Sash bar dimensions for historical windows

[Jacob]

These planes were sold as an ovolo matched pair, with a pair of templates thrown in as part of a package. I am certain that if they wanted a different profile, they would’ve brought a set a Planes for the different profile.

But by all means, give it a try!

It'd be the same profile slightly on the no.2 extended by the amount showing in the two scribe lines, as your pairs seem to be in your photo, so the 2 would remove the nib from the glazing bar and take the profile that tiny bit further.
I found one possible pair in my collection but they are different makes so may be separated from their partners. They are no.1 5/8 and no.2 9/16 which doesn't seem to relate to anything I can measure, but the profiles seem to be identical.

 

[Grandad455]

Sawn timber tends to be to multiples of one inch, with some 1/2" sizes thrown in.
Talking about finished sizes the common expression is "ex (sawn size)" so e.g. a board planed up finished from sawn size 6x1" would be referred to as "ex" 6x1" and actually be 1/4" smaller in both directions, or thereabouts.
I tend to think in imperial for sawn sizes and metric for finished, so "ex 4x1" would end up being finished at 96x19mm (or thereabouts!)

Have to disagree there about how much is lost from sawn stock. As a timber retailer pre-decimal sizes, 2 x 1 sawn would lose an 1/8th in machining on both dimensions, 4 x 1 would finish at 3 7/8 x 7/8, approx 98mm x 22mm.
Post decimal, stock sizes were 25mm thick finished to 22mm width finish was about 3mm less than sawn size, so a nominal 6" board in metric was 150mm which would finish about 147 ish.
The likes of B& ? started selling timber to even more reduced sizes, hence what was once 1" nominal and 7/8" finish now comes out at 20mm if you are lucky. Tree wood ain't what it used to be.
Once asked the rep what was the difference between PAR and PAR select and he gave me all the spiel about not having so many knots and shakes in the Select, to which I replied, No, PAR is twisted when you get it, PAR Select twists when you finish the job. We had a lot of twisted stock uplifted and replaced!

 

[andrew_2]

Off topic, but a couple of posts a while back were talking about adding lead weights to the existing iron rather than getting bigger iron weights for sash double glazing upgrades. (Mine are Edwardian 1908 and very simple boxes).
When I get round to go looking, what are these called?

 

[Jacob]

Off topic, but a couple of posts a while back were talking about adding lead weights to the existing iron rather than getting bigger iron weights for sash double glazing upgrades. (Mine are Edwardian 1908 and very simple boxes).
When I get round to go looking, what are these called?

It's a problem if the box isn't big enough or tall enough. I used to cast weights in lead for the tricky ones. Easy to do, can describe it if you want. Or just cast enough for an add-on weight or two.

 

[toolsntat]

Off topic, but a couple of posts a while back were talking about adding lead weights to the existing iron rather than getting bigger iron weights for sash double glazing upgrades. (Mine are Edwardian 1908 and very simple boxes).
When I get round to go looking, what are these called?

https://www.mightonproducts.com/sho...w-weights/lead-sash-weights/lead-makeweights/

 

[Samkilby]

Gosh this has been an epic saga !

As far as I was taught -
The rod drawing on a board Jacob refers to is called a rod board. From that you can mark your rods, if taking them somewhere else to make, or you can mark your first of a batch of similar components. In which case the first component become the rod (or story/storey stick etc etc)
So whilst yes, if you have a full scale rod board, you very often don’t need sticks or rods. But if you don’t have the full scale rod board, then you can use a stick as a quick substitute.
In either case you are really using whatever first marked object merely as a means of repeatability, and hopefully a decent level of dimensional accuracy. If for example there are three similar length rails on a design, you would not mark them off the three (very slightly) different drawn lengths, as pencil lead thickness or drawing accuracy would likely cause minute issues in the joinery (shoulder lengths could be at a guess a mm off) Therefore there isn’t that much clinical difference between a first component marked from a rod board, or a rod or stick produced without a rod board, both are measured at some point by hand and thereafter become the knife mark transfer guide. In some ways a stick could be more overall dimensionally accurate, if you mark the stick with a knife in the first place, not a pencil.

Horses for courses and if you are comfortable with a method then of course continue using it. But Jacobs way of assuming everyone else is in the wrong and only he knows the true way is a bit galling.

 

[johnnyb]

I reason any post can have the most enlightening information and it could come from anyone. it's not about the right way or my way it's about assessing what someone's saying right or wrong. the rod storey board etc is interesting because Mr butler has provoked people to expand on there methods(unintended no doubt)
in real detail(thank you sgian et al)
which has value in its self. many posts here attract zero interest or argument and that is the real problem.

 

[Jacob]

Gosh this has been an epic saga !

As far as I was taught -
The rod drawing on a board Jacob refers to is called a rod board.

Just called a rod traditionally

From that you can mark your rods, if taking them somewhere else to make, or you can mark your first of a batch of similar components. In which case the first component become the rod (or story/storey stick etc etc)
So whilst yes, if you have a full scale rod board, you very often don’t need sticks or rods. But if you don’t have the full scale rod board, then you can use a stick as a quick substitute.

Yes, with the rod you don't need story sticks

In either case you are really using whatever first marked object merely as a means of repeatability, and hopefully a decent level of dimensional accuracy. If for example there are three similar length rails on a design, you would not mark them off the three (very slightly) different drawn lengths, as pencil lead thickness or drawing accuracy would likely cause minute issues in the joinery (shoulder lengths could be at a guess a mm off) Therefore there isn’t that much clinical difference between a first component marked from a rod board, or a rod or stick produced without a rod board, both are measured at some point by hand and thereafter become the knife mark transfer guide. In some ways a stick could be more overall dimensionally accurate, if you mark the stick with a knife in the first place, not a pencil.

The difference is that every step away from the rod, by measuring from it or making story sticks, is a chance of making a mistake, or just minor random variations which could accumulate into a bigger error. Not least because you'd have to annotate the stick to make sure you were using it in the right place. Marking from the rod directly reduces those sorts of mistakes. It's like a map - you can take measurements or other details from it but the map remains definitive and error free. Marking with a knife does not make things more accurate - it makes them more precise, which isn't the same thing. It could be in the wrong place!

Horses for courses and if you are comfortable with a method then of course continue using it. But Jacobs way of assuming everyone else is in the wrong and only he knows the true way is a bit galling.

Sorry if it's galling - it doesn't do to be too sensitive!
I'm just telling what I was taught, learned and confirmed by making many hundreds of windows/doors/other items. Pleased to see that it is pretty much the process as described in the best books too. Take it or leave it!
Actually Greenhalgh/Corkhill/Lowsley do show one departure from the rod, for ease of handling, where a door stile is marked from the rod but then other stiles are marked from that stile. But you wouldn't want to mark any from the second batch as that way errors accumulate. One step away is enough!
The main thing about it is that it starts with an accurate drawing where everything can be seen to fit, and is very fast and error free.

 

[Samkilby]

But you must concede Jacob, that the first thing marked, whether a component or stick, has the same amount of accuracy ?
To produce the drawing you are using fairly primitive measuring methods (steel rule for setting out ?)
If you don’t want to produce a rod board, you can use the same methods to mark the stick. On vertical one horizontal.
It’s really just a way of transferring a scaled (for example a cad) drawing into the real world.
You end up with the same level of accuracy. You are transferring from your as accurate as possible measurements (wether on a stick or a board) to a component. Hopefully once, and then using components to mark others where possible.
For some people annotating a stick would be a lot quicker than drawing a rod.
In industry I have only ever seen people or made rods for complex joints or curved details. I have never seen one for a whole project since college. It has never been factored in to the build time, quoted by someone remote who has usually had the thing designed on cad.
I could see that in a bench joinery workshop making the exact same thing regularly they might still use boards, but the method I have encountered is a3 cads, then produce sticks. For anything up to small batch joinery it has seemed to work out ok for me too !

 

[Jacob]

But you must concede Jacob, that the first thing marked, whether a component or stick, has the same amount of accuracy ?

Yes but every step can involve a tiny error, which could add up like chinese whispers if you don't go back to the rod.

To produce the drawing you are using fairly primitive measuring methods (steel rule for setting out ?)
If you don’t want to produce a rod board, you can use the same methods to mark the stick. On vertical one horizontal.
It’s really just a way of transferring a scaled (for example a cad) drawing into the real world.

You would need the final working drawing before you could mark up your sticks.
But if you have the drawing on a board you wouldn't need the sticks.
Yes the would be occasions when it would be handy to take measurements of it, but not if you marking up for say 5 sash windows with over 100 components of all shapes and sizes. Or just one window for that matter.
I don't use CAD and I'm a bit mystified about how you'd take details from a computer to the work bench for marking and cutting. A full size and accurate printout would need a very good and large printer!

PS come to think, I've never used anything like a story stick and never felt the need, though I did do a "story rod" for each of the three staircases I've made so far. But this is a very different thing.

 

[Samkilby]

There aren’t 100 unique components in many sash windows.. you surely would mark your first unique off the rod, then any similar off the first .. the first unique component becomes the stick

 

[Jacob]

There aren’t 100 unique components in many sash windows.. you surely would mark your first unique off the rod, then any similar off the first .. the first unique component becomes the stick

3x4 pane window could have 30 or so bits. Marking them from component to another would be a nightmare, instead you stack them up on the rod and mark them in a batch, with a set square and a pencil.

 

[Jacob]

View attachment 165580

All new to me this moulding plane stuff about pairs etc. I've never used them except for playing with, I've done all my stuff with home made spindle cutters.
Looking at Steve's planes above I'm convinced that plane 1 is for the frames and plane 2 for the glazing bar but without the nib.
Plane 1 could do the glazing bars with the nib in the ordinary way but plane 2 is a slightly deeper profile and would take the nib off. Just a slightly refined extra crafty detail which wouldn't interrupt the work flow.
What clinched it for me was Richard Arnolds comments above, plus sheer coincidence of having these two off-cuts in my collection, similar to his.
One is a piece of the original, the other my copy but with a nib still on, which on the job I would remove with a block plane.
I only made the one spindle cutter, equivalent to plane 1 and did wonder how they did the bars. Answer I now see would be plane 2, or for me to make another cutter!
Had similar problem with another profile where with hindsight there should have been 2 cutters.
Doing it with hand planes would take zero/time effort to switch from plane1 to plane 2 but on the spindle could be an hour or so getting it set up plus having to make another cutter

PS cruising around the net - lots of pairs seem to be identical, unlike Steve's above, which suggests both stories are true - the identical pairs being for fast/fine finish, the non identical for shaping a variation on the glazing bars.

 

[niall Y]

That is some nice, quarter-sawn, stock you have on that original moulding.

 

[andrew_2]

It's a problem if the box isn't big enough or tall enough. I used to cast weights in lead for the tricky ones. Easy to do, can describe it if you want. Or just cast enough for an add-on weight or two.

Yes, I would like to hear that, if you don't mind taking the time. Mind you, short of nicking lead off next door's roof, I have no idea where I would get it from.

 

[andrew_2]

And following the rods discussion with interest. I used to work in a big retail design consultancy. We had to check the rods from the sign manufacturers before they started to make the things, One day there was an orrible banging and crashing coming up the stairs and eventually two blokes struggled into the studio carrying a massive lump of tin and acrylic. Pete, the head designer, stood on his chair and screamed: "Millimetres. I said millimetres!".

 

[Jacob]

Yes, I would like to hear that, if you don't mind taking the time. Mind you, short of nicking lead off next door's roof, I have no idea where I would get it from.

A box with builders soft sand (very slightly damp, not wet, not bone dry) for the mould. It's usually clayey enough to set and stay in shape
Make up a wood pattern - lengths of square section but slightly tapered so you can get it out of the sand mould without disturbing the sand.
Press it into the sand and pack it tight, tamping it down, dead level with the surface, prise it out again. repeat if it's not perfect
Ask a plumber for scrap lead pipe etc or a scrap dealer - or buy it new.
Melt it in a saucepan over a powerful gas ring.
Pour in molten lead, not too suddenly, until full.
Do it in the open air, wear boots to protect feet, rigger gloves for hands
Wait til its cool enough and saw bevels at one or both ends so its a bit tapered and won't catch when passing the other weight
drill hole for string
cut to desired weight, pair slightly heavier than top sash or lighter than lower one
You could saw it into little add-on weights with hole to thread them onto the string, but might make them too tall
PS and it has to be done dead level for obvious reasons!
Old lead sash weights often quite shapely and tapered all the way up so the weight is as low as possible and the thing won't clank about so much as it gets moved.

 

[andrew_2]

https://www.mightonproducts.com/sho...w-weights/lead-sash-weights/lead-makeweights/

Thanks for this. I owe you a pint.

 

[andrew_2]

A box with builders soft sand (very slightly damp, not wet, not bone dry) for the mould. It's usually clayey enough to set and stay in shape
Make up a wood pattern - lengths of square section but slightly tapered so you can get it out of the sand mould without disturbing the sand.
Press it into the sand and pack it tight, tamping it down, dead level with the surface, prise it out again. repeat if it's not perfect
Ask a plumber for scrap lead pipe etc or a scrap dealer - or buy it new.
Melt it in a saucepan over a powerful gas ring.
Pour in molten lead, not too suddenly, until full.
Do it in the open air, wear boots to protect feet, rigger gloves for hands
Wait til its cool enough and saw bevels at one end so its a bit tapered and won't catch when passing the other weight
drill hole for string
cut to desired weight, pair slightly heavier than top sash or lighter than lower one

Now if I could just persuade you to come round and give a practical demonstration....
Thanks Jacob!

Really that's far and away beyond my comfort zone. I'll leave that to the experts.

 

[Jacob]

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