For you guys who haven't gotten the White backsaw right yet.

[george wilson]

These pictures of a repro of the only existing White backsaw (early 18th.C., have been made so you can see the details better. I gave up trying to protect this saw last month!!The background is a red spruce guitar top blank. The date is deeply stamped in as 1995,to avoid these turning into valuable antiques after several years of use,often in the open.

THIS SAW IS CRUDE. The original was,too,and I was obliged to closely copy all characteristics of the original tools we had to reproduce for the Historic Area.

Sometimes Jon and I had to work DOWN to get the spirit of an object correct. The earlier English tools were,the cruder they were, Elizabethan tools were REALLY crude. I saw the ones from the Mary Rose exhibit. They looked like new,except the iron had perished. The beechwood was nice and pink,as if it had been made yesterday,from being buried in the silt since Henry VIII's time.

The White backsaw,and the somewhat later Cartwright(1775?) both had these cheap,cheesy looking backs made out of about 16 gauge iron. Quite thin to our eyes. Metal was hand refined,and very expensive though,and they skimped on it,I suppose.

The handle of this saw clearly belongs to an earlier era. It looks rather bizarre to me,though it serves the purpose well enough. Some like it. It was rasped out,scraped some,and left that way.

This saw did not have proper,purpose made saw screws. The screws looked more like hand forged carriage bolts,with hastily decorated square nuts done with a triangular file and left rough.

There is a rather poorly designed decorative notch at the end of the back,again hastily filed out.

They hadn't yet given thought to gracefully terminating the back at the handle,so,the saw blade just is left sticking out of the back,looking unfinished and odd. Maybe it looked o.k. to the old makers at the time.

These White brand saws were known to have been popular in Virginia in the 18th. C.,so we made some in 2 sizes for the shops,along with the Kenyons. The Kenyons were much more highly developed saws in terms of their design,heavier backs,and the use of proper saw screws.

The teeth were filed by eye. We never had any type of guides for filing the teeth,just relied on personal skill as the early craftsmen would have had to do. Later,in the 19th. C.,saw filing tools were developed from more than just a 3 square file.

If there is any appearance of big tooth/small tooth in any of the pictures,it is due to my poor lighting. The teeth set away from the light source may be shaded a bit.

[Marv Werner]

I don't know George, I like that saw. The teeth look pretty darn consistent from here. If a filer has a good eye for spacing, the teeth could just be estimated for distance between points. Notch the entire saw plate, then rely on the shaping of the teeth to make the gullets consistently deep.

Do you happen to have a picture of an original White saw?

If that end of the back above the handle was radiused, it would finish it off quite well. They did that little fancy thing at the other end though. That seems a bit out of character for the rest of the saw design.

Bending those long steel backs is no walk in the park. Did you have a press brake or some similar method to do the bending so the back would be straight?

Marv

[seth lowden]

Hello again Mr. Wilson, and thanks again for the great sharing of knowledge.

Could you compare and contrast the two saws in my attached photo?

Thanks!!!

[george wilson]

Marv-I made a long bending jig with a "V" about like the V I just printed. There were 2 posts which the upper blade slid on. I made a wide,narrow press with 2 bottle jacks in it,from 2 1/2" square steel. The "V" jig bent the backs to a 45º angle. Then,the backs were annealed,and set exactly on edge in the press. If they weren't set just so,one side of the back might curve under,leaving the other side straight.

The backs were squeezed till they were narrower than the saw blade. I ground a little bevel on the tops of the blades,so they wouldn't shear any metal off of the brass backs,and tapped the blades in.

It worked just fine,and none ever got back to us loosened or with curved blades.

Must run-supper.

[george wilson]

Seth,obviously you were in our shop during one of the forums,EAIA meetings,or some event which caused me to polish up my brass! The two saws are,in the back ground,a White tenon saw,and in front,a Kenyon reproduction tenon saw.

The White is Ca.1765,and the Kenyons are late 18th.C. There is a much better brass back on the Kenyon,heavy enough to just about propel the saw down through the wood. The Kenyon has fully developed saw screws that remained standard for decades beyond. The Kenyon's handle is a more fully developed style,not as obsolete and underdeveloped as the White saw's handle. The White's handle looks Elizabethan by comparison(though it's really not.)

I personally,design wise,like the Kenyons a lot better. Some guys like the White,though.

In the background I see my 1/2 size smooth plane.It was a copy of a salesman's sample a wealthy collector had. I liked it so much I had to have it,so I made one. Never saw another for sale,anyway. If I had,it would have been 4 figures,anyway.

Also,my brass and rosewood "Nessy" shoulder plane. I posted all those things here several months ago. You can find those posts by searching my past postings. From the text,you can tell if a picture was posted. Also seen in the FAQ section here.

The medieval letter stamp set is seen also. I showed it a few weeks ago.

I cannot identify what the very small object next to the letter stamps is,though. No idea.

[Ray Gardiner]

Hi George, Seth, Marv, and others..

Here is a picture of the 1750's White saw... Sorry I can't attribute the picture source...

http://www.backsaw.net/pics/1750_white.jpg

Maybe someone will recognize the picture, and identify the source..

Regards
Ray

[Marv Werner]

Thanks George, you did a very good job replicating it. :)

Looks as if the maker just took a regular handsaw and put a back on it.

Marv

[Marv Werner]

Thanks Ray for the picture. George did a good job of replicating it.

[Marv Werner]

I made a press once using a bottle jack and learned the hard way that they won't work up side down.:D Had to totally rebuild the darn thing.

I like your press idea. Leif Hanson would love the idea.

Marv

[Adam Cherubini]

I made saws similar to this and I'm not sure if you (George) were refrerring to me when you wrote about copying museum pieces/other people's property or not.

I'm very familiar with museums' feelings on this subject. While I respect them, I'm not sure they have a legal leg to stand on. That said, I always ask permission and respect their wishes. More often than not, I follow my own drummer, changing my pieces significantly enough that I no longer feel there is much of a similarity, so I end up feeling stupid for asking.

In this post you wrote about getting this saw "right". Since I wasn't shooting for an exact replica, I don't feel my saws were "wrong".

What I did was build a mock up of this saw, played with it, then changed the design to suit my hands and preferences. I sought to maintain a family resemblance, as if this was a common style that multiple makers produced their own versions of. I dropped the handle and squared it slightly with the blade opening up the upper protion of the finger hole.

What I liked about your reproductions was how small the features of the handle were. I feel mine looked cartoony by comparison. What I didn't like was the lack of knuckle room in the top of the handle and the very small upper horn. Of course, I'm not average size.

My first saws' handles were shipped with rasp marks, which didn't bother me. That's how I made them and I suspected the originals as well, so it's good to hear your valdation of this. But Mickley complained so I scraped and very reluctantly (and hastily) sanded some saws' handles to improve the finish.
http://www.adamcherubini.com/Tools_files/JT_saw.jpg
I believe the original's blade would have been tapered, but I think the original has quite a bit of blade filed away. So again, I sought to make the saw appear as it might have when new. I looked carefully at the angle of the toe end of the saw for clues. That said, I like the heavy taper to these saws.

Just my thoughts on the subject

Adam

[george wilson]

Like I said,I gave up trying to protect this saw months ago.

Adam, I thought you had changed the saw enough that it wasn't legally a copy.

I think the saw blade was tapered as a design artifact of crosscut saws. Tool evolution has been done in such baby steps,like the still off center handle of the jack plane I posted.

We made some 17th.C. English and Dutch crosscut and rip saws for Jamestown. The English saws had the ugliest handles!!! The Dutch ones had a "S" curve handle sitting crossways on an iron rod that was riveted to the blade. It looked like the head of an old walking stick. Not really uncomfortable to use,though.

Did anyone notice the little "V" nick on the White's blade under the handle? I don't know what it was for,being so small,but it was there. Too small to tie a tooth protecting strip to. Did someone test a file there? We can't know,but still put it there since the old saw had it.



Marv,I didn't use the bottle jacks upside down. They were under the moving jaw of the press,and pushed it up. There are some auto shop presses that might have their jack upside down. I'll have to look. If they do,they must have special arrangements internally that allow them to be upside down.

The press was like a window frame,with the 2 jacks pushing up the bottom edge of the sliding window(except the sliding bottom edge was all there was to the window.)
.

[Sean Hughto]

Nice work. How is it to actually use?

[David Weaver]

But Mickley complained so I scraped and very reluctantly (and hastily) sanded some saws' handles to improve the finish.


Mickley? Warren? I wish Warren posted on this forum, though he is on another one that i haven't yet been banned from.

Scraping is a nice effect for the person making the tool - you can remove a lot of material fast, much faster than hand sanding in the open areas, but most people who are used to looking at machine-made totes probably won't tolerate the faceting that it leaves.

If someone didn't want that type of saw entirely as a period piece, I have no idea why they'd want it at all - at least for a user. If you're not a period user, there's no reason to use one, and if you're a period user, there's no reason to have one sanded. I'd prefer mine with file marks on it if I was going to have or make one.

[george wilson]

It works fine. Adam has said he really likes his.

David,most real old saws have had their surface tool remnants worn away. My open handle Groves still has visible scraper marks on its rounded areas. Sandpaper,or sea dog skin was expensive,and not too good. I can't recall when sand paper became available,anyway. Sometime in the 18 th.C.. Doubt it was used much at all. Paper itself was expensive. A well bound book was worth the equivalent of about $2000.00 the book binder says. There is also a plant that has sucked up silica in its leaves. Roy Underhill experimented with it one time.

Any way,abrasives were so poor,scraping ,possibly followed by boning the surface(polishing with a smooth piece of bone) was the way to smooth things out. Some lutes were boned. Scrapers,of course,can be shaped to better fit around convex or hollow surfaces.

[David Weaver]

David,most real old saws have had their surface tool remnants worn away.

I'm sure you're right. I guess there are two different ways to go:
* try to make a tool now so it looks like an antique right away or shortly
* try to make a tool now the way the original antiques were made

The second one, i understand. The first one is as corny to me as is a fender relic telecaster.

I see a lot of posts on the web of people antiquing their tools right away because they don't like the way new tools look. The closest I ever get to anything like that is apply gun blue, but certainly not to make the tool look old.

I don't understand the mindset of the first bullet point when certainly nobody was running around trying to figure out how to make brass parts and such tarnish immediately on new goods 250 years ago.

Of course, all of this goes out the window if someone is paying you to do the work, and they are not going to try to use it to scam someone into thinking it's antique (like a lot of the suddenly more common "50s" telecasters and stratocasters done by scam artists) - you do what's requested, I guess.

if I was paying for a replica, though, I'd want it to be made just like the original was. I'd imagine a lot of craftsmen immediately burnished their handles with something hard, be it bone or whatever else was handy, just to make them comfortable.

(Finding a silica-impregnated plant is over the top!)

[george wilson]

Our mission was to make tools as they would have looked when new. Then,let their daily use age them.

When I make replacement parts for my favorite customer's antiques,she does want them aged to blend in with the other old parts already there.

I can tell you,I have put a great deal of time learning how to very accurately duplicate the patinas of old objects.

For example,old ivory parts almost invariably have a very thin layer of soot on them,which has gotten physically attached to the ivory over hundreds of years,from old stoves in houses,or fireplaces. To get that to look right has taken some doing. Real old rust is also not so easy to truly duplicate. It really has gotten down into the surface,and just rusting a new part doesn't always make it.

Archaeologists use the patination of ancient verdigris,with its tiny bubbles to authenticate real artifacts from fakes. apparently no one has yet been able to fake those tiny bubbles. Fortunately,I haven't had to.

Jon and I were asked to replicate an early (1721) sun dial that had been out doors for all that time. We were able to do a good job of it. Fortunately,the sundial hadn't been dug up.

I do have black and white pictures of it if you'd like to see it,and if I can get this infernal new printer/scanner to import. I had the old one figured out.

It had been in a church yard on a marble stand where anyone could have stolen it. Now,the original is safer inside the church in a show case I made for it. The reproduction wasn't low cost either,but it did not have the history behind the original. So,replacing the replica would cost money,but not history.

Jon found a real 18th.C. sundial in the county dumpster!! He has gotten original 18th.C. prints out of dumpsters,too. He has had good luck at that!! He got 2 Hogarths that way.

[David Weaver]

George - no need to go to the trouble of digging a picture up unless you wanted to share the sundial in general, but it sounds like it could be a post of its own, though if you do post it and you post it in one of these threads, there's a better chance it would stay and not get moved to off topic unless it's got wooden parts (and I'd assume absolutely not if it's survived in the weather since 1721).

I'd say I've seen good aging like you likely do, but in reality, if it's done really well, i'd never know if I saw it. I surely have seen plenty of guitars that have been exposed to a piece of rope, fake belt buckling and muriatic acid.

I probably have seen some that were done well and couldn't tell they were fake!

[george wilson]

My customer is the most observant and picky person you'd ever want to work for. since I'm the same way,and I understand what she wants,I enjoy working for her,except on some projects she hands me that are exceedingly difficult to pull off.

I often spend more time "aging" work than I spend doing it.

[george wilson]

To age the sundial,I just put it into a trash bag with a saucer of ammonia for several days. Can't recall how long now. The old one was absolutely fuzzy with verdigris,though,after hundreds of years out doors.

[Marv Werner]

George,

Did some Googling and found some autobio that you wrote that included some pictures of some of your luthier work. Phenomenal is the most expressive word I can think of at the moment.

With every endeavor, someone has to be the best. Not one of the best, but THE best. During my life, I have always wanted to be the best at something. When I evaluate my accomplishments, there is nothing that I can feel I am THE best at. Pretty good is about all I can claim.

My question to you is, do you consider yourself THE best luthier of our day? Seeing but only a few pictures of your work, I can't imagine anyone doing it any better. Your abalone and ivory inlay work is nothing short of awesome.

I would post the link here to the website I found, but out of respect, I don't feel that it is my place to do so.

Marv

[george wilson]

There's always someone better. Besides,"the best" at what? Making great tone,design,skill at inlay work,and exactly which instrument? It can get pretty compartmentalized. And,it is always so subjective. What is the best is always someone's opinion.Just because Segovia played a Ramirez or Hauser guitar didn't mean that every other great player also did. Anyone who thinks he's the very best in the World hasn't found out about ALL the others,or has too big a head. The World is a pretty big place,and there is a lot of activity in instrument making now. Lots of books and material suppliers. The computer has revolutionized the information available to anyone today.

When I started at age 13 to build guitars,I was in Alaska. Pretty isolated from others who might be making guitars. There were no books about building,and very few home type builders. Today there must be thousands. I had to find out how to do things the hard way. I was always very persistent,though,and had MUCH more energy than I now have at nearly 70.

I do consider myself to be very versatile. This was sometimes a source of ire to some of the other craftsmen in Williamsburg. Some of them seemed to think that they alone had the "rights" to do whatever they did. Those few that were like that were small minded,and insecure.

I never felt that way. If anyone wanted to make an instrument,I thought only of helping
them. Sometimes I'd make a flintlock gun,or a silver item,or forge something,or do some brass casting on my home built gas furnace. Sorry I left it there when I moved.

I have a mind that is curious about all kinds of things to make. That is why my large shop is short of space. I have a fully equipped woodworking shop,a fully equipped machine shop,and blacksmith area,and still have all the casting equipment except for the furnace,like several 5 gallon pails of casting sands,flasks,crucibles,etc. Harry Strasil and I am sort of kindred spirits in that way. I think he has more energy,though! I never haul my stuff around,set it up,and do demos.

[Kirk Poore]

There is also a plant that has sucked up silica in its leaves. Roy Underhill experimented with it one time.



I believe this is horsetail or shavegrass. A Google search shows it to be used as a dietary supplement for silica. I image you'd have to cut it and let it dry out, then use a handful like sandpaper or steel wool. I've never met anybody who's actually used it, though.

Kirk

[David Weaver]

If we talk about it too much, someone is going to try to glue it to glass and sharpen with it.

[george wilson]

I think you are right,Kirk. And David is also right. But then there will be a 6 page discussion about the different grits of shavegrass.:)

[Marv Werner]

George,

The first paragraph in your response answers my question exactly as it needed to be answered. Well, said and I concur totally. All the points that you made, explains exactly why I have never been able to label myself "the best" at anything. That's a good thing.:)

Marv