Introduction
Earlier this year, I purchased a new set of chisels from Taylor Toolworks. I have used them sparingly since then mostly because I have not spent the time to properly set them up. I am about to finish a project where I will be making 33 wooden crosses similar to the one I made for my son in August just before he left for college. Chisels will be used a lot while making these and I, therefore, decided now was a good time to get these chisels set up correctly.
Resources I Used
The main resources that I referenced to help me with the process of initializing the chisels were a handful of videos. The three primary videos that I used were:
- Getting a Chisel Scary Sharp by Jonathan Katz-Moses
- How to Sharpen a Chisel by Paul Sellers
- How To Sharpen Chisels By Hand – Like a Pro! by Rob Cosman
As far as tools, I am using the OneTime Tool Sharpening System from Woodpeckers for my sharpening guide as opposed to doing this freehand. For the actual sharpening, I am using Shapton Whetstones and a DIA-FLAT Lapping Plate to keep the stones flat. Lastly, I have a strop that I made from a scrap of 3/4″ plywood and this leather that I purchased from Amazon.
A Few Lessons I Learned
The first thing I learned is that it can take quite a while to get the back of a chisel flat. Your chisel may look flat on the back when new but when you start flattening it on a known flat stone, you will quickly find out whether or not this is true. The first chisel I worked on had a fairly significant hollow area on one side about a 1/4″ back from the edge. I say significant not because it was really deep or anything but because it took a long time for it to be completely gone. On the positive side, I should never have to do this again. Once the back is flat, there is no reason I should ever need to flatten it again.
After some time, I realized that I was flattening my stone too often. Whetstones wear as you use them and must be flattened occasionally. The more I have used the stones, the better I have come to be able to judge how often I need to stop and flatten them. I think this is one of those things you have to get a feel for. I would recommend starting by flattening more often and then adjust as you gain experience. If your stone is not flat, you will have a hard time flattening the back of a chisel or getting a good smooth bevel.
Determining when the back of the chisel is flat can be difficult to do visually. This is particularly true on the thinner chisels (3/8″ and below). What I have found to be helpful is to occasionally check the flatness by switching to the next finer stone and making 20 to 40 passes. This will smooth the flat areas but not the parts that are not yet truly flat and make them much easier to see.
Narrow Chisel Difficulties
Speaking of the narrow chisels, their backs have been particularly frustrating to flatten. In one sense, they are easier because there is less surface area that must be flattened, however, the narrow profile is difficult to work with. In Rob Cosman’s video, he addresses this issue and talks about holding the chisel at an angle to the stone. I found this to be effective but I needed to exaggerate the angle more than I had originally thought. On the two narrowest chisels, I kept getting an area along one edge that would not get flat undoubtedly caused by a flaw in my technique that was allowing the chisel to roll slightly. I was finally able to get rid of this by a combination of using a more aggressive angle with Rob Cosman’s technique and by using the end of the stone with another technique like the one shown here by Katz-Moses. My technique was a little different in that I would keep the chisel in contact with the stone and move back and forth while also slowly moving side to side across the end of the stone.
The other difference I have found with narrow chisels is that I am not able to put a micro-bevel on at the end. The reason is that I am not able to get the micro-bevel uniform across such a narrow edge. Like the difficulty in flattening the back described above, with a narrow profile, I found it impossible to keep the chisel aligned well enough with the stone to get a uniform mico-bevel. My understanding is that the point of the micro-bevel is to aid in keeping the chisel sharp because you have a very small surface that needs to be worked on when touching up your cutting edge. Well for a narrow chisel, the entire bevel face is small so I don’t think this is going to be an issue. I will only be using a micro-bevel on the 1/2″ width chisels and up. For the 3/8″ and below, I will only sharpen at the primary 25-degree bevel angle. I may try again on the 3/8″ chisel to establish a micro-bevel but definitely not on the 1/4″ and 1/8″ chisels. The 3/8″ width is the point at which I start to have trouble with the narrowness of the profile. Over time, as my technique improves, this will hopefully become less of an issue.
I hope that you find this information helpful.