Winter Sucks

Sure, it's good for snowboarding, sitting around a fire, drinking beer, and if you're up to the task, cold-water surfing.  It has its pluses. 

But nothing beats warm water and hot sunshine.  Nothing.

In anticipation of a big summer, I've been planning, planning, and making.

Here's some Sea Dog (name still pending) hand planes, made from 100% reclaimed lumber.  Features a spooned nose, single concave and hard rails.  Its brother, the Sea Wolf (name ALSO pending) is going to be the same outline, except with engineered Vee cut into it, to aid in tracking, speed and maneuverability. 

All planes are going to be branded with a vintage Japanese branding iron that is on its way from the other side of the world.

More shots to come.

Enjoy the Stoke.

Nothing like following up a day of procrastination with a day of super productivity.  An order for 4 Bottom Feeder Ply Hand planes came in last Saturday, and I finally got around to cutting and shaping them today.  It the first planes that I've shaped in over a month or so, and honestly I was going a little crazy without a serious craft to do.  Once you starting doing something and it begins fun for you, not doing it is torture.  I'd compare it to an addiction of something illegal, but that probably wouldn't be proper. 

Earlier in the afternoon, I went and got some custom Christmas cards printed for my Etsy customers, as a token of my appreciation to them throughout the year.  Customer relations and service is something I feel a lot of companies lack, and it seems that the smaller the company, the better they are with reaching out to customers to show them how much they care.  True, larger companies have more volume, so it's harder to account for everyone, but you're still never treated as an individual, just a demographic.  I'm going to do everything I can to prevent that.

Rounded out the day with Christmas tree shopping (although that isn't Points East related...) and had some wood burning done for one of the planes.  

More to come.

Enjoy the Stoke.

How It Happened

I can safely admit that I've always wanted to be my own boss, and hopefully one day I can TRULY become that.... I suppose I'm on the right track now (I don't want to jinx myself).  

Points East didn't start as some get rich quick scheme, or anything like that.  As a matter of fact, I found out about hand planes for body surfing by browsing my favorite sites: Swaylocks and Korduroy.  At the first sight of hand planes, I was skeptical.  However, I wanted to try one.  So I free-handed a template, refined it, traced it onto a really crappy piece of rotted and porous wood and went to town on it.  It was kinda of the first time I used a bench plane, as I never enjoyed them in high school.  But I quickly learned to love the tool.  Before I even got to try the first one, I made another.  The first wave I ever caught on a hand plane gave me the wildest sensation... My mouth was hanging open so much that I swallowed somewhere near 5 gallons of water, which I then coughed up when I resurfaced.

Since that day, I was hungry.  I wanted to shape and experiment as much as possible, and I scavenged everywhere for old wood.  After more shaping, I wanted to share the stoke as well as become a better wood worker.  My first stringer plane was gorgeous, but still, my most proudest work was the only double stringer plane I've done to date, seen below.

I was so proud of it, and when it finally sold, it was like watching a child leave your home forever.  Well, I think so, cause I've never had a kid.  That was the start of surf craft woodworking.  The plane is actually sitting on top of my poplar Alaia that I had shaped a few weeks before, which is the first of many.