What is considered handmade?

[jack forsberg]

You make a good point. Of course, our ancestors who made the first copper tools (which preceded iron) did do that, perhaps with stone tools.

And that's a good example of why it's impossible to be totally "hand made". You're always starting from some form of machine made tools or supplies.

Mike

not that impossible

https://primitivetechnology.wordpress.com/

[Roger Nair]

As a now retired timber framer, 20 years general carpentry followed by 25 years timber work, I claimed my frames were hand crafted, even though I used in part electric tools and nearly all the timber was sourced from sawmills. My mental reservation was, I carry the tools to the timber, not carry the timber to the tool and wield the tools by hand and guided by eye.

[Matt Radtke]

I like the idea that Bob Rozaieski put forward. It's "hand made" when a human can screw it up. The example he used, which I think is perfect, was something to the effect of: "If you hook up a duplicator to your spring-poll lathe, it isn't hand made."

A curve cut on the bandsaw is as just as hand-made as one cut on bowsaw. You, the human, is driving the cut.

The posting I'm referring to is ' What is “Hand Made”?' from 2011.

[John T Barker]

The real question is do you feel its hand made or not? If you made the piece tomorrow twice as fast and with quality as good as the first piece with more machine, does it mean anything in reality?

I put the question out for the forum to be a part of the discussion.

[John T Barker]

I like the idea that Bob Rozaieski put forward. It's "hand made" when a human can screw it up. The example he used, which I think is perfect, was something to the effect of: "If you hook up a duplicator to your spring-poll lathe, it isn't hand made."

A curve cut on the bandsaw is as just as hand-made as one cut on bowsaw. You, the human, is driving the cut.

The posting I'm referring to is ' What is “Hand Made”?' from 2011.

So if a human screws up the programming on a CNC machine that completely makes all the pieces of a piece of furniture then we have a hand made piece?

[John T Barker]

I would focus on the quality of the construction rather than whether someone wants to categorize it as handmade or not. The majority of what I have built over the last nearly thirty years has been constructed with good, sound joints (mortise and tenon and dovetails.) I've used mostly solid wood and have used plywood when it was necessary for the integrity of the piece (the bottom of a box within trapped sides.) I own most of the power tools (stationary and hand) we all use and I own a boatload of traditional hand tools. I have flattened and thickness boards by hand. All my dovetails are handcut and certainly fitted by hand. My tenons are fitted by hand. I consider the work I do to be good quality and I know I use my hands a lot. I would say that in this area (woodworking) there are terms that have changed over the years, like handmade and masterpiece. I believe those words can still be used but would not mean exactly what they did 200 years ago.

[Frank Drackman]

I was talking to day with a furniture maker in town and he considered "hand" made anything where a power tool has not touched the wood from unfinished to finished product.

Is this correct?

In other words, if I make say, a wooden toy and use a scroll-saw and electric belt sander, etc to make it, can I label it "handmade in the USA" ?

IMO, that was answered by David Pye when he defined the Workmanship of Risk versus the Workmanship of Certainty.

[Matt Radtke]

So if a human screws up the programming on a CNC machine that completely makes all the pieces of a piece of furniture then we have a hand made piece?

Heh. Read the rest of it.

If you, the worker, are holding the wood or tool and can influence the action right now to improve or ruin the work, it's likely hand made.

Clearly NOT Hand Made (imho): CNC. Lathe Duplicators.

Clearly Handmade: Hand sawn dovetails. Hand sawn tenons. Hand chiseled dovetails or mortises. Turned work where the turner is solely responsible for holding the tooling.

I like using the concept of "the workmanship of risk." In the above examples, CNC is entirely "workmanship or certainty." You will get exactly what you told the computer to spit out. Dovetails are entirely up the human and quintessential "workmanship of risk." (And just so we're clear, I'm not worshiping dovetails. They're just a perfect example for demonstrative purposes.)

Everything else, that's grey. And why you've started the thread.

If I must put some math on it, I'd break it down by part and then the risk/certainty of each part.

If you build a Shaker or Mission or Arts and Crafts table that consists of cutting parts to size at the table saw, cutting to length with stop blocks, tenons with a tenon jig, mortises with a mortiser and more stop blocks, I wouldn't call the thing hand made, though I don't know what the correct term would be. One-off-Manufactured? It's still likely very well made and better than the vast, vast majority of furniture for sale today. Calling back to the math I referenced above, I'd call each part 90 percent certain, 10 percent risk (owing entirely to feed rate and similar details), for a total of 90/10.

Cut those tenons at the band saw without a fence or other jig and, in my opinion, that same table would "improve" to 60/40 and be on the cusp of handmade. I put quotes around improve because something that is hand made isn't inherently better. In many ways, manufactured can be and is better...

[Matt Mattingley]

One could argue that the space station was handmade. It was! A human hand and brain went into every part of it. There is not a robot out there that has not been and made. When there is an artificial life form that has the ability to reason , that's when I consider something no longer handmade. Were in trouble then!

[Brian Holcombe]

For the love of god man!

[Matteo Lorenzo]

even handtools are separating the skin from the lumber, are they not? so unless you use your fingernails to scrape, your palms to rub and your fingers to tear and squish the wood into submission, it is deviating from the face-value definition of that term.

i wouldnt worry about it. if you put your time, effort and skills into making it from start to finish, regardless of method, i think its fair to say its handmade. if you are worried about people questioning your techniques, supply an up-front description of how you achieve your work and there will be no need to explain further.