Portable Woodworking

I bought this cheap Ryobi table saw a few weeks ago.  I've been thinking about some sort of power saw ever since I broke that little bandsaw I got last year.  A casted part simply snapped on me, and replacement parts don't exist for that model.  A real shame.  So I finally broke down and picked up this table saw, for now it will do what I need.  I am mostly using it for long rips, such as ripping stock to width.  I've also used it to cut the shoulders of a couple of cross grain rabbets on some wide boards (12") that I couldn't easily do with my handsaw.

The stock blade that came with it is far inferior to the Diablo blade I picked up for the saw.  The Diablo blade is thinner, which helps to make up for the less-than-monstrous motor, and it feels like the Diablo blade has less vibration and tendency to jam.  Overall an inexpensive upgrade that makes this saw cut noticeably better.

Here are a couple of pictures of my portable planing beam I've been toying with.  The first picture here is it on the floor, without any cleats to raise it.  It's not terribly comfortable to use, I think cleats will help some.  It would also help to have some sort of stick to brace it against a wall so that I don't have to hold it in place with my foot.

I'm also trying it on horses, this time with a stick keeping it off of the wall so I can just focus on planing.  The trouble with this setup for edge planing is that if the opposite edge isn't square, it's hard to make the top edge square.  I may try getting a couple of wood screw clamps to hold the two faces of the board, so it's held perpendicular to the workbench.

I tried attaching this cheap little vise, looks like it was originally designed for a kid's bench, and it worked okay but it doesn't have a ton of holding power.  Maybe some grippy cloth in the jaws would help.  For now I pulled it back off.

Just for fun, I moved my planing plank inside to the kitchen sink and glued up some legs.  

I'm having a bit of trouble getting my new Japanese plane to cut a straight line, it seems to like to make hollows.  I need to take a closer look at the sole, maybe it's not quite as relieved in the right places as I thought.  Anyways, I'm not giving up on my #8 jointer just yet.