Hand Tool Craze
Hand Tool Craze…. I am a hobbiest, as who all, started with power tools. I work as an accountant. Woodworking lets me have the creative release I need. Discovering handtools has allowed me relax, and learn the finer points of the craft. As for the future, I see myself developing into a hybrid woodworker. Power when easiest, but hand when doing the finer craft side.
I agree that the use of guides can be dangerous and is probably a carryover from powertool thinking. (As is the idea that you can buy your way into accuracy)
But some handtool appliances are useful – like a Stanley #241 Mitre Box.
The major difference is that the edge of a handtool must be kept free to cut the wood. The wood moves to the blade on most floor and bench mounted power tools, but the tool moves and the wood is fixed with most handtools. So IMHO the most important “jigs” for handwork are those that keep the wood where you want it so you can use your tool properly. That’s why benches. holdfasts, bench hooks, vices etc are at the top of the handtool user’s jig list.
Using magnets and screws and suchlike to hold the tool or its blade is incorrect, you don’t have the HP to work that way (of course the exception to this rule is the handplane, which is a jig to hold a chisel, but it also provides the user with a way to move it). But a guide that doesn’t affect the free working of the tools edge can help.
So a shooting board, a mitre box or even a jointer plane fence is OK as training wheels – I have seen an old woodie with a fence for jointing. Similarly appliances to help with boring straight (or at the right angle) and to the right depth are OK.
But once you have got your inner square set up through muscle memory, you don’t need it (like sharpening jigs).
The trick with all of them is that they mustn’t affect the smooth operation of the tool because if you need to use more force to make the tool do its job, you have just made the tool not only more difficult, but also more dangerous, to use (it’s as if you had deliberately dulled the blade).
Some jigs and fences are easier and better to use than others. That’s why I often use a batten when rebating or ploughing – it interferes less than the side fence with the smooth operation of the plane, in my experience.
This is a fun discussion, let’s keep it up.
I would like to think that Bob would agree with me. I think he and I see pretty eye to eye.
Jeremy, you raise some good points about “jigs” like bench hooks and other work holding methods. Shooters are a great help but what about when it won’t work like squaring up the end of a 4×4 bench leg? I have seen people paralyzed with what to do because it won’t fit the shooter. I guess that’s where the don’t be afraid to screw up part comes in. You strike some lines and hit it with a plane and/or chisel until the square says it’s good. I think primarily the sawing jigs are the ones that strike me as odd.
All this discussion of hand tools throughout the past few years has, I believe, been very beneficial to the whole of the woodworking community, and hopefully it will continue to grow. I also think that the availability, while at a certain cost, of very high quality hand tools has also spurred this movement towards fine craftsmanship. Fine tools can create even finer work if wielded properly. However, my understanding is that the human body is the ultimate square, guide, reference, whatever you choose to call it. The muscles just need to be trained, and shooting boards, battens, hold-fasts, vises, etc. just increase our ability to use these hand tools properly and train ourselves in their use. I’m pretty sure an old timer would roll over in his grave if he saw someone using a dovetail saw with a “guide” to get a perfect cut, lay out your tails and pins, saw to that line and LEARN how to do it. I know any woodworkers’ satisfaction will be much greater to err on a few pins and tails while learning to do it properly. This is a great craft and the universal motor certainly put a lot of ideas in a lot of peoples heads, but hand work is an entirely different aspect, don’t pull a Tim Taylor and strap a motor to everything, some things work just fine as is. Happy shavings everyone!
I agree with the sawing issue, although even here I believe it is not so easy to be definitive on the point. There are longstanding techniques which in effect create jigs or otherwise help to develop the requisite muscle memory. A first class saw cut not only creates a clean edge, it also provides a fence to run the saw against. Similarly, for the 2X4 crosscut, the old timers had training tip for the tenderfoot – strike two lines 1/8″ apart and saw down the middle; it does work and it helps develop muscle memory.
Where this leads me is to the suggestion that in handtool use there is a lot of knowledge that needs to be acquired. Some of it was lost when apprenticeship dropped away as the main trade learning method but it can be obtained by reading the old classics of woodwork as well as thru modern sources (HTS, podcasts like Bob R’s, St Roy’s shows and school, the Schwarz’s books and articles, online forms, etc). Some of it only comes by the experience of cutting wood at the bench. Unlike power tool use, only rarely can you buy a jig or gizmo that replaces the learning process in hand tool work – you just have to do the leaning somehow and having done that at the cerebral level, you just have to do the musle training physically.
One other thought – apropos the learning process, I wonder if this isn’t where Sloyd comes in. Doing the exercises in the order of the course not only creates the cerebral knowledge of the techniques, but also builds the skills gradually, so that the path is one of incremental addition of skill with each step reinforced by a successful physical task.
And that Jeremy is exactly why I based my Hand Tool School on the Sloyd principles. Thanks for helping me make that point.
Well said Shannon, for me the first big draw to hand tools away from power tools was the inherent simplicity I could see in just setting up a board and cutting or shaping it. When I was doing a lot of power tool work I hated the part where I had to build a jig for this and another jig for that. I didn’t want to build jigs, I wanted to build furniture.
Nothing replaces the time you can spend with the tools in your hands learning to just cut it true and square the first time, and nothing replaces the feeling when that practice and hard work pays off and you can do it consistently.
The yesterday in the shop I cross cut five 9″ wide boards to accurate size and square via handsaw. I couldn’t help but smile at the accomplishment and feeling I got from it. I never got that feeling of accomplishment when using the table saw or the miter saw.
I used to really enjoy woodworking and the results of my labors. Since I discovered hand tools I find myself simply enjoying the whole process of creating a finished piece.
Cheers
Oldwolf
I’ve read through all the posts here and can relate well with portions of each author’s ideas. However, Oldwolf struck a nerve when describing the feelings of elation/accomplishment of his hand sawn perfection! I can remember the very moment when my “inner square” kicked into gear and I “sawed the line” on a project and, when tried, the edge was arrow straight and righteous square! The magic of the craft revealed itself to me through that straight and square edge and I’ve been hooked (more like addicted) since that moment.
My inspiration initially came from my grandfather when I was very young. My favorite memories are working in “grandpa’s workshop” under his sage tutelage. Dad wouldn’t let me touch his tools, but Grandpa would! Dad wouldn’t let me near a power tool when I was seven, but Grandpa would! I remember vividly the first time he let me use the drill press for the first time. I was seven and I was, with his help, making a cribbage board out of an old wood His words still ring true with me as I set about my work. “Set the blade to the wood” he’d say about the table saw, “so if you make a mistake you only cut your finger, not cut it clean off!”
It’s on his early advice that I bought only high quality tools. If he said it once, he must’ve said it a hundred times, “A good tool is a lifetime friend, but a cheap tool is nothing but junk.” I only had to prove his wisdom once when I bought a “bargain” tool…I despised that tool for six months before I finally gave it to my a neighbor I didn’t like very much and bought the upgrade for myself!
I was fortunate enough to spend this last weekend entirely in my shop. The curls of pine, oak and maple left on the shop floor all had a significant role in the answer to my current state of relaxation. Ahhhhh, the smells and sounds of handwork…there’s nothing better!
Wishing all the opportunity to “stop and smell the sawdust!”
