I made my first wooden frame saw.

It’s the worst saw I’ve ever made, and the best saw I’ve ever made.

The first problem is that the tenons aren’t tight enough in the mortises, so the saw comes apart too easily. (it’s just as easy to say that the mortises are too loose for the tenons I cut. When I start cutting with the saw, the first few back-n-forths are fine, but then the tenons start to pop out of the mortices (since they’re not glued). Tighter tenons, deeper mortises, would solve some of those problems.

So that’s a thing I need to work on.

The second problem is that all the twist in the pieces that didn’t appear on the workbench, are all too apparent in the finished product. Which means I have to learn how to plane my pieces flat, square, and true. All of that, I’m going to have to learn how to do much better and more effectively.

The third problem is that the kerf which holds the saw blade is the correct depth, but improperly set in the uprights, and also that I need better hardware for holding the saw ends.

Tool Making

I can’t even make cabinets or boxes yet. Why on earth did I make a frame saw? And if I was going to make a frame saw, why did it have to be a bad one?

My friend Scott, who used to work at NASA, said that when you’re making something you’ve never done before, make the whole prototype so you know where all the major mistakes are. Big Box Lumber Store pine is cheap, even in these days of inflation. This whole thing is assembled out of scrap wood and scrap string. The most valuable object in it is the saw blade, and I think that was $19.00 — a new DeWalt handsaw is roughly $29.00, so I’m already ahead by quite a bit. This saw blade is also re-sharpenable, probably several times — so creating a reliable saw that I made myself is a real test of my abilities.

But I’m also a great believer in the idea that tools make tools make things. I wanted to make a frame saw because I see them as a great blending of the metalworker’s art and the woodworker’s craft. Being able to make a frame saw is a simple way of testing my skills at making tenons, at mortising another piece of wood, and doing so in such a way that two pieces of wood can form right angles to a third piece in the same plane. That’s just a lovely layering of accuracy that I appreciate a lot.

Small Projects

But another reason had to do with the nature of my shop, which is outdoors under the deck — it’s out of the direct rain, but it’s really only useable on some days. The weather has to be between 55° and 80° F, and while it can be cloudy or sunny it can’t be rainy or foggy or misty or windy. Any kind of weather at all, and it tends to be challenging to work in this environment.

In this environment (or others like them), I’ve made a number of big things: my Roman-style work bench after Christopher Schwarz’ book Ingenious Mechanicks, a Roy Underhill episode, and a YouTube video by Rex Kreuger; An 18th century style saw bench, after an article by Megan Fitzpatrick; a pair of modular saw horses for supporting an old hollow-core door as my painting and assembly table; a shaving horse after Rex Kreuger; a Dutch Tool chest (DTC) after Megan Fitzpatrick.

But — because of working in the open air — some of these projects take days, or weeks, to complete. And my heart yearns to be able to make smaller things, better, and also faster. Things like this saw, and the shooting board I made a few days ago to clamp onto my low Roman workbench. I’ve set myself one big project for Spring through Autumn 2026, the Nail Cabinet of Roy Underhill as imagined by Christopher Schwarz. But I also have it in mind to make three saws, and some small boxes and a few other things like some outdoor benches and maybe an Adirondack chair or two for the porch. I would like to stop making things that allow me to say I have built a workshop… and start making things that I can say, I made that in my workshop.

Christopher Schwarz, in his book AMERICAN PEASANT, that the goal should be Good Work At Speed: Do your best work in the time that you have available, and see what you’re able to produce. The shooting board I created is not great, but it’s a damn sight better than what I had before, which was bupkis – nada – nihil – nada. It may not shoot edge grain cleanly to a 90° angle, but it’s a lot closer than I could manage on my own before I built it. Similarly, the frame of this frame saw is terrible… but it’s shown me a lot about the kinds of mistakes I’m making, and also where in the process I’m making those mistakes.

Which is to the good.

So that’s the commitment for 2026. Not just to make things out of wood for my workshop (and admittedly, a saw is a thing for my workshop rather than from my workshop), but to make things that are useful and ideally beautiful and desirable to have around the house, and could be intended either as a thing for my own home, or as a gift for someone else.

This is the point in my woodworking effort where I want to start making things, not just for the sake of having the woodworking set-up and tools, but for producing useful things from that set-up.