Thread: Can a firmer be re-ground into a skew chisel?

Yes it can Will; a turner's skew is 6-8mm thick.

If you can find a good old Titan you can use it on the lathe with just one bevel, the cutting edge ground at about 70 degrees to the shaft, if you can turn ambidextrous. If you hollow grind the bevel on a bench grinder then you can readily refresh the edge freehand on your benchstones.

But you will have to change the handle, to something like 1.5 to 2x the orig length.

Added: would also suggest a firmer width of no less than 1"

Hi WSAL,

Can't see why a firmer couldn't be re-ground and pressed into service as a skew. The catch is that the $10 flea market chisel will likely be carbon steel. That means you will have to sharpen much more often than with HSS and you will have to be very careful not to fry the chisel during grinding specially when doing the re-shaping. Make sure if you foillow this path that you fit the firmer with an appropriate handle for wood turning, buy the collars from Carbatec. Only takes a few minutes to make a handle custom fir to your own hand.

Cheers Old Pete

Yes, the hardness of HCS is something to consider, but if you stick to medium density, low silica timbers, and develop the knack of refreshing an edge on a benchstone, it's a viable alternative to HSS.

Sounds good! Thanks guys
Will

Be careful with very old flea market chisels. Check first whether they are laminated or not. If they are old enough to be a laminated chisel then the steel cutting edge is only on one side. It will not grind into a skew from both sides as you will strike the soft iron substrate instead of the cutting steel.
If the chisel is that old it probably is too valuable as an heirloom to do this to anyway.
Most chisels aren't in this category but it is as well to be aware of it.
Cheers
SG

And another qualification is this: usually the harder the HC steel is, the more brittle it is.

And for a beginning turner this can easily lead to chipping out at the edge.

Another option for you is to source a HSS blank and roll your own.

If that appeals, then put up a post asking how on the woodturning section of this forum.