Japanese method for Dado

Re: Japanese method for Dado *LINK*

paul womack

>I have no knowledge but the existence of this plane seems indicative.

BugBear


http://www.hidatool.com/woodpage/plane/fenced%20groove.html

Re: Japanese method for Dado

Dave Burnard

>Typically you would use an azebiki saw (see http://www.hidatool.com/woodpage/saws/azebiki.html) with it's curved cutting edges (one rip the other crosscut) to cut the kerfs and then either chisel out the waste and clean up with a traditional groove plane (see http://www.hidatool.com/woodpage/plane/groove.html) - or just use the groove plane to take out all the waste. The fenced and nickered version of the groove plane is also used if you have one in the right width. The azebiki method is more flexible, and can also be used for things like tapered sliding dovetails.

For long dadoes that run parallel to the grain (say for sliding door tracks) there is a longer one sided rip groove saw (kamoihiki) for the job.

In modern times there is a power groover which looks like a beefed up circular saw that takes special dado cutters from 3mm to 30mm wide - very handy. Way faster than using a router, but hard to come by these days since no one appears to be importing them into the US anymore.

Re: Japanese method for Dado

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>Mrs. Mori will import a Hitachi groove cutter for you and Makita versions are available in Canada. The only problem is how much lighter your wallet will be after buying the machine plus cutters.

Chichi, so far as I know there isn't a unique Japanese method, even though the tools may differ a bit.

Pam, who knows this because of her workshop project, in which she has resigned herself to using a regular router for cutting the slots

Re: Japanese method for Dado

ThomD

>I have a Japanese Dado Plane. The groove plane looks like a rebate plane. The Dado plane has two knickers and a blade a lot like the blade in a westerm molding plane. There is also a fence designed just for establishing the depth of cut, not offset.

Re: Japanese method for Dado

Dave Burnard

>Hey Pam, how spendy are they these days. I paid $460 for mine back in Dec 2000. Timberwolf was selling the smaller Makita model for $395 then. You probably really only need one cutter, maybe two. I had to cut grooves in just about every post and beam to accept the interior plywood skin the way I was building. I used a "wobble" cutter that Hida ordered for me, but a 15mm blade would have been fine since that's what the 5/8" ply I was using was really dinemsioned to. Considering the multiple passes it would take with a router and the screaming nature of that nasty tailed apprentice - it was well worth it. Now a days you could probably resell it pretty easily and get most of your money back afterwards. Although I will say that once you use one, it's really hard to let it go!

Handtool content: I missed cutting a groove or two prior to assembly, due to some late plan changes and had to cut those grooves later on. These were in awkward places where it wasn't possible to wield the groove cutter, so I broke out the azebiki and a 15mm chisel. There's a lot to be said for peace and quiet.

Spendy groove cutters

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>$600 for the large Makita in Canada plus $125 per blade. Mrs. Mori offered the small Hitachi for $480, the large for $500. I did find a Makita beam saw on ebay for a bit less than $400 with 3 blades, mostly for the guys who will be helping and don't know squat about sawing.

I still haven't made a final decision on the groove cutter, figure I can sell both it and the beam saw on ebay. I'm hoping the Onrud spiral cutters will help the router enough to make it palatable. They arrived today, so will do some testing next week when I plan to be able to handle a power tool again.

Pam, who managed to walk a bit more than a mile last night with no pain, hooray