Thanks Dustin, and thank you for buying my books. I'm glad you find them interesting. Cheers.

Thank you Peter, and thank you for buying my books. I appreciate it. Cheers Des

Thank you for buying the books and for the kind words. Table saw is good; doesn't matter how the patterns are made, the fun is in making them. Cheers and all the best. Des

Thanks very much for buying my book and for the kind words Kevin. All the best with the lantern build. Cheers, Des

Hi Alan. The epoxy gives me a lot more working time so I can assemble and glue the entire andon in one go. To me this makes it easier to square all the pieces on all four sides, clamp, then make any minor adjustments necessary to make sure everything stays square. Wood glue doesn't have the same working time, so here I had to do the glue-up in two steps. Ultimately, for a small piece like this though, it just gets down to preference. One step or two steps, as long as everything is checked and re-checked for square, it doesn't really matter. The individual timber pieces on this andon are fairly thin, so there's not going to be enough wood movement to worry about. Cabinets and other larger pieces are a different matter, and I always glue those up in stages.

Hi Jim. All the tools are fairly straightforward. Table saw, jointer, thicknesser, and drum sander to get the kumiko to the correct dimensions regarding thickness and width (I briefly explain this process on an Instagram post a few years ago at instagram.com/p/BECqUJZovDl/ ). After that, it's hand tools and jigs - handsaws, chisels, and block plane. If I need to cut grooves in the outer frame, I use a router on a very simple router table (which consists of a MDF sheet clamped to my workbench and a fence clamped to that). I also have a Router Boss system that I also use occasionally. All the jigs are explained in detail in the books as they're needed. I cover how long it generally takes in a later video here kzfaq.info/get/bejne/gNSkZLyj0pnInGw.html, and it probably answers your question. I don't have anything against using a table saw to cut the kumiko joints, as long as people are aware of the limitations. As you mentioned, they are limited to the width of the kerf of the saw blades they have available. At the college in Japan where I studied, we had a wall of table saw blades of different thicknesses, but as far as I'm aware, they're not readily available outside of Japan, mainly because they're not particularly necessary other than with shoji and kumiko work. The big advantage in cutting by hand is that if I want to adjust the pitch from, say, 45mm to 47mm, I simply make up a new story stick. I don't have to make any adjustments to any jigs. I can also have multiple pitches to suit the design - no adjustments necessary. It's not that easy when using a jig on a table saw. It's an individual decision, though, and as long as people are satisfied with the kumiko patterns they're making and are having fun, either way is perfect as far as I'm concerned. Cheers, Des

@@kskdesign1 Thanks you so much Des. I went to the 2 links and watched and studied both. For the first few small sample projects (coasters and such) I'll do the thicknessing with a plane jig. after that I can see a drop sander coming. :)

Thanks PaulSeminary. I bought those from Amazon. They’re miter clamps, and you also need the spring pliers to use them. A search on Amazon should give you a few options.

kskdesign Thank you !

Thanks Shane. I bought the paper and glue in Japan. People have passed on a couple of sources for shoji paper in Australia, so if you could email me, I'll pass them on. The glue is simply a starch glue, so the school Clag glue should work. Just mix it with water to get a cream-like consistency. I've never tried it, but because it's a starch glue, there's no reason that it shouldn't work.

@@kskdesign1 Thanks Des. From my memory school clag was for eating, but I was at school along time ago..... I will have to see if I can find some, has definitely been along time. Have found a few Australian sites for Shoji paper, will probably try them out. Hope you find time to keep up these videos. And look forward to the intermediate course in Sydney, Hint, Hint..... Either way, much appreciated.