Lost Art Press

Moulding Planes: Where to Start

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I recently had a conversation with a professional woodworker and carver who was shocked that other pros use dovetail jigs for casework when making high-end commissions. I pointed out the irony of his statement: He never makes mouldings by hand before adding carving to them.

Everybody sees the process differently. To each his own.

A lot of people get into this hobby through machinery and then add some sort of handwork. Dovetails appear to be most woodworkers’ transition point. Once you know how to make this joint by hand, your drawers do not have to be made to fit the jig. Even if the jig has variable spacing, dovetails done by hand are nearly unanimously seen to be more attractive than those done by machine. Additionally, the skill is recognized by even the most novice among us. If nothing else, it’s a way to immediately transmit our prowess to others who are in the know. It’s a secret handshake of sorts.

Like making dovetails with a saw and chisel, making mouldings with hollows and rounds has real advantages. You will make profiles that highlight a piece exactly the way you want. You will manipulate the light and shadows to fit the piece and your eye, not in a predetermined fashion made by a manufacturer. By making mouldings by hand you will dictate your results.

Unlike making dovetails by hand, the tooling, method, purpose and starting point for making mouldings with hollows and rounds is not always apparent. After all, any dovetail on furniture can be cut with a single saw. Every moulding cannot be made with two, four or even 10 moulding planes.

The good news is that most of us have no need to be able to make every moulding. Most of our work does not encompass the full range of furniture and decoration. We may all include ogees in our pieces, but not all of us make ogees that range from 1/4” in width to 3”. Most of us do not need a half set of hollows and rounds (nine pairs, 18 planes that range from 1/8” radius up to 1-½”) along with snipes bills, side rounds and plows.

The inevitable question of “where do I begin?” is one I’ve addressed a lot. The first answer is that you must have a way to accurately and efficiently make many varying rabbets. If you are not comfortable with making the following rabbets then you will need a method to do so.

I opt for a rabbet plane (often supplemented with a table saw) to make rabbets. A simple rabbet plane has no fence and no depth stop, which is an absolute advantage. No fence and no depth stop means no adjustments, which means that you can hop from one rabbet to the next in the course of a recoil from a forward stroke.

Like a rabbet plane, hollows and rounds also lack fences and depth stops, which, again, is an advantage to those making small runs of profiles. Hollows and rounds make a specific circumference – not a specific profile. “Mouldings in Practice,” my new book to be published by Lost Art Press, will walk you through the process from holding the planes and setting the irons to making large profiles composed of several different shapes.

With one hollow and one round and a method for making rabbets you are able to make a few dozen profiles. Each profile, however, will be derived from the same circumference. You will learn which tools you need as you learn the process of using them. I think you need at least two pairs to learn how to truly use them.

If you start with two pairs of hollows and rounds, you are able do far more than twice as much. With two pairs you will, of course, be able to make the same moulding profiles in two different dimensions. You will also be able to mix and match the concave with the convex to mimic profiles that are more representative of those that you will see upon the pieces throughout the ages. By adding a second pair of hollows and rounds you are also able to make ovular or elliptical shapes by using two different sized pairs.

With two pairs of hollows and rounds you are able to make multiple moulding profiles that complement each other and are not simply derivatives of the same circle. By adding that second pair of planes to your repertoire you are able to recognize the true versatility that these planes both allow and encourage.

If you do not know where to begin but you know you want to make one specific profile, find the various radii included in the profile with a circle template and you’ll have your answer.

If you still do not know where to begin then I often recommend starting with either pairs of 6s and 10s (radii of 6/16 and 10/16, respectively) or 4s and 8s (radii of 4/16 and 8/16, according to the numbering system to which I subscribe). If the largest piece on your “to do” list is a lowboy or small chest of drawers, then go with the 4s and 8s. If you want to make a high chest of drawers or something larger, go with the 6s and 10s.

These two pairs of planes may be all you ever need to execute the profiles of your choice. If you later decide to add more pairs you will know exactly where to go with the experience you have gained at the bench. Whether you end up with four pairs or 14, these sizes will certainly be included in your ideal set.

Moving the process from your computer to the bench is the most important thing to do in acquiring this skill. As you progress, you will learn to sharpen more accurately, lay profiles out better, and to design as you see the profile take shape knowing that you can change it at any point.

By using the methods I describe on my blog and in my book you will never get to the end of a profile and wonder what went wrong. The answer is always apparent.

But what do you do in a few months when you recognize that your first attempted profiles aren’t perfect? Tell anybody who notices that you once bought cheap router bits and didn’t have the control like you do now. And be content knowing that you’ve distracted them with the great work you have done on your dovetails. That’s the secret handshake that most people know. This one – hand-cut moulding – is still a secret.

— Matt Bickford, author of the forthcoming “Mouldings in Practice”

New: ‘Chisel, Mallet, Plane and Saw’ by Tony Konovaloff

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While reading John Brown’s columns in the 1990s, I learned about a West Coast woodworker named Tony Konovaloff who built furniture for clients entirely by hand. Brown, writing in Good Woodworking magazine, mentioned that Konovaloff was writing a book about the way he worked.

At the time, that seemed crazy to me. The biggest force in woodworking was Norm Abram’s “New Yankee Workshop,” and the Internet had yet to bring together all the nutty hand-tool woodworkers in the world. We had Roy Underhill, but his show seemed no match for Norm, who was everywhere.

But something that Konovaloff wrote back then stuck deep in my craw:

“The things I make may be for others, but how I make them is for me.”

Konovaloff’s book languished, slumbered, hibernated. But earlier this year, Konovaloff started a web site and made the finishing touches to the book, which had been in the works for two decades.

Like everything in his life, Konovaloff published the book on his own terms. He did the lay out. The photos. He had it printed by a local printer. He was determined to get the book published in the way he envisioned it.

Because his book embodies so many of the principles that we believe in at Lost Art Press, we have taken the unusual step of carrying the book – “Chisel, Mallet, Plane and Saw” – in our store. It is a great book. Opinionated. Based on experience. Succinct. To the point.

In its 146 pages, Konovaloff discusses both how he builds furniture by hand and why. He spent a year under James Krenov at The College of the Redwoods, but it would be a mistake to say his work is derivative of Krenov’s.

In the book, Konovaloff says his biggest influence is the Shakers. Yet, when you look at the cabinets in “Chisel, Mallet, Plane and Saw,” you cannot help but feel there is a modernist muscle that pulls each design taut. His work is clean and focuses on small and subtle details – tight-fitting drawers and doors. Subtle reveals and quirks. Precisely fitted frame-and-panel backs.

And yet, his stuff is designed for living – not for display.

The majority of the text of the book focuses on how he works – the minimum tool kit, the shop and the mindset for modern hand work. He uses basic tools, and yet Konovaloff stretches them to their limits to make drawer blades with sliding dovetails, haunched and mitered mortise-and-tenon joints and coopered doors.

If you appreciate things that are simple, well-built and fit for a contemporary home, we think you will appreciate “Chisel, Mallet, Plane and Saw” as much as we do.

The book is black-and-white with both photos and hand illustrations. Printed and bound in the United States. The book is available to ship immediately. Click here to order it for $35 plus shipping.

— Christopher Schwarz

I’ve Got Crabs (Don’t Tell my Wife)

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While in Maine earlier this month, I was looking forward to lobster and a trip to Liberty Tool in Liberty, Maine. I wasn’t interested in buying tools at Liberty – I’ve got enough of those. Mostly I wanted to raid the store’s mason jars.

The store is chock-a-block with bits of hardware – old screws, nails, pulls, locks and the like.

I was going to drive up to Liberty Tool last Sunday, but then I found out that furniture maker Freddy Roman had beat me to it and ransacked the place.

Sigh. While I’m not much of a wood hoarder (until tomorrow, perhaps), I do pick up bits of hardware whenever I stumble on them. Good blacksmith-made chest handles can cost less than $10. A crab lock, like the one shown above, runs about $80.

While I try to give blacksmith Peter Ross all the business I can (he’s actually making a crab lock for a tool chest for me), I cannot always afford custom work. So buying old stuff stretches my hardware budget without having to buy from Home Depot.

Your best bet is to shop for the stuff in person. While you can find cut nails, hinges and locks on eBay, the prices are high. One guy was asking $7 for a nail. A bent one. Other woodworkers I know have had good luck with Robinson Antiques, especially for chest lifts and locks.

Again, you pay for the convenience. The best prices are in the scrounge market. And scrounging takes time.

I you are wondering what the heck a crab lock is, check out the video below. It’s a surface-mount chest lock that can automatically lock the lid when you close it. Of course, this is a fantastic way to accidentally lock your key in your chest. So be wary of the crab’s claws. They bite.

— Christopher Schwarz

Pictures from the Womb

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Here we have 11 more tool chests, waiting to be born.

Next week I’ll be at Kelly Mehler’s School of Woodworking building “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” alongside the students. One of their questions will be on hardware – what to use and where to get it.

I’ve been completely satisfied with the hinges and ring pulls from Horton Brasses. But what if you want something more old school? Something like a crab lock, perhaps?

Stay tuned.

— Christopher Schwarz

Spots Open in the ‘Hammer in Hand’ Class

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There are several spots open in the “Hammer in Hand” class that runs Sept. 4-8 at the Marc Adams School of Woodworking in Franklin, Ind.

The class is perhaps poorly named – it’s not just about nails. Instead, the course is as much instruction on building traditional casework by hand that I can cram into five days. During the class we build three projects: A Moxon dovetailing vise, a shooting board/bench hook and the dovetailed Schoolbox from “The Joiner and Cabinet Maker.”

The class is open to all skill levels of woodworkers. I’ve had students who have never picked up a tool before, and I’ve had professional woodworkers who want to learn hand techniques.

The class is structured to challenge your ideas about handwork. Most people get the impression that it is slow, perhaps a little crude or that you need years of training to do basic things. Not so. Here’s some of stuff we learn in the class.

1. Sharpening. Get it done in three minutes and get back to work. It’s more fun to make tools dull than it is to make them sharp.

2. Flattening by hand. How to quickly flatten boards with planes by paying attention to only a couple key surfaces and ignoring the rest.

3. Shooting. How to shoot boards for accurate joinery with a simple appliance.

4. Dovetailing. Learn what’s important and what’s not so you focus your energy and attention in the right place. Find out where people make their biggest mistake (it’s not sawing or chiseling).

5. Traditional glues. Why hide glue is the woodworker’s friend.

6. Truing up an glued carcase without spleching the corners.

7. Nails. Why you should love cut nails. They are an important part of the hardware, like a lock or pulls.

8. Cut dados by hand. It’s a snap. No dado plane needed.

9. Make basic mouldings by hand – both with complex moulders and hollows and rounds.

10. Mitering by hand. You don’t need a chop saw.

So if you have a free week, we’d love to have you join the class. It’s the only class I’m teaching in 2012 that has any open spots. To register or get more information on the class, click here.

— Christopher Schwarz