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I'm the weirdo who prefers a hand drill over my power drill for small jobs
Everyone in my crew laughs at me for keeping a vintage brace and bit in my truck. But last week I had to hang three cabinets in a 100 year old house in Austin. The studs were so brittle that my cordless makita just blew right through the wood. Switched to the hand drill and got perfect control, no cracking. Plus I don't have to worry about batteries dying midday. I get that power tools are faster for big stuff, but for small trim work or old houses I think hand tools win. Anyone else keep an old tool around that people give you crap about?
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roberts.leo2mo ago
Oh man, that's a good one. I've got an old Stanley spokeshave that my grandpa gave me, everyone jokes it's a museum piece but it's perfect for shaping door edges in these old houses here in New England. The brittle studs thing is real, I've had the same problem with cordless drills just tearing through old growth pine like it's nothing. Hand tools give you that feel you just can't get with a motor.
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lily572mo ago
Huh, I don't know @roberts.leo, maybe it's just me but I've never had that big a problem with drills tearing stuff up unless I'm really cranking on it. Kind of feels like people overthink this whole hand tools vs power tools thing sometimes.
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the_fiona2mo ago
Also honestly I think a lot of it depends on the kind of wood you're working with too. My buddy brought over this really old barn wood from his grandpa's place and I tried using my regular drill on it and it just shattered the whole piece. Like one wrong move and it was splinters everywhere. I switched to a hand brace my neighbor gave me from some garage sale and it worked way better. There's something about going slow and letting the tool do the work instead of forcing it. But yeah for most stuff I'm with you, people get way too worked up over hand tools vs power tools like it's some kind of war or something lol. Just grab whatever works and move on.
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