Defective LN chisels

[Jim Barrett]

I have a set of LN chisels that I purchased back in November 2004. I have been a little leery of their ability to "hold an edge". They seemed to break down pretty quickly. Anyway when I was at Rob Cosman's workshop this past summer I asked him about it and he told me LN had a bad batch of chisels right around the time I purchased...hmmmm....anyway wondering if anyone has experienced this? I am going to call LN tomorrow and see what they say.

Jim

[Mike Henderson]

In my experience, LN will stand behind the chisels and will probably exchange the set for a modern set. I would be extremely surprised if they didn't take some action to satisfy you.

Mike

[Chris S Anderson]

LN is an honorable company with ethics. I learned that from a guy who works for a company that LN is taking to court, so they must have a great reputation.

I bought a LN smoother 2 weeks ago for working on 3 cutting boards for my family. I didn't want sand paper to touch these, and was excited about getting the new planes.

UPS listed my items as "UPS Internal Error" for 4 days. I didn't think I would get them in time, and I emailed LN and they assured me that if UPS didn't get them to me, I would get another set sent overnight. UPS came through, but I was glad LN was there to back me up for my holiday family gifts.

[David Keller NC]

I have a set of LN chisels that I purchased back in November 2004. I have been a little leery of their ability to "hold an edge". They seemed to break down pretty quickly. Anyway when I was at Rob Cosman's workshop this past summer I asked him about it and he told me LN had a bad batch of chisels right around the time I purchased...hmmmm....anyway wondering if anyone has experienced this? I am going to call LN tomorrow and see what they say.

Jim

I've a set with the same issue - the steel is both brittle and soft - the edge will roll over and chip in anything harder than eastern white pine. Mine were purchsed within a week of when they first put them in their line-up. The guy at L-N confirmed that they'd had some issues with steel in plane blades and chisels right around that time, and suggested sending them back for evaluation and possible replacement. Unfortunately, though, I haven't quite got around to it yet....

[Jim Barrett]

David,
Thanks...I'll have no problem sending them back for evaluation....

Jim

[Mike Brady]

I agree that you should call them and discuss your problem. They also will probably suggest that you:
1. Sharpen them back slightly to get to the "good steel".
2. Change the bevel angle to 30 degrees. A2 steel does not like on edges that are as shallow as the 25 degrees you received as a factory grind.
If you have not tried the above, you haven't really given the tools a chance.
Many people also complain about the socket handles coming loose. That is also an "operator error" that is solved by just using the chisel normally (unless the edges crumble).

[kevin loftus]

I agree that you should call them and discuss your problem. They also will probably suggest that you:
1. Sharpen them back slightly to get to the "good steel".
2. Change the bevel angle to 30 degrees. A2 steel does not like on edges that are as shallow as the 25 degrees you received as a factory grind.
If you have not tried the above, you haven't really given the tools a chance.
Many people also complain about the socket handles coming loose. That is also an "operator error" that is solved by just using the chisel normally (unless the edges crumble).


If A2 steel does'nt like an edge as shallow as 25 deg., why does'nt
the factory send them out with a better bevel angle? It seems a bit
of a strange one to my way of thinking. :confused:

[Sam Takeuchi]

It's a lot easier to add a few degrees than reducing it.

[rob cosman]

Beg to differ gents, I have a few LN's that I grind to 17 degrees with an extra few degrees in the secondary and tertiary bevels. The intent is to use these on softer "easier to crush" woods such as Aspen, Pine, some Poplar. They cut so easily that I often use them in Walnut and Cherry as well. While I would never expect a chisel to stand up at such an acute angle, the LN's do. I did witnes some bad chisels in the early days of thier release and at the time as a dealer we replaced them without question. That was several years ago and I have never witnessed the problem since. I did have a customer in western Canada who claimed on the replacement chisels that the problem still existed. I was scheduled to be out there a few weeks later and he patiently waited to meet with me. I took one look at the chisel in question and saw the problem, not properly sharpened. The back was not flat, something those of us who teach this can see from across the room. I proceeded to re-do the chisel for him, sharpened it on my Shaptons and proceeded to spend 10 minutes chopping across a pc of maple multiple times. At the end of the test the tool was as sharp as when I started, he was dumb founded but went away happy.

As for thier current shipping angles, I do not like 30 degrees on my bench chisels, it puts too much cutting pressure on the wood and performance is not as good as when the bevel is dropped to 25. The later is what I think you should have for general work, exception being on mortise chisels. If you think there is a problem by all means return them to LN and be satisfied. Ask for Patrick, he is the woodworking expert and can answer any and all of your techincal questions, he is my go-to guy.
Cheers
Rob

[David Keller NC]

I did witnes some bad chisels in the early days of thier release and at the time as a dealer we replaced them without question. That was several years ago and I have never witnessed the problem since. As for thier current shipping angles, I do not like 30 degrees on my bench chisels, it puts too much cutting pressure on the wood and performance is not as good as when the bevel is dropped to 25. Cheers
Rob

Rob - This is the specific issue with my chisels. They were from their first released batch, and the edges will not tolerate paring pressure in poplar, nor light tapping in eastern white pine - the edges will both crumble and roll, and that's ground at 25 degrees with a micro-bevel at about 32 degrees. The difficulty that L-N communicated to me is that they received a bunch of A-2 tool steel that was off-spec and wasn't compatible with their heat treating and tempering process. I also have an A-2 plane blade that shows similar performance (or lack thereof) that went in my L-N 5-1/2, and also an A-2 blade for the #9 miter plane.

All of these tools were purchased within a month of each other. L-N's already replaced the miter plane blade, and the performance difference is quite startling. This blade is regularly used to shoot the end-grain of cocobolo, and after a couple of months, I've not even had to strop it - it still takes end-grain shavings from this rather incredibly hard wood.

[Sandy Stanford]

I have a set of LN chisels that I purchased back in November 2004. I have been a little leery of their ability to "hold an edge". They seemed to break down pretty quickly. Anyway when I was at Rob Cosman's workshop this past summer I asked him about it and he told me LN had a bad batch of chisels right around the time I purchased...hmmmm....anyway wondering if anyone has experienced this? I am going to call LN tomorrow and see what they say.

Jim

If I were you I'd ignore calls to hone a bench chisel at 30*.

[Mike Brady]

......or you could listen to the people that made the chisels. From the L-N web site:

"The bevel is flat ground at 30°, but a higher secondary bevel (about 35°) is advisable, depending on the wood and how the chisel is being used."

[Jim Barrett]

Spoke to Deneb at LN...his advice was to grind back the steel about 1/16th of an inch and put a 30 degree primary bevel on the chisel. He said not to hollow grind...too much heat. hmmmm....well I must say Rob Cosman uses a grinder and as he said even grinds to 17 degrees. Anyway just for the heck of it I followed what Deneb said and it actually did improve the durability of the chisel. I used sandpaper and a honing jig to grind the primary bevel to 30 degrees and followed up with 1000 and 8000 Shapton waterstones. The chisel did not break down but it doesn't seem to cut as "clean". Will do some more experimenting.

Jim

[Joel Goodman]

No experience with the LN chisels but I can say that LN has always gone out the way to make things right -- including returning my shipping costs to them. If you end up unhappy let them know and they'll fix it.

[gary Zimmel]

Hope everything works out with those chisels Jim...

I have a few LN chisel sets.
One set I have ground down to 17 degrees.
I don't use these to do any hard chopping, like on a half blind but they work very well to clean up to my baselines..
Most times I use aspen for my drawer sides and the low angle shines for me in this application.

[Jim Barrett]

Well after experimenting and bringing the chisels back to a 30* primary angle I banged out a few dovetails in some western maple. I took a look at a few of the chisels I used and they were pretty well nicked up. The edge retention was pretty poor...my cheap set of Marples held up better than the LN. So I called LN and sent them back. We'll see what happens next.

Jim

[Wes Grass]

I got a 'bad' piece of A-2 last year. Heat treater said, based on the hardness he got from it, that his best guess was they sent me some O-1. He sees it nearly every day. Came up about 41Rc IIRC. Not important in my case, as they were vise jaws, but for anything critical, like cutting edges, it would have been a disaster.

Not that I'd recommend it based on the need to return them, but it would be interesting to heat and oil quench just to see what they do.

[Leon Jester]

I got a 'bad' piece of A-2 last year. Heat treater said, based on the hardness he got from it, that his best guess was they sent me some O-1. He sees it nearly every day. Came up about 41Rc IIRC. Not important in my case, as they were vise jaws, but for anything critical, like cutting edges, it would have been a disaster.

Not that I'd recommend it based on the need to return them, but it would be interesting to heat and oil quench just to see what they do.

I'd return them, but this may be of interest:

http://www.knives.com/heatreat.html

http://www.crucibleservice.com/eselector/general/generalpart2.html

[Sandy Stanford]

......or you could listen to the people that made the chisels. From the L-N web site:

"The bevel is flat ground at 30°, but a higher secondary bevel (about 35°) is advisable, depending on the wood and how the chisel is being used."

That's a concession to the characteristics of the steel (A2) and that advice is offered more to keep returns to a minimum than anything else. If you use your chisels to pare as much or more as you use them to chop then 30* + is not acceptable. The recommended angles more or less have to become a self-fulfilling prophecy because A2 breaks down at lower angles and won't perform. Visit Ron Hock's site and read what he writes about it. L-N can't recommend that it be ground and honed it at 20* because it won't work at 20* except maybe on Balsa and Eastern White Pine.

There is virtually no reference in the historical record of which I am aware about grinding and honing angles that high (30*+) for chisels that expect to see a lot of duty paring joints. I'd be most interested if somebody is aware of one that does.

35* is a great angle for rough carpentry where wood needs to be notched and roughly and rapidly so.

[Rick Erickson]

I've got a LN 1/4" and 1/2" A2 honed at 17-degrees and it cut through cherry like butter - gave me super smooth pin sockets. If you sharpen it correctly it will hold an edge. I learned this from a Cosman class a while back. I've only damaged the edge once (cutting into Walnut). I reground and just finished up several half-blinds in cherry without a problem.

[Jim Barrett]

Rob uses his chisels all the time at 25* and 17* not what LN recommends but...it sure works for Rob.

Jim

[Sandy Stanford]

Rob uses his chisels all the time at 25* and 17* not what LN recommends but...it sure works for Rob.

Jim

I wonder if he told L-N about his success at lower angles with the A2 when he was still employed by them. And if so, why did they go with the recommendation they did? Should we put more stock in it than they did/do?

Of course, L-N has diffused the matter by offering O1 which has a reputation of tolerating lower angle grinding and honing.

[Eddie Darby]

Please let us know how everything turns out in the end.

[Jim Barrett]

I expect to hear from LN next week...will let you know what they have to say.

Jim

[Mike Brady]

Jim, as a general comment, I believe this thread was flawed from the start by the rhetorical title of "Defective LN Chisels". It could easily be called "Defective Sharpening Techniques", or Defect Advice from Other Posters". Now that everyone is offended, let me add that none of us really know the cause of the failure of these chisels to perform to your expectations. Your assumption is that the product must be faulty. I once heard Thomas Lie-Nielsen and Robin Lee discuss how many tools that they receive back from purchasers that are out of spec. Those specs, however seem to be put into place by the consumers, who frequently have unrealistic expectations about things such as sole flatness. Both gentlemen suspect that information sharing on forums breed much of this uber-expectation. Bottom line is that a large percentage of tools returned to these makers are just fine. None of the above may apply to you or your chisels. You probably should have addressed your problem thoroughly with L-N before labelling your chisels as defective and asking for all of the above posters to speculate about them.
L-N is an honorable company, as is Lee Valley. I don't recall them issuing a blanket recall of any of their products, which they most assuredly would have had their been a manufacturing error. It is unlikely that your entire set of chisels would have met the misfortune of bad heat treating, etc. These are not made-to-order items. Everyone from that production run would have some chisels that had failed.
I hope you will share the eventual outcome now that you have returned the chisels to LN. It would be helpful for all of to have the real diagnosis even though many cures have been prescribed already.

[Jim Barrett]

Mike,

Thanks for the comments.

Jim

[Jim Barrett]

I called LN today for status on my chisels. Well.....I have a brand new set of chisels coming my way. That is what I call customer service/satisfaction.

Jim

[gary Zimmel]

Great to hear it worked out for you Jim.

[Rick Erickson]

Great news Jim. Glad to hear they did you right. I'm sure these will perform for you. I've been nothing but happy with mine.

[Jim Barrett]

Thanks, I'm looking forward to giving them a whirl on some DT's.

Jim