When building doors for our Chicken Coops, we use a biscuit joiner. Now 99% of the time we use #20 biscuits for our work.  But while building the models for our Monster Mayhem display I had to switch to small #0 biscuits. And when I put the tool back, I left it at that position (since I’d be building more models).

Unfortunately, Evelyn didn’t know that, and when she went to make some speed carts for the base of Monster Mayhem — well, she was a bit pissed off. She made the cuts, all at the wrong depth.

This little adventure reminded me when I went to fasten some 5mm panel for some coop doors. Ka-thung! Boy, that nail seemed to go deep. But I kept going. Only later realizing that the 5/8″ brads I thought we in the tool were actually 1 1/4″ brads we use for the coop core frames. That door was nailed to the bench!

So, what to do about the situation. Well, sure, always triple-check everything. But when a tool is set up a certain way 99% of the time you reach for it, and use it, without thinking twice. Almost always use #20 biscuits. Almost always use 5/8″ brads. Except when we’re not.

To help, I borrowed an idea from the aircraft industry: Remove before flight. The idea being that if a tool is left in a “non-standard” configuration, and you put it back (because you know you’re using it later for the same task), let the other person know — or let yourself know, if you forget. On aircraft, this is done with little flags. So I used the same idea.

Here, I’ve just finished cutting dados into some 1×2 material. The slot / dado is where some wiring will sit for our models. Because it’s deep, it’s done multi pass. And I left the tool in the “high” position. If I forgot that, I tried to cut another piece, it would (best case) bog down the router and (worst case) throw the material across the room (been there, done that).

Here, I’ve left brads in the nailer, but don’t know what size. So I flag it:

If I had left the biscuit joiner in a non-standard position (say, a #0 biscuit cut), I would flag it:

All those flags are are some plastic spring-loaded clothes pins with a piece of old red t-shirt tied to them. Nothing fancy, but something that’s easy to remember and easy to spot.

So now if I see a tool with a red strip attached to it, I know that it’s in a non-standard configuration (different brads, excessive depth, high speed, etc). It’s an easy way to remember in a shop where we quickly move from one task to another.

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