Thread: Chisel - Sharpness

(straight across the top - endgrain - of the wood would be much harder, too)

here's one I found humorous.

I was making some chisels last year in this style and graham haydon asked if I'd make him one. I just sent him a mule that I made for myself to test the functionality of the induction forge (not really ideal to heat treat thin stuff like this, but it turned out OK).

18th Century Style Chisel - First Trials #handtools #woodworking - YouTube

when I saw this video, which youtube somehow magically knew to serve to me at the time, I wondered what it was as it's a struggle because it's not cutting at an angle to the straws, but rather right across them.

it's ash. Not the hardest wood in the world, but it doesn't pare very well either.

Originally Posted by derekcohen

Hi Raffo

To be honest, I was not posting for any message or effect. Just something that was a shaving in end grain (from file photos). Controlling a shaving is not a big deal, hence the cross-grain tenon example. Below is soft Jacaranda without any support.






I will add that paring Jarrah, as in the earlier post, was a big deal. The wood is very hard and going in square-on is likely to cause the chisel to skip over the wood. Skewing the blade enables the corner to catch and start the cut. Planing without the guide is sometimes a lot easier and you can start thicker and then thin down the shaving. Starting with a thin shaving is tough with hard woods.

Regards from Perth

Derek

the harder the wood, the less of the chisel width you'd run through it. The only thing that should really be a deal breaker would be silica, which is trouble in long grain but a real bear directly across the grain.

Silica is what caused me to make an exasperated turn to the buffer with an incannel gouge. In rosewood, directly across the grain. The result of that was a shock - no nicks in the edge, but spider web scratching on the outer barrel of the gouge.

Stuff like jarrah hardness definitely isn't easy to pare physically, though. I'll give you that.

it'll be hard for us to figure out what jacaranda is in the states as we don't call any wood that, but imported wood listed as that is dalbergia nigra - brazilian rosewood. if the word jacaranda is on anything that comes through customs, it'll be a problem.

The wood in your picture reminds me of avodire or some of the chinese ashes - but I'm guessing it's australian.

well, I was partially wrong. Jacaranda is used in the southwest for an imported ornamental tree - one that I've never seen here. I guess we don't see mesquite for sale locally, either. on an Imported guitar, though, customs will immediately open the package looking for brazilian rosewood. For some reason, if you get an old guitar that is obviously brazilian, they will actually inspect it and not care. If the customs form comes from a japanese person who uses a translator and the word jacaranda is anywhere on the form, you'll never get the guitar if there is actually brazilian rosewood on it (very common on guitars 40 years ago for at least the fingerboard to be brazilian).

Jacaranda mimosifolia is the name of the flowering tree sold in the southwest here. the listing for it states that it doesn't grow in the US, but is imported - it does list it as being common in australia.

Wood database seems to have no idea it exists, but that's not uncommon if something has no commercial domestic or imported value here as lumber.

David, for your information, "jacaranda" is indeed the botanical name for a genus in the Bignonacae family, quite distinct from the Dalbergias, which are in the legume family. The "blue" jacaranda is very widely grown in Aus as an ornamental and when in flower (late Spring) is probably the most-photographed plant in the country.

It's listed as "vulnerable" in its native habitat (central Sth America) but as a potential weed here in sub-tropical Queensland, & I believe it has also gone a bit feral in Florida. The wood is white, softish-firm (on a par with cherry) and relatively easy to work. It carves cleanly & is one of the few woods that will dry "in the round" without splitting - bowl-turners love the stuff. Most trees are open-grown & it can't make up its mind which way it wants to go so you rarely get straight lengths of trunk longer than 2 metres and usually a lot less than that. What's interesting about it to me is it has a grain structure very similar to elm (Ulmus spp.), which led me to use some for a couple of copies of chairs which had elm seats:

Chair match.jpg

Once stained up, the match was near-perfect!

Although relatively easy to plane where the grain is straight, some of the curliest trees have the wildest grain I've come across, & having relatively soft parenchyme between tough fibres, even the sharpest blade & closest-set cap iron leave patches with finely textured surface where the grain reverses. It's a form of tear-out I guess, but so fine you don't see it until the finish is applied.

To ecologists it may be a weed tree, but for woodworkers who can get their hands on it, it's a very useful resource.....

Cheers,

I saw the pictures of the trees in california, or at least advertised (the listing was a seller). They could've been everywhere. They looked like you say - like the tree wakes up each season and decides which way each branch will go, which may not be the same as it was last year.

It's an interesting use of the word jacaranda though even when I was warned it would be trouble shipping from japan, the warning was that it could be applied to other "Brown" woods that weren't brazilian, but to avoid it.

many of the ornamentals that we plant here are listed as potential invasive threats, but I guess we continue to plant them. In the states, most of what's growing (grass, fruits, etc) are plants imported from somewhere else. I can only think of one fruit tree that was native here - paw paw - and I've never seen one.

if they're planting it in the southeast, maybe it can push out some of the kudzu.

I went back and tried the paring action with the piece below the guide, like Derek's. Works perfect.

With the piece sitting on top, very awkward, and the chisel gauges the guide.

20230727_194738.jpg20230727_195149.jpg

Originally Posted by derekcohen

... Does this help - paring jarrah mitred through dovetails ...

Originally Posted by graemecook

... My guess is that your chisels will be up to the job.

qed

Hi Graeme. I had to look "qed" up. Quoting Latin is definitely lifting the game

Originally Posted by D.W.

here's one I found humorous.

I was making some chisels last year in this style and graham haydon asked if I'd make him one. I just sent him a mule that I made for myself to test the functionality of the induction forge (not really ideal to heat treat thin stuff like this, but it turned out OK).

18th Century Style Chisel - First Trials #handtools #woodworking - YouTube

when I saw this video, which youtube somehow magically knew to serve to me at the time, I wondered what it was as it's a struggle because it's not cutting at an angle to the straws, but rather right across them.

it's ash. Not the hardest wood in the world, but it doesn't pare very well either.

When demonstrating how a chisel cuts, it is a “cheat” to allow the shaving to get thicker, rather than maintaining thickness. Thicker requires less control. Paring at an angle (chamfer) is easier than paring parallel.

This is a 1/8” chisel I made for a friend about a decade ago. Here testing its ability to pare end grain Jarrah …



Regards from Perth

Derek

Originally Posted by Mountain Ash

Hi Graeme. I had to look "qed" up. Quoting Latin is definitely lifting the game

But I was responding to Derek.

Originally Posted by derekcohen

When demonstrating how a chisel cuts, it is a “cheat” to allow the shaving to get thicker, rather than maintaining thickness. Thicker requires less control. Paring at an angle (chamfer) is easier than paring parallel.

This is a 1/8” chisel I made for a friend about a decade ago. Here testing its ability to pare end grain Jarrah …



Regards from Perth

Derek

It is diving into the cut. Posting graham's video had nothing to do with whether or not he was going to use the paring cut. He's literally using a chisel that weighs half to 2/3rds of what any typical open market mass made chisel would weigh, and cutting deep straight across the grain.

That's the point. Not heel nipping about whether or not he's going level enough. It's not a furniture cut in the first place. If you had any amount of material to remove across the grain of something exposed, you would use an incannel gouge and clean the surface off after the gouge found nothing more to remove.

Yeah, my post came across as critical, but I know Graham and I did not mean to imply he was cheating. Just that control of a cut is aided by sharpness. I doubt the blade was diving because he was not in control, because he was not trying to do so, and rather he was just paring to show it cutting.

Regards from Perth

Derek

Originally Posted by derekcohen

Yeah, my post came across as critical, but I know Graham and I did not mean to imply he was cheating. Just that control of a cut is aided by sharpness. I doubt the blade was diving because he was not in control, because he was not trying to do so, and rather he was just paring to show it cutting.

Regards from Perth

Derek

I actually have no idea what he was doing. it's about as thick as a seaton chest pattern firmer - the business end of it is about .07 or .08". It's more a chisel for malleting despite really light weight. I guess he just wanted to see how it felt.

the whole obsession with paring outside of an actual "furniture act" is a little weird to me, because we get to making furniture and find the unexpected need to do something like this:

https://i.imgur.com/bo9RpYr.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/lFcCLcI.jpg

(no worries about the sloppiness of the wood, it's prior to finish planing)

and it's not similar to any kind of paring "chisel tests".

I test chisels paring, but it's nothing to do with woodwork - it's to look for damage. Pare, mallet heavily, pare.