Tools for Making Log Furniture

Drawknives

• The main tool used in the shaping of the logs is the drawknife, which is a straight or curved edge blade with handles on either end. The drawknife is pulled along the log to remove bark and shape the log. The curved edge is used to remove bark from the logs while the straight edge is used for shaping. The blades are made of high-carbon tempered steel. Two techniques, peeling and skip-peeling, are employed by furniture makers when using a drawknife. Peeling removes all of the log’s bark while leaving the tracks from the drawknife visible. Skip-peeling leaves some of the bark intact, giving the logs a more rustic look.

Tenon Cutters

• Much of log furniture is made using a mortise-and-tenon joining system where the ends of a log are formed into a round peg and fitted into a corresponding hole drilled into an adjoining log. Tenon cutters are machines or tool attachments that cut the round peg (tenon) portion of a mortise-and-tenon joint. A number of tenon cutters are available for purchase. Some attach to a drill or a router, using the spinning motion of the bit, which is shaped like a tapered cone, or a cone with a cylinder on top of it. Tenon cutters of this type are designed to cut specific-sized tenons with a fixed length and width. Another type of tenon cutter is the pencil-sharpener-style, freestanding tenon cutter. Logs are inserted into this tenon cutter, like a pencil is inserted into a sharpener, and cut to specified diameters and lengths depending on the chosen cutting guide.

Mortising Machinese and Bits

• Mortising machines are designed to create the hole, or mortise, portion of a mortise-and-tenon joint. They are available in a variety of diameters and brands. Mortising machines make two shapes of mortises, square and cylindrical. Log furniture primarily uses cylindrical tenons and would therefore need a cylindrical mortise. These cylindrical mortise bits attach to a handheld drill or drill press and create cylindrical flat-bottomed holes. A mortise machine that drills cylindrical mortises functions like a drill press where a bit is pressed down into the log with the machine’s “arm” and lifted back up, creating the hole. Depending on the size of mortise necessary, a regular or spade drill bit may work to drill a mortise as well.