Make a Sack Back Windsor - Episode 1
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- Опубліковано 7 сер 2024
- A Windsor chair begins with the seat. Mike prepares the seat blank by hand planing both surfaces. He cuts the seat’s profile on a band saw and shapes its outside edge with a drawknife and spoke shave.
Check back every Tuesday for new episodes!
Visit us online at: www.makeawindsor.com/
Facebook: / thewindsorinstitute
Instagram: / windsorchairs
Filmed and Edited by Nico Zottos at Vibe Media Production Co.
This is one of the BEST UA-cam videos I have seen about Windsor chairs!!!
I have taken a number of classes with Mike at the Windsor Institute. He is THE Master and those weeks were some of the best time spent ever. The school was amazing, the instruction, the other students, just amazing. I have 6 various Windsors in my home and made one for my sister for her wedding gift. Mike is the best teacher and I am enjoying this immensely as his style is just so perfect. Take petting the dog for instance, absolute genius in it's simplicity. There are plenty of talented guys on UA-cam but Mike Dunbar is truly the King of Windsors!
Although I may never make, much less attempt to make a Windsor Chair, Mr. Dunbar is worthy of watching whether one undertakes to fashion one for self and family or friends. One could do far worse than watch the series on the Sack Back Windsor Chair Mr. Dunbar and his colleagues present. The work is may well be one of the most comprehensive tutorials I have ever seen on the UA-cam platform. His precision and clear explanations and the videography are first rate. The art of making is one that is returning and with good reason. The methods, tools and technical aspects of such making are largely alien to the collective consciousness of folks these days. Even if one does not wish to undertake such a project, the lessons, in my opinion, appear relevant to most aspects of woodworking. Thank you, Mr. Dunbar and your colleagues for your clear presentations and sharing your knowledge and wisdom. Best wishes to you and yours in your endeavors.
I took your class nearly 20 years ago. I'm so thrilled to find your videos. I still have my hand tools and can't wait to try building another Sack Back again soon! Thanks so much.
Thanks Scott. That's the kind of message I enjoy receiving. The videos should get you through that next chair. Be sure to subscribe.
Thanks Mike for everything you taught me. Be well
Bob Behrens
Tim O’Brien here Mike. My dad Len and I attended two of your classes some years ago. Sadly, we lost him a couple years ago but he sat on the chairs he made in those classes every day and some of our best memories together were when we got to learn at the bench of “The King of Windsor”. This series is a blessing and although I have made chairs steadily since my initiation. I will particularly enjoy new techniques developed since the olden days of my classes. ; -)
Sorry to learn about your Dad, Tim. I'm pleased to know we provided you with lasting memories. Thanks for kind words about the videos.
Mike! I built my first Windsor from your book with the blue cover. I also did my own research, etc., but what a wonderful form of woodwork. I hope this chance to say Thank You finds you...
Mike, you are doing a great service to us old guys who have taken some of your classes as well as the new generation of chair makers who will learn to love your masters touch. Thank you so much for this special chance to relive the very special weeks spent at 'The Windsor Institute'.
Mike, thanks for making these videos. I took a 2-week class from you in June of 1981. Back then at BYU we built sack-backs during the first week and continuous-arms during the second week. Referring to your books for refresher, I have since made 5 continuous-arm chairs. Presently I am making my first sack-back since that long ago Utah class. In my shop I find myself asking, "What would Mike suggest or what guidance would he provide if he was here?" These videos provide answers to my questions. Thanks again for the sack-back videos and any further videos.
Thank you, Stan. My methods evolved a long way from those first classes at BYU. Over the decades we made it much easier.
Worththeffort sent me here. One episode and I'm hooked. Thanks for your effort and time.
Danger. Warning. Stop. Do not cut. I love it. Glad I'm not the only one that does that.
Mike I am so proud to show people the sack back I made in one of your classes nearly 20 years ago! It's as beautiful and tight and comfortable as ever and I expect it will be for another hundred years or more. Thank you for one of the most rewarding weeks of my life.
20 years. That's a good endorsement, Bill. Good to hear from you again.
I met Michael at the Windsor Institute for a sack back class in 1994? and what impressed me at the time was the history professor in The Chairmaker.
While family issues- and eventually, just ‘life’ - wound up getting in the way of making chairs as a habit (which I regret) the class and Michael’s methods impacted my carpentry and woodworking vocation and style to such a degree that I still maintain the habits unto this day. Vanishing points, sharpening tools, the nuance of extending one’s mindful sensibilities into one’s work are just a few aspects where Michael lives in the results I achieved building homes, countless vocational carpentry projects, and cabinetry I built.
While each contained existential elements I can only attribute to Mike Dunbar in origin, my own esthetics and character may have and probably did influence my work as well. That said; Michael’s wholistic approach to the chair as an entity extending for centuries clicked with me. It was the first time I ever heard another person say things about their work that “clicked” with how I viewed much of my work (and probably also how much of - or why- my employment over the years was of little interest to me, of little intellectually satisfying effect) and took pleasure and meaning from the results of excellence in intent. Perhaps I’m the odd duck, but the class changed my mindset of what satisfying work was.
I still have most of my tools originally purchased for the class, and others acquired since. Many times they’ve been employed making a living not from building chairs. I wound up here today because over the last few months I’ve determined that is going to change and I’ve been poking around UA-cam on chair making for the last few months.
Yesterday I cut down a smallish scraggly maple next to a friend’s barn. I have enough pine stock on hand for six or eight seatboards, and a very nicely proportioned mid century comb-back that needs copying. I’ll build them to sell; probably in size it would be considered a side chair, but a careful 5% upsizing would be appropriate and be a great place to start.
While out in the snow yesterday swinging hatchet and axe splitting out optimal portions of good straight-grained maple for spindle blanks I thought of The Windsor Institute class those many years ago: I really need a froe!
Perhaps my first next woodworking project should be firing up the TiG and connecting an eye to an old piece of broken leaf spring?
Such a pleasure to see the Master back, as he has always been : a clear, simple, accurate teacher and a handtool virtuoso .
Good to hear from you, Vincent. How are things in Paris?
First a thank you to Jay Bates for suggesting this series of videos.
Now about the maker, wow wow wow. It’s a treat to be able to watch a true woodworker at his craft. You make it look SO easy and ENJOYABLE. It’s very obvious that you have made more than just one chair in your day.
Your teaching method on video is great BUT I would have loved being able to take a class and be able to ask for clearer explanations. I understand you have to do it the way you are on video. Just saying what a joy it would be to ask questions and get help with technique and such. BUT I’M EXTREMELY THANKFUL FOR YOUR TEACHING.👍
Thank you for your kind remarks. While I don't teach any more you can always ask questions through the channel's community tab.
This video just reminds me of how much I miss the Windsor Institute. Great memories there. Give Sue a huge hug for me. Very happy to see you back in action. So many of the techniques learned at the Institute transfer to solving other woodworking problems. Love hearing Mike Juniors great music in opening this video. It would be great to see Don participate as well.
Don was present every day we taped. He shows up in the bending sequence, yet to come. Michael is in Nashville pursuing music and getting some traction.
You are amazing! I showed my husband your channel.
Thank you. I hope he makes a chair. If he does, send me a picture.
Bless you man
I followed Christopher Schwarz's link here and it's like he gave me an early Christmas present of what I wanted most. I live in Montana and getting way back east was always difficult at best for me. This is great and thank you very much for what you are doing. You are helping me cross something off my bucket list and for that I am grateful.
I really enjoyed the video. I'm in the process of reading your Windsor book in preparation of making a chair myself and these videos are really helpful companions. Thank you!
Thank you, Robert. Good luck with the chair. Send me a picture of it when you're done.
So glad to see Mike putting his lessons on video. I took his class in 2006 and often wished I had a video record for reference. When he was still making a living by teaching, I understood why he did not want to have a video out there to compete with his classes. Now that he's retired, having all of his accumulated wisdom in a series of video lessons will make sure that his expertise is available for generations. Mike put as much thought into his teaching as he did the woodworking, These videos will be a treasure.
Wow great work Mike! I’ll never forget my week at the Windsor Institute!
I'm blown away by your teaching skills! Thank you!
Not only informative...this is extremely inspirational! Your passion and integrity is appreciated. This is the best gift I've gotten! I learned how to make ladder back 'sit-in' chair from Russ Filbeck and will sing his praises forever...now I have a new song! Thank you!
Mike, many thanks for putting the videos online.
These will be a great resource for future chairmakers and a valuable refresh for former students.
All the best.
--Dennis (Sack Back April '07)
Not only has the design never been topped, it has actually regressed.
People simply run through a series of (literally) wobbly-ass cylindrical mortise chairs throwing them out while wondering why they get loose. It's a solved problem! Now, the difficult part, to make my own.
Good luck in making a chair. The purpose of this series is to walk you through the process. If you get stuck I am only an email away. When you're done send me pictures. I get a real kick out of seeing someone succeed.
Thank you so much for putting this series together. Awesome
Mike, Great job as always!
Fantastic. Thank you for taking the time to put this together!!
A true legend at work! Thanks so much for making these videos.
Great instruction! Can’t wait to see more.
One of my great regrets not making it to the Institute. This is great to see.
Thanks for sharing!
Best regards.
Watch a master at his work. A treat to watch and learn. He makes this look so easy and effortless but I know better.
Mike, fantastic! Great to see a much loved woody teaching again.
Sooo glad you decided to do this, Mike! It's been a while since the class and it's great to be able to brush up! Slainte!
I want to binge watch the making of the entire chair now.. Mike... I am hoping to learn this first and then teach this to the community school here in Pune, India... and we will put your name on every chair we make....
I really like that idea, Nikhil. It pleases me to think of Windsor chairs spreading around the world. Don't hesitate to ask for help. Be sure follow The Windsor Institute on Facebook.
Thanks for sharing your knowledge!🙏👍👍👍
Thank you Mike! I took your sack back class and I have made more then a dozen more. I look forward to building many more. Thanks again Mike
Fantastic and Thank you Mr Dunbar.
Thank you, Mike. Your channel is really awesome and I learned a lot here.
This is so great to see! Thanks for the video reminders of what we did in class! Looking forward to the rest of the build!!
Thanks so much for doing this- I can show my kids a little bit of what I was blessed to experience first-hand!
Welcome! It's great to see you continuing your teaching here on UA-cam. TWI '95.
Mike: So glad you are doing these Windsor Chair videos. Watching this first one brought back memories of the class I took with you many years ago. My chair hold a special place in our house and I have enjoyed it from the very first day that I brought it home.
Enjoyed every step of the way and the great details, thank you for these wonderful gifts of knowledge
Mike I took your class in 2011 and loved it. My Windsor is my favorite chair at home. Very glad your doing the videos! Thank you.
Thanks for putting this up Mike! My dad has me started on the Sack Back. So far I've got the spindles down, seat is up next. Looking forward to more videos!
Hey Mike!! So great to see you in the shop, I have so many wonderful memories of spending time at the Windsor Institute and have missed it very much. And what timing, I was just thinking to myself two days ago about how great it would be to have something exactly like this! I'm so excited for these videos and can't wait for more. Thanks for all you've done for chair making and for sharing your knowledge. Best Wishes! -The Immortal Sir. Travis
great stuff - love it thanks
Mike, good to see you again. The classes I took from you we're the best. I hope all is well with your family and keep these videos coming. Boy, they bring back good memories.
Awesome Mike! Great to see you back making chairs and sharing your unique knowledge and talent. I hope you include some of your other chair designs. Your classes were the best classes I have ever taken, anywhere!
There are few things that look or feel like a good wooden chair, especially a windsor chair. I am so happy to see Mr. Mike Dunbar still giving advice and sharing his vast amounts of knowledge and experience. I am not certain that if he does not know something about making these chairs, it may not be worth knowing?! Thanks for posting these videos, good to see you around again.
Mike: I'm so happy you're now teaching Windsor Chairmaking to everyone who wants to learn. I enjoyed attending the Windsor Institute and learning to make my first Windsor Chair directly from you. I'll be looking forward to seeing all of your future instruction videos. Frankly, I can use a refresher before I start another chair on my own. Thanks for doing this.
Thanks Mike. A nice refresher for when I build a new chair seat. Also nice to not "disturb" other chair makers as in the old days!
Mike, This is great...My daughter is in the process of making her first chair and it is great to have her able to see the master at work! HG Mike Speck
thank you Mike again for teaching this way, God bless you
Hi Mike..Good to see your still at it. Thank you for doing these videos. They are helpful in refreshing the instruction you gave us. Although I have not made a chair in a while...I will soon, spoon bits and all! Keep it up...I look forward to all the videos you create. Yours...Knight 109
I came here through Chris Schwarz's link, too. Thank you so much for sharing this. This is just amazingly well explained. Very, very helpful.
Nice to see you on here Mike. Justin sends his regards.
Hi Mike, glad to see you doing this, your classes have been amazing, my son and I have great memories thanks to you and your staff!
Mike's staff were the best!
Very nicely done Mike! This is going to help tremendously with future chairs!! This helps out a guy that works at a slower pace and grasps concepts by doing. Keep up the great work, and I look forward to your future episodes that I am sure I will be glued to, in hammering the great concepts you have further into my skillset! I actually forgot about some of the concepts, the video jogged my memory and I'm like, Oh yeah, that's what we did and why. Thank you!
Mike Whitney
It was great to see you back at work. Not quite as good as being there but getting close. Didn't recognize the studio, but figured it was your hideaway. I liked the intro episode, I was checking my class notes as you went along to make sure I had all that information down correctly. I look forward to future episodes. Thanks for thinking of this avenue for enlightening the rest of us.
Mike. Great to attend one of your courses again! An excellent refresher and really good to see you teaching again. Please say hello to Sue for me. I hope all is well with both of you and yours. Thank You for doing this!
Thanks for sharing--beautiful work!
Thank you for the compliment. I hope you enjoy the rest of the series and that it helps you to make a chair.
Truly wonderful!!!!!!!
Thank you. I hope you enjoy the other episodes as well.
Hey Mike, thanks for sharing....You still have it!!! No huffing and puffing and your shoulder seems fit as can be. :). Hugh
Hi Mike, great to see you in the videos. I have started another Sack Back and thought I should review your videos.
Really, really good thank you
Great to see you again Mike! Loved taking my sack back class with you! Wish I could have taken other classes before you retired, but this UA-cam idea is great! I hope that you'll expand it to include some of your other chair designs! The Windsor Institute class was one of the greatest vacations I ever took!!!
I do intend to add lots of other chairs, as well as additional techniques - for example, choosing a log, splitting it, making the wood into bending and spindle stock. Also, making a steam box and steam bending. The video is expensive and where it goes from here will depend getting this channel self-sufficient. So, tell all your fellow woodworkers and other friends.
Thank you Mr. Dunbar!
Well done
This is fantastic, Mike! Thank you for doing this. It took me 4 (or 5?) years to finish the continuous arm chair I made in the last class I attended and I've pretty much forgotten the details so I'm really pumped up now knowing I can make another one!
I “forgot” the details from the class, too. Do not worry- just build and the obstacles will reveal the right questions!
Realistically? For me: I’ve done enough carpentry and woodwork in the last 35 years that I almost feel like it’s not going to be hard to start doing well right away. The chair class influenced my carpentry approach; chairmaking is just another discipline.
I regret that I have just now found this UA-cam channel, I would have loved to attend you chair making school and learn from a great craftsman.
Hi Mike, Good to see you at it again. Same here in Texas, I just finished my 52nd Windsor , a C-Arm. Hope you and Sue are doing well, best wishes to you both. Larry
Wow! 52 chairs! Good for you. Sue and Michael are well.
Very informative
I’ve just recently become a fan of these chairs and will be making them. Although I’m too late to take your class in person, I’m very happy you are doing this UA-cam series. I’ll be following along. Regarding questions from this first episode:
1 - it would help to have length and width dimensions of the board used to make the glue up,
2 - the template for the seat is a key element. I guess i could estimate its shape, but might you consider including in the description a link to download a template that i could print?
3 - I’ll have to rewatch the description of the 1/5 2/5 discussion as I didn’t quite follow.
Hi Mike, glad to see you back in the saddle again. Will be adding any of your historical humor as well? Good luck.
Lots of jokes to come, Albert. And they don't get any better.
if this reaches you in a timely way, i just want you to know that i hope you got through all the flooding in hampton beach this past march weekend, i thought of you as soon as i saw it online.....
The flooding is bad, but limited to the beach area. We are two miles away and on higher ground. So, we are fine. Thanks for you concern. I hope you are well after all these years.
Hi Mike. Great to see that you are still active in the industry. I am your lone student attending your institute from Saskatchewan, Canada. I enjoyed it immensely, albeit many years ago. I completed my most recent sack back chair a month ago. I am now attempting a fan back arm chair. I steam bent the comb yesterday and it now sits drying in the form. I do not have plans for the fan back, so I hope the curve I came up with for the comb will work. On a side note....I am struggling to acquire riven wood suitable for spindles.....living on the prairies. Does anyone have a suggestion as to supplier of rough riven oak for spindles? I reached out to Hancock, but never received a response. I an also interested in acquiring 40 seat blanks if the cost is within my budget. I look forward to your next video.
Kevin, I have some red oak you'd be welcome to but I'm in Ontario. You can reach me at teddyhodson(at)hotmail if you want me to mail some rived blanks to you.
Mike - thank you so much for creating this great video and sharing your wealth of knowledge with us. There's a lot of really great info here and the production quality is top notch. I look forward to watching the rest of your videos. One question, though (and I apologize if this has already been asked and answered) - at the end of this video when you go back to "touch up" the edges, which tool do you use? Are you using both the drawknife and the spokeshave? Or just the spokeshave? Thanks!
Thanks for the kind words, Dan. The final touch up is done with the spokeshave only.
Ahh, the Master back at work! Thank you, and thanks to your production staff, too. Good job. Nico, isn't it? I did notice that you are dressed in what appears to be a shortened-sleeved straight jacket. Do your handlers come in after the episode and wrap you back up in it? Someone mentioned wanted to see more of your comedy. Maybe dial back on the thorazine a little? Just advice from one who knows what he's talking about...
Hey Mike, if Chip is giving you too many problems, remember you still can yell out the chairmaker’s distress call. We’ll come take care of the situation.
Many of you remember Chip. We taught together and he has always chewed on my leg.
Mike I LOVE windors!!! please tell us how we purchase one of these from you??
This is really amazing. Also tipped off by "Worth Effort" channel.
Hi Mike.... It was a lot of fun to watch and listen to a master of his trade. Wood workers have our own language! BTW, what happened to the 10 episode? I was looking forward to seeing you drill thise steep angles! Just for fun...Have you ever run into a 'ball and socket' joint? I did when I first started my apprenticeship in '76, a funny-scarey-sad story. Take care. Also I was impressed with your physical endurance!
Hi Birdie: Thanks for your kind remarks. Episode 10 is now up and I drill those angles. Not sure I know what a "ball and socket" joint is.
@@thewindsorinstitute2047 Ball and socket joint night-mare.... I apprenticed in 76, as an apprentice I was to help out when needed and clean the shop (even though I had been building furniture for 5 years on my own-I learned from books, asking questions, trial and ERROR etc.) In that shop my first step up was funrinture repair, working at least 10 pieces at a time. You learn alot from furniture repair. Anyway one day an antique dealer came in and needed a chair reglued. Only way to do it right was to take the chair apart. This was a shaker chair, museum piece and I was told to have it done for pick up in 4 hrs. Easy enough I had done many chair repairs before. When I tried to get the legs out of the seat..those suckers would not come out!!! bang bang and bang no luck!!! I figured someone had set a nail deep into the tennon and i didn't see it. I keep banging utill the bottom of the seat RIPPED open, holy crap was I in trouble now. The boss was NOT happy! Back to the joint. You carve a ball into the top of the dried hardwood leg. Then you drill a hole into the green seat, then carefully carve a socket inside of the hole you drilled. When you are ready you BEAT the ball into the socket, the green seat give some then swells back, when the seatdries if you do it right the joint is tight...similar to a fox-wedge (a blind mortice and tennon with wedges inside the mortice) once it is together it can't come apart. Bottom line I had to fix the bottom of the chair so NO ONE could see it, which I did! (out of fear and desperation) I learned a lot that day. BTW the best chair joint is one that can easily be fixed when the chair has to be reglued in 50 to 75 years... BTW I've designed and built quite a few chairs and loved each one, beginning to end!
Wonderful resource! Thank you for sharing. Will you make seat templates (or a drawing) available for sale?
Thanks for the inspiring videos, but I feel like I can't start project without the template(s). Here's to hoping I find them soon!
Look at the vids. Screenshot the cheat sheets. Draw the knowns after watching and taking notes and you can probably just extrapolate the rest.
Another thing I’ve done a few times: wrecked, destroyed old antique windsors that look good can be found in garage sales, auctions, and even antique stores for not much money. I’ve paid $5- $25 a few times just to have a beautiful but poor condition chair to pattern.
EDIT: link in below post
Would it be possible to build a sackback chair with squared pieces rather than spindles? Would it even look right?
Hmmm. While it would be technically possible. You will have to cut square holes through the arm and bow.
Is it possible to print the template?
Yes. Use this link. The down load includes the seat template, bending form template, hand template and spec sheet. www.makeawindsor.com/