In this episode, Joshua and Mike discuss something they both feel strongly about – the primacy of wooden hand planes. In unpacking Joshua’s article in Issue Twelve (heading to mailboxes as we speak!) about making your own fore plane, they go over why wooden planes are just plain better than their metal-bodied counterparts, and how approachable the craft of planemaking can be.
Most modern woodworkers view toolmaking as a craft dependent on NASA-level precision, but in his article, Joshua dispels that popular misperception. In this podcast episode, he and Mike talk through the pre-industrial process of planemaking, explaining that appropriate tolerances are determined more by the eye than rule.
SHOW NOTES
Issue Twelve
We have now opened the pre-order window for my brand-new book Worked: A Bench Guide to Hand-Tool Efficiency. This prequel to my last book, Joined, focuses on the way hand-tool-only woodworking actually gets done without fuss. We’ve all seen the painstaking planing procedures and the convoluted workholding setups that attempt to simulate machine work with hand tools. They’re unwieldy and cumbersome. And they give hand tools a bad rap. But this is all a misunderstanding. Hand tools are efficient when used the way they were intended – with “sensible” tolerances. Worked was written to show you what that actually looks like. It was written to reclaim the “hand” in “handcraft.” We’ve got two ways you can pre-order this book: You...
It’s been said that woodworking is little more than marking lines in the right places and cutting carefully to those lines. While simplistic, there’s something refreshing about the aphorism. It is true that knowing where and being able to cut wood is the heart of most woodworking operations. At the same time, in the shop, we are nothing without our tools. And our tools are nothing without a way to secure the stock being shaped. Having a firm grasp on workholding methods is an essential component to artisanal development. Beginners struggle to find a way to hold their stock for comfortable work, and this struggle greatly hinders the cutting action of their tools. But anyone who’s been around for any...
I have a love/hate relationship with sandpaper. Before M&T, I spent better than a decade working on boats – mostly small, wooden sailboats, with the occasional lobster yacht or Nordic tug thrown into the mix. There was a beautiful Herreshoff Rozinante, built as finely as a violin, or that 1937 International One Design racing sailboat from Norway that had sunk three different times – each time, she was raised and repaired. I primarily did paint and varnish work, which meant that I spent winters sanding. A lot of sanding. At the end of each season, all the removable brightwork– tillers, wheels, seats, dropboards, hatches – I pulled off the boat, cataloging and shelving it all in my heated varnish room. The...
Yesterday on the Dispatch I posted a video preview of my new book Worked: A Bench Guide to Hand-Tool Efficiency and spent some time discussing the logic of the design. I realize it needs a little explanation. It’s common for publishers to limit the number of photographs to a minimum and prioritize the written text. Ironically though, I’ve found over the years that I’ve learned more from the books and articles which feature lots of large photographs than the ones leaning heavily on the writing. I think this is because woodworking is a material and tactile thing and even the most verbose descriptions do not do justice to what an artisan actually sees while working. In this new title (just as...
I’ve become convinced that if we are going to successfully revive pre-industrial tools and techniques, we are going to have to understand and come to grips with pre-industrial tolerances. We need to know how square our “square” ought to be and exactly how smooth is “smooth.” When a machinist’s square is placed on the surfaces of period furniture, one is hard pressed to find anything we moderns would call “flat.” Even discounting instances of warpage from the ravages of time, the surfaces of rails, the flats of tapered legs, drawer faces, and even tabletops display a refreshingly human workmanship. It no longer surprises me to find that the undulations on a “flat” drawer face allow even my thickest feeler gauge...
Today’s installment of the “Setting Up Shop” video series is utterly, completely, 100%, boring. And after watching it, we think you will agree.
Since time immemorial, woodworkers have been seeking the best way to make a round hole in a piece of wood. From the use of friction, to Roman-era spoon bits, to modern auger and twist bits, Mike talks us through an introduction to the boring technology available to hand-tool woodworkers today. You know the drill – check it out, and leave any comments below.
Wood is weird. Sometimes it seems like it has a mind of its own and surprises you with its behavior. There is mystique about particular species and their unique qualities, unparalleled by any other. What accounts for these peculiarities? Why is wood the way it is? I stumbled across a pile of excellent wood science videos the other day and thought they were worth sharing here. Dr. Callum Hill makes helpful use of a light board to put into plain English the nature of wood. Anyone who calls themselves a woodworker should understand at least some of this information. There are a ton of videos on their YouTube channel, but check out a few here: As they’ve put it, “The...
This week, I am putting the finishing touches on a book manuscript I started working on last year. The Dispatch followers have been hearing some about it for some time, but other than that I’ve kept it largely under wraps until now. This book follows Joined: A Bench Guide to Furniture Joinery in the Bench Guide series. Teaching joinery in this way seemed like a good introduction to a pre-industrial craft mentality, hammering home the significance of primary and secondary surfaces, “sacred” lines (as I called them), and pointing out what actually matters and what doesn’t. Modern approaches to joinery can get unnecessarily complicated because they depend on machine-perfect stock (think: scribing tenon shoulders with a marking gauge referenced off...
We are excited to announce that we are opening up the M&T Craft Research Grant for 2022 applicants! Launched last year, this program is intended to provide opportunities for new voices and enthusiastic research in the realm of pre-industrial handcraft. Up to $3,000 will be awarded to each recipient, and can be used to cover travel expenses, research materials, or time taken away from a day job to focus on the area of interest. And this research will culminate in an article published in a future issue of M&T. Our goal is to enable those passionate about craft to dig in and share what they learn with others. We say it time and time again, but the rabbit trails are endless when...
