Free (to make) Iron Holder - I know I've posted this before..

[David Weaver]

I know i've put a picture of this up before, but I can't remember where and I can't find it in my attachments. I told Tony Shea i'd send him pictures, but i think everyone who is going to flatten more than one iron with a slot should make one of these.

I sometimes make pretty tools, but I never really intended to show this publicly. It is such a time, finger soreness, and fingertip-skinning-preventing savings that it's worth spending 10 minutes locating some junk and putting one together. It's just a 2x4 with two holes it and two bolts and handles rasped off as fast as I could get them chunked away with a coarse rasp. I generally grab closer in to the iron and don't use the handles much. If you bother to make it any neater, it's just going to get slathered with dirty swarf, save pretty for other tools.

If you are really lazy (like me) you can keep a cordless drill with a socket driver head handy to turn the bolts in and out. (they are just held on with washers and nuts on the other side).

A quick shot of the nastiness.
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And a shot of one of those bugger hss muji irons after five minutes on a 400 grit atoma - no need to go more coarse. Even though you shouldn't push hard on a diamond hone (i didn't), it's still a huge advantage to have the holder, no sore fingers, much faster stroke and no finding out later that you wore skin off the ends when blood starts showing up on stones. (winner winner chicken dinner with that hollow, huh? It'll take at least a year of hard use of that iron to get to the hollow)

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The advantage is several fold greater if you have a badly pitted iron and want to go coarse and hard at it on a steel plate with diamonds. The only trouble you'll have with these is if you both push really hard and use soft stones. I go straight to the shaptons with this without doing anything other than wiping the swarf off quickly.

I saw a video a long time ago of a japanese blacksmith putting an iron in a holder (a new one). If you've ever gotten a new high quality japanese iron, they are already lapped on the back, the blacksmith or someone else in the shop does it on a really long stone with an iron holder. I don't have many original ideas, and this isn't one, either.

(i did get a commercially-made holder for japanese irons to eyeball it, too, and I would conclude from it that you could get two hose clamps from home depot if you have an iron without a slot and get along extremely well still with this design).

[Pam Niedermayer]

...(i did get a commercially-made holder for japanese irons to eyeball it, too, and I would conclude from it that you could get two hose clamps from home depot if you have an iron without a slot and get along extremely well still with this design).

I've wondered about this, David. The one holder I've seen in a photo shows two L shaped clamps extending from the sides to hold the blade. How would your hose clamps work? Where would you put them on the blade?

Thanks,
Pam

[David Weaver]

Pam, i'd put one just out of the reach of the stone to avoid scuffing the stone (so 2 1/2 inches or so back from the edge?), and the other one wouldn't really matter, another two or three inches toward the far end, just to keep the iron from being able to pivot in the first hose clamp.

I thought this one looked a little iffy by how little of the bolts are touching the iron, but I've never had an iron move or come close to it.

[Leigh Betsch]

I'd make some sort of smart comment on the workmanship but I noticed an infill in the background and I figure with a little positive encouragement maybe we'd get a better look see. So on the blade holder, I like it, looks like a great idea, exemplary workmanship and also very thrifty. Now can we get a pic of the infill?

[Pam Niedermayer]

Pam, i'd put one just out of the reach of the stone to avoid scuffing the stone (so 2 1/2 inches or so back from the edge?), and the other one wouldn't really matter, another two or three inches toward the far end, just to keep the iron from being able to pivot in the first hose clamp. ,,,

OK, but then the entire blade is being sharpened unevenly, at least for Japanese blades. What am I missing?

Pam

[David Weaver]

Pam - it shouldn't be uneven. You have the option to keep pressure toward the cutting edge of the iron just by how much left or right hand pressure you put down. With a japanese iron, you keep pressure on the left hand so as not to grind down to the ura all the way up. I generally do the same with western chisels - the result is pretty much identical to flattening with fingers with minimal attention paid to what you're doing (i.e., when you go to sharpen the iron the first time, you can just use finger pressure near the cutting edge and polish out the wear bevel just fine).

[David Weaver]

I'd make some sort of smart comment on the workmanship but I noticed an infill in the background and I figure with a little positive encouragement maybe we'd get a better look see. So on the blade holder, I like it, looks like a great idea, exemplary workmanship and also very thrifty. Now can we get a pic of the infill?


Leigh - i'll get some pictures of it. There are parts of it not that flattering! I used a cordless drill and a belt sander to make it (and, of course, files, hand planes and a hacksaw). The only picture I have other than that on this camera card is a picture of the mouth (with till george sees those hammer strikes and that one -fortunately only - woofer tail that broke out). I lapped out the hammer strikes on the sides.

You guys with mills can cut those mouths on an angle and make them look small and pretty. I broke off 3 (chinese) drill bits getting mine to a point I could get a file in it. It is a little more even than the picture shows, the mouth gap that is. The iron was probably just out of adjustment.

I like using this plane, it's really hard to get yourself in trouble. If you find something absolutely unruly, and still manage to go against the grain, the biggest tearout you'll get is one or two light passes worth.

[Pam Niedermayer]

Pam - it shouldn't be uneven. You have the option to keep pressure toward the cutting edge of the iron just by how much left or right hand pressure you put down. With a japanese iron, you keep pressure on the left hand so as not to grind down to the ura all the way up. I generally do the same with western chisels - the result is pretty much identical to flattening with fingers with minimal attention paid to what you're doing (i.e., when you go to sharpen the iron the first time, you can just use finger pressure near the cutting edge and polish out the wear bevel just fine).

Yeah, but that second hose clamp would definitely get in the way.

Pam

[David Weaver]

Pam, i'm not sure I follow. For a western iron, if they're in the same place as those bolts, they're not in the way and you can see that the flattening job isn't uneven. It was a nonevent to go from the 400 grit atoma up through the shaptons.

For japanese irons, I would probably do one metal strap / hose clamp and a wedge of some sort. IIRC, the tsunesaburo holder pretty much one metal strap with a wedge and a threaded bolt to apply pressure (like a plane lever cap).

I don't know if I'll ever use that one for a plane iron or not, I haven't gotten a japanese plane (well, at least not after the initial funjiis years ago) that needed any significant work flattening, they're pretty much ready to go to the stones for a routine sharpening check and initial hone when you get them, right?

[Pam Niedermayer]

...For japanese irons, I would probably do one metal strap / hose clamp and a wedge of some sort. IIRC, the tsunesaburo holder pretty much one metal strap with a wedge and a threaded bolt to apply pressure (like a plane lever cap). ...

Aha! That's it, a single clamp for Japanese. Thanks.

Pam

[Derek Cohen]

Thanks for the jig, David. I'll add another and call it a blade back flattening thread ...

I posted this method about 5 years ago, and there is an article that depicts it here: http://www.inthewoodshop.com/WoodworkTechniques/Lapping%20the%20Backs%20of%20Blades.html

In a nutshell, I used a rather heavy-duty magnet:

http://www.inthewoodshop.com/WoodworkTechniques/Lapping%20the%20Backs%20of%20Blades_html_m569096a8 .jpg

http://www.inthewoodshop.com/WoodworkTechniques/Lapping%20the%20Backs%20of%20Blades_html_m20b55449 .jpg

Regards from Perth

Derek

[David Weaver]

Aha! That's it, a single clamp for Japanese. Thanks.

Pam

Yeah, the clamp and wedge. The wedge will provide the force to make one hose clamp work fine.

[David Weaver]

Nice one, Derek. I'm sure I've seen it before, but I can't rememeber it (i'm pretty sure I've gone through all of the topics in the "in the workshop" array).

Safe to say, it doesn't really matter what the design is, magnets, mechanical restraint, etc, just whatever it takes to get the fingers up off the iron and away from the stone but give you a way to drive the iron across a surface with some force and control on where the pressure is on the iron.

Especially with HSS now becoming popular, but just as much to give people on a budget a way to grind out the pitted irons for big woodies that are always almost free.

[Pam Niedermayer]

...In a nutshell, I used a rather heavy-duty magnet...

Good idea, Derek. Unfortunately, probably doesn't do all that much for holding cast iron.

Pam