Comprehensive Woodworking

We’ve programmed Comprehensive Woodworking to be a wholistic one-week over-view of the craft of woodwork. This is the core information that every woodworker needs. It’s the vital information that we teach our apprentices at the beginning of their training.

So many woodworkers pick up their knowledge in a piecemeal way. They learn misinformation, pickup bad habits and follow out-of-date practices. All too often, wood workers reach for a bad tool or struggle with a flawed piece of wood without understand what’s wrong or knowing how to improve.

For many, it’s simply a lack of access from a young age. Perhaps your school didn’t teach woodwork? Perhaps you haven’t picked up a chisel in 30 years? Perhaps you were once discouraged from working with your hands? No matter! We’re here to provide you with a complete over-view of the craft and to point you in the right direction.

Many of you’ll consider yourselves to be “good” woodworkers. You’ll think “I don’t need this course”. You’ll wait for a course that offers something exciting to make. The thing is, you don’t know what it is that you don’t know. In a world of Youtube, wood shows and podcasts, there’s so much conflicting advice. Many people are trying to sell you an expensive piece of unnecessary kit. We just want you to enjoy the creative process of woodwork.

Day One

All about timber

We share our deep love of timber. We talk about hard wood, soft wood, long grain, end grain and “difficult” grain. We look at colour matching, grain matching, sliced and sawn veneer as well as common substrates. We experiment with figured timber, burls and knots. We look at some of the common cabinet species, we discuss commercial timber sizes and we talk about how to buy and store wood. We pay special attention to timber movement, grain direction and moisture content.

Day Two

All about hand tools

We go through all the basic hand tools and how they cut. We look at saws, chisels, hand planes, marking-out tools, scrapers, carving tools, sharpening and the importance of good steel. We compare Western tools with their Japanese equivalents. We discuss what to look for in a tool and which tools are the most important to invest in first.

Day Three

All about hand-held electric and pneumatic tools.

We look at all the common woodworking hand-held power tools, including routers, Domino machines, biscuit jointers, drills, electric planes, track saws, angle grinders, jig saws, palm sanders and circular/contractors/mitre saws.

Day Four

All about machines.

We look at the surface planer, thicknesser, band saw, table saw, radial arm saw, router table, spindle moulder, re-saw, and linisher (sander). We discuss the importance of jigs, machine safety and general maintenance.

Day Five

Everything Else

We look at gluing-up, sanding, finishing, vacuum bags, clamping, steam bending and curved laminating. We also look at screws, nails and hinges.

We bring all this together by designing and building a safe, logical jig for the router table, using all the knowledge gained during the week.

Notes

Morning tea and lunch included.

Students must be 18 years or older.

You do not need to bring any tools. However, you are encouraged to bring any hand tools that you would like some advice on (such as a hand plane that needs tuning). Part of the course will be on sharpening and tuning hand tools. This is a great opportunity for you to fettle your hand tools! Please don’t bring any power tools.

The total course fee is $2,695 incl. GST. We require an $300 deposit at the time of booking. You will be invoiced for the balance 2 weeks out from the commencement date. The deposit is fully re-fundable up to 4 weeks prior to the course commencing. If you are unable to attend due to illness (such as COVID 19) at the time of commencement, we will refund the deposit or put the deposit towards a later masterclass.

Hello Evan,

In my haste to get away on Friday I forgot to personally thank Aditi and would be grateful if you would pass on my thanks. She has a lovely manner and amongst other things very patiently took me through the intricacies of sanding. The thought of it no longer fills me with dread.

I would like to thank you for a very rewarding week. The class was truely comprehensive, and I gained insight and practical knowledge about all aspects of woodworking. I admit I attended as a novice interested principally in joinery techniques- the class though has now ignited an interest in all aspects of the craft.

Warm regards,

Jim (January 2024 Comprehensive Woodworking student)

Hi Evan,

Hope you are doing well. It took a while for me to think about what feedback I could give you. Also sometimes it is not worth taking holidays when you come back to a mountain of work! I was reminded to email you by seeing yet another woodworker who had taken off the tops of two fingers with a router. I really appreciated your emphasis on safety while woodworking. 

The topics that I found most useful were: 

1. Structure and drying of wood, especially the different Australian woods. 

2. How to sharpen properly! 

3. Correct use of hand tools, especially planes 

4. Hand sanding 

5. Gluing techniques and the reasons why. 

6. Finishing/oiling. 

7. General principles for using a bandsaw which will be applicable to a scroll saw. 

8. Repairing scratches in furniture As you can see I prefer hand tools, both because I like doing things slowly and carefully and because I see serious injuries from woodworking at least once a month. 

Our group represented a good cross section of ages, abilities, resources and ambitions. You did well to cater to everyone by starting with the basics and giving us the scientific reasons why wood behaves as it does. Not everything you taught was relevant for me but there was always something useful every day. Thanks for sharing your knowledge. I found it very interesting and hope to put it to good use in the future. 

Regards, Margaret​ (January 2024 Comprehensive Woodworking Student)