鋸-鉋-鑿　（Nokogiri-Kanna-Nomi）

Yokosaka Masato (横坂正人) is a Japanese blacksmith, plane maker. He is most famous for his rakuzan (樂山) plane. I wanted to post a photo of him, demonstrating the making of a plane blade during kezuroukai 2007. On the photo, notice the simply shaped but massive anvil, the forge itself, the "magic" powder (bottom left) to sprinkle on the steel before forge welding on the iron, the wooden tub full of water for quenching...

It's been well, 5 years since I didn't write anything on my blog, 5 years during which I kept in touch with woodworking, Japanese, Taiwanese and western style, sharpening, but some personal troubles kept me from investing myself into what I like to do. Troubles are behind for the moment, and I hope they remain there.

I see some comments on my posts but can't find out how to reply, I only have the option to mark them as spam, delete them or remove the content! And blogspot is now in mandarin since I am writing from Taiwan! Moreover I received no email notification about the posted comments. I'm quite unhappy about this. I used to be notified when a comment was posted, but in 5years things may have changed in the way blogspot works.

I sincerely apologize to those of you who asked questions, and I thank those of you who found the few posts on this blog interesting. I'll try to address the comments:

Chris and JimR: About the black stone: they are quarried in Taiwan, or were, as my understanding is that they are over 50yrs old. They were only available from local hardware stores near where I live, hidden on a shelf in a corner, as almost no one has any interest into these stones. They are not perfect in shape (may have been chipped) but I find them very interesting to use. They are very very hard, but with a preparation with a nagura or better a diamond stone, they produce a fine slurry which makes the stone much more pleasant to use. I gave one to the boss of Kezurokai (Mr Sugimura) back in 2010 and one to a good friend of mine, so I have only one left for myself. I don't know if they are still available but if you are interested I can check. Let me know (hinokidotkuaimuatgmaildotcom where, dot = . and at = @)

Mark: about tools for making shoji: I'm afraid I am not able to sell any tool for the moment, but you can order from several tool shop in Europe (big one in Germany: more than tools.com but expensive, some in the USA, in the UK I am sure you can find what you need). James: about a link to your friend's shop: yes, why not!

Tibor Hegedüs: about quotation on timber and veneer. I don't have connection with wood wholesaler, sorry.

Karl Holtey: thank you for your encouragement. I am back and will post more indeed.

Kezuroukai involves craftsmen and craftswomen (sure there are ladies holding the plane and rather well), tools and blacksmiths, wood and shavings. But outside the meeting itself there's also other things I'd like to show. Here is a photo gallery.



(I'll finish later)

I think I'd rather split my postings about this kezuroukai meeting in several parts, it will be easier to read compared to one long post.

Dai Making

An other interesting demonstration workshop during this meeting was dai making. More particularly, the making of special planes: kiwa kanna, daitachi kanna...



Traditional dai were made in front of the interested craftsmen. The dai maker Koyoshiya, on the photo above uses oil (in an abura tsubo, an oil pot) as well as a pencil to mark where the blade contacts the wood as the bed is being cut.



Note the position of both dai makers, they work on the floor. The special dai maker, whom unfortunately I couldn't name, is sited in a position that can be found in some yoga posture. He makes great use of his feet to hold the piece at work.



You can see on the photo above that the chisel set of a dai maker (here the one of Koyoshiya) is somehow limited. No extra tool. Each has is adapted to a particular task, from the large chisel for mortising the dai to the tiny narrow ones, through a scraper for removing material only where the blade contacts the wood in its bed.

There should be more to come (on other topics related to this meeting).

I needed this trip to put me back on track with what I like: wood, woodworking, tools and the good craftsmen and women from the woodworking world.

Upon arrival in Nagoya a little after noon, I start helping Mr Sugimura and the copper smith Mr Kunia and son. They were still working on the Inu Jinja, and what a change since I have left 6 months ago.

This kezuroukai was held in Yoita, 与板町, a 5 hrs drive from Nagoya, my base station when I go to Japan. It is a little town of less than 8000 inhabitants, in Niigata prefecture. Yoita hosts several blacksmiths, some very famous in the Japanese woodworking community even abroad in Germany and the USA.

Tatara

Highlights during this meeting was the tatara, the traditional method to reduce sand iron into steel (it is iron with a small but not negligeable amount of carbon). The tatara was set-up by some university students of the university of Nagaoka. The furnace burnt during 36 hours, and from 18kg of sand iron and more of charcoal, about 5kg of steel was harvested.


At the end of the demolition process (bricks of each layers are removed with a pick) the treasure iron is here, glowing at a more than 1000 degree Celsius. Demolition takes time, as one has to wait for the charcoal to burn until the level of the lower layer.



Though the process of making tamahagane, the precious material used to make high end tools and japanese swords, is the same, parameters involved are different: the heat has to be higher, and the amount of raw material much bigger. The time involved is also doubled. The yield of high grade tamahagane is much lower than the one of iron/steel or lower grade tamahagane.

What was my excitement yesterday when the first images of two natural stones powder appeared on the monitor connected to a SEM (Scanning Electron Microscope)!

I had had the idea (more precisely the faint hope of a possibility) to observe stone powders under an SEM soon after I joined the institute where I am currently working here in Taiwan. The Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) regroups many different labs specialized in domains as varied as material science, opto-electronics and medical instrumentation.

I had asked my friend Emma (more thanks to you Emma!) if she could arrange some time to observe the powder, but she had had so far a busy and tight schedule. But eventually the day came. I don't recall having seen many SEM images of stone powder, only 1 of which I am sure, in a Japanese book. And never had I had the chance to observe my own stones.

Before writing more, here is one of the image we saw. It is a black natural stone from Taiwan, which a close friend of mine estimates to be in the 10,000 to 15,000 grit when lapped with a diamond stone.

Taiwanese stone


Japanese stone (Kyoto, honyama brand)



Stone powder preparation

I obtained the stone powder by simply lapping my stones with a diamond plate adding small amount of water. Both the stone and lapping plate were thoroughly rinsed with water prior to collect the slurry. The paste I got from the lapping process was then collected into a clean plastic container and left to dry.
The powder is then scrapped and deposited on a small metallic plate (which fits the SEM vacuum chamber) and covered with a thin, vapor deposited, layer of tin. The tin is necessary for non conductive material and it doesn't change the structure of the specimen.

Comments

Well I hope you can participate!
What stroke me the most is the that many particles appear like scale of a fish, as if some crystals in the stone had been cleaved. I wonder whether that is the action produced by the diamond plate. And that is what would provide the stone (particularly the Taiwan stone) a more pronounced cutting action.
Note also that on a larger scale (dimension), many natural sharpening stones can split into layers or strata. I wonder if the microscopic observation has any relationship with the mentioned property.
Further observations would be to look at the surface of the stone itself, that is flat and free from any slurry from the lapping plate. A whole stone will not fit in the SEM chamber, but I could break off a 1 or 2mm piece.
I would also be curious to observe a slurry in which metal particles are also included from a few sharpening strokes.
Also of course, I would love to observe different stones.
Now, let us make an analogy with planet exploration. If an imaginary earth observer was to point his telescope from a distant planet on the Gobi desert, he/she'd have a seriously biased idea of what earth is. Have you seen the scale of the photos? 1um to 20um... There is surely a lot more to be seen and discovered even for one particular stone.
And my friend said that a blade could also be observed...

The issue to these experiments is the cost. My friend accepted to do it for free the first time, but since her lab performs observations for other departments, it must charge the customer. The cost of using the SEM is about 80US$ per hour. An observation can be done in 30mn a the fastest, that is still some money that unfortunately I would rather spare for buying wood or for a trip to Japan.
If enough of you are interested in these observations, with each one sharing the cost, then let us decide of a stone to observe and conduct more observations.
One remark: with the SEM, we can not distinguish a chemical element from another, silicate from aluminum dioxyde...

Note on the images
I have no problem you copy these images and publish them elsewhere at the condition you mention their origin.

Reflexion of the sun on a copper foil used for roof restoration of the Inu Shrine

Daily work in a Japanese workshop

During this 6 days stay in Japan I have had the chance to work in Mr Sugimura's workshop. Mr Sugimura is a temple maker, also head and creator of kezuroukai.
What stroke me in the workshop, and I believe it is the same in most if not all similar workshops around Japan, was the cohabitation of modern electric machinery with traditional tools and instruments.

Tenons, at least those I have seen being cut in front of me, on beams meant for a house structure, are not with a hand saw but with a device (which I can not name) equipped with 4 motors and 4 blades, cutting in one single pass all sides of the tenons.





At the same time, these tenons and other markings are drawn with a sumisashi dipped into the ink pot of a sumitsubo. The later is also frequently used when it comes to draw straight lines on long beams, including round ones.




Marking tenons with a sumisashi









A sumisashi. They are made from the outer part of big bamboos, sold preformed and to be finished by the craftman.







Mr Mori's selfmade sumitsubo







An interesting tool is this power plane. The blade is fixed and the piece (big, otherwise small hand plane would be used) is carried on top of it. It is impressive to see in work, the beam on the photo is grasped and accelerates significantly before reaching the blade, then it stops at the end of the table and comes back in the hands of the operator. It happened that the pressure of the upper rollers was not enough and the beam continued its course straight ahead, of the nobody was at the other end to catch the beam back.
I used the machine and it is actually fairly simple to operate.
Shavings are checked to assess the quality of the planed surface: a continuous long shaving promises a smooth surface.
For an effective and tear free surface, care must be taken to send the beam ... foot first, with the head (atama) pointing toward the operator. Foot and head refer here to the tree as if it was standing. The head is marked with the sumisashi, if it is not then one has to observe the wood grain, knots are very helpful for this purpose.


Inu Jinja (dog shrine) restoration

The Inu shrine is located in Nagoya, Aichi prefecture. It was believed that the emperor Temmu (天武天皇) was harvesting rice in the area surrounding the shrine. Temmu was the 40th emperor of Japan, where he ruled from a.d. 672 to 686.
One of the main purpose of the restoration is to remedy to a decaying roof: replacing decomposing parts, replacing macadam paper with more durable cooper sheets. Against common belief, hinoki or its Taiwanese brother kuaimu (which made parts of the shrine) does decay, if it is left in a constant humid envrionment, such as under sheets of macadam papers. It could however be kept decennies if kept in water.


Kiso wood market

Kiso is a town in Nagano prefecture. It is a 100km drive from Nagoya.












All the wood sold at this timber market is kiso hinoki, the place where it is harvested gave its name to the wood.








It is different from the Taiwan closest relative, chamaecyparis obtusa var formosana and chamaecyparis formosensis. The smell is different, though somehow related, the kiso hinoki smell is lighter and maybe a bit more spicy than its two Taiwan brothers. Color is pale yellow as the Taiwan's closest relative.

This Kezuroukai meeting took place in Takaoka, under a temporary (but immense) shelf to protect a boudhist temple under renovation (more details on the temple to come).
Kezuroukai means literally planing meeting, but besides the planning contest, many activities are organized. This meeting gathered craftman from various fields related to the temple renovation: sculptors, painters, wood turners, particular, ... and other more directly related to woodworking tools: a dai maker was present, as well as a "toishi master".

It has been several months since I didn't write. I am just back from a short trip to Japan, and am bringing back a lot of material to fill up a big post.
Topics which will be developed are:

• kezuroukai in Takaoka
  
• the use of electric tool in modern japan
• restoration of the Dog Shrine in Nagoyga city
• some woodturning
• daily life in a japanese workshop

These will probably be posted in several parts in the coming week.

I have been working on that biplane for at least two weeks, almost every nights. I gave it to my son for his second Christmas.










It is made out of the following woods:

• fuselage: a branch of incense cedar (Calocedrus formosana, 梢楠 in chinese), harvested after a recent typhoon

• wings: Taiwan incense cedar planks (Calocedrus formosana, 梢楠)

• propeller: Taiwan fir (Taiwania cryptomerioides, 亞杉)

• engine: Taiwan acacia (acacia confusa, 相思樹)

• cylinders: Taiwan camphor wood (cinamomum camphora, 樟木)

• wing dowels: teak

• Wheels axles, support: white oak, USA