A grooving plane. A plane used in carpentry to make a groove. For a groove less than 15 mm wide a small anazukikanna…

A type of smoothing plane. The arashikō ganna is the first smoothing plane used on a piece of timber, planking…

A wooden measuring gauge *jōgi 定規, generally, 6-7 cm wide, 35-45 cm long, and 0.9…

Lit. ridge cutting saw; from aze 畔 meaning a ridge between rice fields. An intermediate cutting saw. The …

An adze. Also written 手斧. A carpenters' tool with a curved handle fitted with a blade. It is used for rough finishing of…

A smoothing plane, used to further smooth the surface of timber after the general roughing plane *…

A large crosscut saw with a blade 70 cm long and 30 cm wide that has a wooden handle at each end for two people. This saw…

A plane used to shave the base of another plane. It is very important in planing that the base of the plane stock, known as…

Lit. saw with attached spine. A tenon or back saw. A saw designed especially to cut the shoulder of a tenon. The blade is…

A heavy duty ripsaw. It is similar to a coarse, ordinary, standard ripsaw that cuts along the wood grain except that the…

Also written 岸岐.

1　1) A general term for any architectural element built in a stepped or zigzag…

A type of hammer with an iron head and an oak handle. The gennō is used to strike a chisel or plane, or to…

Box-shaped measuring tool used when inking and marking off a pillar in order to fit the horizontal beams surrounding a…

Also known as anahikinoko 穴挽鋸. A round-nose roughing saw. The name is derived from the shape of the top of the…

Lit. secret hereditary writings. A manual which describes carpentry techniques developed by the master carpenters…

A coping saw. A saw used to cut curves in wood. The blade is very narrow so as to allow free movement when cutting. It…

A smoothing plane. The hiraganna is used for smoothly planing the surface of a board or pillar. Of the many types…

Lit. wide chisel. A type of striking chisel *tatakinomi 叩鑿, with a blade-…

Also known as osaehikinoko 押挽鋸. A thin bladed crosscut saw used to make a plane (see *…

A floor plan for a wooden building drawn by a carpenter on a thin piece of board. The plan does not include detail, but the…

A gauge used to confirm the straightness of structural members. A structural member is placed between the two boards of the…

Special finishing plane. A smoothing plane used in the final stages of wood preparation to get a glossy surface on timber,…

A double-line marking gauge with an iron handle bent into an L-shape where the marking blade is attached. The iron handle is…

A carpenter's hammer with an iron head. It differs from the steel double faced hammer *…

An architecutural element which incorporates a right angle. For example, a corridor with a right angle bend is referred to…

A carpenter's square. It has a long side, about 49 cm, and a short side about 24 cm, and looks like an L shaped ruler. Also…

A plane, used to shave away the surface of timber to get a smooth finish. In Japan, where most buildings in pre-Meiji…

A marking gauge. A tool used to draw accurate, straight lines on the surface of timber. The marking blade is fixed to the…

A gimlet. A tool used to bore holes in timber by rotating the blade tip. Gimlets are divided into three types depending on…

A plane used for shaving and finishing the sides of a mortise or an internal angle. There is a plane for left-side cutting…

A mallet that is usually made of oak or holly. It is used in cases where a metal hammer such as the *…

A trowel chisel. A type of paring chisel *tsukinomi 突鑿, with…

A large ripsaw with a blade about 60 cm long and 40 cm wide. It was first introduced in the 15th century and was used until…

Standard purpose carpenters' ripsaw. A ripsaw with a blade approximately 35-40 cm long and 12 cm wide. The blade narrows…

A special type of plane used for paring a curved wooden surface. A sotomaruganna 外丸鉋 is used for paring a concave…

A type of striking chisel *tatakinomi 叩鑿, with a thin, arc-shaped…

A carpenter's hewing ax. It is smaller than a tree-felling ax, tazuki 多都岐, and weighs between 750 and 1300 g. The…

A special plane used to cut bevelled corners. A shooting board, that serves as a guide, is attached to a small smoothing…

Also known as shakuriganna 决鉋. A plane used exclusively for making grooves in a doorsill or lintel. If the width of…

A plane used to curve the grooves in a doorsill or lintel. Unlike the *mizoganna 溝鉋,…

A saw. Saws are the most used tool in Japanese carpentry. They divided into two broad groups: the ripsaw, which cuts along…

A chisel. A tool used by a carpenter to bore holes in timber. It is divided broadly into two categories depending in the way…

Also pronounced ōga. A ripsaw thought to have been introduced to Japan from China at the beginning of the 15th…

A preliminary roughing plane. The oni-arashiko ganna has only a single cutting blade, expressed as ichimaiganna…

An ax. The ax has existed since the Stone Age, and was one of the earliest implements used by man. Its design was improved,…

A double-edged utility saw. A widely used saw which has rip-saw teeth on one side of the blade and crosscut teeth on the…

Also called shōjiki 正直. A plumb line with a plumb bob, furiko 振子, at the lower end. The plumb bob is a…

A rod-like, rectangular piece of wood made of Japanese cedar sugi 杉, or Japanese cypress hinoki 桧, 1.8 to…

A special finishing plane. A plane used in the final stage of smoothing wood after the surface has been flattened with the…

Lit. "bottom-cleaning chisel." A chisel designed to clean out the wooden shavings which have accumulated in the base of the…

A plane used for moulding curved, wooden architectural elements such as gable boards or projecting rafters. The sole of the…

A carpentry gauge used to mark accurate, parallel lines on pillars, door frames and planks, or to accurately redraw the…

Also known as sumi-ito 墨糸. A carpenter's inking line. It is used for drawing a reference line (the procedure is…

Also written 墨芯. A bamboo brush or drawing spatula. The tip of a piece of bamboo is sharpened into a pallet shape and then…

Carpenter's ink pot, or ink pad. The sumitsubo, unlike other carpentry tools, does not have a fixed shape or size.…

A tool called a "punner" in English, used to pound down broken stones laid below the foundation of a building. It consists…

A striking chisel. The primary structural elements in Japanese wooden buildings are pillars and beams, and not supporting…

A ripsaw. A saw used to cut timber in the same direction as the wood grain. There are various types of ripsaw including: the…

A whetstone, grinder, or grindstone. A tool used to sharpen the blade of a plane or chisel. Carpenters used a set of ranging…

Lit. "sword-guard chisel." The chisel used to make the hole needed to drive a Japanese nail wakugi 和釘 into a piece…

A hammer or mallet. Tsuchi are subdivided into various types according to its use. The *…

A paring chisel that shaves a timber entirely by hand pressure. Chisels called *tatakinomi…

A strike-through chisel. Normally, when constructing a pass-through mortise, the timber is carved away from both sides with…

Also called urame 裏目.
The scale marked on the back side of a carpenter's square, which is the square root of…

A plane used to smooth the sides of a groove, particularly in a doorsill or lintel, after the base plane, *…

Lit. "splitting gauge." The splitting gauge is used to mark thin pieces of wood along the grain so that it can be broken…

A plane thought to have been the only plane employed in ancient times to pare and finish timber. Today carpenters do not use…

U-shaped metal pieces nailed to a gate, allowing it to be locked with a sliding timber gate-bar *…