We’ve had a couple people ask what tools they need to make the cherry tool chest built by Whitney Miller in “Make a Swedish Tool Chest” (available at introductory pricing of $35 until Aug. 26) So, below is a list of every tool Whitney picks up on camera. To those you could add a jointer, planer and table saw if you’re going to prep your own material with the aid of power tools – though you could also carefully choose 3/4″- or 7/8″-thick S4S stock at the lumberyard, and glue up panels from that, resulting in minimal prep.
Cutting or marking gauge (Whitney is using a Tite-Mark cutting gauge)
Dovetail template (Whitey is using a 1:4 Crucible Dovetail Template, which matches the angles on the paper template included in the video)
0.5 mm pencil (Whitney is using…several – any will do, but my current faves are Graphgear and Ohto)
Marking knife (Whitney is using a vintage Blue Spruce knife)
Dovetail saw (Whitney is using a Lie-Nielsen non-tapered DT saw)
Coping saw (Whitney is using a Knew Concepts 6-1/2″ saw with an aftermarket handle by Elkhorn Tools, which is no longer)
The coping saw blade is a Pégas 18tpi skip tooth blade (which cuts slowly but cleanly in this 7/8″-thick cherry; the 10 tpi blade would also work, though it would leave a more ragged cut)
Bevel-edge chisels (Whitney is using a 1/2″ Lie-Nielsen socket chisel)
Crosscut saw (Whitney is using Chris’s vintage Wheeler Madden & Clemson)
Mallet for dovetail chopping (Whitney is using a Blue Spruce 16-ou. round mallet)
Smooth plane (Whitney is using a Lie-Nielsen No. 3 in bronze)
12″ adjustable square (Whitney is using a Starrett)
24″ adjustable square – not strictly necessary (Whitney is using a Starrett)
Block plane (Whitney is using a Lie-Nielsen No. 60-1/2)
Jack plane (Whitney is using a vintage Stanley No. 5; I think it’s a Type 11…for the tool nerds among us)
Glue brush (Whitney is using a No. 2 Torrington glue brush. Along a Dixie cup that contains a few ounces of Piggly No Wiggly glue. For the drawers, we used Titebond Original PVA for its quicker setup time.)
Rectangular mallet (In my brief appearance to help knock the case together, I grabbed the Blue Spruce 24-ou. rectangular mallet)
Clamps (we used Bessey K-bodies, aka parallel-jaw clamps)
Paraffin wax (I believe the brand is Gulf)
Drill/driver (Whitney grabbed a 12-volt Milwaukee for light-duty needs, and a 20-volt DeWalt for heavier-duty needs )
Drill bits (we swear by HSS Lipped Imperial Brad-Point Drills from Lee Valley – so I assume Whitney used these)
Countersink (Ours are Insty-Bits)
Slot screwdriver (Whitney used a Grace Gunsmith-style Slot Screwdriver)
16-ounce hammer (Whitney is using a vintage Plumb “Autograph”)
Rabbet plane (Whitney is using a Veritas Skew Rabbet plane, which technically is a moving fillister plane)
6″ adjustable square (Whitney is using a Starrett)
Plough plane (Whitney is using a vintage Record No. 043)
Small router plane (Whitney is using a Lie-Nielsen No. 271 open mouth)
Centering punch, not strictly necessary…but awfully fun to use (Whitney is using a Starrett No. 819 Automatic Center Punch)
A pocketnife and needle-nose pliers (while installing the traditional ring pulls – I have no idea what brands)
Also shown throughout are a Crucible Lump Hammer, Crucible Holdfasts and a Benchcrafted Moxon Vise. The bench is Christopher’s “Anarchist’s Workbench.”
I think I got them all – if I missed any, my apologies (and I’m sure someone will let me know).
In this book, Cianci (aka The Saw Wright) teaches you the fundamentals of maintaining backsaws and handsaws: how to file and joint your saws with the correct rake, fleam and pitch to keep them cutting sharp. You’ll also learn how to deal with saw teeth that are in good shape but dull, plus how to successfully doctor teeth that have been abused.
Plus, Matt shows you how to identify and restore vintage saws (i.e. is that yard sale box lot a good buy?) – and basic sawsmithing – how to hammer out a bent blade, and how to re-set the spine on a backsaw.
Do you remember sitting in junior high geometry class and trying your best to stay awake? Me too.
While we don’t have to talk about the Pythagorean theorem in this chapter, it is important to understand the basic shapes and angles related to saw teeth. We’ll also cover basic terminology. Grab your highlighter.
Hand Saw Anatomy Western-style hand saws come in many forms, but the two most common to woodworking are the handsaw and the backsaw. A hand saw (two separate words) refers to any saw worked by hand power. This includes large two-person timber saws for felling and bucking trees to pit saws for sawing boards from a log, and even tiny keyhole saws and dovetail saws for fine joinery with all types in between. Hand saws can have a thin, narrow blade tensioned in a wood or metal frame, or the blade can be unrestrained and of sufficient gauge to remain stiff and resist buckling in use. A handsaw (one word) is a particular form of hand saw that includes a wooden handle with closed grip on one end of an unrestrained blade, which is used for making straight, dimensioning cuts in boards of all kinds. Handsaws are identified in size by the length of the toothed edge of their blade, which can range from 12″ to 30″. The most common size is 26″, which is the prototypical carpenter’s saw.
A backsaw is a hand saw with a thinner blade and an applied metal rib along its top edge to provide stiffness in use. It has an open- or closed-grip handle ,and is used for making precise joinery or fine dimensioning cuts in wooden components of all kinds. Backsaws are also identified by the length of the toothed edge of their blade and typically range in size from 6″ to 20″ , with 12″ being the most common. A special variety of backsaws, called miter box saws, are designed to be used in manufactured miter boxes, and can be up to 30″ in length.
Backsaws: from top to bottom, a 10″ Disston No. 68 gent’s saw, my reproduction of an unmarked 18th-century dovetail saw, a 12″ backsaw of my own design, and a 14″ Disston No. 4.
There is common language used to identify the parts of both handsaws and backsaws that you should understand before you learn about saw teeth. The thin steel body of the saw that contains the teeth is referred to as the blade. The toothed edge of the blade is called the toothline, and the opposite edge is called the back. The other major component of a handsaw or backsaw is the handle, which is self explanatory and usually made of wood. The two ends of the toothed blade are distinct. The end with the handle is called the heel; the opposite end is called the toe. Unique to backsaws is the metal reinforcing rib, called the back, along the top edge of the blade. These can be made of iron, steel or brass.
Rip teeth (left) and crosscut teeth (right).
Parts of Teeth The teeth of Western saws are shaped like triangles, and each part of these teeth have a specific name and function. Understanding these elements is the first step in learning to sharpen your saws. The point is the acute apex of the tooth where the wood fibers are first cut. Depending on how you file a particular saw, these points can have different geometric distinctions and cut wood in different ways. The face of the tooth is the side of the triangle that first contacts the work when the saw is in use. Because Western-style saws cut on the push stroke, these faces are always on the toe side of the toothline. Logically, then, the opposing side of the tooth is called the back. The site where the back and face meet is called the gullet.
Backsaw anatomy.
Handsaw anatomy.
In use, all four parts of the tooth work together to cut a kerf into a piece of wood. The kerf is the empty space created by the saw as it cuts. Here’s how it happens:
The acute point of each tooth is pushed down into the wood as the saw is thrust forward. As the point penetrates the surface of the wood it cuts and lifts up a tiny chip of wood.
This chip then slides up the face of the tooth as the saw moves forward.
As the chip reaches the gullet it breaks apart and collects with other chips in the gullet.
As the tooth exits the work on the backside of the kerf, the chips of wood fall out of the gullets. The saw is drawn back and the process repeats.
For conceptual purposes, it has long been suggested that the cutting action of saw teeth is similar to the cutting action of many other edge tools, like chisels and knives. And while this is true for an individual saw tooth, it does not give the full picture. Planes, chisels, knives, axes and all other edge tools possess a single cutting edge, whereas a typical handsaw can have more than 200. For a saw to cut well, each of these teeth must not only be sharp, but also must be uniform and harmonized with all neighboring teeth. Uniformity in partnership with sharpness is the goal for saw teeth. This is why saw sharpening can be so challenging for even the most experienced woodworkers. The efficient and accurate function of the saw is not solely dependent on the quality and geometry of a single edge, but on the quality and uniformity of many edges in relation to each other.
Now that we have defined the parts of a saw’s teeth and how they cut in general, let’s look more closely at how changing the size, shape and geometry of the teeth can make them better suited to different kinds of work.
Saw tooth anatomy.
Tooth Spacing Tooth spacing determines the size of a saw’s teeth and is measured by the number of teeth a saw has within one linear inch. There are actually two different but often confused units of measurement common to hand saws for tooth spacing, and they are points per inch (ppi) and teeth per inch (tpi). They are, in fact, not the same unit. On handsaws, tooth spacing was traditionally stamped onto the heel of the saw on the medallion side of the blade right below the handle. Backsaws had no such marking.
Points per inch (ppi) vs. teeth per inch (tpi). You wouldn’t say yards when you meant meters, would you?
To identify the ppi tooth spacing of any saw, take a rule and place it on the toothline of the saw. Line up the 1″ mark on the rule with one of the tooth points at the heel of the saw. Begin to count the number of tooth points starting with the point aligned with the 1″ mark and progressing up to and including the point under the 2″ mark. This count is the ppi tooth spacing of the saw.
To measure the tpi tooth spacing of a saw use the same rule, but this time line up the 1″ mark with the gullet of a tooth at the heel. Now count the number of full saw teeth (gullet, back, point and face) from one gullet to the next until you reach the gullet under the 2″ mark. This count is the tpi spacing of the saw. If you completed this task correctly, you should arrive at a tpi spacing that is one less than your ppi measurement. This means that a points-per-inch measurement of a saw will always be one greater than the teeth-per-inch unit. Represented in an equation: ppi = tpi +1. So, a 6 ppi saw is not the same as a 6 tpi saw. A 6 ppi saw is equal to a 5 tpi saw, and a 6 tpi saw is in fact equal to a 7 ppi saw. Got it? Good. Of note, I only use ppi when describing tooth spacing.
This will be on the test: Tooth size is determined by the distance between the points.
If you followed the steps above to identify a particular saw’s tooth spacing, and you are finding that the points (if you are using ppi) or the gullets (if you are using tpi) are not lining up with the exact inch marks on your rule there could be a couple of reasons why. Historically, full-size handsaws were commonly available in half-point increments in coarser sizes. So that means that 6-1/2, 5-1/2, 4-1/2 and 3-1/2 ppi saws are commonly found. In fact, 5-1/2-point ripsaws are about as common as any other ripsaw spacing in the wild. A discrepancy in measurement could also mean that your saw has morphed over years of careless filing into an odd spacing. This is especially common on backsaws with very small teeth that are easy to misfile. For handsaws, look for the heel stamp (noted above) to confirm the original spacing. Also, always measure teeth at the heel of a handsaw because ripsaws were commonly toothed one point finer at their toe to allow for easier starting of the cut. This means that a 6-point ripsaw has 6 ppi spacing at its heel and 7 ppi at its toe.
So why are these distinctions about tooth spacing so important? Because more than any other element, tooth spacing affects how a saw will cut, and unlike the other geometric features of saw teeth we will discuss later in this chapter, tooth spacing is not typically changed once it is established. Tooth spacing determines how large or small the teeth are on a saw, which in turn determines how large or small a bite of wood each tooth will take. This is due to the distance from one tooth to the next and the resultant gullet volume the teeth create. In use, a saw tooth will continue cutting chips of wood as long as its point is able to reach the bottom of the kerf. Once the gullet in front of a point fills with chips, it is overcome and can no longer effectively bite into the wood. So a saw with a greater amount of space between each tooth point, and hence a greater chip capacity in its gullet, can go on cutting and creating chips longer than a relatively smaller tooth. But this speed comes at a cost. Larger teeth may cut faster, but they leave a rougher surface on the wood and are not as inclined to the precise work of joinery. Conversely, fine-toothed saws for joinery sacrifice speed, but they allow a smooth, even stroke, whose tiny teeth gently nibble away at the wood to cut a finer line.
On Chris’s bench right now are two mahogany chairs.
Update: Comments are now closed (We’ll respond shortly to any that are posted and not yet answered). Join us again for Open Wire on Sept. 14.
Chris and I are both working on projects in the shop today – but we’ve reserved time in between chairmaking and dovetails (and both – Chris’s current chair features battens secured in sliding dovetails) to answer your burning Open Wire questions.
You know the drill: Post your woodworking queries below in the comments, and we will answer – and it is much appreciated if you keep the questions succinct. Comments close at around 5 p.m. Eastern.
On my bench are parts in progress for 11 Shaker silverware trays. Still.(It feels to me as if I’ve been working on these for months.)
fig. 2.2.22. The human form resides just beneath the surface.
Below is a short excerpt (a sidebar) from “By Hand & Eye,” the first artisan geometry book by George Walker and Jim Tolpin.
In “By Hand & Eye,” the authors show how much of the world is governed by simple proportions, noting how ratios such as 1:2; 3:5 and 4:5 were ubiquitous in the designs of pre-industrial artisans. And the tool that helps us explore this world, then as now, are dividers.
One key to good design is to master these basic “notes” – much like learning to sing “do, re, mi.” How to do this is the subject of the first three-quarters of the book. It offers exercises, examples and encouragement in opening your inner eye, propping it up with toothpicks and learning the simple geometry that will help you improve your design.
Critics point out that modern builders and architects can fall into a malady called the Greek Temple disease: slapping together classical elements from antiquity to somehow capture a sense of power and integrity. Of course, they do so without a clue about where these qualities came from, and how they came to be imbued in buildings from antiquity. It’s an easy conclusion to make if we focus on the surface without considering there might be something deeper. It’s true that many of our revered civic buildings often were modeled after temples from antiquity. Historical design literature emphasized the perfection found in the Greek and Roman classic orders.
fig. 2.2.23. Because classic orders are anthropomorphized forms, it was even thought that an interior with multiple layers of objects based on the orders was filled with human forms.
Yet the tradition reveals something deeper than a fascination with carved stone columns. To the Greeks, the classic order was the embodiment of the human form, but also of the building itself. Sweep them away and the roof collapses. The Romans extended the idea that the orders embodied the human form, yet applied new materials: concrete and brick. The result was that walls could support a building without requiring the orders for structural integrity. Yet they still used the classic orders to organize the façade, even though columns often had little or no structural role. They began to shadow the orders using shallow representations, sinking pilasters and half-columns into a wall to suggest the order. Later, designers completely eliminated columns or pilasters but continued to weave the proportional sequences to organize a façade. An exterior or interior wall could be divided into beginning, middle and ending using mouldings and paneling to echo an invisible classic order. Not just walls, but just as the order has internal elements that repeat the beginning, middle and ending, other elements in an interior – windows, fireplaces, furniture, candle stands, lamps – all could shadow the classic orders. Because the orders embody the human form, designers were in essence filling their homes with a host of human figures large and small.
p.s. We’re working right now on a new artisan geometry book from George Walker and Jim Tolpin, “Good Eye, Skilled Hands,” that we hope will be out later this year. In it, they explore the practical applications of lessons found in historic furniture forms.
The following is excerpted from “The Anarchist’s Design Book,” by Christopher Schwarz. The new, expanded edition of “The Anarchist’s Design Book” is an exploration of furniture forms that have persisted outside of the high styles that dominate every museum exhibit, scholarly text and woodworking magazine of the last 200 years.
There are historic furniture forms out there that have been around for almost 1,000 years that don’t get written about much. They are simple to make. They have clean lines. And they can be shockingly modern.
This book explores 18 of these forms – a bed, dining tables, chairs, chests, desks, shelving, stools – and offers a deep exploration into the two construction techniques used to make these pieces that have been forgotten, neglected or rejected.
“The Anarchist’s Design Book” is available for order in print, or you can download a free pdf (and you don’t need to register, sign up for dumb marketing or even tell us who you are). Just click through this link and you’ll find the download in the second sentence of the first paragraph – the one in italics.
Embrace or Reject the History Lesson
If you want to make historical furniture reproductions or pieces that are inspired by vintage work, you must devote yourself to studying old work – in person, up close and without prejudice.
But if you want to make things that are new or modern, you instead must devote yourself to studying old work – in person, up close and without prejudice. Otherwise, how will you know what it is you are rebelling against or rejecting?
In other words, no matter what sort of furniture maker you are, understanding the furniture record will make you a better one. Otherwise you might end up like some members of the Bauhaus, for example, who rejected historical work and set out to reinvent architecture, furniture and other crafts from first principles. As a result, they made a lot of unnecessary and time-consuming mistakes to create a new world. (See armchair F 51 designed for the director’s room of the Bauhaus.)
As I see it, every generation of makers has goals that fall upon these three lines:
Exalt old work to revive principles that have been forgotten by our degenerate society.
Create new work that rejects the principles of our degenerate society.
Make birdhouses.
All three are completely valid ways of approaching the craft. Only No. 3 allows you to skip the furniture record and create something useful with minimal effort.
Another Chinese chair. Hans Wegner’s Chinese Chair No. 1 (1944).
As I write this, I am surrounded by hundreds of books filled with thousands of pieces of furniture that I’ll never build. Many of those pieces are somewhat ugly or, at the least, too ornate for my taste. Yet I am thrilled to study every line and curve of every William & Mary, Georgian or Seymour piece that I can lay my hands on. Some of these pieces are brilliant because of their technicality. Their talented makers found clever ways of making extremely complex pieces in a shockingly simple way. (If you have studied furniture bandings, then you know what I mean.)
Other pieces are notable because of the sheer patience and focus of the maker (see French marquetry).
Still other pieces are forms that are perfectly proportioned in silhouette.
In my personal work, I seek to combine all three of those properties (though I rarely succeed). And the only way I can try to reach that goal is to study old work. So every day I open an old book, go to a museum in a strange city (thank you, crazy teaching schedule) or plumb the Internet.
Example: In a manor house in Cornwall there’s a beautiful Chinese chair. Why is it there, surrounded by 300-year-old English stuff? The house’s docents don’t know. So I buy a book on the history of the manor house and its contents. I explore Chinese chair construction on the Internet. I turn up some Hans Wegner chairs in my search and find a bright string from traditional Chinese furniture through Danish Modern.
Suddenly, the curve of the chair’s crest rail makes sense, across time and cultures. What I do with that information is up to me as a designer – but if I decide to incorporate a wishbone shape into a future design, I have a path to explore all the possibilities. And I can embrace or reject the history lesson.
