Any woodworkers on the forums. I'm having a coronary at the price of tools here

Forums › Home Workshop DIY › Any woodworkers on the forums. I'm having a coronary at the price of tools here

1 | 2

Batman

Mad Scientist
29717 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#1941693 17-Jan-2018 21:03

It's not new. Try building a house here. You can build a Trump tower in the USA for the price of a townhouse in NZ.

neb

11294 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#1941702 17-Jan-2018 21:23

zxspectrum:
Seems my link did not work. Not sure what I did wrong. - http://www.nzlii.org/nz/journals/VUWLawRw/1999/18.html#Heading11

Quoting that:

No international intellectual property treaties or obligations compel signatories to prohibit parallel importing.

Until TPPA is ratified, that is.

gedc

355 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1941737 17-Jan-2018 22:52

I see what you mean re Rockler shipping - Roughly $450 Kiwi to ship 1 clamp costing $70 Kiwi...Good old UPS. They also won't ship to a freight forwarded in the US such as You Shop.. I presume UPS got a bit pissy re everyone bypassing their wonderful prices.

kiwigander

231 posts

Master Geek

#1941744 17-Jan-2018 23:43

If you're looking for Veritas gear why not go directly to Lee Valley Tools?

http://www.leevalley.com

(edited to correct the link)

gedc

355 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1941776 18-Jan-2018 06:39

Yep. Got some from them as well but upto now only small amounts given GST threshold includes postage costs etc. Cheers.

Bung

6397 posts

Uber Geek

Subscriber

#1941779 18-Jan-2018 07:19

gedc:
I see what you mean re Rockler shipping - Roughly $450 Kiwi to ship 1 clamp costing $70 Kiwi...Good old UPS. They also won't ship to a freight forwarded in the US such as You Shop.. I presume UPS got a bit pissy re everyone bypassing their wonderful prices.

I think the problem with clamps is the length of the bar pushes them out of Post into Courier immediately.

The is a lot of unused gear out there waiting for the owners to move to the rest home or worse. I was building up some kitchen benches using blocks and wedges on a floor when my neighbour revealed that he had 6 clamps.

There's also a lot of alternative ways of skinning a cat. I've been surprised by the amount of stuff on Youtube on working around a lack of the proper equipment.

MikeAqua

7769 posts

Uber Geek

#1941815 18-Jan-2018 09:11

In Nelson there is a guy at the Saturday and Sunday markets who specialises in selling second hand tools, has been doing for years. I suspect he buys estate lots etc.

Hie prices are pretty high, although reasonable for the high end tools.

But the fact he has based business on it suggests there is a good supply of second hand tools out there and he probably only has local catchment of say 75,000 people in The Nelson region. I suspect if you keep an eye on local garage sales etc, especially those saying deceased estate or similar you will find plenty of tools available. Also local social media pages, if you say you are on the lookout for second hand woodworking tools you may find some stuff.

Mike

Lenovo

Shop now for Lenovo laptops and other devices (affiliate link).

Lastman

306 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1941902 18-Jan-2018 10:59

I see the Toolshed have clamps for $50 that look pretty decent. Trade Me/ second hand as others mentioned.

Bunnings and Mitre 10 are competitive on some things, expensive on others, shop around.

1eStar

1604 posts

Uber Geek

#1943614 19-Jan-2018 15:57

Might be cheaper just to retire to the UK, it's expensive to live out here in the antipodes.

neb

11294 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2250762 3-Jun-2019 23:30

Adamanski: Has anyone bought anything direct from Rockler? Their sure foot aluminium clamps look easy to work with, just calculated shipping and it’s $$.

Rockler are generally pretty good, provided you can get it in the US and don't have to pay for shipping to NZ, at least for their cheaper stuff where the freight can be a significant part of the total cost. However, their Alu clamps have had somewhat mixed reviews, I've been debating getting Dubuque equivalents. Whatever you do, don't get any of the Chinese-made alu bar clamps, they're just folded or thin extruded alu sheet that require extensive post-work to make them usable, principally heavy reinforcing so they don't buckle as soon as you clamp anything more solid than a feather pillow. Here's one of many tutorial videos on getting them up to scratch, and the Harbour Freight ones are better than many you see on eBay and the like.

neb

11294 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2250766 3-Jun-2019 23:42

Oh, another thing is you don't mind the amount of work involved is to use 2x4s and wooden wedges as bar clamps. What you do is get a 2x4 of the required length, nail/screw a 2x4 block on top of it at each end with a separation between the blocks slightly wider than what you want to clamp, and then drive in wedges from either side to provide the clamping force. Since it's usually done as part of a glue-up, you'd want to put baking paper over the 2x4 to prevent it becoming part of the final product.

1 | 2