Hand tool skills: making a simple pencil box – Beginner

Four 4-hour evening sessions

Prerequisite: Intro to Guild Safety

Instructor: Ruth Warbington

Assistants - TBD

Working with hand tools is fun, quiet, and satisfying. Hand tools are very effective used in conjunction with machines in woodworking or on their own for many operations. Certain surfaces and woods lend themselves to final or near-final surface finishing with hand planes (less sanding!).

In this class, you’ll use only hand tools to make a butt-joined sliding-lid box from a pine board. Emphasis will be on learning and using hand tool techniques; final box finishing may take place after class. You’ll hand saw parts to size and then square up and refine parts with hand planes. A plow plane is used to cut grooves for the sliding box lid. Then chamfer the lid with hand planes and create a recessed pull with a carving gouge and a bench chisel. Finish the box with a smoothing plane and add fine chamfers on all edges. The box is about 10” long by 5” wide by 3.5” high.

Hand tool beginners and intermediates are welcome. Skills to be practiced: hand sawing to medium precision; planing edges straight and square, flattening, grooving, shooting ends and sides, chamfering and smoothing. Bring your own tools if you have them, but don’t shop for saws and planes just for this class. We’ll have enough saws, planes, and chisels for everyone.

Tool list: Pencil, try square, measuring tape, ruler, hand saws (rip and cross-cut), hand plane (smoother and/or jack), small block plane, ½-1” chisel.

Check out the Guild Scholarship Program to see if you qualify for the various scholarship we offer.

The guild promotes and encourages all members to act responsibly in matters of health and safety by adhering to the following measures:  

• Staying Home When Sick: Members are urged to prioritize their health and the health of others by refraining from attending guild events, workshops, or gatherings when experiencing symptoms of a contagious illness, especially those associated with COVID-19.  
• Follow CDC guidelines: If you have tested positive for COVID-19 or have been exposed to someone who has tested positive for COVID-19, you are expected to follow the current CDC guidelines.  

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