Woodworking plans - Which is the best woodworking guide?

john lee

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Hello folks! I'm a woodworking newbie & I wanna invest meself in one of these woodworking guides but i cant make up my mind on choosing the best.

which diy guide is better?:huh:
Tedswoodworking or Woodworking4home?

Tedswoodworking comes with 16,000 woodworking plans at a price of $67, but Woodworking4home is cheaper at $49 with 14,000 woodworking plans.

has anyone bought these guides?
are they good or scam?
are they worth buying?
please help me out!:wave:

thanks & God bless ya'll
 
John, welcome to the forum. :wave:I don't own either of those books. I'd recommend that you enroll in a course if you want to learn how instead of spending the money on any books. Many local schools, comunity colleges offer begining woodworking classes and you'll get a lot more out it then you would with any Do it yourself books. Where are you located maybe someone is in your area and cold offer some guidance.
 
There is an article in the May 2010 issue of Wood magazine by Tom Lovino "The Shop Monkey" called 'Monkey Business" that addresses this very issue.

Basically, the gist of it is that these 'collections' of plans are typically poorly done, that they may not actually own the copyrights to the plans, and that they typically lack the type of instruction that someone new to the craft might need in order to be successful.

He suggests either going to the library and checking out the books or to subscribe to a few decent magazines.





Hello folks! I'm a woodworking newbie & I wanna invest meself in one of these woodworking guides but i cant make up my mind on choosing the best.

which diy guide is better?:huh:
Tedswoodworking or Woodworking4home?

Tedswoodworking comes with 16,000 woodworking plans at a price of $67, but Woodworking4home is cheaper at $49 with 14,000 woodworking plans.

has anyone bought these guides?
are they good or scam?
are they worth buying?
please help me out!:wave:

thanks & God bless ya'll
 
And thinking about it, I think you'd probably be best off just thinking about what it is you want to build. Pick a project of some sort, whether it's a simple box, a small table, some sort of 'thing'. I've had good lucking finding ideas and plans just looking online once I decide what it is I want to build first.

Then come back here, and ask for suggestions on what projects others have built along those lines. I'm sure you'll get plenty of help and suggestions that would be more useful than wading through a cd full of pdf files :thumb:
 
John, since both of the sites you pointed to are owned by the same company, the "plans" they are selling are likely the same. But you probably already knew that. Just sayin'.
whistling.gif
 
Gee, John, where are you? Here I am looking for someone just like you to teach!

Read the off-beat request thread for more info.

If you are not local to me, we might still be able to work something out.

Oh, the plan book(s). Hold off for now. There is a better approach.
 
Spend your money on good wwing mags as they often are better than the coffeetable books you discribe. Want to read up on how to, go to the Libruary and check out a copy. See if it suits your needs If you are enthrawed then buy it.

Head to Barnes & Noble and brouse their Mag section, they carry all the great ones, find the ones that show you what info you are seeking, I can spend hours standing at the Mag rack... I buy a few and the ones I like , I subscribe. Lowes has a complete rack of cheaper HowTo books, I would never invest the $$$ you mention on a single book as they are not all there is to know books. I have a basement full of old text books on how to.
 
Just to be clear,

The 'guides' referred to in this thread are not in book form. They are "plans" that are either available from an online site, or purchased as files delivered on CD.

For a full description of what you get for your dollars, I suggest checking out the Wood Magazine review of these types of sites.

http://www.woodmagazine.com/woodworking-tips/editorial-extras/discount-woodworking-plans-review/

The Review recommends that you skip those sorts of on-line collections and stick with magazines or books that you can review in detail before parting with your hard earned cash.
 
When I started out I gathered every plan I could find. Except for a couple of shop jigs, I do not believe I have used any of them. They are perfectly good plans, they just aren't for items that turned out to be interesting to me.

I have however, bought or found a few plans that I have used. I discovered that plans are like router bits; get the ones you need as you need them and as your skills grow, so will your ability to predict what you may need.

The growing knowledge of what is specifically of interest to you is what allows you to get that corner clamp at 50% off even though you don't use it for 6 months ;-)

Welcome aboard, enjoy the fun.
 
Reposting some info from a recent topic here just in case anybody finds this thread.

This video does a great job of explaining whats going on with the whole woodworking plan DVD Thing.

http://thewoodwhisperer.com/woodworking-piracy/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TWW+%28The+Wood+Whisperer%29

Just in case you didn't sit through the whole video, here is that guys link to some sites that he considers reputable and has vetted. I haven't but I assume after watching the video that he has.

BTW, The video isn't that long and it really is pretty good...

http://www.woodworkingformeremortals.com/p/woodworking-plan-links.html
 
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