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Thread: Shoji Door Project
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11th July 2015, 10:18 AM #1Boucher de Bois
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Shoji Door Project
I thought this little project may be of interest to some on here...
I've just done some major work on the master bedroom - gutted it completely, insulated, removed one window and walled it over, replaced another two windows, relined, installed a bamboo floor etc. The next step is the wardrobe, which will extend over one entire end of the room (3m wide, floor to ceiling). What better for that than a set of Shoji doors?
There are also two small windows high up on the wall that I'm going to cover with a pair of little Shoji screens to give a nice soft lighting effect. Here are the windows (and the edge of where the doors will go):
Note the bogan double glazing - a layer of bubble wrap that provides an extra layer of insulation between the glass and the shoji screen. Will obviously be invisible.
I started with the frames for the windows, which are a mortice and tenon assembly to provide some cohesiveness with the stile and rail arrangement of the shoji doors:
The timber is clears Macrocarpa, and as per the traditional way of doing shoji, they are simply planed with no finish.
Next up are the doors themselves. I'm doing 3 doors, each 2.1m x 1m, with a fairly sparse kumiko arrangement to achieve the look we're after. Here's a sketch:
So far, I have dimensioned and dressed the timber:
Next up will be marking everything out and doing the joinery...
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15th July 2015, 05:21 PM #2Boucher de Bois
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Have now marked everything out. The main rail joints will be double mortices, 6mm each as per Des K's book. As I have a habit of making a hash of sawing straight tenon cheeks, I've made a set of 4 little guides that I can clamp onto the rails. A test joint proved the concept, so I can proceed with some confidence...
I'm using two mortice gauges to avoid having to reset them for each part of the double - one western and one Japanese. From using them side-by-side, I can conclude that Japanese gauges are far superior...
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15th July 2015, 06:54 PM #3
Watching with interest Stu. Top idea with the sawing guides.
DesSee some of my work and general shoji/kumiko information at kskdesign.com.au
My Instagram page
My YouTube channel
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19th July 2015, 07:42 PM #4Boucher de Bois
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Progress is slow as it's difficult to find a lot of shed time at the moment... Anyway, first 4 mortice and tenon joints are done for the top and bottom rails on one door:
All seem to fit OK, which is nice. The sawing guides do a good job of keeping the tenons straight and even
I have struck an issue with one of the stile pairs though - it appears to be essentially unplanable: the grain reverses all over the place, so I get sections where it's impossible to plane in any direction without major tearout. This is with a razor sharp, very carefully set up Kanna too. Things are slightly better with a western plane (with a higher bedding angle), but it simply won't be possible to have the planed surface be the final finish on those bits. I'll just have to sand it to 600 or 800 or so, and burnish the surface with a bit of oak to get a reasonable match to the planed surfaces on the other bits.
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16th August 2015, 12:39 PM #5Boucher de Bois
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Haven't got too much further with the door construction - I've finished all the main rail/stile joints and thought I had better tidy the shed before I started on the kumiko (the thin lattice stuff). However, the shoji paper I ordered (eventually) arrived, so I was able to finish off and install the window screens.
Quite pleased at how they turned out.
They're actually stuck on to the wall with super-strong automotive double-sided tape. Permanent and invisible...
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3rd January 2017, 06:58 PM #6Boucher de Bois
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Holy thread resurrection batman!
(apologies for the broken image links in the above posts - I've switched image hosting providers and I don't think there's a way to edit the earlier posts.)
It's been a rather busy 16 months since I last posted, with no progress until this week when I found some time to get stuck into the half-finished pile of shoji bits sitting on my workbench. So, I've now cut all of the kumiko mortise and tenon joints, and the half lap joints in said kumiko:
IMAG0347.jpg
Rails, with tenons done and rebated to go in the track
IMAG0349.jpg
Stiles, with all mortises done
IMAG0351.jpg
Lots of kumiko all cut and ready to go
The next step is to cut mortises in the stiles for the flush pulls:
IMAG0352.jpg
...and then do all the finish planing and assemble.
After that, I have to cut the final rebates in the stile ends to fit the tracks and fine tune the fit, then stick the paper on. It'll be nice having it all done
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3rd January 2017, 07:13 PM #7SENIOR MEMBER
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I've just ordered a book on shoji and am looking forward to having a crack at it..
Yours is looking very nice.
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7th January 2017, 04:35 PM #8Boucher de Bois
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Got the first one assembled. Not 100% happy with some of the joints (tenon shoulders not quite even, leaving small gaps at the front in a couple of places), but it'll be serviceable enough!
IMAG0357.jpg
The other two doors should be better. It's all a learning process!
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8th January 2017, 06:13 PM #9
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21st January 2017, 02:51 PM #10Boucher de Bois
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Finished. Fitting involved a little tweaking to get them to slide nicely, but here you go:
IMAG0375.jpg
IMAG0379.jpg
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21st January 2017, 04:16 PM #11
Nicely done Stu. The doors look great!
DesSee some of my work and general shoji/kumiko information at kskdesign.com.au
My Instagram page
My YouTube channel
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21st January 2017, 04:43 PM #12Boucher de Bois
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Cheers Des, and thanks for writing your book - I can highly recommend it to anyone else pondering making some shoji!
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23rd January 2017, 09:50 PM #13
They do look very nice.
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24th January 2017, 08:21 AM #14
Three thumbs up!
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25th January 2017, 02:06 PM #15GOLD MEMBER
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- Oct 2003
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- Sydney,Australia
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Hope you don't have any cats. Apparently they are renown for pawing holes in the paper rather than go around.
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