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When I first became intrigued by hand-tool woodworking, I kept encountering people who said things such as: “Yes, but Moxon says jointer planes should have their cutters sharpened straight across – not curved.”

“Moxon says you should cut mortises this way.”

“Moxon says you should test a handsaw by bending it.”

As Jan Brady of “The Brady Bunch” might say: Moxon. Moxon. Moxon!

At the time, I figured I should really try to take a woodworking class with Joseph Moxon. He seemed to have the ear of the entire woodworking hand-tool community. As I soon found out, however, Moxon has been dead since 1691. Not even the long arm of Marc Adams would be able to get that guy to teach a class. Nor would Marc want to. Moxon was a printer and globe-maker by trade. Not a woodworker.

What Moxon did, however, was remarkable. He published the first ever English-language account of woodworking shop practice. He covered tools, techniques and general shop practice in a series of pamphlets titled “The Art of Joinery,” which were later combined with accounts he wrote about other trades into the seminal “Mechanick Exercises.”

So I snagged a reprinted copy of “Mechanick Exercises” and read it several times. It was slow-going. The English language of the 17th century transposed the letter “f” for the letter “s.” So the sentence “…so shall the bounds of your mortise be struck” reads as “fo fhall the bounds of your Mortefs be ftruck.” Plus the sentence structure of the time can be a maze for the modern mind.

Fourteen months ago, I began to update the text of the chapters that comprise “The Art of Joinery.” I cleaned up the transpositions, shortened the run-on sentences without changing the meanings, and I added notes in the text to help the reader. I split up Moxon’s plates so the drawing of the paring chisel is with the text about the paring chisel.

Then I added my own plain-spoken explanation of Moxon’s original text, which can be bedeviling at times. I tried to explain what was going on in each section of “The Art of Joinery,” and I illustrated Moxon’s techniques with more than 40 photos.

It’s not an academic book by any means – I’ll leave that to the people with more college degrees. The text I added is from the perspective of a modern woodworker seeking to understand historical shop practice and find techniques to make life easier. And I did indeed find some good stuff in Moxon, from using a fore plane properly to using spit to sharpen.

I’ve put it all in a 96-page book that is now at the printer in Maryland. This will be a hardbound 6” x 9” book with a linen cover and embossed letters. The interior pages will be Smythe sewn – meaning the pages will be sewn together instead of simply glued. The entire book will be in old-fashioned black and white.

The book will be $17 and will be available here at Lost Art Press and through a select few woodworking retailers. It will not be available through mass-market channels. All copies sold through the Lost Art Press web site will be signed, of course.

As soon as the book arrives in house later this fall, we’ll update the site.

— Christopher Schwarz

Guess what? I finally got my Wenzloff & Sons, Seaton tennon saw and it was worth the wait! This is the 19” inch monster. When I first tried this saw it felt too tippy to use. Chris explained that this is an advantage that helps you saw plumb. The reason is that you can use the tippy-ness of the saw to tell you when you are plumb. When you balance the saw on the work, not tipping one side or other, the saw is plumb! It is simple physics. All you have to do is move it to and fro to get a perfect cut. I know that there is a story floating around that Newton discovered gravity by watching an apple fall, but I don’t believe it. It’s more likely that a woodworker already knew this because of his saw and told Newton about it.

Anyway, I have been practicing Chris’s sawing technique for sawing tennons. I marked out a couple of tennons and started to saw. In the first picture below you can see how I have the work clamped in the vise. This way I can advance on two lines at once. The important thing is to stop when you hit the shoulder line. The picture shows where I stopped sawing. Flip the work around in the vise and do the same technique on the other side stopping in the same place. The result is that both sides are cut down to the shoulder lines with a “hump” remaining in the middle of the work.

Now to saw the hump, clamp the work in the vertical position and roll the saw horizontal advancing down the hump (see the second picture). The third picture is the result. The tennon is ok. You can see there is some of the line left on one side and nothing on the opposite side. This problem is caused by our bodies. To explain, if you extend your arm away from your body it is easy to roll your palm down. When sawing I have noticed that us right hander’s push the saw plate out as we slightly and inadvertently roll our palms down. This problem shows as the cut travels away from the line or across the line, depending on which side of the tennon I am sawing. I think being aware of this tendency will help correct it. I have done six cuts so I think another 94 and I might actually make something.

– John

What do you think of this clock! Nice isn’t it. Yes and no. Yes that is my house and no I didn’t build it. This is a Shaker clock built by Glen Huey for Popular Woodworking issue number 163, 08/01/2007. As a woodworker, I have a strong aversion to purchasing furniture. When I see a piece of furniture that I like, I say to myself “I can make that and I will be able to justify a new tool”. The piece goes onto my list of things to build which is presently, six months behind! So when recently visiting Chris, I noticed this clock that was still sitting in the office. After some pleading, I was able to take it home.

Now, when sitting in my favorite chair looking at this piece I feel inspired. When I look at pieces I have built, I tend to focus on what went wrong. I say to myself, heck there is that gap that was caused by…or, if I do that next time I won’t make that mistake again…on and on. When I look at this clock I see what is right. I notice different things and think “how did he do that”? I grab that article and find the answer. I am also inspired by the dimensions and can use the width/height ratios or the size of moldings on the waist or hood to help me design a new piece. It is nice to see something in my own house that encourages me to get up out of the chair and as Glen says, build something great!

-John

Once upon a time, after finishing a nice dinner, a couple bottles of wine, some beer, vodka and gin someone said “John don’t you have a bench to move.” The referenced bench was the 8′ long Nicholson English bench built by Christopher Schwarz and made from Southern Yellow Pine. My shop is in the basement which lies on the other side of a tight turn at the bottom of the steps.

Earlier in the evening I had taken out a tape and measured the space. It seemed to me that there was a “9 foot space” that would allow the 8 foot bench to clear the wall. So we put down our glass, picked up the bench, two in front and two at the other end, and proceeded down the stairs. As we moved closer to the “9 foot space” it got tight, well ok, it got stuck. Being that we all were feeling quite optimistic from the wine, we naturally pushed forward until I heard a noise and Chris say “there goes your wall.” Undeterred we pulled back, shifted the bottom up a bit and pushed again. Yes, another sound and another “there goes your wall.” After another number of minutes and another sound I looked up to see my wife laughing hard and holding the video camera. As the concerned and helpful wife that she is, she saw the train wreck before it happened and decided to film it. I wonder if I should search Youtube….

Anyway, I did get the bench to the basement and decided to rip out the offending wall! There must be a moral to this story but I am not sure what it is. Maybe it is build a bench that can be taken apart?

Last summer we filmed a new DVD on workbenches. When I say “we” I mean Chris Schwarz, Jeff, AJ and Mandy. I helped as I could, moving benches (three benches were used and rotated through), turning on and off lights, chiseling an area of a workbench and whatever else I could do. I also learned what a “Grip” is. You know when watching the credits at the end of a movie you see the term “Grip”. In order to fix a light issue, AJ came up with the idea to hold a blue cloth behind Chris. It worked and I stood there and gripped the cloth.

Making a woodworking DVD is a lot of work. Many different shots were taken to show something from different angles. There was pausing to wait for the passing of a loud truck, voice overs, changes in the sun glare through the windows, reflections from a camera tripod and other issues. The crew did a great job noticing anything that interfered with the shot or the sound. Then there was the heat. We had all the windows shut and turned the A/C off because of noise. When they turned the lights on it felt like putting your hand in front of a roaring fire!

Now that Chris is done, there will be more hours spent watching the video and selecting the best takes to put on the final DVD. All is all it was a lot of fun for me, and Maine in the Summer is hard to beat. And yes, I went to Lie-Nielsen Toolworks and bought some new tools. I bought two chisels, a 1/2 inch and a 3/8 inch for dovetailing. I have been using Marples blue chip chisels which are great but the sides are quite thick and as Chris has written, the wide chisel sides tend to monkey up the area where the bottom of the tail meets the baseline. So, after trying to save money and avoid buying more tools I splurged on two chisels. If you haven’t been to Maine it is a great place to visit and see the Toolworks.

-John