. Square steel tubing scavenged from broken office furniture legs, ends plugged with scrap nylon and mounted to pieces of a transfer switch panel and sawed up structural channel. The post screws into Unistrut and t-slot nuts.

My 486 laptop stations near to lathes, mill and table saw with a swivelling arm mounted to Unistrut channel bolted to the wall. A similar arm positions a camcorder behind my horizonal mill and displays on a monitor above it.

Drill presses

A radial drill uses parts of a power feed, door closer, typewriter and treadmill. It drills closer than 15cm and farther than 85cm from its column that sits on some steel channel with wooden t-slots.

My grandfather's bench drill press has a heavy variable pitch pulley rigidly mounted between bearings and five speeds powered through a round belt. I put a pneumatic feed that can be set up for self operation. It is very nice. An enclosure helps control chips and noise.

What looks like a small mill drill says "5 speed heavy duty Drill Press" using the head and base off an old Taiwanese drill mounted with a column from a radial arm saw and a cheap x-y table. There is a 10-tpi screw and nut inside the column look like a nice basis for a vertical fine feed.

I added a footswitch to another bench top drill, and use the spare table with a top and fence adapted for large workpieces.

Wood lathe

I lost the plan of step pullies my grandfather used across wood and metalworking speeds, so I put a variable speed motor suspended from a wood frame under the bed ways. The bench top limits swing behind the headstock but works as a sort of bed gap with a platform for the compound rest.

Table saws

Frank H. Clement nr.1 tilting table saw left by the previous tenant takes up to 14" blades. Table inserts include a router sub base, which bolts in with the saw blade removed. A tilting fence originally from a Clement jointer complements the router with a set of modular faces, and is convenient cutting smaller pieces. A tall slotted extrusion bolted to a Craftsman miter guide clears the router where the shortened original does not and usually I push with work behind it. (A Craftsman 10" table saw sits on a dolly waiting for a fence or need for cutting angles greater than 10 degrees)

Proxxon 3 1/8" tilting arbor saws sold by Micro Mark are made of plastic and aluminum but are good for miniature work, especially with available accessories. The micro adjustable rip fence is better than any sold for larger saws. A 40cm square steel table with a combination of ball bearing and plain slides is useful making piano action parts (a magnetic indicator base makes a convenient fence). (I made another production saw like a cross cut carriage, the whole table of the 7 1/4" saw slides up to 15cm. A belt drive spindle is inside a sewing machine head bolted inside the enclosed base, with a series motor bolted outside. Guide rods adjust vertically for cutting depth and small angles.)

Planers

Belsaw 9102 Moulder Planer is not much more substantial than portable machines and with the awful feed drive I use it only when size requires it. I moved the hinged cover and chipbreaker closer to the cutter head and added an adjustable pressure bar to help keep thin pieces flat, and also a knurled infeed roll but replaced it with the original rubber one.

The excellent little Hebert Moulder Planer cantilevers from a dovetail column and feeds manually. My cutterhead turns 7000rpm and planes full width to less than 1mm thickness even in Elm.

Glue spreader

Applying glue on small projects and during repair is straight forward but can become difficult with large projects and surfaces. A glue spreader helps work before glue sets up, applying it evenly without much waste. Work is fed from below by a slow motor through a knurled roll and the pair of rubber upper rolls only turn when work goes through.

Power hacksaw

I put mounting brackets for a portable bandsaw onto the falling arm of a beat up Millers Falls machine and a counter weight spring on the drive crank.

Tool grinder

A universal grinder with a sliding table that can grind small surfaces. The wheelhead is a Micromark variable speed grinder.

Small universal tool

An articulated dividing and milling head built around a cast iron Unimat headstock with a fitted wooden storage case.

Atlas MFC milling machine

My spindle was nearly severed by a poorly reassembled drive, I painted and repaired most of the little horizontal mill before figuring this out. After installing a replacement then I measured 0.3mm wear in the ways, now I have too much time invested to sell the thing for parts.

Minilathe

The tool I use most, it is a Chinese "7x10 Variable Speed Mini Lathe" like what are sold by Harbor Freight, Grizzly, Homier and Cummins, this one is from Wholesale Tool. Like most tools that are popular because of price it is not refined but will absorb misuse out of the box and with a few modifications it is strong and capable of close tolerances.

Optical devices

I made some optical tools used for setting up and examining things.

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