Am I the only one who misses when trim carpenters cut everything on site
Honestly I did a trim job last month in an old house in Springfield and it hit me how much the trade has changed. Back when I started in 2003 we cut every piece of crown and base right there on the floor with a miter saw on a scrap of plywood. Now half the stuff comes pre-cut from a shop and I am basically a guy with a nail gun and a caulk tube. Last Tuesday I spent more time fixing a bad factory miter than I would have spent cutting the whole window casing myself. The shop sent 14 pieces for one room and 3 of them were off by a quarter inch at the corner. I get that speed matters and nobody wants to pay for hand fitting anymore, but there was something good about knowing the whole run came off your own saw. Any of you older guys feel like the work got easier but less yours, or is it just me?
Man I gotta disagree with you on this one. Cutting everything on site sounds nice in theory but I spent way too many years breathing sawdust and dragging a chop saw around a cold house because the floor was out of level and nothing squared up. Pre-cut stuff saves my knees and my lungs. Yeah the shop screwed up your miters but that is a shop problem, not a pre-cut problem, you just call them and make them fix it or eat the cost. The part of the job that is really yours is the fitting and the eye for what looks right, not who pulled the trigger on the saw. I get the pride thing, I really do, but I will take a warm shop cut over a wobbly one on a piece of plywood any day.