18th Century reproduction window sash

[Tom King]

  I know it won't make sense to anyone other than woodworkers until we get to the end and have finished sash to show.

 

Lower part of this page.  I know I need to do some more formatting and take some better pictures of some things.

 http://www.historic-house-restoration.com/windowwork.html

[Tpt life]

Hey Tom, who's this for? If this is for us I say full steam ahead. If this is for your customer, you probably have more info than you need. I am specifically referencing the hold downs and cut order. Most will have to look "cope" up and will assume wrongly what stick means. Make sense?

[Tom King]

It's just on my website for what I do.  If it befuddles the average person, that's okay.  They will only care about the end result anyway.  No worries about the "customer" one way or the other.  I just stuck that much on there today.  I wasn't sure if I needed to be more detailed, or if it was clear enough like it is to woodworkers. 

[G S Haydon]

Makes sense to me  . You say cope, I say scribe, all that US UK variation stuff. What species is the "Heart Pine". 

C, I don't like to speak for Tom but in ye olde joiner "stick" would be the process of applying the moulding or rebate and cope would be to create the profile on the end of the tenon shoulder, on a glazing bar back in the day this would be done with a coping saw, hence cope I assume.

[Tom King]

Heartwood of the longleaf pine that was virgin timber when this country was first founded. There are virtually no standing trees left now. Pine trees these days are quick growing hybrids with much lower quality wood than the old, slow growing Longleaf.  Almost all of it comes out of reclaimed beams from pre-20th century warehouses and factories.  Some comes from old sunken logs.  It's what almost all houses and structures were built with here in the17th, 18th, and 19th centuries.  If these structures are to be restored authentically, this is what you have to use.  Normally, there is always some compromise in desired grade and quality.  Usually, there are old nail holes and other defects, and you cut what you want out of what the supplier provides.  Typically, 20 bucks and up a board foot.

 

The cope is the profile on the tenon shoulder.   It's not cut yet in those pictures.  The "carrier" supports the cut so there is no tearout.  Normally, as sash are made these days. The cope is cut on the end of a wide piece, and the muntins ripped out of that.  On the old sash, there are several different lengths of tenons, from a stub tenon on horizontal, short muntins, to long tenons on the vertical muntins that go all the way through the lock rail.  I had a cutter made that only makes the little curved "cope", so I can cut the tenon lengths as needed.  Heart pine is pretty brittle at the edge of any cut, and even if done the normal cope first method, there would still be breakage at the end of a profile run the long way after the cope was cut.  This is the easiest way to make sure the final cut is supported, with the added advantage of being able to fine tune length if needed.

 

Normally, there are only two cutters for making sash these days.  The sash cutter which cuts the design profile, which the muntins match, and the rabbet on the back for the glass.  The other cutter, cuts the cope to mate with the design profile,and a stub tenon that goes into the rabbet.  The parts are simply glued together.  Very simple two step process to make.

 

These 18th century sash have a mortise and tenon at every intersection, including all the muntin intersections, and pegs---no glue.

 

I'll explain it all more thoroughly in an article, and put the article on that page when I get through with it.  I was just hoping this was clear enough for now.

 

This discussion is exactly what I needed.  I don't think in words, use few of them, and never figure out, to start with, how to say things best the first time.

[Tpt life]

Like I said, for me full steam ahead!

[G S Haydon]

Tom, I'm delighted your taking the time to post this. We are currently working on an old stately home with very old joinery dating to 1816. I really love this kinda stuff. What paint finish are you intending to use? I have yet to take all this in  starting on page 255 but it's a horses mouth account of what would of been used in the UK.

[Tom King]

Interior woodwork is unfinished.  The outside will be painted-yet to be determined.

[dwacker]

Those are pretty neat. Have you seen the modern way of doing them. When I say modern I mean early 1800's sash relisher, which of course was replaced by tenoners and shapers. The sash relisher was an evil looking old beast safety was obviously not a concern back then.

[Tom King]

I know someone who has one- nowhere near operational.  I feel safe doing it my way.  He also has a cotton gin sharpener-complicated contraption that uses gears, triangular files, and hand cranks.

[CessnaPilotBarry]

I'll watch!   I live in New England...

[TRBaker]

OUTSTANDING, Tom. I love this kind of work. That house looks like the project of a lifetime.

 

Here's a couple pictures of a restoration I worked on in Fairhope, AL. The guy bought the oldest standing Amish barn in upstate NY, bought another in PA, had them dismantled and sent to Texas where a group of Mennonites married the two into one large barn. The barn was then shipped to Fairhope and the Mennonites reassembled the framework (all mortise and tenon, pegged). We took it from there.  He wanted a "party barn".

[wdwerker]

Looks like you have figured out a wonderful process to make functional reproductions with faithful joinery and modern machinery! I have done several projects with reclaimed heart pine and I agree about it chipping out in the most inconvenient places.

Those folks at Whiteside have made me a few bits , great quality!

[Tom King]

Page updated.  If you are interested in this progression, check back each day during the week.  We're not working on this project full time, and there are hundreds of pieces for the 47 sash we are making, so some updates may be a few days apart for days during one part of the process.  For instance, there are 200 of the short horizontal muntins with multiple steps each.  I get tired of the repetition, and have to walk away from it sometimes and do something else.

[G S Haydon]

OUTSTANDING, Tom. I love this kind of work. That house looks like the project of a lifetime.

 

Here's a couple pictures of a restoration I worked on in Fairhope, AL. The guy bought the oldest standing Amish barn in upstate NY, bought another in PA, had them dismantled and sent to Texas where a group of Mennonites married the two into one large barn. The barn was then shipped to Fairhope and the Mennonites reassembled the framework (all mortise and tenon, pegged). We took it from there.  He wanted a "party barn".

+1.

 

An Amish Party Barn, bet that's a riot  , was that next door to the Shaker Casino?

[Tom King]

We finally got back on this project, and I've updated the page.  Now we have to wait another month for Whiteside to make a cutter for the tenon end of the muntins where they join the bars for my structural design change over the originals.  The muntin end in the picture with a blue chisel handle for backdrop was cut by hand to see how it would work before I placed the order for the fifth cutter.  There are something like 190 of those cuts to make, and I didn't want to make them all by hand. 

 

Another router will be dedicated to cutting the 1/4" wide mortise.  Ends of those mortises will still need to be squared up by hand, so there is still a fair amount of hand work.

 

I've searched every search I can think of, and can't find anyone else making 18th century (or any old) reproduction sash out of heart pine.

 

The boxwood cope carriers worked like a charm.  I had to take a hair off of one of the muntins at assembly, and it worked perfectly with no extraneous chipping out-shaved the length, and then cut the cope.

 

http://www.historic-house-restoration.com/windowwork.html

[TRBaker]

Tom, those windows are looking great. You mentioned in your comments that no glue was needed on the assembled window. Are you going to use glue at all? If not, are you using any mechanical fasteners?

[Tom King]

They need neither.  The originals didn't have any.  They're much stronger than your average sash as they are.  I can knock the pegs out of the originals, and put them back together just fine.  Even the surviving 230 year old ones are still plenty rigid even without any glazing in them.

 

I have a bunch of extra pieces to make replacement bars and muntins out of.  If a sash was glued together it would be a lot more trouble to replace parts down the road-hopefully into future Centuries.  Like this, you can knock the pegs out, take it apart, and replace any broken pieces.  There are nine of the old sash left with broken bars  and muntins.  We may get around to fixing them at some point.

 

I need to knock that finished window apart and hand plane the stiles and rails, but I needed a complete one for a presentation this weekend, and ran out of time to finish it completely.

[G S Haydon]

Lovely work Tom. It would be good to be working with you in your shop/site on this job.

[Tom King]

Thanks a lot Graham.  Compliments that mean the most come from people who do the same sort of work. 

 

I had to give a presentation yesterday, and while there were all sorts of compliments, what really went into the work was way over their heads.  There were all sorts of people there, including some PhDs in historic preservation, but even they had never done this type of work.  It was very much appreciated, but not really any understanding on what it really took to make the windows.

 

This job will get put on the back burner for a while.  The weather is starting to cool off enough for a 43 foot tall chimney to build the stack on (we pulled off that job when it got hot-the back chimney on the Robinson-Elam house), and after that temperatures will be about right for plastering before weather starts freezing, so this job will be a good inside job for this winter.  It takes a good half day to cut and fit mortises and tenons, and assemble one window, so it will take us a long month to make the other 46 sash.  There are 16 of these 4-lights, and also some 6 and 9-lights.

 

Then it will take another couple of weeks to glaze, and paint the exteriors, and who knows how long to fit them into the old window jambs.  We're using hand made glass like it would have been made in the 18th century.  http://www.restorationglass.com/antique-window-glass.htm

 

If you have viewed the picture page before, hit your refresh button because it's been updated several times, and your browser may just show you an old version.

[G S Haydon]

Only those that do can appreciate the level of skill, otherwise we take for granted. Goes for just about anything really, nurse, teacher or office worker. I love the colour of that old pine too.