Norse Woodsmith Blog Feeds

 Still haven't finished the 'extra' cherry bookshelf. It might be done tomorrow though. fingers crossed on that. Wandered down a one way street and I played with making two more small cherry bookcases. Spent most of the afternoon shift in the boneyard cleaning up and organizing what is staying, what it going to the dump, and what is going to my sister Kam. I have to have all this sorted out before the wife comes home from North Carolina.

forgotten pic

This was the one thing I said I got done yesterday but forgot to include pics of in the post. Kind of large but it fits in the drill stand cabinet - I am slowly smarting up and putting drill related things in that cabinet.

good fit

I wanted to make the box out of solid wood but I didn't have any thin wood in this width. The lid is a decent fit with a consistent gap 360.

2 1/2"

The OD is 2 1/2" and I was mildly surprised by the quality of it. Not what I expected from China.

unexpected

Came with a replacement center drill bit and the allen wrench.

hmm......

Don't know what the purpose of the spring.

nice fit

I really like this fit - it is just a couple of frog hair worth of clearance. Seriously thought about removing the insert and redoing it. Nixed that because I glued the insert in with hide glue. 

1/8" dowels

They ain't a 1/8" diameter, they are a 64th under. An 1/8" drilled hole is too loose and I want these to be snug.

done

Got two dowels in each pad. I was nervous about the thinner back one possibly cracking/splitting but they didn't. I drill the dowels at a slight angle too. 

sneak peek

This will work well for DVD/CDs. I don't have any paperbacks to check how they would seat on the shelf. 

hmm......

This is the left over cherry from the 3 other cherry bookshelves. These are the two boards from resawing one in half. There is one divot on the left one and two big and one small one on the right one. The plan was to thin the boards to 1/2" and hopefully that would remove the divots. The thickest part of either board is wee bit more than 9/16".

gone

Wasn't sure that I could get this to a 1/2" and remove the divot. Got lucky and I have a 1/2" thick cherry board for a shelf. 

wash, rinse, and repeat

The right board was a bit dicey IMO because one divot was deeper than the other two.  The divots on this board planed away smoothly with no headaches.

the problem divot

This is the before pic of the big divot on the right board. The only problem I had planing this to thickness was planing it down to the gauge lines. The left side ate up a lot of calories and time before they disappeared.

about 32nd more

I planed a ton of shavings off this side seemingly without lowering the face. Eventually I got it. The divot disappeared long before this gauge line did.

gone

Extremely happy that I planed the divot away and didn't dip below the 1/2" thickness.

hmm......

Planing to thickness for the ends, one I had to plane 3/16" off and the other a 1/4". The plan is have the ends at 5/8", the shelf 1/2", and the back slats 3/8".

done

This board I was expecting some tear to happen but none did. Got zero tear out using a #6, #7, #5 1/2, and #4. 

my LN 4 1/2

This isn't a plane that I use that much but I needed it today. The second board I planed to thickness for the ends tore out. The grain on it ran almost dead straight end to end except for one little curly Q spot. The 4 1/2 plowed through it without a whimper and dead smooth. I keep a 55° frog in this plane just dealing with wonky grain.

done

I still have to plane the back slats from a 1/2" to  3/8" but I didn't do that today. Playing with the shelves and ends had me sweating by the time I stopped. A little over 2 hours start to finish. As an aside the shop temp is hovering at a comfortable 63F/17C. The temp in shop has risen 4 degrees in the past 3 days.

final prep

Sanded the end grain on the ends up to 220. Almost forgot to do and caught it as I was ready to slap shellac on it.

fanned out

Don't know if I mentioned this before but in case I didn't here goes. When I'm done with my shellac I manually fan the brush out. It holds this shape well until it is time to use it again. I have found that it dissolves in alcohol much quicker than if I didn't do this. 

shellac time

The cherry one is awfully close to be done. The pine one is just starting out. I do the bottom first 4-5 coats before I do the rest of it.

the problem spot

It raking light the end grain looks a bit dull IMO. Since I'm applying shellac to the pine one I'll keep putting shellac on this area until I'm happy with it.

made in Germany

This belonged to my wife's grandmother and she doesn't want it. Typical german engineering because it is built like a tank. The drive belt is all metal - no rubber at all. If anyone wants it let me know - it would be just the sewing machine and accessories. The cabinet has water damage and rot so it is toast. 

nice touch

That is the original oiler for the machine along with the instruction booklet. It is a small instruction booklet, I would have expected something closer to 8" x 11".

nice haul

I saved the hardware for just in case. I might not ever have the need for it but you never know. This do dad thing was for locking down the lid.

hmm.......

Found this in the boneyard - box I started and stopped. I had applied hinges but removed them and plugged the screw holes. Never progressed beyond that. Thinking now of applying the banding on the box bottom and lid bottom and top. I ordered more banding today and I'll leave this on the workbench so I don't forget about it.

boneyard find #2

This is a jewelry box I made a bazillion years ago. It is a pine box with a floating cherry panel in the lid. Because it is mostly pine it really hasn't resonated with me as being worthy of a jewelry box. That changed and I'll be finally finishing this. All it needs is for me to slap a few coats of shellac on it.

the interior

The hinges took me several years to install. I used Brusso hinges and I epoxied the screws in the lid. Because of the thin lid I couldn't use a full length screw. Maybe this would be good enough for one of my young nieces?

accidental woodworker

The shavings fell from every plane and the river of shavings kept building before my broom could get to them. "Get a move on, lad!" Merlin shouted across the bench as I swept the shavings as vigorously as a two-foot wide broom could go. You'd be surprised how much plane work resulting in shavings half a dozen men can produce in an hour of full-on planing. Pines of different kinds, oak, walnut, ash and beech. All of a different hue and scent. This becomes enrichment to a boy like me. That was then and this is now. I still have the same scents in my shop every day. Looking back on it now, I doubt that there are many out there who have ever seen what was a common sight back in the pre 1960s. Ten bin bags but hessian or burlap sacks went to burn in the boiler where I stoked waste wood to heat the workshop all day long. But I loved it. The banter back and forth, the way the men talked about their political beliefs, the arguing for one party or another and then those in the union condemning those who weren't. Then there was a certain kind of solitude in the working of the hand tools. Three men using handsaws, two with planes and another two with chisel chops coming from mortising an extra mortise. But then there was something else in these postwar heroes. They sang, they whistled, they hummed, and they sang songs they knew from their war years that lifted their spirits' in camaraderie. George was way too young for the war, but he too knew all the songs, and he'd sing along or whistle. I liked it best when they would spontaneously start ad hoc music with sticks and flexed saws; Keith pulled out his harmonica, he was good, and then the a cappella singing of men harmonising quite out of the blue had the distinct brilliance only spontaneity can bring; I have yet to hear anywhere ever again in such a real and vivid man's working environment. The masculinity of it was pervasive as if mixing with the scents of the wood, the accumulated aromatics unique to only truly vintage woodshop.

After sweeping, I would end up on the clamping machine that we used to clamp massive or small frames together, seating a dozen or so mortise and tenons in a frame all at the press of a single foot treadle before we drove the pins through the joints to hold them. Even then, there was a synchrony that somehow steadied the work from every man and boy. I learned the songs they sang. Vera Lynn's "We'll meet again..." but then they'd mingle in a classical opera piece or a more modern singer from the 50s. What is it that we lost from that era. Where do you ever hear men sing together at work? The work itself never stopped, except for an odd crooning moment where two or three of them sang Etta James' "Stormy Weather" in perfect pitch and harmony. The deep, 'do woos' background and such followed by lots of Nat King Cole "Unforgettable", "Rambling Rose."

Our singling lasted for 20 minutes. The work harmony melded with the camaraderie every other day. It was spirit lifting and we to a man took our part. Old Bill had just about lost the breath to sing, but his lips moved in unison with everyone elses. The prompts from the radio usually sparked one or another to start singing, but then too there was another aspect to the environment I saw from these men. An illness, a broken relationship, the loss of a newborn, a teen crisis by one prompted support from another. It was a whole support network never spoken or voiced into being, and yet two men, maybe three, huddled in a group to support some failure on the part of one family they might never have met. These few men impacted my life. It wasn't always good, but generally, they somehow softened under the weight of supporting one another. The war changed the working classes to empower them in ways we could never really anticipate. I wonder where we are today.

Anyway, just a few thoughts!

The shavings fell from every plane and the river kept building before my broom could get to them. “Get a move on, lad!” Merlin shouted across the bench as I swept the shavings as vigorously as a two-foot wide broom could go. You’d be surprised how much plane work resulting in shavings half a dozen...

Source

I was given this plane in pretty rough condition by a guy who really didn't know anything about planes.  One telltale sign was that the iron was upside down when I got it (bevel up).  And while I know a fair bit about planes, I knew little about this particular brand when I started on this one.

The plane as found

Something look funny here?

Maybe the upside down iron explains why the cutting edge  was so chewed up!

It's an oddball size - it has a 9 1/2" long sole similar to a Stanley #4, but the sole's width is 2 1/8" and the iron is 1 3/4" wide, like a #3.  Initially, the only identifying mark I could find on the plane was the remnant of a DUNLAP decal on the broken tote.  From a Dunlap type study that I found online, a #3 size plane has the 1 3/4" wide iron, but the plane should be only 8" long (or 9 1/4", depending on the source of info).  Go figure.

I found two websites that were very helpful in researching this plane.  According to justtheplanefacts.com and aplanelife.us, Dunlap planes were manufactured for Sears by either Millers Falls, Sargent, or possibly at one time by a West German maker.  Some details point to this plane being made by Sargent in the 1940-41 time frame, but I think it is probably a bit later than that - maybe the mid 1950's (reference the Dunlap type study on the A Plane Life site).

Here's the plane fully disassembled, complete with broken tote and bent tote screw/post

Initially, I could find no identifying marks on the casting, iron, cap iron or lever cap.  The only marks I could find are a casting number on the frog (5272) and a raised "MADE IN USA" mark on the main casting just below the adjuster knob.  However, since I started writing this, I cleaned up the iron and it's got DUNLAP APPROVED BL stamped clearly at the top.

DUNLAP APPROVED BL

Here's the iron all cleaned up, but not yet sharpened. Note the hole for the cap-iron screw is at the top, unlike Stanley plane irons.

I had to grind back to the blue line before grinding a new bevel and sharpening

According to the sites I referenced, the "BL" and the cap-iron screw hole location are indicators of a plane made by Sargent.  So is the upside-down U-shaped lateral adjust lever.

As for the plane's casting, I took sandpaper to the sides and sole.  They looked horrible, but cleaned up fairly easily.  A wire wheel in the drill was used to clean up all the hardware.

The body was really grungy and the sole was horribly rough

But it cleaned up nicely

The tote was broken, so I cleaned up the mating surfaces and reglued it.  I'll have to see if that fix holds over time.  Originally, the tote had a decal or two on the left side.  Unfortunately, more than half of it was gone.  It looked like there was once another decal up where the middle finger grips the tote, but it was missing completely.

The still-broken tote showing remnants of a decal

Here's another interesting tidbit.  The yoke was a two-piece construction, as opposed to a casting.  It still works fine, but it's interesting that the two "fingers" of the yoke can move independently.  That's no big deal; when the plane is assembled, the adjuster nut keeps them aligned.

The two-piece yoke

Here showing how the two "fingers" can be misaligned with each other

When I finally had the parts cleaned up and the iron sharp, I put it together, adjusted the frog to get a reasonably tight mouth, and tried it out.  It made a shaving, but the shaving was like an accordion.

First shaving all crinkled up

I'm aware this could be caused by the cap-iron being too far forward.  Some adjustment helped, but not enough.  I also noticed a rippling effect when face planing.

You can see the ripples

So there was some juddering of the plane as I planed along the face of a board.  To me, that points to issues with how well the frog and plane body keep the iron firmly in place.  Here's where I really had to do some work.  The surfaces of the frog and plane body where they meet were painted or japanned, and were not level, so the contact between the two was poor.

Pointing to one of two spots where the frog sits. These needed to be filed/sanded level and flat.

Same with the frog seat

Frog seat filed flat

After this, I was able to get a better edge shaving, but there was still a big problem.

Got a much better edge grain shaving ...

... but when planing the face grain, CLUNK! The plane stopped in it's tracks and dug in hard!

Here's the problem with this plane and it's a serious design flaw.  And it's also why I think the plane was made in the '50's - you know, after plane makers "forgot" how to make planes that worked well.

The frog of Stanley planes has two flat areas that mate with two flat areas on the plane body.  The frog "seat" and the frog "toe" both should be milled flat and mate precisely with corresponding spots on the plane body.

Locations of the frog seat and toe

In this plane, not only is there no milled spot on the plane body for the frog toe to mate with, but the frog toe doesn't even come in contact with the plane body at all!  It's basically cantilevered out over the plane body, just behind the mouth.  Without support there, it's no wonder that the frog and iron don't have enough support to plane face grain.

This is a piece of cardboard, probably about 1/32" thick

Sliding the cardboard under the frog's toe.  I could have fit 3 or 4 of these cardboard pieces in there.  And this was with the frog bolted firmly in place!

I've started trying to make a piece of wood that will fill that gap, but I don't hold out hope that it will fix the problem.  But for this plane to work, I believe there needs to be firm support for the toe of the frog.

Summarizing, there are a couple of details that gave hints about the maker and age of this plane, thanks to the type study provided by A Plane Life.  The position of the iron's keyhole, the "BL" on the iron, the inverted U-shaped lateral adjust lever, and the two-piece yoke all indicate a plane made by Sargent.  The lever cap had been nickel plated, though the plating was removed when I cleaned up the plane.  The nickel plating indicates a plane possibly made in the 1940-1942 timeframe.  Other details include the double threaded 12-20 rods that hold the tote and knob, the brass waist nuts holding the stained hardwood tote and knob, and the three-ridged knurling of the adjuster knob.  But even with these clues, I can't help suspect that this plane was made in the mid-1950's due to the shoddiness of the design.

This is an odd plane for sure.  If there are any collectors of Dunlap planes out there and you're interested in this plane, please let me know and I'll be happy to mail it to you free of charge.

Edo period, late 18th century
Last week I visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art - the first visit in awhile. I had a good experience (aside from a supposed upgrade to the coat check that entailed a time-wasting data entry session on an iPad rather than the give-a-jacket-get-a-number standard method).

One of the exhibits I had wanted to see was on "The Infinite Artistry of Japanese Ceramics." As expected, the exhibit was full of pottery, fabrics and wood prints. I was struck by one very nice-looking modern piece. Being open minded, I said to myself, "That's great, they're having some modern stuff along with the old stuff. It's a really wonderful contrast between old and new." But then I took a closer look at this "modern" pottery and discovered, much to my surprise, that was 250 years old! A lot of pieces on display were just like that: modern design in appearance, but in fact actually centuries old. This phenomenon can be a real source of double-takes, because it turns on its head what it means to say "modern" as opposed to "new." After all, usually when talking about design, when someone says, "This is a very modern piece," they also mean it's new and cutting edge. Certain designers like Gerrit Rietveld have designs from the 1920's that don't look dated. But I wouldn't exactly call them "modern." I would say Rietveld's furniture doesn't look like most current furniture that would be considered modern today. In the case of modernist Danish 20th century design, Ikea has commonly co-opted everything, and increasingly anything that's sort of Danish style is assumed to be mass-market and probably cheap junk. But it's not, and it doesn't have to be.

But seeing this Japanese pottery and not identifying the style as modern makes no sense to me. Sure, you can say it's from such and such a period, and such and such an artist, but it still looks modern. Also notable: this style didn't really catch on. Most of the other pieces in the show, some quite beautiful, certainly look of their time period. NYC has several Japanese supermarkets (and Korean and Chinese markets that stock Japanese items) in which some of the same patterns of the not-so-modern goods are still on offer. But we wouldn't call those designs "modern." Is it possible that the word "modern" means "different from the standard of the time" rather than new per se? If the style catches on and everyone copies or riffs upon it, then the style will get its own name. For example, "mid-century modern" defines a specific genre in a specific style. Eventually the style became more accepted, and then more simplified, until it became (in the popular consciousness anyway - and I say this as someone who once owned a Wim & Karen bed) as "Ikea" or "Ikea-style." Rietveld's furniture, nearly a hundred years on, still looks pretty avant-garde. But it never really became a thing. The Bauhaus design movement (1919-1933), which eventually evolved in many respects to mid-century modern Danish furniture, was designed from the get go be be factory made and lent itself to a popular genre - even if later designs aren't directly connected with the Bauhaus. (And perhaps Bauhaus nowadays is best known as the name of the British goth band.) Reitveld, on the other hand, designed his furniture to be made largely by hand so anyone could built his designs from common wood materials. But most of his work would be fussy on an assembly line and his style never caught on.

I'm wondering if 300 years ago in Japan, a potter produced a pot, and his friend said "That's a really modern pot!" and the potter replied, "Yeah, shame nobody likes anything new." That potter used a design vocabulary of his region and most of what he made would be in that design vocabulary because that's what people wanted - the definition of a popular style. Doing anything new and different would make the creator an outlier - and outliers are the modernists of their time. And it seems that, at least back then in Japan, a potter's idea of a modern design would be pretty much what we would call modern today. And now, like then, people still mostly prefer traditional designs (simplified for manufacture) not modernism.

Early 17th century
Changing anything for anyone making products is always a risk. You need to convince people that the conventional style, which is by definition what is popular, is just one option, and other options are different and better in a meaningful way. That's not easy to do and this problem has been true from centuries.

N.B. Before you accuse me of drawing conclusions without enough evidence, let me remind you that for centuries archeologists have been postulating civilizations and taxonomy based on the survival of a single bone. So I am in good company! The furniture in museums isn't usually representative of what most people had. Rather it represents what donors and other rich people used - and what managed to survive.

Edo period, ca. 1670-90

Cast iron and Bronze. Onishi Gorozaemon mid-17th century

 Got my truck back today and the driver who picked me up said we are getting an inch of the white stuff tonight. There is snow, freezing rain, and sleet in the forecast for the next week. Thursday is supposed to be partly sunny and it is looking like the only day for a while that I can make the trip north to Highlands Hardwoods is then. hmm......

nope

The pkg says 350 dots and there is no way this pkg has 350 dots but that isn't the problem. The problem is the thickness of the dots which are almost an 1/8" thick each. I'll have to search Amazon and buy something else for attaching the photos.

changed my mind again

I like how the wedge cures the shelf tilt headache but I don't like length of it. The wedge also negates the cutout for the legs. Going back to the drawing board to come up with plan #2.

signature change

These are the initials I have engraved on my bench plane lever caps. Decided to go from cursive initials to print ones.

hmm.....

Rasped a small chamfer on the feet. This shouldn't get dragged around like a chair so the small chamfers should suffice. Fingers crossed on that.

shellac time

Getting 4-5 coats on the feet first. Then I'll do 4-5 on it with it upright.

the oops bookshelf

Chiseled the Miller dowel flush with the back slat. It isn't visible at all looking at the bookshelf in situ.

hmm......

This is better. Not exactly what I prefer but it fixes the oops better than the full length wedge.

gap filling

This shim has the long grain facing up. Made it a wee bit dicey hammering it into the gap and filling it.

gap on the left

I wasn't going to fill this one but I had a lot of shim material left so why not? I went with solid wood because wood putty stands out with shellac applied to it.

one more gap to fill

The bottom of the dado really sticks out with the left side gap filled. 

first step

Sized the bottom of the legs with super glue. After it had dried I super glued the 'pads' to the legs.

almost done

The edges on the ends  and the shelf only have two coats. The rest of the bookshelf has 4 coats. Won't be done today but it should be fini in the AM.

accidental woodworker 

Happy Year of the Horse from Hello Kitty and Giant Cypress!

 My wife left for North Carolina on sunday to keep daughter #2 company while her husband is away on a business trip. The bookcase didn't go but the glass door cabinet did. Supposedly the bookcase is going south on the next trip south. Now I have to get it out of the shop and into the boneyard but that may be a headache. My wife is turning it into a reading room. Translation - I can't use the boneyard anymore for projects.

hmm.......

From China and there are three 93 1/2" long bandsaw blades. The current blade on the bandsaw burned the cherry bookshelf badly. I had to expend extra calories to rasp and sand it away.

hmm......

This sat overnight on the front porch step in below freezing weather. Before I try and use them I'll let them warm up for a few hours.

nope

Decided to put this away for now. Ace has 2 1/2" hole saws from $30 to $52 which were too much but I did find and order one on Amazon for $10. I'll have it tomorrow.

might be toast

The burning hole from yesterday may have drawn the temper out of this. I sharpened it and put it away. Two days ago I found a pkg with two of these cutters but I can't find where I put them down. 

look at what I found

I didn't know I had this big ass bit - it is a little more than 2 5/8". That is close enough to the 2 1/2" diameter I need. Before I used it I sharpened it again with my diamond stone paddles. You can see that the machining on this isn't something to write home about.

new insert

This piece of pine is between rift and quarter sawn, perfect for the insert. 

ok....

There is about a 16th clearance all around the guide. A little sloppy IMO but I won't have to worry about it binding in the hole.

insert ready

The bushings fit in a 5/8" hole. The top of them is shouldered and that is acting like a stop for them. 

sigh....

Put the cart before the horse. I missed sawing the insert to length before drilling for the bushings. On to insert #2.

got it

The fit is snug. After I drilled all the holes, planed it for a drop in fit.

lid

I sized the lid to be almost a dead on flush match with the outside of the box. I did this because the plan is to put a rabbet on the underside of the lid to fit in the inside of the box.

Lie Nielsen skew block plane

Ran a knife line 360 and planed down to it until I removed it. Did the end grain ends first and then the long grain sides.

not an oops

The length fits well. It dropped into place with no binding and no slop neither. However, the width doesn't fit. I planed the rabbet shoulders with my 1/2" shoulder plane. The pencil line on the lid is what I thicknessed the lid down to - 3/8" after fitting the lid.

hmm......

I chamfered the edges to soften them. As of now, I don't plan on putting a knob on the lid or making a finger access divot. 

lid is done

Didn't like the chamfered look so I sanded them to a round over. 

not enough

I wanted to use walnut dowels for the contrast with the cherry but it ain't happening today boys and girls. Thought of using birch but went with cherry.

finishing the ends

I had sanded the outside of the ends up to 220 but there were scratches left from the flush cut saw. Scraped them away with a card scraped.

gotta save this

I was going to cut the back slats and the shelf off but nixed it. The shelf would have ended up with a width too narrow but the length would have been ok. Decided to try and salvage it somehow.

hmm.......

Sawed two 7° wedges and put them under the feet. The shelf is tilted  up and back and the sneakers on the legs don't look wonky IMO. It is just a concept and the only hiccup I see is the back sneaker is a little on the thin side. That could be a potential breakage point.

Another headache is the orientation of the grain on the sneakers. The end grain side is against the feet. I had to make two more sets that had the long grain facing up against the feet. Doing that was bit of pain in the arse. None of the do dads I had for setting an angle worked - the 3/4" thick stock wasn't thick enough to lay out the angle.

better

I don't know what this angle is - I laid it out from the left bottom corner with the angle going up to a end point 6 1/2" away. This fix is growing on me and I'm thinking of keeping it.

squaring it off

This almost gave me a headache trying to figure out how to square this end off to saw. I could have sawn the angle to match the front edge but I wanted it squared off.

hmm.......

I think this is the way to go. The sneakers on the bottom look deliberate.

that is an option

As I was getting ready to kill the lights this popped into the brain bucket. Cut/saw the sneakers to match the length of the back and front feet plus a 1/4". Maybe even follow the curve of the cutout into the sneakers. Time to think about it over night.

 accidental woodworker

 While paring kumiko In the past I’ve often thought that I could create a tool to make this task a bit easier and possibly more ergonomic as well. Recently I had a customer/friend contact me to inquire as to whether I would be interested in creating such a chisel for him. 

I made a list of the criteria we put together for this chisel:

(1) Wide blade for easy registration on the jigs typically used in kumiko work.

(2) Shorter blade so the pressure point of your hand is close to the cutting contact point. Something butt chisel length.

(3) Shorter handle as compared to a bench chisel so the end would fit comfortably in your hand and provide a way to push with the butt of your hand.

(4) A lower bevel angle to make for a better paring cut.

(5) Lower heat in the tempering process to leave the chisel a bit harder than standard. Paring and chopping are very different task. Leaving the steel in the blade a bit harder promotes a sharper edge better for paring than chopping.

(6) All sharp edges on the chisel blade where one’s hand may come in contact are broken/softened to make the user experience more pleasant and less wearing on the hand.

Below are pictures of the product created using this criteria. Woods are Desert ironwood, olive and figured resin infused maple.

Ron

 I recently completed this set of Dovetail chisels using Resin Infused Curly Maple for the handles. I also implemented a new ferrule design. The change is not obvious as it is concealed in the handle. The new ferrules feature an integrated threaded stud that actually threads into the handle and once thread locked it becomes integrated into the wooden handle.

 

 

This new feature allows all the components to become one thing and makes the final assembly a bit more predictable as well.

 

I had intended to list these chisels on the Tools Available page today but a former customer discovered that I had these in process and contacted me about purchasing them. Chisels are SOLD.

Ron

The last Awls I added to the Tools Available page sold out quite quickly. I've just added 3 more of these awls to the tools available page as of 9/2/20.

To access that page follow this link. Tools Available

If you have any questions please contact me at ronbrese1@gmail.com

All Awls are sold. 

The awls featured in the last post sold quite quickly so I set about making another small batch of these tools in various woods. I also thought this might be a good time to create a page specifically for the tools that I have available for sale at any given time. Tools Available link.

I have more awls than any one person needs. That's because I have an issue with awls. When the tip of an awl becomes less than sharp it will skid and not hold locations as compared to a sharp tipped awl. This is especially a problem on end grain when marking centers in preparation for turning blanks. Because the blades are permanently fixed in those awls it's not an easy thing to regrind a perfectly symmetrical tip.

I guess if I really wanted I could fashion a jig to accomplish this task but as of late I've just made a new awl.

The obvious solution is to make an awl with a removable blade that is then easily chucked into a drill and spun against an abrasive to create a newly sharpened tip. This past week I've made a prototype of such an awl and have also made a small production run of removable blade awls.

It's mid summer here and too hot to be outside much after mid morning these days. Luckily we're having afternoon thunderstorms and that cools things off in the evening. Makes for better porch sitting time in the evenings.

I've suspended outdoor projects for a while and have retreated into the shop to resume tool making.

I've recently completed another set of the diminutive Dove Tail chisels. This set features resin infused very curly maple handles. My friend and saw maker Ron Bontz is set up to do this infusing work and has a good bit of experience in the process. The maple turns much nicer after being infused and the figure is dazzling.

Sizes are 3/16, 1/4, 5/16, 3/8 and 1/2".

I've used Presco 0-1 tool steel for the blades on this set. It's a very high quality tool steel. It's the same tool steel I've used and enjoyed for plane irons.


Enjoy the rest of the summer, stay cool and safe,


Ron

This weeks accomplishments include a 6 piece of set of Desert Ironwood chisels and an Awl.



You may think this set of chisels looks quite similar to the chisels in the last post and I would have to agree but there is one significant difference. The steel used in the blades is Japanese Hitachi White Paper steel.

The Hitachi steel is proclaimed to be very pure steel and I have to say I could tell a difference as soon as I started roughing out the blades in the bandsaw. This stuff works lovely. Given the expense of obtaining this material I'm glad there were more benefits than just a difference in the hardened results.



 The White Paper Steel requires just a bit more effort at the sharpening stones as compared to most high carbon tool steel but it feels great on the stone and the edge that results from that effort is most satisfying. It visibly came to a higher polish. A while back I made myself a set of chisels from this material and the edge life is surprising.

Considering the price of the White Paper Steel these chisels are priced at $110 each with $5 per chisel discount for purchasing the entire set of 6. Total $630.

I had intended to post this latest set of small Dovetail chisels earlier this week but a very close encounter with a tornado delayed things a bit. The line of storms that ripped thru the southeast Sunday night to early Monday morning caused a lot of havoc. We were awakened at 2:00 am Monday morning by our phones instructing us to "TAKE SHELTER NOW!!!"

We heard the distinctive roar of the tornado as we were standing in our bedroom closet and then it was over. We made the assumption that the tornado had passed over in the upper atmosphere. The next morning revealed a much different reality.

The tornado was a mile wide and was on the ground for 10 miles. The edge of the swath of destruction it left was literally 100 yards from our house. We were unbelievably lucky. Less than 2 miles from our property a house was moved from it's foundation intact and deposited in the middle of a state highway.  Just a bit too close to OZ.

We were without power or cell service for 2 days. Obviously that wasn't much of an inconvenience compared to the devastating effect the storm had on the lives of the people in the path of destruction.

Now about the chisels. This is a 4 piece set and as I like to have all the handles in a set from the same piece of wood, I could only coax 4 handles from this piece of wood. This is especially true of Desert Ironwood. It can be so different from one blank to the next.

As a lot of you know I've been on somewhat of a hiatus from Tool making.  It's been refreshing to pursue other types of work and it renews the spirit of creativity. I have made some tools along the way but mainly for my own needs.

I built what I would consider my dream shop for a someone else last year. It was a major construction undertaking that I wasn't sure I could accomplish. As in a lot of situations you find that you're capable of a lot more than you can imagine. For quite a while we could work at our leisure and then cover everything from the elements. We did this thru putting in the foundation, framing the floor and subsequently framed the walls and had them laying flat on the floor system. We could still cover everything with tarps so the weather wasn't much of a worry but then there's the day when you stand up walls and then you have all that time and material exposed to the elements and then it's a push to get dried in. It was a lot for two old guys to do but after a bit of trial and tribulation there came the day when it rained no more in the building. I can't even begin to express the relief.

But I digress. I then began pursuing some woodworking projects that had long languished on my list of things I wanted to make. Most of those things were joined with dovetails in one manner or other. I had a very adequate array of chisels for this work but soon discovered that I did not have what I would consider an optimum set of chisels for these task. I found myself picking up and putting down tools really more than should be required and finally came to the realization that with a proper set of chisels I could eliminate a lot of unnecessary movements. I began putting together a list of criteria that would describe this set of chisels.





 I owned some shorter dovetail chisels that I really enjoyed, however they were 1/4" thick and given the way I typically layout my dovetails they would not fit between the ends of the tails to provide for incising the point where the side of the dovetail meets the baseline. In every case I had to put down one chisel to pick up another that was thin enough to fit.

Chopping base lines. When chopping to the baseline there should only be a minimal amount of material to be removed so an extravagant thickness is not required of a tool to accomplish this task. That sets one criteria. The second was length. It's nice to have a chisel short enough so that the base line where you're sticking the edge of the chisel and the top where you strike the chisel is in one line of sight. With longer chisels I would put the tip of the chisel in the base line and but when I changed my focus to where I would strike the handle the tip would move slightly. If you don't notice this then you end up with a wonky baseline. That sets another criteria to design for.

Personally I prefer good ole high carbon steel for my woodworking tools. At the last Forp Event where French/White oak was being worked profusely for days on end I noticed that everyone's chisels had serrated edges as the result of chopping in wood that had varying degrees of density. It didn't seem to matter if the chisels were A2 or PMV11 or High carbon steel. The end result was the same. The difference was in the time it takes to recover the edge. I realized years ago that a high speed steel edge that fractured took longer to recover than anytime one could possibly gain in edge longevity. I much prefer the sharper edge to be gained from using high carbon steel. I don't mind maintaining the edge as I work and when the edge does need to be restored with good technique it just doesn't take very long to be sharp and working again.

Evidently there are many others looking for a similar set of chisels because when I began posting pictures of the chisels I was making on my Instagram account I immediately started getting requests for these chisels. I took measures to get set up to produce these tools with a bit more efficiency and after a lot of trial and error and subsequent testing I was confident that I had a process by which to make very nice versions of these chisels.

The first 4 sets went out the door as soon as they were made and the set with Desert Ironwood handles pictured in this posting are the first I'll be offering for sale here on the blog.

As I mentioned this particular set has Desert Ironwood handles that all came from the same piece of timber. The ferrules are of course brass and the tool steel for the blades is New Old Stock Starret 0-1 tool steel. The overall length is 6". The sizes in this set are 3/16", 1/4", 5/16", 3/8" and 1/2". They are ground to have zero land on the edges but that edge is then broken so that it doesn't cut one's fingers as they are used. It's as minimal a land as can be had and not be dangerous to the user. The backs are polished and they come honed and working sharp.

The blade tips are taken into the heat treating process in a blunt state so that portion doesn't take such a beating in the hardening process and are subsequently ground back twice prior to final honing to make sure they are worked back into good steel.

I've recently killed the Brese Plane web page. Sometimes when people notice a change of this nature they assume the worse. Don't. I can manage my offerings just as well thru this blog and my Instagram page. That being the case there was just no reason to maintain the Web page and it's nice to shirk the cost associated with web hosting.

What I said about assuming the worse. I'm doing well, in fact I'm better than I've been for a while. In the last couple years I've shed 56 lbs. I'm more active than usual and feeling great.

I've been pursuing other interest, in fact I've been the General Contractor on a construction project since this past spring. As this project is winding down I'm back to restoring vintage machines and making planes again. I'm also doing more woodworking than I have for quite a while, in fact I'm about to embark on another work bench build. Not for myself. This is a commissioned piece for a client.

So there you have it, I hope you are all well and enjoying your woodworking,

Ron

Catharine Kennedy and I have a patron that fuels our work with his request. In this case a solid brass "Brute" shooting plane engraved inside and out.

Just making this plane in the simplest functional form is quite a task. Coordinating both our efforts together adds an entire other element to this work but that keeps it's fresh and interesting and also makes it quite a challenge.

This is how it goes. I make all the parts. I mask all the areas of the interior of the plane that she is not to engrave and send them along to Catharine. She engraves the interior surfaces and all the movable/removable parts and sends them back to me. I then deburr, rub to a satin finish and oil the surfaces. Then I assemble the plane taking great care to preserve the engraved surfaces. There is no going back from here.

I then send the assembled plane body back to the Catharine to engrave the exterior of the plane body. She subsequently sends the plane body back to me. I work and oil the exterior surfaces, add the wooden bits, the iron and actually make the plane work.

Then it is shipped to our patron John Rexroad. Yes, these plane parts are quite traveled before this is done.

This is the third in this collection of tools. To date we have done a Winter Smoother, Winter Panel plane and now this Shooting plane.

When I post pics of these tools I always have people comment to me that this is way over the top for a "tool", and I realize this is not everyone's taste, however this format of tool making makes for a very rare collection of highly functional tools.

Ron

"The greatest challenge in life is discovering who you are. The second greatest is being happy with what you find"