doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion Classic & Custom Single Barreled Sporting Rifles @ doublegunshop.com Sharpening a chisel?

Michael

I should add, use a sharp knife (not a pencil) as a layout tool to scribe the pins and tails. Leave the line. Pare to fit.

My thanks to everyone, lots of great information. I logged onto YouTube last night and stayed up late watching all the different dovetailing methods.

Most of them make it look like child's play. One of the big things I learned on there is to always marked the section you want to remove. I won't tell you how many times I cut out the wrong piece.

Cutting the wrong piece? Oh how familiar that is.

What are you practicing to make?

Brent

My first attempt was exactly that, on both pins and tails. It fit together beautifully, and fell right apart!

Ouch! Never happened to any of us out here.....not . My solution has been to avoid furniture making

First this guy, then to the buffer to pull the wire edge, then to the hard Arkansas stone for a couple of swipes.

Grind against the belt/contact wheel, holding the chisel upside down, and the hollow edge appears by magic.

Note the drive belt is in the slow speed step for sharpening.

Scary sharp!

With the size of my shop I'd have to get rid of my lathe or mill or both to have enough room for that ;-).

I have found that if you can find a good sharpening shop that farming out the sharpening can save a lot of time and bother. Just touching up is a lot easier than establishing the proper bevels and edge.I sent out all the plane blades and chisels that I used to one shop and it was a long time before I needed his services again.

Good point, but I find myself stepping over to the sharpening station every half-hour or so when I'm chopping dovetails. Trusting my sharpening needs to a tinker would sure slow things down a bit!

Everything I've read here works.

I think a big thing to remember is to start from squaring up and making sure the back of the chisels are flat, true, and square. Working to sharpen the edge is so much wasted effort if the back is not flat, true and square first. The thing with mass-produced chisels is that they often come out of the factory with some level of twist, bend or rounding that is within acceptable manufacturing limits and yet will make for less-than-acceptable dovetailing.

The tip to use the knife to scribe is excellent - it will provide a more definitive and thinner line than any pencil.

I'm of the opinion that the hollow-ground is not as good as flat, but YMMV. I think a diamond honing "stone" is really useful, too.

But, the important thing is results and not necessarily the getting there. (I say that as I look at the scar from a home-done skin graft on my right index finger, where I slipped one time, as a reminder.)