tools for making sayas?

I've recently purchased some wood to make some sayas. I was originally going to use thin basswood to make a sandwich style, but am now I'm contemplating trying one or two by chiseling out the space for the blade. What size chisels would I need? Also, what type of mallet would people recommend for this type of work? TIA for any help!

I just made my first saya. I used a combination of 10mm, 14mm and i think a 20mm chisel. Didn't use a mallet just hand carved with sharp suitable chisels. Also used a jigsaw to cut it out and and a random orbital sander. Plus good old sanding block and elbow grease

When I make sayas it is generally for single bevel ground blades and I only cut the notch on one leaf. I score the outline of the notch with a very sharp woodworking knife and then trim away the wood freehand with an electric router. The reason for the scoring is it delineates the cut out and gives a clean edge. I like to check frequently to ensure I am getting a tight enough friction fit with the blade. I use a 6mm chisel to clean up and final friction fit is done with a cabinet makers scraper if necessary. The work is clamped in a wood vice for routing and only cut to shape when the two halves have been glued together. I use cascamite glue for this. I drill the pin hole before gluing up so that the inside can be cleaned up as necessary.

The pin is made from ebony on my sayas and produced on a lathe. I don't have a lathe so I get a local wordworking workshop to run me off a batch of about 20 at a time (as they get lost sometimes). They could be hand carved from an offcut of ebony, walnut or rosewood (for example) if you are only doing one or two pins.

toddnmd said:

I've recently purchased some wood to make some sayas. I was originally going to use thin basswood to make a sandwich style, but am now I'm contemplating trying one or two by chiseling out the space for the blade. What size chisels would I need? Also, what type of mallet would people recommend for this type of work? TIA for any help!

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Basswood is soft and pretty forgiving. It's a great wood to try your hand at carving with. But what size chisel is best will kind of depend on what type of knife you're carving for. Ideally, you want to try and strike a balance between a width that is wide enough to cut relatively quickly, but small enough to give you control when carving the tapers/angles. I like to aim for a chisel that's no wider than 1/3 the blade height but that's an arbitrary reference.

I find 5/8th (16mm) to be a good universal option, in general. If doing a tall gyuto or a nakiri, you can do a lot of the work with a slightly larger blade, and if doing a yanagiba or something shorter in height, 3/8th or 1/2in will give you more control. I also like to keep either a 1/4 inch or a skew tip chisel for cleaning up edges with more precision, or working near the tip.

If you are trying to hone your skills, arguably more important than chisel size is chisel type. There are many profiles and styles, not unlike our kitchen knives. Bench chisels (the sort of home-depot, universal do all chisel) that most people think of and are quick to slap silly with a mallet aren't usually great for precision carving work. The bevels can easily cause you to dig into the wood if not careful about reading the grain direction, and the shorter length of their neck doesn't give you much leverage (or knuckle clearance) if you're going to try and use them free hand. with a mallet, you lack some control and have a greater risk of gouging or chip-out. Mortise chisels are usually pretty stocky and while good for both hand cutting or a mallet, depending on the cut depth and direction, they are the chisel equivalent of a chopping tool. From the western tool box, the chisel to go grab is going to be a paring chisel. Longer, with a thinner neck that may flex a little, these are ideal for doing slower, controlled hand cuts. Once you've outlined your shape, you can shave away material quickly and cleanly with a sharp paring chisel. It's lighter style won't be as prone to dig into the wood, and they do a great job paring off thin shavings cross-grain - ideal for the angles involved in getting a saya cavity that matches the blade tapers and bevels. *( If you don't have a paring chisel, look at socket chisels. They usually are longer than generic bench chisels, though still a multi-use design that can be used with a mallet or freehand.)


All this said - basswood is forgiving, so it's worth jumping in and just giving it a go ... Because it's a soft wood, as long as your chisels are sharp, you should be able to get a good result regardless of chisel type or sizes.

As for mallets - I like wooden mallets for chisels...but apart from outlining my cut (which I prefer to use knife for), I don't use a mallet for much work on sayas unless it's really dense hardwoods. I use one hand to push the chisel and the other to put pressure on the chisel neck or just behind blade...this allows maximum control.

if your curious to browse specialty woodworking tools, look at highland hardware, traditional woodworker or lee valley.

CPD has great advice.

I second that carving one side out makes most sense. Marking with Camelia oil is helpful for a perfect fit.
Keep your chisels sharp! I did mine with Oire Nomi (bench chisels) and was frustrated by banging my knuckles.

No mallet! Pare only!
Less is more. Good luck on the paring chisels--they're hard to find. The only new one that I'd recommend is blue spruce (tons of money). You may have better luck with The Best Things, by telling what you're doing. Henry Taylor supposedly makes a great paring chisel. Sorbys tend to have spotty quality. Japanese are great, but a bit cumbersome for a saya.

I'm personally looking at ebay for a paring chisel with a forged octagonal tang...oops, shouldn't have told you.

If you want a GREAT chisel for basswood saya, look into a saya nomi.
I'm in the process of possibly commisioning one through Stu Tierney (toolsfromjapan.com)...I'm too cheap for japan woodworker.
Marko has excellent posts in past threads outlining the importance of the parts (bullnose, bent at around 12 degrees, springy, long blade for a japanese chisel, excellent white steel).

One thing that is overlooked--get a nice sharp knife for carving out the outline. You want it to penetrate a solid mm into the wood. An exacto knife or scalpel might be too light here. You can use a utility knife or chipcarving knife for it, but a kiridashi is the correct knife for this. I use a Murphy Mill knife blade for mine.

For pins, I use ebony guitar bridge pins (just happen to have a bunch). Mine are slotted. I use a special reamer, but I'd recommend using 80 grit sandpaper wrapped around the pin if you're just starting.

Walter Sorrell has an excellent tutorial on youtube for katana. Just carve one side.

Anyways, good luck and have fun!

-Matt

Thanks for the helpful responses.
Perhaps I wasn't clear--my original plan was to use basswood in the middle of a saya, between two pieces of other (harder, and generally, to me at least, "nicer" wood). Then I saw some people suggest using a chisel to cut a cavity. I was going to try, but after more reading, decided it might be too difficult and require more time and tools than I have right now. So now I'm back to the original idea of doing "sandwich" style.

i bought saya chisels from japanwoodworker and found them worth every penny if you are actually going to make a few of them.

A small one for hardwood/detailed work and a bigger one for stock removal is a good combo

toddnmd said:

Thanks for the helpful responses.
Perhaps I wasn't clear--my original plan was to use basswood in the middle of a saya, between two pieces of other (harder, and generally, to me at least, "nicer" wood). Then I saw some people suggest using a chisel to cut a cavity. I was going to try, but after more reading, decided it might be too difficult and require more time and tools than I have right now. So now I'm back to the original idea of doing "sandwich" style.

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Todd, don't be scared away from a two piece approach. It's more challenging but it's not, by any means, an incredibly difficult project. As long as you work with relatively soft woods (translation: avoid fancy burls which have wild grain patterns, or dense exotics like ebony, rosewood etc) you should be able to pull it off. And along the same lines, you don't need lots of fancy tools. To be sure, the right tools (or variety) makes it easier to get a great result, but If you have tools to make a 3 piece saya, odds are you have enough to make a two piece one...just as long as you've got one or two sharp chisels and patience...a block plane, sand paper and something to cut the outer shape...you pretty much have the essentials.

This thread is helpful, I got some 3"x12"x1/4" basswood from LV and plan to make a few at some point for the knives I couldn't get the generic sayas for. Nothing fancy, just to protect the working knives.

Everyone, thanks for the info and encouragement.
Rockler had a sale a few weeks bag, so I indulged and bought some various pieces of 3x24x1/4 wood (plus already had a few pairs of pieces I've bought from Burl Source in the past couple years). I love cool woods, so I'd rather have the outside boards made of nice wood, so my plan is to use a basswood spacer in the middle. That's my near-term plan. I think I'll be able to make sayas for most of my knives on hand now. My main tools will be a jigsaw and a marking knife. I'll try to take some pics once I get into it.
In the future, maybe I will try something with a chisel and softer wood. From what I've seen, it would certainly make sense to use a slightly thicker piece to carve out the cavity.

toddnmd said:

Everyone, thanks for the info and encouragement.
Rockler had a sale a few weeks bag, so I indulged and bought some various pieces of 3x24x1/4 wood (plus already had a few pairs of pieces I've bought from Burl Source in the past couple years). I love cool woods, so I'd rather have the outside boards made of nice wood, so my plan is to use a basswood spacer in the middle. That's my near-term plan. I think I'll be able to make sayas for most of my knives on hand now. My main tools will be a jigsaw and a marking knife. I'll try to take some pics once I get into it.
In the future, maybe I will try something with a chisel and softer wood. From what I've seen, it would certainly make sense to use a slightly thicker piece to carve out the cavity.

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If you go with the sandwich approach, consider adding a block plane to your mix if you don't already have one. You can shave the basswood middle piece to a thickness/taper that is very close to your knife's taper and bevel with a sharp plane and some sand paper to even it out (put the sandpaper on a good flat block). If you match the tapers before cutting out the recess with your jigsaw you have a good shot at getting close to a friction fit without ever doing chisel work.

I always wanted to make one, but I don't how to solve the glue squeeze out issue for the interior cavity, also do you guys wax the interior?

Glue squeeze out is only an issue if you use the wrong glue or apply it to excess. I make my sayas as two piece and wipe a very thin coat of freshly made cascemite cabinet makers adhesive on both faces before clamping the saya in a woodworking vice (built into the bench) rather than clamping with G cramps. Leave for 24 hours before final shaping an finishing. I don't wax the inside. It is extremely difficult to tell that these sayas are made from two leaves of wood.

I have been contemplating making a custom knife block in this way, until I saw the version that Dave Martell was selling that has shelves removable for cleaning.

CPD said:

If you go with the sandwich approach, consider adding a block plane to your mix if you don't already have one. You can shave the basswood middle piece to a thickness/taper that is very close to your knife's taper and bevel with a sharp plane and some sand paper to even it out (put the sandpaper on a good flat block). If you match the tapers before cutting out the recess with your jigsaw you have a good shot at getting close to a friction fit without ever doing chisel work.

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Thanks for the suggestion. I was going to buy some extra 1/32 basswood, which I was thinking might help with the fit. Would try to strategically place a strip or two on the inside. Of course I'd love friction fit, but my goal is something that protects the knife and looks good for this round. Hopefully it will fit pretty well, and since the edge would primarily have contact with the soft basswood, it doesn't have to be perfect.

Thinking of tackling a few utility sayas myself. For double beveled knives with non-friction saya fit, is it ok to only carve out one half of the 2 pieces of wood?

Yup.

You may want one side thicker, but should work fune

Thanks for the info! I plan to use titebond, will do a test piece first

Adrian said:

Glue squeeze out is only an issue if you use the wrong glue or apply it to excess. I make my sayas as two piece and wipe a very thin coat of freshly made cascemite cabinet makers adhesive on both faces before clamping the saya in a woodworking vice (built into the bench) rather than clamping with G cramps. Leave for 24 hours before final shaping an finishing. I don't wax the inside. It is extremely difficult to tell that these sayas are made from two leaves of wood.

I have been contemplating making a custom knife block in this way, until I saw the version that Dave Martell was selling that has shelves removable for cleaning.

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Wife wants to go to the craft store so I think I'll look for poplar or basswood there. Have coupons so maybe a cheap chisel too to just get started.

Any opinion on these? Maybe the 1/2". Decent enough to get started with soft woods?

http://www.leevalley.com/us/wood/page.aspx?p=71290&cat=1,41504

Friction fit is really much easier than you think. I kind of halfassed tried for it on my first saya and it was pretty natural feeling. Just make sure that when you think you have it clamp the ever living crap out of the two halves and try the fit. I messed up a few this way. If you shape the outside with a chisel at all definitely mark it all up with a pencil. Do what it takes to visualize where the cavity is, you are going to sand it all off later. I messed up a few more this way. Basswood is cheap and if you blow it throw it away and call it a lesson learned. This is supposed to be fun anyway!

brianh said:

Any opinion on these? Maybe the 1/2". Decent enough to get started with soft woods?

http://www.leevalley.com/us/wood/page.aspx?p=71290&cat=1,41504

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If you can be patient LV often has free shipping to USA, the last promo just ended at the start of June so it may be awhile again. I just stop at the store on my way home from work; lots of "wants" there, not so many "needs".

I did an online search for chisel and got pages upon pages of them. Found some of the Japanese ones made of hitachi white HRC 65ish, fairly pricey, no different than knives I suppose.

EDIT
I'll be interested too if those would be good to start with, sorry for going off on a tangent

brianh said:

Any opinion on these? Maybe the 1/2". Decent enough to get started with soft woods?

http://www.leevalley.com/us/wood/page.aspx?p=71290&cat=1,41504

Click to expand...

those should be more than decent enough to get you going on softer woods. If you're going to use them exclusively for sayas would suggest you slightly round the corners. Subtle adjustment easily done, but it will help prevent you from accidentally digging in on some cuts.

Amazing help, thank you. I bought 1/4" and 1/8" basswood sheets today, along with a bag of pins I should be able to taper nicely chucked in a still press. The 1/4" for carving out, 1/8" for flat side.