Thread: New Chisels

Not meaning to be a smart ass but if you still can return them now. They are junk. Because they will not take or hold a fine edge.

See this thread

chisels

Here are some youtube video on chisel sharpening on an oil stone.

https://www.youtube.com/results?sear...hisel+oilstone

I am sorry, they are all i can afford, i thought i was buying decent stuff, but in a small regional area there is not much choice.

i am a single dad of 2 disabled children. i did not expect to be shown a lack of respect from a not so valued member or their opinion.

Hey Wilkim, first up, you should check your stone to make sure it is dead flat. if you've been using it for knives it is most likely not to be.

don't sweat it though. Do you reckon you can find a scrap bit of float glass? or thick glass that is dead flat (check it out real careful. I use a piece fo glass from some 'dead' bathroom scales, the electronic type. Stripped away all the feet and circuitry and was surprised it was real good.

Get some various grades of wet'n'dry and some Selleys spray adhesive if you can and glue some 200 or 250 grit, a 400, 800, and even finer if you can get. Use this the same as stones/diamonds.

I've found that it works real well, and a few of the YouTube woodworkers will show some more on the technique too.

Hope that helps and good luck. You are starting the same place as I did but it's great that you found the forum to get some support early.

wilkim. the following video should get you going. Most likely your new chisels are supplied with a 25 degree flat primary bevel. If you aim for a 28-30 degree honing angle on your oil stone you will be okay. As mentioned in the video, use the finer grit side of your oilstone. The coarser side is far too aggressive for what your needed at the moment. If you dont have access to a name brand honing oil, whats being sold as baby oil will do fine. Enjoy your woodworking.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1F5aSs2ureQ

Stewie;

Just to clarify, you can glue on four different grits on each side. That way you are able to get the flat of the chisel back down flush to the grinding surface.

Originally Posted by planemaker

wilkim. the following video should get you going. Most likely your new chisels are supplied with a 25 degree flat primary bevel. If you aim for a 28-30 degree honing angle on your oil stone you will be okay. As mentioned in the video, use the finer grit side of your oilstone. The coarser side is far too aggressive for what your needed at the moment. If you dont have access to a name brand honing oil, whats being sold as baby oil will do fine. Enjoy your woodworking.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1F5aSs2ureQ

Stewie;

Great no-nonsense instructional Stewie

Which ones did you get ? A quick search reveals bunnings has them at about $20 each.
Timbecon for example has narex chisels for around the same price that will be better suited to fine woodwork and might be less work to flatten. Or finetools.com.au. or aldi chisels, for $12 they get a huge wrap.
Also you dont need a full set, 2 or 3 will be heaps unless you need a specific width for a mortise or dado.

I use baby oil on my oilstone. Is it the $30 odd norton combination one in a foam case ? For finer honing I use diamond paste which is very cheap on ebay.

Plenty of tool snobbery goes on but I believe thumbsucker was being practical, much of bunnings hand tools arent the best. Or the cheapest.

So what are you making ?

Some great advice there.
I started out just like this and I bet many more did.
My only suggestion and it's only a suggestion.
I found just water alone was enough to keep the sandpaper from moving on the glass.
Plus it makes changing the paper so much easier.
Also when you can keep an eye out for the Narex brand of chisels.
There not bottom end, not top end but are still a good buy.
Me and many others here use them.

Originally Posted by willkim

Hi,

I have purchased some new Irwin Marple's wood chisels, from the place with the big B.

I was wondering how i firstly polish the back of them so they are flat, and how to correctly sharpen them?.

I have a double sided stone, i use for my knives, and what oil do i use as i just use spit for my knives.

The chisels will be just fine.

The aim is a coplanar back - this does not mean that you need to polish its back along its entire length. Only about 1" behind the bevel needs to be polished. The remainder can be 120 - 240 grit.

Use sandpaper glued to glass or MDF when flattening the backs. Start at 120 grit, and move up progressively to 2000 grit behind the bevel. (I roughly double the grit in the progression: 120 .. 240 .. 400 ... 600 ... 1200 ..2000). The high grits are available from auto shops. We cannot say what your stone is, so this is a more reliable method for now.

The chisels probably come with a 25 degree primary bevel. If so, sharpening involves adding a 30 degree secondary bevel. This is easiest with a honing guide.

Now use the chisels. They should be fine. However, if one does not hold an edge well enough, increase the secondary bevel by 1 degree, and keep increasing it by 1 degree until the edge is held.

Regards from Perth

Derek

Did not mean to offend just being factual - best to search trash & treasure markets and garage sales for old tools. You can pick up good English (Ward) & Australian (Titan) chisels sometimes for less then $5. Then put some work into fixing them. They are much cheaper and better then anything you get from Bunnings.

willkim - I am someone who has a tolerance for relatively soft tools. I'm sure if those chisels don't need to be returned for any other reason, you'll be able to get good service out of them.

light oil for your oilstone. I think the only thing you want to add to your kit is to locate your metal polish and a piece of flat wood to make to remove the burr from those stones. These are chisels and not a finish plane iron, so you can use them before you have perfected the backs of them as long as you can manage to remove the wire edge.

I wouldn't venture to flatten the stone at this point unless it is horribly hollow in the center. There is a technique that you can use for basic preparation with a stone that is not perfectly flat, and that is to allow your tool to work only on the highest points of the stones (that may be the ends). This is a technique that was probably used for centuries, but has been lost a bit by modern desire to have perfectly flat because woodworking is now amateurs who don't have a good grasp on the basic issue with sharpening (which is just geometry and then polish at the edge, and not perfect flatness of the tool).

The metal polish will allow you to work the wire edge (burr) you create to something weaker that should just come off easily. I don't have any new coarsely ground chisels, or I'd make a video for you to watch.

Good on you for being a single dad and doing the work that really matters.

wilkim. I sharpened this set of early manufacture Robinson Hall Chisels this morning. They have a flat 25 degree primary bevel, with a 30 degree secondary honed bevel.

Norton Crystolon stone, followed by 3 finer grit water stones was worked on both bevels.

The mirrored finish I was able to achieve from the stropping compound didn't show up clearly within the attached photo's.

Stewie;

ROBINSON HALL LTD
1 Sylvester Street;
Sheffield; England.

1953 Robinson Hall Sylvester Street Sheffield Ad | eBay

Sylvester Works. Sylvester Street, Sheffield

As mentioned garage sales are a good source for good quality chisels,but if you get them from G S's be prepared for a lot of work to get them in good shape
Some good comments and advice on sharpening has been given,the thing is by the time you get rough tools in good shape you know what to do and with the right angles done you usually only need a quick lick to get back in good cuttinf form
I got a lot of stuff for my son this way