Japanese Carpentry OSC

OSC stands for Open Source Curriculum

Here I will be posting the teaching/curricular decisions and tools needed for an introductory course in japanese woodworking/carpentry.

Day 0: (Meet up to check the tools, people, pay the fee)
- Take a look a the tools.
- Plane one face each.
- Saw something.

Day 1:
- Sharpening plane blades.
- Set up japanese workshop (planing beam and others).
- Squaring sawn timber with kanna.

(This is the kanna day, plane till you are dead square.)

Day 2:
- Sharpening chisels.
- Lay out and cut saw horses.

(This is the saw day, half laps all day long. Make the shape of the saw horse a sawing exercise.)

Day 3:
- Sharpening saws.
- Ura-dashi and repair old kanna.
- Dovetailed dovetail marking guide.

Day 4:
- Green and green finger joint box / dovetailed box.

(Using the shooting board, joinery exercises.)


Day 5:
- Condition your plane to plane straight.

(It takes a whole lot of time to fix one or two planes for the first time.)

Day 6:
- Make a dai in a day.

(Saw, plane square, lay out, chisel. Instructor should buy irons, repair them in day 3, sharpen in day 4 and give to student in day 6)

Day 6.5:
- Visit to the lumber yard/flea market with food outside. 

Day 7:
- Workshop appliances: straight edge, winding sticks, shooting boards, planing board. 

Day 8:
- Centre lining, sashigane use and joint marking/cutting. 

Day 9, 10, 11...

- Project mayhem 3.0:



Once every month we meet for a full day to make the above box happen. It has 33 joints or so, each joint needs ca. 4 man hours plus preparing the wood. You need at least to have taken the basic course, bring a pair of saw horses, sharpening stones and your own saw, hammer and chisel. I guess the ideal number of people for this is 8 including me. We mark the joints together and then you cut it yourself. No errors are allowed at this stage.

The basic tool list:

- Dozuki 180 diagonal cut
- Ryoba 240
- Hammer
- Kanna
- Chisels
- Sharpening system (In my experience, you only need to go to 3000 for a beginners course, how long they need to reach 6000 or 12000? good question. King 1000/6000 it's a very good only stone if your stuff is not chipped.)

(This basic tool list means you don't need to fix your kanna, if you want to fix your kanna too you need more tools —chisels in smaller sizes at least, paring chisels would be nice— same goes if you want to sharpen your saw, etc. Which brings me to the coca cola bottle. Did you watch the gods must be crazy? Tools are not iphones. They are not individual and isolated beings. They are tools only when in a certain social context and for somebody with a certain skill set. A tool is only a tool in a skilled hand. Or rather: tool is the name of the process, not the object.)

Basic appliances:
- Straight edge (made without straight edge, so make 3 in one go).
- Shooting board.
- Planing board with screw for stops.



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