I'm a mostly self-taught woodworker heavily influenced by Japanese tools, Japanese woodworking, and a love for hand cut joinery. This is my journey into craftsmanship.
Very nice bench. Enjoyed seeing your build. Wow, that Danish oil really makes it look nice. Interesting - I have never seen those leather covers for your bench dog holdfasts. I think the 5-foot size will serve you well. Most projects are not that large and when they are larger you can always figure out a way to deal with it. Best to you. Happy woodworking.
Wow… I know you said you’ve answered the kind of hand plane you use. Which I can see is from Suzuki Tools. Would you mind sharing which particular hand planes you prefer to use?
I don’t really have a preference for smith but I do have a handful of Yamamoto planes. Blue steel tends to give me excellent results but white steel is a speedy and effective sharpener.
@@CowDogCraftWorks 18:42 is where the slick on the table is. , I’m new to working with Japanese tools and appreciate your work, would you ever use glue in these joints?
I know this is an old vid but I just now found it. This is a perfect beginner project and one that will be useful. My son just moved into his first house and this will be a great project we can do together so he can start woodworking without having to build an expensive large heavy workbench like mine. Hell I will probably make one for myself as well. Keep up the good works.
Thanks! Yeah I still use the hell out of mine. I did it at the same height as my timber frame saw horses which are also on the channel so I can use them all in tandem if I need to.
Hey Chris @cowdogcraftwood did the 2 part epoxy or urethane finish effect the fit in the trigger mortise? Did you compensate at all when sizing the mortise? Also, can you share any details about how you sized the shaft track for the size spear shaft the gun will use? Thanks!
Didn’t affect the mortise whatsoever. As far as the track itself I used a spear shaft and went somewhere between 1/16 to 1/8 larger… it was a while ago so my memory is a little fuzzy.
I absolutely love this project and the greater initiative. Can you tell me what the marking device you are using is? Is there an existing video I should check out?
There’s a handful I used. Is it the beveled marking gauge you’re referring to? Or is it the ink pot/ink line? Apologies it’s been a while since I made the video.
@@CowDogCraftWorks sorry it looks like a paint brush and leaves a line like a Japanese calligraphy brush. Not sure I’d rely on it for thin dovetail lines, but it’s absolutely beautiful
@@jamesbarros950 yeah that’s a sumitsubo… Japanese ink line. They make smaller ones that can be used for furniture applications they also have more ornate ones. However, modernly a lot of people just use ink pen.
Now I'm looking for a blade to buy (to build a handle for), but the blades I have found so far are replacement blades for existing handles and do not have a tang like the one on your video, just a short part with some other kind of seating mechanism, such as a hook or a cross with screw holes. Where can I find a good Japanese saw blade with a tang?
@@CowDogCraftWorks I'm in Sweden, so a European store would be preferable. But if shipping costs are not too high I could order from other parts of the world as well. Amazon has Swedish and German sites but I did not find this kind of blade there. Perhaps I'm not using the correct terms to search for it. I've been using search words such as replacement tang blade Japanese saw.
@@Ianssoniihonestly I would check out Kurashige tool. They ship directly from Japan. I order a lot of stuff from them and they do have quality saws. Although I believe a lot of them have handles. I’m actually getting a batch of saws in myself. E-mail me cowdogcraftworks@gmail.com and if shipping isn’t too oppressive I could probably make something work for you.
Thank you for a very good video on this subject, that I happened to be interested in today! I have one question though. At 6:40 you describe how to separate the blade from the handle again: "if you want to remove the handle you tap on the handle toward the neck, while supporting the blade with your other hand." I don't quite understand. English is not my primary language, so please help me out. (I thought you were doing exactly that, tapping on the handle in the direction of the neck in the film, to get the blade into the handle.) Could you describe the separation in other words? I learnt the technique of putting a mallet head on its handle as a child in the 80's, and was also fascinated. This may have been when playing croquet, and the mallets came off their handles, but I never intentionally wanted to get them to loosen :) Edit: now I found another video. At 2 min 18 s in this one. I guess that's how you disassemble the blade from the handle: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-SC3j5whLzHE.html .
Howdy!! What are the parts you used for the trigger and stuff? And also what was the total cost (excluding labor)? It is an amazing speargun and as a spearo myself I’d definitely use that gun!
Honestly? Fairly inexpensive. The trigger mechanism is from neptonics. It was under a hundred bucks… granted I made this like four years ago. I got the reel from them too and that was fairly inexpensive. Of course… the tools to build it aren’t necessarily cheap. It really depends on your hardware kit… definitely check out neptonics for that.
@@CowDogCraftWorksill definitely check them out! I’ve been thinking of building my own speargun after watching your videos, since my buddy is a carpenter i guess me and him can work on one! Would be great to send u the final results!
It’s been a long time since I’ve made it so I’d have to go measure it. If I had to guess though… the head is probably like a 10x8 face and 12” long. Handle is probably 48”.
How did this hold up? I have some black walnut pieces that I need to use, and I really want to do a table this way. With the expansion/contraction of the wood, do you have any separation or did the epoxy maintain its adhesion to the concrete?
The epoxy maintained its adhesion but… do not place anything hot on the epoxy without a trivet of some kind… wife let a citronella candle burn to the base of the can and well… it created problems.
Really nice work. This is by far the best one on setting up the Japanese plane. A jem of a video. Going against the grain with western or Japanese blade is the same. All about the sharpness and cutting angle. So for people saying you can’t do this or that with Japanese plane (or western), all of those have been done or been done for decades by people on all kinds of lumber. My only problem with Japanese plane is the availability of one in US (for a reasonable price) made of the right wood to make sure that it doesn’t fluctuate too much between the winter and summer.
Thank you. So for the most part they’re almost all either made from Japanese white oak (kashi) or Japanese red oak (hon akagashi). I do know a guy that lives in Canada that cuts his own dai from Osage orange. Suzuki tool is a great resource for getting Japanese tools in the states. Thanks for watching. ❤️
The top is “butt joined” for lack of a better term to the torsion box style base. So there’s nothing restricting movement. It expands and contracts freely along its width.
Thank you guy C D C W ; for English speaking, I has been watched Indonesain guy for 2 years I don't understand what they said, but I watched what they doing by my eye is the translator not the language at all , so you speak English explain very well because we are speak English thank s again 👍👍.
I think you can use both. If you get tired of one position you get to the other one. It would be better for your body. You reduce the repetitive movements in half.
This was a awesome video, a great companion to Odate and Brotherton's books. I feel more confident after watching this. I just got two beautiful block planes from Suzki-Ya. I decided i want true the soles on sandpaper on a glass plate. And a card scraper to relieve the hollows, After watching your and another video on RU-vid. Because im familiar with the process and i already have those tools. But I also plan to oil fill them to stabilize them. And im not sure if i can set the blade and true the sole then oil fill after without it shifting or warping. I want to oil fill after because the oil might clog the sand paper. I just purchased them and live in Indiana. Thanks Tim
My only caution with a card scraper is the flexibility across its length. You want to make sure the relief is even across the full width of the block. I wouldn’t worry about oil clogging your sandpaper. Once the oil cures in the block it’s a bit of a non issue.
@CowDogCraftWorks Ive been following you guide to setting up my Japanese hand plane. I finished today and when I try and plane my wood. The plane cuts in to the wood and gouges it. Making it hard to move or getting stuck. I flatten the chipbreaker, with the gouging i the wood chips stuck. The only thing I didnt do was use the scrapper since I dont have anything. What am I doing wrong?
Could be a few things. For starters it sounds like your depth of cut is too deep. The blade should barely protrude from the body. If you’re sighting down the bottom toward the mouth it should resemble a thin hair at the mouth. You should be able to take effective passes first without the chip breaker.
I can’t get this thing to shake if I tried. It’s a brick. I am considering taking the leg chop off and replacing it with a bench hook. Since this video I’ve gotten really into Japanese tools and the leg chop, while useful at times, tends to get in the way.
I have a variety of stones but my low grit stones 3000 and under are nsk diamond resins. Not particularly practical from a cost perspective but they do cut very fast.
@@CowDogCraftWorks Those are expensive indeed, but resin bonded diamond stones are great. Fast cutting speed and flatness of diamond stones but the feel of a waterstone.
Thats what I desperately needed.... Thanks a lot for this detailed guide. I bought 2 "entry level" japanese Planes last week and now i know how to properly Set them up ❤ this is goin to be a Blast, cant wait for them to arrive 😊
