I'm very excited to share with you a very cool Kaizen throwback to making things using nature and habitation with the use of tools. The other day, I was speaking to my neighbor Jim who incorporates the Art of Japanese Joinery into his Artwork, and got me to thinking how we could use this technique more today! From the book, "Tsukuru Aesthetics at Work"; a craftsman's work is a process of discovering and extracting the beauty inherent in nature, using techniques and skills that were refined to incredible tolerances over generations.
The tongue and groove wood working, called Tsugite (splicing joinery) or Shiguchi (connecting joints), are what these Japanese craftsman have been using for millennia and still use today. There are over a 100 different methods of Shiguchi employed over dozens of different uses which have been going through the Kaizen process for thousands of years.
While I lived in Japan, I would walk through these incredible Shinto and Buddhist shrines and temples and Castles that were made with the Shiguchi methodology of tongue and groove with no nails, screws, plates, or bolts. Some of these structures are over a 1000 years old and still in beautiful condition.
The craftsman that made these had to develop incredibly intricate tools to create these structures with the smallest of tolerances. These tools are thought to be the extension of the craftsman's limbs to which they help refine, strengthen, and make more efficient our manipulation of things and materials.
In most cases this way of building is completely dependent on the skills of the craftsman. Since Japanese Joinery is so intricate with using chisels to chip away at wood to very small tolerances, the risk of error is great so much emphasis is placed on the craftsman to be nearly perfect.
As an industrial engineer, I would like to take this beautiful art of Japanese Joinery and make the process more efficient and common place in today's society. With the use of metal incorporated with the Japanese Joinery methodology we could bring in the best of both worlds to continue with making the process of building better.
For example, the Tsugite joints of traditional Japanese timber buildings are made without screws, bolts or plates; with the method involving cutting away of parts of the structural section. This reduces the structural strength of the wood because the stress of the woods is reduced the strength of the joints, which if small, could be considered a shortcoming to this ancient art of Tsugite Japanese timber structure making.
Since the strength to weight ratio of timber as a structural material is lighter and more durable (tensil, compressive, flexural) than steel or concrete, the use of tongue and groove that's reinforced with steel would seem ideal.
One company that I researched uses such a system called the KES System in which metal plates of the KES System are integrated into the beams and columns without cutting away large sections of the timber. This creates frames that are far more rigid than traditional or conventional timber structures.
http://structure.kes.ne.jp/KesTechnicalArchitecture/architecture/index.html
I look forward to watching the growth of this matrixed form of taking the traditional Japanese Joinery process and complimenting it with the newest advances in building technology.
From an Industrial Engineers and a Japanese Traditionalist art of building stand point, this could be the way of the future by keeping costs down, increasing quality, and increasing the artistic form of building western structures.
Hope you found this interesting and I look forward to any questions or comments you may have below or via e-mail.
Ja Mata Ne!!!
Scott
