Old timer at the lumber yard showed me a square trick I still use

Guy must have been 70, he saw me fighting with a framing square and just walked over. He flipped it upside down and used the tongue as a fence against the board edge, made my layout perfect in 10 seconds. Anyone else got a weird old timer tip they still lean on?

2 comments

2 Comments

betty_park628d ago

Oh man, I gotta respectfully disagree on this one. I get why people love those old school tricks, but for me that upside down fence method never felt right. It throws off my natural hand position and I end up fighting the square more than using it. I think we get caught up in "old timer wisdom" because it feels nostalgic, not because it's always the best way. A lot of those guys learned one way and stuck with it, but there's usually a cleaner modern method that works just as good.

david7018d ago

@betty_park62 you hit on something I think about all the time with that "old timer wisdom" line. I tried that flipped square thing once and ended up with my tape stuck to my own knuckle for ten minutes. Looked like an idiot. At this point I'll take any modern method that keeps my fingers out of my own way.