"pigsticker" chisel question

[Greg Crawford]

There are some pigstickers available locally, and I believe they're French made from around 1900. I'm interested in them, but I thought they should be the same thickness from front to back. For instance, if it's a 1/4" chisel, should it be 1/4" thick all the way. These taper from the back of the chisel to the face, which seems to me it would jam in the material, plus it wouldn't clean the mortise sides as well.

I have several Sorby sash mortise chisels, and they're the same thickness which helps remove the waste on the sides, and they leave a cleaner side. I've never had any pigstickers and would like to get some, but want to get good ones.

Thanks.

[Robert Rozaieski]

No, they were typically trapezoidal in cross section to allow them to be removed from the mortise easier. It's not a drastic taper, but it's usually there.

[David Weaver]

Agree with what Robert said. Of the mortise chisels I have, japanese, a couple of old long socket mortise, pigstickers and sash mortisers, only the sash mortisers have parallelism on the sides.

They all clean the walls of a mortise just fine.

most in-tact pigstickers should be good - the older ones should be laminated and easy to sharpen. The only new ones that I can think of are definitely good, but a lot more expensive than vintage pigstickers if you can find vintage in the sizes you want.

[Jim Koepke]

I think if the sides are "square" then it is called a registered chisel.

As Robert said, a mortise chisel will have a slight inward slope to the sides.

jim

[Greg Crawford]

OK, thanks all.

Greg

[Zach England]

Are they called "pigsticker" because they look like something used to slaughter a pig? I have some Ray iles, and I do indeed believe they could effectively slaughter a pig.

[Robert Rozaieski]

"Pigsticker" was a term coind by Patrick Leach for describing the chisels. Their real name is oval bolstered mortise chisel.

[Dave Anderson NH]

Greg, things have changed over time.

Back in the days where hand tools were the primary mode of making furniture, houses and lots of other things, tools were designed and made by folks who understood their use and designed according to function and design criteria developed over eons. Subtle changes made great differences in performance. The OBMC or pigsticker was more functional and easier to use than those of a straight rectangular design. The primary reason that most mortising chisels are rectangular today is that the raw material is bought as rectangular bar stock and then has the bevel added. Many of the modern tool designers have never worked with the hand tools and know little if anything about the history of tool design and why a particular design has evolved over the years. Most of these designers designed for ease of manufacturing and to eliminate as much labor/cost as possible. In other cases designs are just copied, flaws and all.

[Christian Castillo]

That explanation makes so much sense. I've always wondered the same thing, but then I read opinions on how some people feel that the taper would not allow the chisel to register in the mortise. Wouldn't make sense to go through a more laborious method to get inferior results. Interesting to note, is that Japanese mortise chisels are also trapezoidal. Why would two different groups of people come to the same conclusion regarding tapered sides on a mortise chisel? Makes you think...

[Greg Crawford]

Amazing. One guy can coin a term, and it gets so used, most people don't know the real name any more. Transitional planes, #6s and OBMCs. What will Pat pick on next?

Another amazing thing, common sense SHOULD tell the story that Dave told. Now I'm ashamed. I guess I do have one thing in my defense, these are from France. Lot's of European tools were styled differently than American tools, and these are the only ones I've ever seen in person. Is that enough to let me off the hook?