For the new woodworker setting up their shop, a trip to Rockler, Woodcraft, or their big box stores presents an onslaught of gizmos, gadgets, devices that “guarantee a perfect (insert woodworking task here) every time”. I went through that phase, spent my money, and made it out (mostly) unscathed. Along the way I found a few that were worth it.
I like to be surrounded by wood, metal, leather, fabric, and other natural materials in my shop. Non-plastic tools just look and feel better in my creative space. I have some plastic in my shop that I can’t really do anything about; the handle on the fence of my table, the dust collection tubes, and my dead blow mallet is covered in plastic. The handle of my combo screwdriver is plastic (although I couldn’t stand that, so I recently bought a combo screwdriver turning kit from Rockler and made a wooden handled one). While my plastic tool aversion might seem a little neurotic and silly, it’s what I like. I’ve been known to retire a perfectly nice new plastic handled hack saw for a wood handled one from the 1920’s I found in flea market. It took me an hour to de-rust off the vintage one, clean and oil the handle. And after all that, it works about the same as the new one. But I like it better.
After all that, I have a few plastic woodworking tools / gadgets that I will not part with. Despite their plastic-ness, these things are great at what they do and I wouldn’t replace them if there were non-plastic equivalents.
(Disclaimer: I have received no endorsements for these reviews, and I have no contact with these companies. I paid full retail for them. I am posting links so you can check them out, but they’re not affiliate links or anything.)
So without further ado…
GluBot(s)
The FastCap GluBot, and it’s little cousin, the BabeBot, are the best glue dispensers I’ve ever used. I’ve tried the manufacturer’s bottles. I’ve tried the mustard-bottle-as-glue-bottle. I’ve tried the “store the glue bottle tip-side down in a holder” trick. Then I found these, and I was done looking. These containers are designed so that no matter how much, or little, glue is inside the reservoir, fresh glue is just a squeeze away. I use the big one for PVA glue, and the little one for liquid hide glue. The smaller BabeBot is easier to heat up in my high-tech pot-on-a-hotplate hot water bath (in order to get the Old Brown Glue up to working temperature of 100-140°F.) These things don’t clog, and glue is always ready to go when I need it. During a glue up, there’s already enough things to worry about without battling a clogged or doing the “I forgot to refill it so now I’ll stand there holding it upside down and shake it a lot” dance.