One of the most madly popular downloads from my site is David Nelson’s ‘Guide to English Sash Planes’ which he sent me a couple of months ago.
David has just sent me another two chapters of his book for download, ‘Sash Planes’ and ‘Sash Tools and Sticking Boards’.
English Sash Planes (The original download).
Sash Planes
Sash Tools and Sticking Boards
Thanks David!
Tag: sash joinery

The glazing bar dowel joint quickly became superseded by the mitred joint. However, the joint itself (and the use of a sash dowelling box to make it) is of some interest to me. It’s actually very simple, as Richard Arnold showed me.

When I have a bit of downtime, I sometimes log into my ‘webstats’, so see which posts (if any!) are considered to be popular on my blog.
Always in the top of the league was a rather ‘cobbled-together’ post about making sash and using ‘templets’ for coping the joints of your glazing bars.
Whilst at Richard Arnold’s open day the other day, I had the pleasure of seeing Richard use these sash templates and their associated planes and I will soon post a few pictures about the technique, because I think people are obviously a little confused as to how they are used.
In the meantime, however, I’d like to show a series of pics of Richard sticking glazing bars before he starts considering the joints, because there are two quite surprising things I learned from his technique. I hope you will also find them interesting.













Sash Joinery (Part 2)
A while ago I did a quick post about traditional sash joinery and the tools in the craft. I had a really good response about it, with lots of people wanting to know more, specifically the order of production and the precise nature of the various planes and templates.
These things are pretty hard to explain over email, so I was very pleased to stumble on this wonderful video, put out by the Arnold Zlotoff Tool Museum.
It’s a great little video and beautifully shot. It also shows the detail of how each part is made and the order to put things together. Absolutely wonderful. I hope this helps explain a few things for the people who asked. Enjoy!