Thread: concave spokeshave

Welcome to the forum, an expert will be along shortly to help you with an answer to your question.

While we wait for an expert......

I have a Kunz concave spokeshave, I wouldn't describe it as awful, but I wouldn't say it was good either.

If I was in a position to buy Veritas or LN then that would be what I do.

cheers.

... monsieur le wastringue? I thought mine was a girl

I can't help with any of your questions. I haven't touched my stanley spoke shaves since I was given a nice old wastringue by a friend in Nantes. It's no easier to use it just looks nicer. I have no real experience with chair spindles but intuitively, I would shape with a straight spoke shave and clean up the curve with a scraper... but one of the experts will tell us how it's supposed to be done.

Actually, one of the things on my list is a draw knife. They are obviously great for big work but I've seen them used with the precision of scalpels.

Good luck with the search.
Where abouts in France are you Catharaxie?

Cheers
Berlin

This is one tool that you really need to try before you buy - spokeshaves are very subjective.

I like my Veritas for ease of adjustment, but it doesn't fit the hand as well as the LN Boggs spokeshave. Swings and roundabouts I'm afraid, and what may be perfect for one person likely won't suit someone else.

Try to find somewhere that will let you try out a few types, or borrow a selection from friends to test......

Weren't you supposed to be asleep? (sauf pour le petit beurré)

I'm from the Pyrennees, but i can affirm no one around me uses (or even remotely knows what is a spokeshave). I'm trying to learn on my own with a 1 and 3 and a half years old boys around, that is to say my knowledge is mostly theory.
It is sadly true that it's all about the feeling in the hands (and a not too dulll edge). I'll have to visit Auriou, they have some LN in stock.

Drawknives are fun, but half a second of inadvertancy, and you make a mess, i can't trust myself on this.


By the way, how good or badly does the clifton 500 replace a travisher? (that's another story)

I've had too many bad experiments with oldies, i'll need to find a real good wooden sopkeshave to know what it's about, a Ron Hock kit or one of Dave's... next year in Jerusalem.

Can i sum up my understanding?
-Sure you can, please yourself.

0)Remove the extra with a axe or a adze, then drawknife
1) You want round stock, you turn it and, if needed, bend it
2)You want curved stock with linear regularity, grab your shaves
3)You want a somewhat irregular stock get your rasps

Please do not confuse me with gouges. I'm tooling up at the pace in can.

"All you need is a axe, a swiss knife and duct tape." McGiver
by the way some old but still incredible links [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6s6fG10mrSM"]With an Axe and Knife - YouTube[/ame]
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGDkliy1DEU&feature=channel&list=UL"]Traditional Swedish Woodworking: Clogs, Spoons and Chairs - YouTube[/ame]

I'm being very talkative, i'll let the night whisper me sweet nothings.

Hi Catharaxie, welcome to the saner section of the Forum!

There are not very many chair-makers around down in the Antipodes, and fewer still doing it with shaves. You might have done better by posting your questions in the "green woodworkng" section, where there is more likely to be a number of shavers. I know one forum member has been making some pretty impressive chairs ("Apricotripper") & he is a very practical hand-tool user, so might have some good insights if he chimes in. He seems to have been very busy elsewhere, lately, & doesn't check-in to the Forum as often as in the past.

I have made a fair number of chairs, & use spokeshaves a lot, but not for shaping small spindles - I do that on the lathe, which is not altogether satisfactory, I know, and it's virtually impossible (for me, at least!) to make the very long, fine spindles needed in some designs on the lathe. Like Berlin, my intuition would be to use a regular straight spokeshave for fine spindles, to get it close enough that a few rubs with sandpaper would produce a convincingly round result. The thought of sharpening that concave curved blade is enough to immediately turn my thoughts to some other method! However, they obviously work in the right hands.

I agree wholeheartedly with Mr Brush that spokeshaves seem to be the sort of tool that people are particularly fussy about, and you really need to try before you buy, if possible. Going on someone else's recommendations alone would be very risky, I think.

I get along fine with my Veritas shaves but I know a lot of people hate those short, round handles. I'd used the Stanley 150 types for many years before getting a Veritas, & at first I found it very awkward tool, & intended to replace he handles. I got as far as buying a 're-handling kit'. But after a bit, I got the hang of them, and am now quite happy with the handles the way they are, so it may be a very long time before I get around to re-makng the handles, & when I do, they won't be a lot different from the originals, after all.

I've not used a proper travisher, & I don't get along with the small scorp I have when it comes to shaping seats. I prefer a combination of gouges and the small double-radiused plane I made. Finding or making a travisher is something on my "to do" list, but it's not on the immediate horizon.

Anyway, I hope someone experience at using concave spokeshaves comes alone with some useful observations, before long.

Cheers,

If your aim is to produce spindles of a constant thickness you might also consider rotary planes or rounders. I have no experience using them but have read suggestions for their use in chair making.

Rotary Planes
The Woodsmith's Store: Rounders and Tenon Cutters - Green Woodworking Tools - Green Woodworking Accessories

I make long spindles with a drawKnife and spokeshaves. If you do it on a lathe you do not get the grain running from end to end. It only takes a few minuets to carve one fron wood that I have split with a froe. I will put up some pics when I get the time.

I do have a concave spokeshave that I bought before I started carving spindles for chairs. I bought it for making oars. Never use it anymore. A spokeshave is much quicker and more accurate. I split some blackwood for chair legs. I made the froes and the hammer or club.. The drawknife is shaving a spindle for a chair back. That is a large knife that is great for roughing out green wood. I must have about 10 spokeshaves and 5 or 6 drawknives.

Cool pics Pagie. That's really interesting. Do you use a shaving horse to hold the work? Looks like fun.

Catathraxie, je suis au foyer en Australie en ce moment... But I'll be back in France in September just in time for mushroom season

Yes I use a shave horse, I have two at the moment.